BigbadB

So do I. Please feel free to explain how Brian Roberts produces more runs than Alfonso Soriano does. I'll be happy to show you how you are wrong once you are done with this assignment. And just for giggles, note that in 155 games, a completely healthy Brian Roberts either scored a run or drove in a run 164 times in 2008 while Alfonso Soriano either scored a run or drove in a run 151 times in 109 games, while not being completely healthy all year.

VORP: Roberts - 47.8 DeRosa - 36.2 EqA: Roberts - .295 DeRosa - .291 Now these measures are not perfect (for one defensive value isn't measured) but its not clear at all that DeRosa had a better year than Roberts. FWIW, Roberts had a higher VORP than anyone on the Cubs last year. Some other pertinent stats: Roberts -- free agent after 2009 DeRosa -- free agent after 2009 See where I'm headed here? Here's some more Cubs 2b production in 2008: .300 .378 .458 .836 Brian Roberts stats in 2008: .296 .378 .450 .828 Also note that Ronny Cedeno's 117 PA at 2b are severely dragging Cubs 2b production down.

VORP: Roberts - 47.8 DeRosa - 36.2 EqA: Roberts - .295 DeRosa - .291 Now these measures are not perfect (for one defensive value isn't measured) but its not clear at all that DeRosa had a better year than Roberts. FWIW, Roberts had a higher VORP than anyone on the Cubs last year. Some other pertinent stats: Roberts -- free agent after 2009 DeRosa -- free agent after 2009 See where I'm headed here? I'd rather have the younger 2nd baseman that we could sign long term....All that aside though I know we'd have no shot at getting both of them. Just wanted to here a proposal from someone Any proposal for both Roberts and Peavy would probably need to start with Geovany Soto. For the difference in DeRosa and Roberts, I think I'd be happy to just hang on to Soto and let Roberts rot in Baltimore.

Is it now time to start requesting birth certificates for scouting directors? :D

Is this Olson from the Marlin's? who was just traded to the Nationals? No. He's talking about Garrett Olson from Baltimore. Oh....By the way and I'm sure there's not, but would there be any possible way that we could somehow acquire Roberts and Peavy in the three way deal? What do you think We'd have to give up cause I know its likely? We don't have enough talent to land Peavy, let alone adding Roberts to the discussion.

If he does go there, I hope he puts all of his weight back on, stops shaving and getting hair cuts, gets himself some prescription glasses and then wear his uniform in a way that resembles Gagne.

Is this Olson from the Marlin's? who was just traded to the Nationals? No. He's talking about Garrett Olson from Baltimore.

I think they are up in arms with the potential of losing yet another bullpen arm, and the lack of depth and available spending money to replenish the pen. Just since the trade deadline, we've watched Eyre, Howry, Wood, Gallagher and Ceda go bye bye, and Marshall and Veal may be next. That's not to say we aren't all happy about Howry going away or Gallagher netting us Harden. But, the lack of pitching depth is going to force Samardzija to go back to the rotation in Iowa, which means another lost bullpen arm. How many can this team really absorb before the pen becomes a complete disaster? What's left? Marmol Gregg Wuertz Guzman Cotts Ascanio Hart Fox Gaudin might not be great, but I'd much rather keep him than count on Fox's arm to stay attached at the shoulder. Guzman isn't exactly a gleaming picture of health, either.

WGN and Wrigley Field are probably the two biggest influences for being Cub fans. It certainly helped having Jack Brickhouse, Lou Boudreau, Harry Caray, among others calling games. If the Cubs never had WGN or Wrigley Field, I'm not so sure the Cubs would have lasted in Chicago. This was a team that was just horrible for too long to mention. I'm talking about the time before Ernie Banks mostly, but even in the mid 70's to early '80's, this was a really bad team supported by fans who liked day baseball in a great park. The Cubs made fans all across America with their superstation televised day games of Cub baseball. Retired people and kids on summer break from school didn't have to tune into some stupid soap opera. They could watch some really bad baseball on WGN. And they fell in love with it. They eventually learned the names of all the players on the team and started rooting for all these guys in a city they didn't even live in to play well, only to typically be disappointed. The lovable losers. WGN was only 1 of a small handful of channels people received with your cable package. Nowadays, my cable channels go all the way up to 1000. The timeliness of the superstation made a tremendous impact on the popularity of a really bad team. I was hooked the day Milt Pappas threw his no hitter. My grandfather never watched a baseball game in his life before he retired. WGN turned him into a huge Cub fan. The White Sox never got that, and they've played second fiddle to the Cubs all of these years. What hasn't helped them over the years is that they were a poorly run organization as well. I'll let someone else run with it from here.

Cool. A future baseball trivia question. Who was the Cubs tv broadcast team when Ron Santo was enshrined into the MLB Hall of Fame?

That's impossible to answer at this point, IMO. If I had to guess, Hendry isn't going to get a very impressive return for Marquis. Heck, he's been dabbling Marquis on the market practically since the day he signed him. Besides that, teams aren't real willing to give up quality talent for a 1 year rental unless they are making a playoff push at the trade deadline.

I'm not going to get excited about it yet. Reading that signonsandiego site from a link this morning, someone threw together an Angels/Padres package that looks way better for the Padres than the assumed Cub package. It was something along the lines of Willits, Aybar, Brandon Wood, Jered Weaver and a prospect for Peavy and Kouzmanoff. Peavy would still have to approve a trade to the AL, but if I was Towers, I'd be all over that. We just need for Peavy to hold off on going anywhere but Chicago.

Personally, I don't think it has anything to do with ownership at all. Hendry has his budget and he knows what he can spend. I think he just needs to move Marquis, 1) to free up money and 2) complete the package for Peavy. We also know that Hendry doesn't like leaks. It certainly doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out Marquis has to go if Peavy is coming here. Besides that, Hendry has acknowledged that teams have expressed interest in Marquis. Hendry is generally recognized as a straight shooter. Towers knows that Hendry is offering up the best package he possibly can and Towers is pretty much stuck and will have to take it. At the same time, Hendry isn't going to shortchange Towers. Hendry likes to be able to negotiate with these same guys in future deals, so this will probably end up being a deal where everyone walks away about as happy as they can be given the situation. I'm still pretty convinced that a deal is already in place and Hendry just needs to find a taker for Marquis. That's pretty much how I feel there may be a player or two that are yet to be determined but the main pieces are probably set in place it is just a matter of time before Hendry makes it a go. I fully expect Marquis to be gone within the first 2 days of the winter meetings next week, and a Peavy deal short after. Marquis really isn't going to be that hard to move if we eat about 3 million of his salary and make the base around 6 million. Hendry loses some leverage if he trades for Peavy first. Granted, most of us would probably take a sack of balls for Marquis, but Hendry isn't so dumb to recognize that he can probably get more for Marquis if he doesn't necessarily "have to be traded".

Personally, I don't think it has anything to do with ownership at all. Hendry has his budget and he knows what he can spend. I think he just needs to move Marquis, 1) to free up money and 2) complete the package for Peavy. We also know that Hendry doesn't like leaks. It certainly doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out Marquis has to go if Peavy is coming here. Besides that, Hendry has acknowledged that teams have expressed interest in Marquis. Hendry is generally recognized as a straight shooter. Towers knows that Hendry is offering up the best package he possibly can and Towers is pretty much stuck and will have to take it. At the same time, Hendry isn't going to shortchange Towers. Hendry likes to be able to negotiate with these same guys in future deals, so this will probably end up being a deal where everyone walks away about as happy as they can be given the situation. I'm still pretty convinced that a deal is already in place and Hendry just needs to find a taker for Marquis.

nearly every argument that you made in this paragraph is completely irrelevant This guy is brand new to the board and this is the best you have to offer? Why don't you explain yourself in a little more detail as a way to encourage friendly discussion?

It's in the insider portion, so you have to be an ESPN insider to view it. This is the link to the start of the article but you can't access the Peavy portion/the whole thing without an insider account. http://insider.espn.go.com/espn/blog/index?entryID=3744124&name=olney_buster&action=upsell&appRedirect=http%3a%2f%2finsider.espn.go.com%2fespn%2fblog%2findex%3fentryID%3d3744124%26name%3dolney_buster Can you copy and paste the relevent portion? We probably shouldn't be copying and pasting that kind of information. The relevant portion has already basically been posted. Olney is saying that the talks are on hold at this point because there is essentially a deal in place (probably in the sense of a handshake agreement), but the Cubs need to wait until the ownership situation clears up, and that the deal will center around Josh Vitters. There really isn't much more to add.

Well, to begin with, regression to the mean is almost always a good assumption. Then add in age, difference in workload, etc. and it becomes an even even better one in this case. What exactly is his "mean" though? Prior to this season, he was a 1 inning pitcher for 4 years. Before that, he was a young abused starter who had numbers that continued to regress until he finally went under the knife. Yes, his WHIP was significantly better in '08 than it's ever been. The HR's were down. The walks were down and the K rate appears to be up a bit. I'm not saying we should expect him to repeat last year's numbers. Most of what I'm reading here is that he will regress badly and not be an effective pitcher. And what I'm saying is that with the adjustments he made last year, I don't see any reason why he couldn't still be a solid 3.25/3.50 starter this coming year and in future seasons. Who's to say he can't be to the Cubs what Chris Carpenter was to the Cardinals before he went under the knife? Very similar careers, except that Carpenter has never spent any time in the bullpen.

I'm interested in knowing why Dempster is bound to regress from his 2008 season. Was it the full season workload that he hasn't experienced in years? Is it the fact that the ink is now dry on his long term deal? I suppose these can be legitimate concerns, but I don't understand the assumption attached to Dempster's future as a starter as one that will regress. If he went out there and had a few good outings in '08, I could be more understanding. Instead, he had many, many good outings. There comes a point where it's no longer a fluke. I'm not penciling him in as the top starter on a team with a long list of potential #1 starters. But, why is everyone so convinced Dempster is going to tank this year?

Fun with arbitrary endpoints. 2003: 4.59 2002: 6.23 I'm much more inclined to say 04, 05, and 07 are the "flukes" (if we must cherrypick) than 02, 03, 06 and 08. The career totals tell a story that can't be brushed off as easily as rumors of arm problems. I didn't include 2002 and 2003 because they were the first 2 years in his career, one of which he made only 17 starts, and they weren't played at Petco Park, nullifying any H/R comparison not because they didn't fit my argument. Besides, in 2002 he had a 3.57 ERA at home and a 4.59 ERA on the road in 2003 and 2.56 ERA at home and a 6.23 ERA on the road in 2002, without the benefit of cozy dimensions and marine layer. So is the problem that he can't pitch on the road in general then? I'm going to go out on a limb and say that the Padres were not playing at Petco Park in 2002.

It really doesn't have to be an argument at all. Agree to disagree and move on. You won't ever hear me claim to be Meph's biggest fan, but if he believes Greene has the capacity to be a top ML shortstop, it's his fantasy, let him live it. It's a discussion board. Differing opinions are the backbone of a discussion board. If we all held the same beliefs and values, there really wouldn't be much to discuss now, would there? If nothing else, the merits of Khalil Greene's baseball abilities have at least detracted the constant page refreshments of the Jake Peavy thread, which is perfectly fine by me.

Hello. Have you forgotten about Chad "I Just Signed a Lifetime Contract to be a Cub until I die" Fox?

Yes, but you lose points for starting another Dunn thread. ;)

Your thread won only because yours was more asthetically pleasing.

There is already a Dunn thread open.

Even if Vitters ends up being Chipper Jones caliber, all the Cubs will need to do is wait until Vitters starts to get expensive and then trade for him. The Padres are not a team that are expected to pay that kind of money for their players. Realistically, you get the best years of Peavy, and potentially the best years of Vitters, as well. Win/win.