nilodnayr

No, same Alex Gonzalez...I have been talking about the expo/marlin/bosox one. If you remember, Hendry has wanted him since when he was on the marlins. Leading up to the trade deadline he had talked about acquiring him from the expos many times. Yet somehow he wound up in boston and we got nomar. Not that it worked out the way it should have, but it was still a great trade.

Since very few posters gave him props for signing his own free agents (ARam, Wood, and Miller), I would think he should be ahead of the GMs that couldn't even sign their own free agents (Soriano, Drew, Schmidt, Zito, CLee, etc.). Evidently you missed the ARAM getting resigned thread. You have to go to page 2 to see it, but I think the last 30 or so pages of the thread are the vast majority of posters giving props for resigning ARAM.

He does seem to be the concensus. Who would offer really offer Gonzalez that kind of contract? Probably the same guy who traded Maddux and 2M for Izturis. How we ended up with Nomar instead of AGon in that 4 team trade, I will never know. Hendry has been giving props to AGon ever since he became GM.

what you say you said is not what you said. perhaps its what you meant, but it's not what you said. your explanation is also illogical. whether or not he has value does not follow from your given facts. therefore, your ultimate conclusion does not follow either. The whole point of this thread is to comapre the two and assess Izturis' market value. In the first part of my post I show that AGonz = a healthy and better hitting Izturis. Then yeah, I am saying that if A=B and some team wants A, then they would want B. However, if they do not have to give up any players in return for A, then they would not want to give up any players in return for B. Leading to the statement that we may be able to trade Izturis for a bucket of balls. What dont you understand? What I don't understand is why you think the explanation is illogical. Do you disagree with the OPS+ comparison? Or that Izturis has injury history? I'm really confused. Help me out.

Imagine if at the end of the free agent period still sitting out there for the Cubs to grab is Drew. Now imagine if Hendry signs Ted Lilly, or Vicente Padilla to some high dollar contract to go along with Blanco and DeRossa and some other fillers. Drew is looking for 15 mill/year for four years and Hendry has already spent enough that he only has 10 million left. Maybe he didn't overpay for DeRosa or Blanco, but what if signing them costs the Cubs the opportunity to sign Drew. If Hendry covets Drew or Soriano he has to set aside money for them. Niether is likely to be signed right away. I guess it is sort of a catch 22 in some ways. But I'd rather he fills the holes he has first. The Cubs have to get a CF and probably need another run producer to boot. Getting Drew and putting him in CF fills almost holes. I don't like the idea of Sorano playing CF and I don't like the idea of giving him a six or seven year contract. i think it is safe to assume that they will hold enough back to get the guys they want like a drew or soriano. on the flip side what happens if they hold all this money back and dont get a drew or soriano? then you are stuck having to play a theriot(good or bad is in the eye of the beholder) a soto on the bench and so one and so one. look at last year all the eggs in the furcal basket and once he ditched us we had already missed out on a bunch of guys that could help us. i would be really upset if we didnt sign anyone because all we went after was big guys, the middle level solid players are a must too, ask the cardinals how they feel about eckstein for example. A) I don't think that is accurate, Furcal signed early in the offseason (Dec 3rd). Who do you think we passed up on that signed before Dec 3rd? B) Given the second base market this year, Hendry had the ability to wait it out with the supply massively outweighing the demand. Middle level solid players are a must at positions you need them at...we however did not need a backup catcher and starting second baseman.

Lets trade him for Jake Peavy then!!!

it does inspire some confidence though. it's simple supply and demand. before this signing we had no idea whether there was a market for shortstops or not or that the market would bare dumping 15M on a crappy, no hit shortstop. I think your assumption that the team is saying they want a healthy Izturis with a better bat is rather illogical. just as likely a team is saying 'we need a shortstop, sign whatever there is right now.' IMO, this is reason for optimism, only tempered by Hendry's apparent man-love for Izturis. No, I'm not making any assumptions. I'm saying the team wants Alex Gonzalez, who is " a healthy Izturis with a better bat". And given the fact that their (rumored) salaries are simliar (albeit Izturis' contract is a year or two shorter), and the team signing Gonzalez wouldn't have to give up any players in a trade, he doesnt have any market value. Therefore, at best we could (literally) trade Izturis for a bucket of balls. Which I guess is cause for optimism, considering I and many others didn't even think that was possible.

I agree that this rumor should be dismissed. JD Drew in Boston makes no sense at all. We are talking about a guy who felt he was treated harshly by the St. Louis fans and media, and who feld he was treated harshly by the Los Angeles fans and media. So he goes to Boston? This is a quiet Christian southern boy. So he chooses the liberal, gay marriage haven of Massachusettes? Drew to Boston for less money than he is worth makes no damn sense. This has Boras false rumor written all over it. While it does take two to tango, Drew to Boston makes plenty of sense because they are one of the three organizations that covet his approach. While he may not agree morally with a lot that goes on in Mass. he only would have to be in the city for about 2 months out of the year (remember they play 81 road games too). Many players do not live in their teams' cities in the offseason. the part about lifestyle considerations was the lesser point. see Serena's post on page 15, which essentially confirms exactly what I said here. plus, your point about Boston's philosophy addresses a completely different angle than I was addressing. of course he fits in with Boston's philosophy. the question I raise is whether the RedSox culture fits Drew, and it most certainly does not. The counterpoint to that is that the BoSox have a bunch of strong personalities so its a perfect place for a quiet guy like Drew to have a lot of the attention deflected from him. He wouldn't be going into the team to be "the guy" as hes a distant fourth to Manny, Papi, and DMat. The Bosox are pretty much the only team where he wouldnt be the talk of the offseason. If he were to come to the cubs, he would be the biggest offseason acquisition and would be counted on to be the key to winning the WS in the year that a big push is being made. Remember when CPatt would strike out or ground out and just walk back to the dugout like he didnt care? And the media jumped down his throat for it. Well Drew does that even more than CPatt. I'm just playing devil's advocate.

Its been mentioned that Mike Lamb might be non-tendered. He is entering his final year of arbi and would probably make 2.5M or so if the Astros keep him. Hes left handed with major splits will probably be a better than Nevin if used correctly and cheaper.

I agree that this rumor should be dismissed. JD Drew in Boston makes no sense at all. We are talking about a guy who felt he was treated harshly by the St. Louis fans and media, and who feld he was treated harshly by the Los Angeles fans and media. So he goes to Boston? This is a quiet Christian southern boy. So he chooses the liberal, gay marriage haven of Massachusettes? Drew to Boston for less money than he is worth makes no damn sense. This has Boras false rumor written all over it. While it does take two to tango, Drew to Boston makes plenty of sense because they are one of the three organizations that covet his approach. While he may not agree morally with a lot that goes on in Mass. he only would have to be in the city for about 2 months out of the year (remember they play 81 road games too). Many players do not live in their teams' cities in the offseason.

Sadly, still izturis... Izturis last three years OPS+ 61 88 (Izturis' "MVP" season) 68 56 Gonzalez last four years OPS+ 100 79 85 77 Izturis is three years younger, but has recent injury concerns. Izturis is making 4.15M this year with 5.45M option and 300K buy out. So basically whatever team has that offer on the table is saying we want a healthy Izturis with a better bat, and we don't have to give up any players for him and we want to pay him just about the same as Izturis...this doesn't inspire a ton of confidence in me that Izturis can be moved or that giving up Maddux and 2M for him was worth it. I agree with you all, its better than hearing Alex Gonzalez can't find a starting job, but when you take everything into consideration, its still not much to be optimistic about. Maybe we can trade him for David Aardsma :)

What does DeRosa fix? The whole point isn't that DeRosa is a steal at 4M or not. That obviously is yet to be determined. The point is taht DeRosa is a nice to have, not a fix for this team. This team has no NEED for a possible upgrade at 2b. With 2b being the only position that supply far outweighs demand, if Jim is looking to upgrade, why not wait until a few of them have signed and in the mean time use that money on players that will actually fix the team. If at the end of the day you have 4 more M, then spend it on one of the many similar second basemen on the market, if you don't have the money, that means you likely landed a big time player (or more than one) and can afford to risk handing 2b over to Theriot. And just like last year, these little signings add up. At this early stage we could have kept Soto as the backup catcher and Theroit as starting 2b and had nearly enough money to sign a second tier starting pitcher.

Well we could have gone 16M, but we just HAD to sign DeRosa. When a stud like that is on the marketplace in a position that you don't already have filled for league minimum, you jump on that ASAP.

Well he did hand out money left and right early to crap players last year too. But of course the difference are the grandoise mention of getting 14 starters and 11 power hitting outfielders. I would say its not unlimited. At the very very very most we will stay under the lux tax, which I believe is about 140M this year. At this stage, if we do expect to get a team that can contend we are going to go over 120M unless some shrewd trades are made.

But how great would he be in the meat end of a platoon with Murton!!!!

Yes, now that would be an efficient use of our money, as opposed to whats happened the last couple of days. I don't like the idea of Marquis, but in a truly low risk situation its fine (ie 1M base and not given a rotation spot). If indeed his flaws have been figured out he would be a good back of the rotation guy.

and Drew and Lugo>>>Sori and Izzy

I'd love to snag Wily Mo as consolation if the BoSox get Drew.

Although its becoming cliche, Wells will demand Beltran type money...meaning a lot more money for a lot longer...really its apples and oranges in comparison to Frank. Also, I'm sure Riccardi will take a Beane approach here and keep Wells if they have a good chance at the playoffs, dish him at the break/deadline if they don't. Selling GMs have a very leveraged position at that time because the demand much outweighs the supply not only in terms of volume, but also desperation. If he were to trade Wells this offseason, the acquiring team would require him to sign and extension, and he would say he wants Beltan money. And any team could just sign Soriano and not have to give up any talent in return. So inversely, at this juncture, Riccardi is the one without the leverage.

If the Cubs get Alph you can forget Drew. The sad thing is that yesterday we could have afforded Sori, Drew, and had about 10M for pitching. However, we just spent 7M on a starter and a backup to replace min salary players who would likely serve the exact same purposes at the same production level.

Kaplan said the other night, Hendry loves Murton, but that he almost guaranteed that Jones would not be with the team to start next year. Schnikes that's good news if true! thats fantastic news. Id try to change Wuertz to Eyre/Howry though, but thats still great. Westbrook would be a great #3/#4 option for the rotation, and would be a steady, solid arm for us for a good 2-3 years. I can't wait to see the type of improvement hed make going from the AL to the NL. He has pitched 200+ innings for 3 straight years, and doesnt walk to many batters. Those things are two attributes we need out of at least one of our starters next year. Westbrook hits FA next offseason. Regardless, I think its a good trade.

The good about Westbrook...his ERA has been bloated the last two years. His peripherals suggest he actually had better years. I don't have his BABIP, but I'm guessing 06 was high because of his big jump in hits/9 and relative stability everywhere else. Hes an extreme ground ball pitcher who keeps the ball in the yard and doesn't give up the walk (the anit- Zito). The bad about Westbrook...I fear his acquisition would justify keeping Izturis as the SS. Unless we also get Hudson, it might not be worth it. Of course Izturis will probably be the starting ss regardless, but at leat it would be justified with those two in your rotation. Note: I don't want Hudson. Hes very comparable to Westbrook but costs twice as much and may net more talent in return.

So you're saying he'll be able to keep that up, right? :D I don't think BABIP is as "lucky" of a statistic as some people would have you believe. Prove it

Anyone upset with this signing and in favor of signing Soriano is a hypocrite. DeRosa is Soriano on a lesser scale.

Not that I feel he has any better info than the dustbunnies living under my bed, but I'd be happy with that bid regardless of if we win or lose the rights to talk to Mats.