Rob

I just threw up a little in my mouth. Why is that? Gary Hughes has value in being a scout. I'm surely not about to debate that. But after the comments of his that I have read, I don't want him in charge of making the decisions. Perhaps my comment was a bit over the top, as I did not mean to disparage him personally, but the things he's said would make me very scared to see what kind of a team he'd put on the field.

having a lot of high draft picks this year should help, especially with that #3 pick. Wieters/Price please I'm really praying it's Wieters.

You, sir, are a bold faced liar.

These winter leagues are getting to be almost as depressing as the regular season.

I'm fairly certain it will be disappointing, but that's about as far as I'm willing to predict. Wow, finals season has me in a bad mood.

Guzman / Marmol / Marshall Guzman easily has the highest ceiling of these guys, and while last season was nasty, I still refuse to cut bait on a guy that posted a 40:0 strikeout to walk ratio in 30 innings just two years ago. In the same vein that Rich Hill was somewhat illogically trusted by Jim Hendry, I feel that way about Guzman this year. Marmol has a very high ceiling as well, thanks to his filthy stuff. And as a converted position player, his arm doesn't have quite the wear and tear that the other guys have. I don't think he'll be too useful for 2007, but come 2009 he could be a real force to be reckoned with. As for Marshall, I'm just not too high on his ceiling. He could be a good #4 for a few years, or a decent #3, but he doesn't have the sort of top of the rotation stuff. He's obviously not without value, but as a gigantic lefty he has perhaps the most perceived value of the group. I'd like to sell high on him if we get the chance.

His bum ticker might have kept him from doing something stupid like matching the Royals' offer for Gil Meche.

The power of affirmations. If you say he's incredible often enough, maybe he'll stop being crappy.

For a ex-decent prospect? Jones has more value than that. I know if I were the GM I would try to get the best available player for Jones. I wouldn't trade Jacque to trade Jacque. Lofton SHOULD NOT be considered an every day player. And no way in hell would I pay him 6 million. If he is willing to take 2 million then I would consider it. Hendry didn't help out Jones' value by saying he would be open to trading Jones to any other team. Im sure Hendry did not say those exact words. Jones for David Newhan? Thats a complete joke. I rather keep Jones than get that bum Newhan on the team. Agreed. Even if the commissioner's office was forcing me to trade Jacque to the Orioles for a violation of some obscure rule, I'd rather take nothing back in return than to take Newhan.

For a ex-decent prospect? Jones has more value than that. I know if I were the GM I would try to get the best available player for Jones. I wouldn't trade Jacque to trade Jacque. Lofton SHOULD NOT be considered an every day player. And no way in hell would I pay him 6 million. If he is willing to take 2 million then I would consider it. Hendry didn't help out Jones' value by saying he would be open to trading Jones to any other team. What's he supposed to do, refuse to trade him to the Mets? :roll:

I don't know about smarter game strategy... I just read somewhere that Lou was thinking of batting Izturis 2nd.

If it takes Hirsh + Wheeler to get Jennings, that means we'd need to offer something like Gallagher + Ohman. That seems pretty rich for Jason Jennings, IMO. If I have to give up that much talent, I want Tim Hudson or Brad Penny, their contracts be-damned. Agreed. Jennings for whoever could end up being the B-version of Kazmir for Zambrano.

Rockies and Rangers, IIRC.

Yeah, but being on the DL doesn't count towards his time spent on the major league roster for the purposes of the Rule V. They'd have to try and carry him on the roster next season too, and they might have a chance of competing then.

If the mechanical flaw made him a bad pitcher and if he's fixed it and if he signs for real cheap, it could be a great $$/talent pickup. On the other hand, if Angel Guzman simply performs at a level near where he's capable of performing, it would be an amazing $$/talent value.

Nate Silver just ran Meche's PECOTA projection. 5.40 ERA

We don't need a shortstop with range nearly as badly as most teams do. We have a very high strikeout staff, and I can't think of anybody besides Wuertz and Zambrano who gets a lot of groundballs (and Zambrano's GB/FB ratio was heading in the FB direction, IIRC). I know there's probably a couple other pitchers that have groundball tendencies, but it's not so significant that we have to have a guy with great range at SS. DeRosa would be a much better choice (and it would make his contract much more palatable to me)

I wouldn't go that far. co-sign

It is completely inexcusable that Church is not on our roster yet.

I just threw up a little in my mouth.

Yeah, but how often do you think a signing is a good one? Rarely, IIRC. Unless I'm forgetting somebody, I've thought 37.5% of our signings this season were very good. Aramis Wood Miller So let's cover the rest. Soriano - Not a bad player, but nobody will debate the money and years are horrible. Blanco - Redundant. Soto could do almost the exact same thing at a mere portion of the cost. This isn't a horrible signing, as we can absorb the money without taking a real hit... but it's certainly not a good one. DeRosa - Not too horrible on the money or years, but for that kind of money I would have expected a real upgrade over Theriot. DeRosa is nearly as unlikely to repeat his numbers from last season as Theriot is. Again, not a bad signing, but certainly not a good one once you figure who else was available on the FA market. Lilly - This is the kind of signing that should be made to help push a team over the hump, not in a last ditch attempt to bring them up to a competitive level. He's an oft-injured guy with a high strikeout rate, high walk rate, and flyball tendencies... the exact sort of guy that hasn't gotten our pitching staff anywhere in the last few seasons. While the talent itself isn't too bad, the money and years are horrible... even if that is what the market dictated he would go for. Ward - He's coming off a career year at age 31 where he hit .308/.380/.546. Yeah, that's a great line. Let's see what he did in the year before that. .260/.318/.405 That kind of line is simply not acceptible, especially if DLee goes down again. The scary thing? That's essentially Ward's career line, minus about 40 points of slugging. So which is more likely, that he'll hit like he did in 2005, or that in 2006 at the age of 31 he suddenly established a new career baseline for himself? I'm inclined to believe his performance isn't going to look much like 2006 did. There's simply better options out there. Is it a bad signing? No. But it's not a good one, either. I don't irrationally hate all the Cubs signings. The only one I'm real peeved about is the Lilly one, and I've loved a good chunk of them. So don't act as if I'm going to hate everything that comes my way, regardless of whether there's a good reason behind it.

Am I the only one completely dumbfounded as to how people can think this is a good signing? I will grant that it's not a horrible one for money or years, but Ward just isn't much of a performer with the exception of last season. He's got to hit for a very high BA to have much offensive value.

If he wasn't talking about Ward, he's talking about Floyd.

The odds of him putting up numbers like he did last season are very small, and the cost of acquiring him would be very high. He put those numbers up in half a season. How could he not match them again? You could argue that he could nearly double them in a complete season, could you not??? Sorry, I look at rate stats. I have a hard time believing he's going to sustain a .533 slugging percentage. That's a .097 jump from the season before, which is pretty huge for a CF. Although, he's getting significantly worse covering CF, so maybe he's packed on the muscle... I'm not sure. He'll get better than he was in 05, I'm fairly certain. I just don't believe his jump last season was indicative of a real progression, and I'd rather not pay an outrageous price for him based on that. I'm not a Baldelli hater, by any means. I think he's a solid player... I just don't think he's as good as advertised... which means he wont be worth the cost.

The odds of him putting up numbers like he did last season are very small, and the cost of acquiring him would be very high.