Rob
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Everything posted by Rob
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Yeah, Urias only has allegations of violence against him from one woman!
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It's also worth noting the Cubs haven't had a lot of guys like Bobby Witt Jr. to sign to massive $200M+ extensions. 23, coming off a 5.7 fWAR season, former #2 overall prospect in MLB... The only real comp we have had in the last twenty years is Kris Bryant. And he's a Boras client. Also, Theo was still in charge then. Rizzo and Bryant both had a bit more age and service time on them when they broke out, and neither had quite the prospect pedigree (though both were highly regarded at times). And again, Theo was still in charge then.
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Cubs opening day payroll ranks (mlb) and W-L records under Jim Hendry: 2003 - 11 (88-74) 2004 - 6 (89-73) 2005 - 8 (79-83) 2006 - 7 (66-96) 2007 - 8 (85-77) 2008 - 8 (97-64) 2009 - 3 (83-78) 2010 - 3 (75-87) 2011 - 6 (71-91) Our payroll was well above average during that whole period, and our cumulative W-L record in those years was 733-723. How easily we forget -- Hendry's problem wasn't a lack of spending. It was a lack of spending smartly. He didn't want to pay for a real analytics department or minor league development. We overpaid for role players and relievers. Hendry didn't like pre-arb extensions, preferring to wait to extend star players like Aramis Ramirez until free agency was two weeks away. Having lived through the Hendry era, I'm glad to see the Cubs exercising restraint and spending smartly.
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What's the point of such a specific hypothetical? Is it a reference to a specific rumor I've missed? The general point was that, yes, there are circumstances in which I could see myself giving up a few million dollars in exchange for other various quality of life improvements. But your hypothetical involves so many moving pieces that there's no way to ascertain what somebody might prioritize. Do they have family nearby? Do they like the weather? Do they have faith in their ability to cash in on a subsequent contract? Do they think their kids would make friends easily at a new school? Etc... TL;DR: It depends. It always depends.
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Maybe I just feel this way because I'm boring, but I can't imagine that I'd ever feel the difference between a $100M contract and a $105M contract. I mean, sure, it's five million dollaredoos. But at a certain point, we've already eclipsed more money than I would ever spend in a lifetime. So I would definitely consider the smaller contract if it greatly increased my quality of life over the duration of the contract.
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Yeah, I think we're likely to see a lot of different permutations and combinations. If done well, it could actually be a strength -- to the point that I've soured a bit on spending the money on Chapman (despite being higher on him than most around here).
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So something may or may not have happened, and it may be either good for the Cubs, or bad for the Cubs.
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I'd love to see the Giants sign one of them. I don't like the fact that they're out there with so much money on hand and so little to spend it on. If they can spend themselves out of the Bellinger/Chapman market, that helps us quite a bit.
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A rundown on upcoming features
Rob replied to Brock Beauchamp's topic in North Side Baseball Issues & Suggestions
I barely use the ones we've got. A like button suffices. -
It's possible. But it's equally possible they met at some random fundraiser or something.
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Whatever it is has been deleted.
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Madrigal has a penchant for being injured, granted. But when he's healthy, he's probably penciled in as our primary 3B. And even in those games where he doesn't start, he's going to get plenty of pinch hitting opportunities whenever it's a situation where contact is needed more than power. So he's probably appearing in 80+% of the games he's healthy for.
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Apparently nobody does. It looks like I misread the post I was responding to.
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I understand on an intellectual level that Mastrobuoni ostensibly has some value to this team. (He's a high-percentage basestealer with positional versatility. In the minors he showed an ability to avoid strikeouts, to take a walk, and even to hit for a modicum of power. Yada yada yada...) But for whatever reason, I just can't believe that he will provide any real value. For reasons that elude me, I have no faith in him whatsoever.
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A rundown on upcoming features
Rob replied to Brock Beauchamp's topic in North Side Baseball Issues & Suggestions
Yup. The weather thread gives me climate change anxiety, and I'd be significantly happier if I could make it disappear from my feed forever. -
Madrigal is 5'8" You don't have to be tall to be a good 1B, but it does help an awful lot. Of recent 1B who are below 6' tall, only Carlos Santana has a particularly positive defensive reputation. And he's 5'11. I just think Madrigal is going to have a hard time reigning in the occasional errant throw.
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I'm not upset to lose out on Turner at that price. His value at this point is basically whatever is left in his bat, and it's showing some signs of age-related decline. He could bounce back, certainly. J.D. Martinez did last year. But Turner is 39. Each year that goes by makes it increasingly likely that he just falls off a cliff.
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Darn, I was hoping that we'd be involved in their rumored trade.
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A day or two ago there were some rumors about the Mariners having interest in Cease. I didn't see the point in that unless he was unloading some of his pitching surplus. I wondered if we might be involved. God bless Jerry Dipoto and his tradelust. He always keeps it interesting.
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I could definitely see Bellinger and/or Boras prioritizing something with an opt-out after 1-2 years. A lot of teams are hesitant to pony up for Bellinger because there's just so much to dislike in his batted ball data. If he can show that it's not a fluke, teams will be much more inclined to pay up.
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If it helps, you can think of our last trade as Busch for Ferris and Almonte for Hope. That's probably pretty close to how they were valued.
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"I'm happily empowering a wannabe tinpot dictator. Can't we just ignore that when I want to enjoy something?" I'm ambivalent about the pen, but feel good about one or more prospects stepping up. Smart money is on Brown.
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If you were actually a conservative, you'd hate Trump and the Republican party. There is nothing classically conservative about either. Party of fiscal responsibility? They spend every bit as much as the democrats, but refuse to pay the bill. Instead they cut taxes and watch the national debt balloon. Party of personal responsibility? No, we better ban books because we don't trust parents to handle that themselves. Party of family values? Only if supporting a demagogue who was banging porn stars instead of his pregnant wife is now what we call family values. Party of common sense? Let's watch the planet burn around us and pretend we don't see what's happening. I was a conservative and a registered Republican for a very long time. What's happened to the party and it's base is a damn abomination. And I'm not going to pretend otherwise so that you can feel welcomed here.
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A rundown on upcoming features
Rob replied to Brock Beauchamp's topic in North Side Baseball Issues & Suggestions
This is your requested, but very late, smack upside the head. -
As a man with no defensive home and a good but not great bat, Morel is just an incredibly frustrating guy to plan around. If he walked more / struck out less, he'd be easy to pencil in as a great DH. But most teams without great DH options simply use the DH to rest regulars and rehab minor injuries. So using him there full time feels subpar. If his physical tools translated to some defensive skills, he'd be easier to plan around. But for whatever reason, they just don't. For a lot of people, I think myself included, it's easier to just assume other teams see his prodigious physical tools and somebody out there thinks they can fix him, and would value him accordingly. So we're content to rest on the easy idea that he should be on the trade block. It's harder to imagine the Cubs player development fixing those issues for him at the major league level, but I'd be thrilled if that's the case.
