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'What would Dusty and boys done if Harry was the Broadcaster? Also Brenly has at least won a World Series, not many guys in that Cub dugout could say the same

For everyone that wants to go out and get "Free" agents, what in the Cubs history of acquiring other teams overpaid past prime players has got you so sure this is the way to build a winner. I will say this again but Brian Giles is going to be a albatross around some teams neck in 2 years. Since he is going to be the 2nd in demand outfielder on the market he will get way overpaid and since he is 35 will probably be really a burden in 2 years. Before you say sign him to a 2 year deal with a club option good luck. The only big time free agent I would be interested in is Frucal because he is still rather young. I think he is also going to come with a heavy price tag. I would rather see us give Cedeno the chance and save the money for Lee, Prior and Zambrano Realistically I can think of only one team in baseball history that went from being below 500 went on a free agent spending spree and won the world series that year (97 Marlins) I cant even think of 1 big time Free agent the Cubs have ever acquired that was worth the money we spent on him(I know there is some minor ones like Todd Walker, but i cant think of a major one) Lets do something that the Cubs have never been committed to doing, play youth and i dont mean just for 3 weeks(dubois) I mean play them for the season. See were we stand at the end of the season and add moderate Free agents like Todd Walker to fill the gaps. Because at the end of the day ALL of the moves that I have seen suggested on this board would only probably get us the 85-90 wins. If you subtract the wins that Dusty will give away it doesnt get you in the playoffs and will hinder our ability to resign Lee, Proir and Zambrano

said this somewhere else but Frucal is well on his way to being overpaid. If we just went with Cedeno he would be almost as good and alot cheaper.

A couple of thoughts on this whole thing 1. Frucal would probably become the most overpaid player in Baseball at that price. Cedeno would probably be almost as good at alot less money. 2. Wagner is also going to be way overpaid. 3. Cleveland isnt broke or a small market team. They CHOSE to go young in light of the team they developed in the 90s was getting to pricey for the value of return. This team and now the Milwaukee Brewers would be great examples of how to build future success. Who would you rather be right now either of these teams or the Cubs. They are both young and upcoming, establishing who can be of use in the future and putting back money to get them over the top in the next couple of years. 4. The team that you have put together does have potential to be good next year, But it could be really bad in 3 years and so overpaid that we wouldnt be able to retain Z, Prior, Lee and Ramirez. So we would be bringing in lesser players that would put us in danger of not resigning the decent core of players we have

The only reason Dusty got us anywhere is 2003 is because Wood, Prior and Clement were absolute studs down the stretch and in the 1st round of the playoffs. Then he just got absolutely out-managed by Jack Mckeon in the LCS. If by chance we go to the WS it will be because a group of players plays at a higher than expected level, overcoming Dusty bad managing to get us there.

We have a couple of options in the minor leagues, So before I would pay Lee alot of money I would like to see him do it again. If he does sign him to a 3 year deal tops. If someone else offers him more the money could be used elsewhere.

Resign Dempster and go young. I would rather go 70-92 with a youth movement than go 83-79 if we are lucky with someone elses overpaid past prime talent. Take a year to see who can play and who cant then fill in the gaps next offseason with moderate FA, While we get a core group of players committed to long term contracts. This is basically what the Yankees did in the mid 90s in it worked out pretty good for them. Or we could go after Frucal and Giles who will be overpaid and struggle around 500. Remember if you want to win by outspending you have to outspend the Yankees and the Red Sox Good Luck!!

At this point if Cedeno doesnt get 4 starts a week at least you can forget about baseball Knowledge that we fans dont have. This is just plain common sense at this point. My wife could make this decision and she probably couldnt name 5 Cub players

My prediction is that some team will have a player over 12. My first 2 bets are 6' 5" 1b and the pitcher with a goatee

What his limitations are are not the question. The fact is he has been more productive that any Cub OF this year. Yes it is a small sample, so it is hard to project what kind of player he will be. He has though EARNED the chance to play on a more regular. Instead the Cubs send him to the minor leagues. Which says that production is not the basis for playing time. So production is why they keep some young players from playing, but when they produce they come up with other reasons not to play them. At the end you just cannot come up with a valid arguement that not only should he still be on the team he should be starting. From there you can start argueing IF he has future value. Until then all other arguement on the matter is Moot.

Pat and Ron; The attendence game is a major distraction to the team!!!

This inability to develop young players isnt new for the Cubs. This has been going on my entire lifetime. They rarely make commitments to young players. The only young position player that they have made any kind of commitment to in the last 10 years is Patterson. I cant even think of another rookie position player who was given a months worth of starts let alone a whole season. This isnt Dusty this is the Cubs organization. I think if Dubois was just given the start in LF from day one he would have had some ups and downs but we would be doing just about as good with him as anyone else that the Cubs have put out there(except Murton) and by next year he would probably be a good everyday player. No we give him 3 weeks he does all right and we look at his weaknessess(feilding?,KOs) instead of playing up his positives.(he may still have the 3rd highest SLG on the team) If Cedeno would have been given a chance he surely could have at least gives us what Perez has and would cetainly would be better for next year. And Murton has been our most productive OF this year(actually Dubois is probably 2nd) and what does management and some fans do, focus on his negitives(Power) instead of just saying that he is our best OF and letting him play. This is part of what they have done to Patterson except they dont really have any other options in CF so they have had to live with it. Patterson is always going to be a low OBP, lot of KOS with decent power and a solid CF who should never bat higher than 6th in the order. That doesnt change the fact that he does contribute to the team though if used properly. The Cubs on the other hand are trying to make him what he is not and making the situation worse. one last thing about Dubois, at least he is sitting behind young more productive players in Cleveland not behind unproductive players in their 30s who somehow give us a better chance of winning(of course looking at our winning percentage shoots that stupid arguement away. Also the last I seen we were about 5 games above 500 in games Dubois started)

sorry about the mistake. Still not a good trade for the Expos/Nationals

Nothing like adding another player whos best years are behind him to our collection of overpaid mediocre machine

Yeah dont you think that Washington would take that certain SS on their team right now. Bartolo Colon was a great pickup for them though

I was one of the very few who was against the move to acquire Lawton and this is the main reason why. Until this whole organization changes how they are run, we can expect 30 year old mediocre players from other organizations to be the mainstay of the roster. I am seriously considering the Cleveland Indians bandwagon

look at what cleveland has done. 3 years ago they make a HUGE COMMITMENT to youth, not a 3 game trial. They are NOW a better team than the Cubs and will be ALOT better next year. Some of the players that were stated above might have become very good players if the Cubs would have made a COMMITMENT to them not just a trial. I dont blame this all on Dusty. This has been a ongoing problem with the Cubs for my entire lifetime. This is something that ownership has got to buy into then trickle it down to the lowest minor league systems. My guess is even if the Cubs did this for one year they would not like the one year results and bring in a bunch of mediocre 30 year olds the next year. Then they will say something like "We can be competitive in this division" I have said this before and I will say it again The Cubs have only had 3 players come from their system and become a regular player in my lifetime of watching them( I am not young either) In the same time span I am guessing not one other team has had less than 10. Untill you make a commitment to developing and playing youngsters you are just playing the lottery with other teams talent. Sometimes you win 84,89,98,03 but most of the time you lose, every other year.

I am kind of hoping that Schilling is the guy in the AL.

Funny how 3 years ago Cleveland went with a youth movement and they past the Cubs tthis year in being a better team. Next year they are going to be alot better, while we fart around with those 2 or 3 guys to put us over the top only to end up right at 500 again

How do we know if anyone of these guys could be an effective starter? 2 bad starts and in comes the next one. I know this may be hard to grasp for alot of Cub fans but rookies and young players need time to develop. Not very many guys come into the big leagues and have all-star numbers immediatly. Taking Rich Hill out of the rotation was just plain silly. If they would just have gone with Mitre last year instead of bringing in Maddux would he be any worse than Maddux is now. The money they are paying Maddux could also have been used to resign Clement. Heaven forbid we stick with a youngster when we can overpay for a 37 year old. This mentallity is just driving me nuts. As far as I am concerned we could go the rest of the year with Z,Prior, Williams, Hill and Mitre and I would be alot happier than seeing maddux getting vested and Rusch living off his one good year. I said this in another post but the Cubs even suck at losing. Almost any forward thinking team would have already gone with this kind of rotation

so basically it has taken a recent hot streak to move up the list. I really dont mind Jose Macias. It is just another example of Dusty not using his resources properly. As a 25th man, pinch run some, early pinch hitter if the starter is bad, spot starter at 3rd. Basically what Dusty had Cedeno doing when he was up. If he ever plays CF again we had better have run out of all possible options. What is silly is he did it several days in a row. He also pinch hits way to much for a guy who is awful at it. If you take away his pinch hitting numbers he is almost credible.

Why would a team that is 5 games below 500 even consider sending down Murton in mid-Aug. Any team that has any kind of sense would be trying to rid themselves of Hollandworth and Macias and would have given the starting job over to Murton already. Another example of why the Cubs are a losing organization. They even suck at losing

Lose the next two and start playing for the future Trade Maddux, Garciaparra, Lawton, Perez, Burnitz and Hollandsworth all would probably clear waivers and start looking at some kids. Win the next two and I have to watch this bunch of has beens struggle to stay around 500 for the rest of the year. I wish we could get more As games.

Has anyone ever looked at mackowiacs numbers. He sucks. He is also the type of player that Dusty would play no matter what. Here is my order of preference Mench Wilkerson Pie Murton Patterson leave the rest alone especially Preston "I cant believe we would even consider this Twit" Wilson

What i would do is pitch him what dusty will do is sit him for Rusch