illiniguy

I was trying to keep it at 4 guys for each team so I guess it should've been the 4 best prospects each team in the division. Wood should've been in there instead of Castro, but I was trying to mix older and newer players. Yes Cubs had other players as well, but so did other teams like Lidge for the Astros and Gallardo/Sheets for the Brewers and heck A Ram for the Pirates (if you wanna get technical about it). As far as Garcia/Alvarez/Stubbs... I really couldn't find or know anyone that should've been in the top 4 from those teams. I did the list to compare Cubs to the division rivals in terms of prospects and "elite" players from each team. If you look at that list from those 4, who looks better than the Cubs? I have to say Brewers/Astros/Cardinals look better there. Reds, IMO, are worse for now and Pirates are close behind the Cubs (due to my thinking that Alvarez will be a stud). Maybe I should've went to like top 10 "prospects to productive MLB players" for each team to "paint" a better picture of each farm system. It was also showing the Cubs "lack" of impact bat as the other teams had at least one (yes Kendall was an impact bat with the Pirates for a C IMO)... Basically in other words, I was trying to show the "cream of the crop" talent level of each farm system. As for Ankiel, yeah maybe so, but he had one good hitting and pitching season each along with good partial seasons as well. Plus after Pujols/Rasmus, I didn't know who else Cardinals developed that was really more productive than Ankiel/Garcia. I pretty sure Cubs smoked everyone in the division in terms of pitching prospect and wouldn't be surprised if they were in the top 5 in all of MLB (most likely top 10 though). I wasn't downgrading Prior. I was downgrading the Cubs for the lack of an impact bat or offensive prospects. Prior was just bad luck for the Cubs. He would've won a Cy Young or two by now had he not had those injuries. Thanks for telling me about MacPhail's era. I never really gone into details with the Cubs (minors/organization/scouting/etc...) until about 2002-2003 or so (when I was 18-19). I didn't know how he was really (but I should really check into that though). Didn't know MacPhail focus on pitching that much. So basically Sosa and Soriano handcuffed the team a little in terms of their contracts and with the offense. Also you said the Braves model??? I must be thinking of another team or something because they signed Maddux/trade for Smoltz and also developed Chipper Jones/Andruw Jones/Javy Lopez/Ryan Klesko/David Justice/Jermaine Dye/Rafael Furcal... Braves were like the Rays right now. They developed both pitching and hitting prospects and are great at it. I agree with your last statement except for I think if Cubs could've had Lee's 2005 season in 2007 that it would've been enough to lead an offense. You also think after that period of time (Grace to now) that you would catch "lightning in a bottle" with one offensive prospect who produced at an All Star level for a few years regardless. Soto has had two all star caliber years.

Well to be fair though, I think Pie been productive the past 2 years with the Orioles (98 and 93 OPS+) even though it's about a season's worth of PAs. Not up to expectations like you said, but he certainly been shown flashes of his potential and starting to come around with the bat. I blame partially on Lou on the way he handled Pie when he was up in the majors. He basically didn't have a chance to show his stuff and Lou wasn't gonna wait around for it (cuz Cubs were doing well in 2007/2008). I think while Cubs have been producing quality (and good) players from their farm system, what they been lacking is the "elite or can't miss" or high impact prospects that turn into really good or great players like some of the other teams have produced that the list doesn't really get your attention when you look at it. At least that's how I see it... If you don't understand that, then here's my question.... when did the Cubs had a prospect like Ryan Braun/Joey Votto/Prince Fielder/Jay Bruce/Andrew McCutchen/Roy Oswalt/Yovanni Gallardo/etc... That's just players from our division. Closest thing to that is Soto nowadays, Z sometimes (when his head is on straight and actually pitching like he did this last half of the season), and Prior (we all know how that went)... Now we can add Castro to that list so that's 4 in the past 10 years... Now I'm starting to feel good about the Cubs farm system again that I think we will see some of these prospects turn into something. I like what I'm seeing from B Jax/Archer/McNutt/Hak Ju Lee/etc... It reminds me of the Cubs farm system at the beginning of 2000s when it was really good, but hopefully it'll be better than that. 4 really good payers in a decade cannot be that bad. Also remember we weren't drafting at the top of the draft the entire run as we had a pretty good decade.

Other than the Pierre trade, name the prospects you are sorry he traded away. Bobby Hill. The return was awful.

The problem is they fold way too often down the stretch in tight games. Yep. Because they play too tight. Last night when it was tied and Weber called the time out as Paul was alling into the backcourt when it was tied without about 3 to go, our kids looked scared as crap in the timeout. The Mizzou kids were jumping up and down and excited. I don't get why our kids seem so scared and timid. And apparently Bruce had a meltdown at the press conference.

Good lord, I hope not. I hope you have someone on your schedule you can beat next weekend. Well you have mid major talent, so he should be right at home in that atmosphere. I don't know if Howard can get him enough Mr. Basketball to win the Big Ten again.

Good lord, I hope not.

nobody calls winning the nit the title and mizzou is going to go to the real tournament Take it easy illiniguy I really don't need to defend myself anymores on Weber being over his head as a coach of our team. I mean if we fire him now we might miss out on recruits that will get 4 or 5 minutes a game in the first two years under his watch. But, when we are in teh NIT again this year I am sure he will be quick to blame someone else besides himself. Again. What amount of coaching accounts for shear stupidity? On who's part? We have the deepest team we have had in years and we are playing 7 guys. If the players are being stupid, use playing time as punishment.

We are going to absolutely be on the bubble again. MSU, OSU, PU, and Wisky will probably all sweep us.

Two horrible games in a row for him. if only we had a 5 star/ 4 star (depending on the service) to take some minutes from him.

nobody calls winning the nit the title and mizzou is going to go to the real tournament Take it easy illiniguy I really don't need to defend myself anymores on Weber being over his head as a coach of our team. I mean if we fire him now we might miss out on recruits that will get 4 or 5 minutes a game in the first two years under his watch. But, when we are in teh NIT again this year I am sure he will be quick to blame someone else besides himself. Again.

And McGamey.

Offense looks amazing. It's like our guys are playing in quicksand.

Shouldn't matter. if we make half our bunnies we are up 10. This team can be so depressing.

DMac is by far the best player on the court. Please take this game over.

If Pressey doesn't get hurt I doubt that Dixon is playing tonight.

This, if anything I think what UCONN is doing is bad for the sport.

Get Clemens out of retirement Just win another 100 games again this year?

That's not really fair, Mike Davis had a rebound. At what point does Weber start to just play Richmond and Griffey together? Just beat Mizzou and forget about this. I'm not really sure what to make of the loss at this point. I still think we will beat Mizzou. We usually play well against good teams. It's these crap teams that are beating us and really hurting our seasons lately. We have to quit losing to the small schools in our state. You guys are going to kill us and nothing convinced me of that more than you guys losing to UIC. We really need to now.

That's not really fair, Mike Davis had a rebound. At what point does Weber start to just play Richmond and Griffey together? Just beat Mizzou and forget about this. I'm not really sure what to make of the loss at this point. I still think we will beat Mizzou. We usually play well against good teams. It's these crap teams that are beating us and really hurting our seasons lately. We have to quit losing to the small schools in our state.

That's not really fair, Mike Davis had a rebound. At what point does Weber start to just play Richmond and Griffey together?

Stop it. I know it's a bit crazy, but what's our signature win? Have you guys even played a conference game yet? UNC was a nice win. That'll look like a good win by the end of the year. No offense, but I'm going to stop complaining about refs in fear of sounding like you guys. Not only should you have killed UIC, but I thought the refs were fairly neutral, maybe even favoring the Illini slightly. Regardless, this was a bad loss but you guys will be fine. You'll make the tourney and be a 3,4, or 5 seed. Yeah I prolly need to just step back. For the record I don't blame this at all on the refs. Not even a little bit.

Stop it. I know it's a bit crazy, but what's our signature win?

Yep. I love when Bruce took Jereme, our best rebounder, out. Then the very next play we got beat by a tip in to pretty much put the game away. Had to have Bill Cole in there. He's a senior.

this is a carbon copy of the Bradley game. Good lord please someone tell me we will make the tournament this year.

the refs would have never called that out of bounds on the powerhouse uic I'd like to get behind this, but good lord, how do we allow a team with that kind of talent to play this close to us in the first place?