BigbadB

Similar to what the Phils did with Lofton and Michaels, right? Sure, why not. I will admit that after looking at Michaels career stats, I would love to see him leading off for the Cubs next year. Good call, UK.

I agree. There is plenty of talent. Maybe if we didnt' see guys like Jose Macias getting occasional starts or pinch hits... But, as long as their is an end of the bench, guys like this will always have jobs whether you have 32 teams or 16, etc... Player talent may not be down, but location/city talent certainly is. I don't understand what this means.

I'd also add that it probably wouldn't just be Lofton in CF, but rather a Lofton/Hairston platoon.

Why didn't you list their stats for 2001? Also, Player A gets hurt alot unlike Player B. There's a pretty signifcant difference between the two. I want a little more for Patterson and Hill than just Pierre though. Is 2001 a better measure of what these two players might do in 2006? If it is, please explain why.

I agree. There is plenty of talent. Maybe if we didnt' see guys like Jose Macias getting occasional starts or pinch hits... But, as long as their is an end of the bench, guys like this will always have jobs whether you have 32 teams or 16, etc...

i dont see hendry trading pie for anyone. perhaps the phillies would take harvey, sing, pinto & hill. Hendry may just be playing up Pie's value in the press so he can get more for him if decides to include him in a trade. The only reason I can see that the Phillies would want to trade Abreu is if they decide they want to upgrade pitching and need to free up salary to go after a guy like Millwood or Burnett. To get a player of that caliber I would have no problem seeing the Cubs trade Williams, Hill, Pie and Pinto if necessary. With the added production in RF (and probably LF with Murton) they could gamble on giving CPatt another chance in CF. Mitre or Rusch could plug into the 5th spot in the rotation and probably either would produce at a pretty similar level to Williams. If the Cubs were to give up all of that for Abreu, then the Phillies better be ready to eat more than half of Abreu's remaining salary too.

My official answer is whatever it takes. But if I have to give a number, I think the Cubs could afford 50 million over 4 years, and I think Giles would be worth it. My only concern is his range in RF. But I am confident that his bat will remain productive at a level comparable to his career averages for the first 3 years of this contract. He's played plenty of LF as well, so it shouldn't be a problem. Heck, he can still play a little CF when you need an offensive boost. He played 17 games there last year. Right, but it isn't a question of whether Giles can play other positions than RF. It is a question of whether the Cubs will have anyone who can be a better defensive RF than Giles. Right now, it is unclear whether Murton has the arm to play RF, but I doubt he does. Giles isn't a protypical CFer, thats for sure, so, if signed, he will be stuck playing RF unless the Cubs decide to sit or trade Murton. That is the only reason why I bring up Giles' arm strength. As far as trading Murton, I love the kid, but depending on who you can get in return, it might not be a terrible idea to trade him for a good offensive and defensive RFer. I don't see that happening, but that would be the only condition I can think of in which I would agree to trade Murton. I agree. A trade for Murton would have to yield a really good player. Murton will be inexpensive for the next several years. You just don't trade good production guys that make league minimum unless the return would have an immediate AND long term impact.

Yeah, those were my thoughts, too. Pierre is a question mark and so is Hill, at this point. Why settle for a question mark and give up someone who could be good when other, better options exist that can be had without giving up anyone? On a side note, BBB, my two-year-old girl was on my lap as I was reading your post, and she exclaimed in a loud voice, "B! Blue B!" I'm thinking she likes your avatar. :wink: Tell your daughter I'm a married man. :D

Nicely done!

I'd rather have Furcal. I'd rather have Lofton as a stop gap until Pie is ready. Either of those can be had without giving up prospects.

They just barely had a better record than the Padres had this year in winning the division. IF the Cubs had that record, they would not only have not won their division, but they wouldn't have been the wild card either. Just like this year, they were the only team in the division they played in that had a winning record.

Well, .333 is not a horrible OBP. And I count 8 guys with over 100 at bats that had a better OBP than .333. Mix in a guy with an OBP that's almost .600 and you can have some .333's in place of some .350's and equal run support. As far as the pitching is concerned, I'd bet just about any team in baseball would be thrilled to have 5 starters all go 185+ innings and average a 3.83 ERA. I'd rate that just a tad bit better than mediocre. Mix that in with a solid bullpen and you have a pretty good pitching staff.

The Dodgers scored a whopping 574 runs that year. Yikes.

You can call the '98 team crap, but look at those fat OBP's on that team. Morandini had a .380 OBP Blauser had a .340 Grace and Glenallen Hill were over .400 Gaetti had a .397 Sosa was at .377 Brant Brown was at .348 Henry Rodriguez was at .334 Mieske was at .373 Lance Johnson .335 They got people on base. They scored 831 runs in 1998 compared to 703 this year, 789 last year and 724 in Dusty's first year. Under Baylor, they scored 706 in 2002, 777 in 2001, and 764 in Baylor's first year. Riggleman did much more with much less.

What's the weather like today in Chicago?

Yeah, maybe I should have said "since the dead ball era". The Cardinals offense in 1968 was very generic in comparison to nowadays. Better yet, look at those ERA's and IP'd by that Cardinal pitching staff.

I suppose I can see that argument. However, how do we know they have a clue what the real problems are? They didn't address them during the season last year when there was time to address them.

What will the Kazuo Matsui contract do to signings out of Japan? Will we see a drop in signings? A drop in how much they get signed for? Shorter contracts? What would fix Kaz here in the states? A trade to a smaller market? Would the Mets trade him while assuming a big portion of his contract? I've always wondered how good he might be if you got him out of the Zoo.

Last year, there was all kinds of news about the Cubs wanting to go after Beltran. This year, the news has been Furcal. Do they pick and choose their spots to drop a bomb on the media? I agree, Hoops. I need to be patient and let things materialize the way Hendry prefers to do it. But, why can't he at least address what the problems with this team are, so that we know that he knows what those problems are? For example, "we need to improve OBP throughout the line up". Or, "we need to reduce the pitch counts and walks from our pitching staff." This isn't naming names. It's telling your fan base what problems will help fix this team. That's all I really want. I don't want this "we know what we need to do to right the ship" crap.

My official answer is whatever it takes. But if I have to give a number, I think the Cubs could afford 50 million over 4 years, and I think Giles would be worth it. My only concern is his range in RF. But I am confident that his bat will remain productive at a level comparable to his career averages for the first 3 years of this contract. He's played plenty of LF as well, so it shouldn't be a problem. Heck, he can still play a little CF when you need an offensive boost. He played 17 games there last year.

That guys arm will fall off any day now. Perhaps it is the walk that teams should spend more focus on now that steroids are having their impact on offense. The Cubs ranked 2nd in the NL in SLG. Only Florida had a better team batting average than the Cubs in the NL. NO ONE IN THE NL WALKED LESS THAN THE CUBS. NO ONE! It wasn't even close. The Cubs walked 419 times. Feel free to do some digging and find out how many teams that walked 419 times or less finished anywhere better than the Cubs finish this year. Good luck! You can disagree with this theory if you wish, but have some statistics that prove your argument rather than simply calling people names, like "walk romanticists".

The Giants had a good offense and good pitching in 2002. Top 3 in AVG, top 3 in HR's, top 3 in OBP, top 3 in walks, top 3 in runs, etc.... Actually, they were better than top 3 in many of those. Did not hit particularly well? Top 3 is a good thing. San Fran was second in the league in ERA. They gave up the least amount of home runs that year. They gave up the third least walks. Why Dusty's Giants teams were able to do all those things, but the philosophy is completely different in Chicago is beyond me. The Cubs once again led the league in HR's that year. All those home runs led to an 11th place finish in runs scored.

Riggleman is currently being looked at in Tampa. Or, at least he was.

Cardinal fans are morans. End of story. :D

They clearly don't make stuff as good as they used to. Therefore, I'd trust the thing that's been standing for 90 years over something that's been standing only a few weeks. Fenway is still standing, meanwhile many stadiums that were built LONG after Fenway have already been torn down, should be torn down or are no longer safe enough to use, etc.... The Padres didn't just decide to build a new ballpark. They used the structure of Qualcomm in need of major repairs as their bargaining chip.