Rob

I'm sorry but Hendry deserves more credit than this. Plus its pretty clear they want someone with defensive abilites over offensive. Correction: Jim Hendry wanted somebody with more defensive abilities than offensive. Being as fickle as he is, he's gonna love this plan until we lose 7 of 10 after our new catchers can't capitalize at the plate in close games. Jim Hendry flip flops more often than a Russian gymnist. You really think he'll stick with this plan once the first few signs of failure inevitably start to show? I'll grant, it's much more likely he brings up Soto and cuts bait on Hill. But I see zero chance that Hill/Bowen is our catching tandem for the rest of the year.

Why on earth would the commish have anything to say about it? He only bitches about paying over slot for draft picks... and understandably so, considering the talent we got in the 06 draft without having a 2nd, 3rd, or 4th round pick. At any rate, we have holes at C, SS, and CF right now, plus the potential to upgrade in RF. At C, only Salty and Piazza are really available. Salty wont be much of an impact bat this year, and considering Piazza's defensive woes, we'd probably be better off just bringing up Soto. At SS, there's really nothing available unless the Yankees fall way out of it this month. Even at that, I don't see Jim ponying up for Arod unless he gets him to agree to waive his opt-out. Again, most likely upgrade is just bringing up Cedeno. In CF, Pie could turn it on and be a real impact player, but it seems likely he's a year away from being truly ready. Unfortunately, most teams with trade-candidate CFers are in the races right now. Andruw Jones, Ichiro, Torii Hunter, Eric Byrnes, Mike Cameron... all those guys are in the playoff hunt. And I don't see Jimbo trading for a guy with more than one year left on his contract simply to avoid blocking Pie. In RF, Cliff Floyd is hitting well enough but is severely lacking power. Jermaine Dye, Ken Griffey Jr., and Bobby Abreu have all been made available. And there's always the chance we could play Adam Dunn out of position in RF. I guess the point is that we aren't going to be able to acquire a real impact bat for the positions we currently have black holes at... so if we do manage to get an impact player, it's not gonna be as useful as it could be.

I could see Jim making up for his stupid decision by making a dumber one... like bringing in Piazza (who no longer has a place in Oakland with the emergence of Jack Cust)

Molina isn't a plus defensive or offensive catcher anymore, and he's expensive. Does it sound like something Jim Hendry would do? Yeah... but that's hardly a reason to get behind the idea.

From Baseball Prospectus' Playoff Odds Report, the Cubs have a 21.11332% chance to win the NL Central, and a 16.74729% chance to win the Wild Card, which leads to a agreggate playoff chance of 37.86060%

We could fix SS and C just by bringing up Cedeno and Soto. But we wont do that.

Neifi was a demigod with a bat for almost a solid month. Yuck. Really? I don't remember that. I still stand by my opinion, however that Neifi was a decent 25th man. The problem was that he was used more that a 25th man should be used. When Neifi first showed up with the Cubs, for 23 games at the end of the 2004 season, he hit .371/.400/.548.

We have a $70 million payroll. It's not great, but it's not awful either. Narron needed to be fired about a month ago. It's about time. He was by far the worst manaer in baseball. Buddy Bell, Grady Little, Clint Hurdle. Buddy Bell does a pretty nice job of keeping pitch counts down. He hurts his team's chances at scoring runs, but at least he isn't sabotaging them down the road. He's a decent enough placeholder.

Well it's fairly obvious he didn't make any moves explicitly because of the situation, but he does have a legitimate gripe that he made non-moves because he had Braun. I think you should probably poll your league owners to see if anybody made any offers involving a 3B that he passed on because he liked Braun.

On the plus side of things, this makes it easier to finally get ready and leave. I'm meeting friends an hour away in an hour and 20 mins.

If yesterday is any indication, this is a good sign.

Cubs are 5-2 this season when I eat Kraft Spiderman Macaroni and Cheese before a game. Yeah, I'm 22. 8-[

I got three hours of sleep last night and had a test this morning... so I am completely freaking drained. I'll be happy if I make it through the entire game.

It took most of my energy just to be as excited reading this as you were writing it. I'm all tapped out now. Sorry.

To answer all the questions about how I managed to get this team... I traded: Kelly Johnson and Gary Sheffield for Dan Uggla and Lance Berkman Carlos Guillen and Jered Weaver for Bill Hall (bad trade, I know... but I had to get Bill Hall to set up the next trade) Alex Gordon, Bill Hall, Jake Peavy, Ben Sheets, and Trevor Hoffman for Alex Rodriguez, Felipe Lopez, Scott Kazmir, and Matt Cain Dan Uggla, Lance Berkman, and Scott Kazmir for BJ Upton, Carlos Beltran, and Cole Hamels Mike Napoli, Carlos Beltran, Josh Hamilton and Roger Clemens for Vladimir Guerrero, Nick Swisher, and AJ Pierzynski AJ Pierzynski, Nick Swisher, and Jhonny Peralta for Joe Mauer and Julio Lugo Adam Dunn and Cole Hamels for Manny Ramirez, Bill Hall, and Andrew Miller I've been doing a real good job of grabbing guys off the waiver wire and flipping them for good value. But the whole chain of events started when I got Berkman while his value was low. I've essentially traded from him up to Vlad by way of Beltran. And since none of the people in my league understand pitching prospects, I'm able to grab those guys off the wire to restock my pitching at will. (Hence why I was able to trade so much for ARod). The only guys on my team that were there after the draft are Pujols, Hafner, King Felix, Rich Hill, and JJ Putz. I guess you could count Howie Kendrick, but I dropped him after his injury and he slowly made his way back around the league to me. Everybody else I've nabbed off waivers or through trades.

:lol: seriously. 3 of his best consecutive power years were his ages 38-40 seasons. He's also dramatically altered his swing to try and drop flyballs into the crawford boxes. His power certainly isn't showing up away from Houston.

12 team standard h2h league with IP and OBP added. In addition, we get four keepers. I've been offered Johan Santana, Jake Peavy, and Carl Crawford for Albert Pujols, Joe Mauer, and Matt Cain. This is my team right now. C - Joe Mauer 1B - Albert Pujols 2B - Howie Kendrick 3B - Alex Rodriguez SS - Bill Hall LF - Manny Ramirez CF - Vernon Wells RF - Vladamir Guerrero UTIL - Travis Hafner SP - Felix Hernandez SP - Rich Hill SP - Matt Cain P - Chien-Ming Wang P - Jeremy Accardo RP - J.J. Putz Bench - Tim Lincecum Bench - Andrew Miller DL - BJ Upton If I were to do the trade, I could slide Travis Hafner to 1B and put Crawford or Manny at UTIL. And Ramon Hernandez is available on the waiver wire to be my new catcher. I'm fairly confidant that this makes my team better this season. But if you haven't guessed from looking at my team, I'm already in first place. And I worry that all it does is slightly degrade my keepers next season. So I have two questions I need help with. 1. Do you make this trade if you're in my shoes? 2. Who on earth would you keep?

Yeah, I'm down to 285.

Just for fun, I've decided to make a team that wouldn't be FA eligible at the end of this season, even though we aren't paying attention to the contracts. Joe Mauer Hanley Ramirez Miguel Cabrera Jake Peavy Felix Hernandez (real surprised at the lack of love for him)

oh for crying out loud....did you even read the article. Yes, absolutely. He makes a point to note that the Cubs waited until Barret's value was at his lowest to trade him, which is completely a hindsight argument. In the offseason, when his value was high, there was no need or desire to trade him. Trading him at his highest value wasn't in anyone's thoughts. So its a nonsensical argument. The other notable names in his article (aside from Sosa) are people who have bounced around baseball, playing for numerous teams, and not sticking with any of them for more than 2 years. How much value do these career journeyman have anyway? Has any team received real value in trading for guys like Walker or Bellhorn? Barrett is a catcher on the wrong side of 30. Given that, there was quite a risk of offensive implosion. While I probably wouldn't have traded Barrett in Hendry's shoes, I would have certainly thought about packaging him with Jacque and Eyre (whose values were certainly about to crash, as they had shown no ability to keep that level of performance up) to see if I could get an upgrade at SS or RF. At any rate, Bellhorn was an extremely valuable part of the Red Sox in 2004. He hit .264/.373/.444 for the team that won the WS. I'd say he has pretty decent value.

Yeah... Pujols is younger and has a lead of 166 HR right now. I'd say Howard has to be ranked well behind him.

Who is the other? It's understood to be me.

My vote has officially been bought.

Meh. Are you kidding me? What? Those girls are classic examples of "Butterface" syndrome.

Colour me skeptical after this long...