craig

Larry, I think it is meaningful. As NY suggests, I assume it means they don't think that Colvin is as good a defensive CFer as is Fuld. They love Fuld in center (Fox, who has played extensively with Pie, said that Fuld is the best defensive CFer he's played with...), so being viewed as less than Fuld doesn't necessarily mean Colvin will never play big-league CF. But most likely they don't project Colvin as a regular big-leaguer CFer. Colvin isn't even fast enough to be a serious base-stealer in AA, and most minor-leaguers projected as big-league CFers are expected to be base-stealing fast. That said, every scouting observation I've ever read has been very favorable regarding Colvin's defense. Strong arm, accurate arm, good at catching what he can reach, and gets good jumps. [Edit, OK change that. The BA article just posted by Cal suggests he doesn't have a RF arm. That's too bad.] I imagine him to be something like Fukudome. Really good in RF, relative to other RFers. But given how many defense-first speedster CFers there are, Fukudome's not special in center. But I think everything is good regarding colvin as a defensive corner. We're not talking Jason Dubois or Eric Patterson or Matt Murton here, we're talking a guy whose defense will help him, not hold him back. All that said, I do hold some hopes for him in center. Lou likes guys who can hit. There were questions about both Reed Johnson (he hadn't played all that much center before this year) and Edmonds (awfully slow for center.) But they've been the guys. If we don't have any CFers who can hit, and colvin ends up being a good hitter, it's at least theoretically possible he would get some CF time even if he's a sound but not spectacular CFer.

I can hope for more than a .750-ish OPS guy (and in Jacque's case, with a brutal arm and lousy baserunning besides). I can hope for a guy who hits 25 HR a year. It's not that rare for a guy who's hitting 14 HR's in AA at 22 to end up hitting 20+ once established in the majors. Certain, not, but it's certainly plausible and hope-able. I can hope for a guy who K's at around 16% rate, perhaps better. Certain, not. But it's not implausible that a guy who K'd at 14% post-break in AA at 22 to play as a guy who doesn't K a lot. I can hope for an 8% BB rate. Certain, anything but. But it's not rare for a guy who is a pretty good contact hitter and hits 20+ HR's to get some walks, and to evolve into a walk-rate in the majors that is comparable to the walk-rate he had as a 22-year-old in AA. Given that Colvin has always hit a good share of doubles and triples, I think it's also reasonable to hope that a fair share of his non-HR hits will go for extras. Here are a set of numbers I could hope for: 600 AB, 25HR, 16% K-rate, 8% walk-rate, 30 doubles, 4 triples, .315 BABIP. Without including any HBP, that would produce a .347 BABIP .483 slugging, .830 OPS. That's more the range I'd hope for: somebody who could be an .800+ OPS guy, while playing a plus RF. None of those numbers are individually unreasonable, and some are a bit conservative relative to what I "hope". (he got 38 doubles/triples this year, in a minor-league season. In the majors, when you give an additional month of August in which to accumulate numbers, my 34 doubles/triples "hope" may be a bit conservative...) There is a big difference between a .750-type guy and an .830-type guy. .800+ guys who play good defense, they are valuable players, even in corner outfield spots. Again, I'm not saying I **expect** him to be an .830-type guy. He could fall well shy of being a 25-HR guy. he could K way more than 16% in the majors. And he could walk well below 8%. But I've got to think that when a good-fielding good-throwing 22-year-old in the Southern League posts a .975 OPS over 116-AB August (not that small a sample), it's not being realistic to say he's got no chance to be more than a .750-ish major leaguer. He's definitely got a chance to be an .800+ major leaguer, even if it's safer to predict he won't.

Colvin did a nice job reviving his season down the stretch. With only 2+ pro years, and having played the year at 22, it's still way too soon for me to think I know what he'll end up being. The optimist in me notes progress in crucial areas: 1) plate discpline/walks improved a lot during the season 2) power continued to progress 3) his K-rate improved down the stretch 4) according to Fleita he adjusted his stance and did much better after that. His hitting was very good over the last month or so. So the optimist sees the chance of continued progress in key areas. Were he able to put those things together, if he walked like he did when he was walking best, while at the same time K'd as little as he did post-break, while hit with the authority he did down the stretch, while continues to show the developing power he was showing, he could be a pretty total package. If you have a good stroke for extra bases, if you hit a healthy dose of HR's, and if you walk some without K'ing a ton, you're going to be a good hitter. It's entirely possible that he'll emerge as a solid-hitting outfielder. The pessimist notes that he's never really put it all together. That he has yet to both hit and walk at the same time, and that his hitting seemed to come when he abandoned the walking routine. So there's a good chance that he'll never be able to be even a passable walker. And the pessimist notes that he's not a big guy, and has never been scouted for major HR-power. Good vs bad: *25HR/12HR per year *16% K-rate vs 20% K-rate *9% walk-rate vs 4% walk-rate If he were to come in toward the good end in each of those three areas, he's likely to be an asset player. If he comes in at the bottom end, not. Time will tell, as usual. That said, I'm tons more open to the notion that he might work out then I was back in mid-July.

Agree with your observations here. That's a really small group of DSL guys. I don't know who this Corletto is; do you? Encarnacion is the only young DSL pitcher (other than perhaps Corletto). Disappointing there aren't more. Hopefully he's good. Medina is already 22. There are so many guys throwing, I think they just need to accumulate catchers. So his invite probably is basically bullpen catcher, without indicating any noteworthy prospect-hood. Morales turns 20 this winter, and made a million errors without hitting great in any area (not a noteworthy power guy; or anti-K contact guy; or base-stealer; or high-average guy.) I'm pretty interested in Quesada. Position-switch pitchers normally have pretty good arms (why switch a guy if he doesn't?), and he had pretty slick numbers in DSL.

I hadn't noticed how extreme that is, he's got 33 XBH out of 56 hits total for Boise. 33 XBH to 23 singles, that's not your normal ratio! .955 OPS is better than Flaherty or Vitters, and while it seems he's been bumbling forever, he's still only 20. So theoretically you could keep some interest. http://www.minorleaguesplits.com/cgi-bin/pl.cgi suggests he's been much park and luck benefited. For what it's worth, it projects him as a .259 hitter with a .872 OPS. I'm guessing he'll probably be Harvey-ized when he goes back to A-ball, and I still have a pretty hard time taking him very seriously. What guys are at 20 doesn't prove what they'll be at 25 or 30, of course. Some guys do improve a lot (Theriot, Soto, and Samardz are recent examples). So maybe Rundle will blossom in ways I can't anticipate down the road, I hope so. But it's hard to anticipate a tall guy who's whiffing a full 1/3 of his AB's against the mostly trashy pitching in short-season is going to make enough solid contact against the sharply improving pitching at higher levels. Rundle's Boise K-rate is even higher than Harvey's was as a 19-year-old. when your holes are so big that even Boise-level guys are whiffing you 1/3 of your AB, you've got an awful lot of hole-closing to do.

Leverton had a 7K game yesterday. IIRC, he was scouted as having a pretty good arm, but he was a position player who switched to pitching fairly late, and was used only in relief. As with any lefty drafted later than the first round or two, he's more likely to make it as a lefty reliever than as a rotation guy. His overall numbers are pretty blah: ERA is mid/upper 4's, K rate is low, walk rate is high. But I'm somewhat interested and encouraged. 1. He's got an extreme G/A ratio of like 2.8. That's a good sign, and suggests a fastball with desirable movement. If you've got a hard sinker, you can make a career without necessarily needing to be great in your support pitches. 2. He's improve a bit, and had a 7K/1BB yesterday after 4 innings or so. That may be a sneak peak that perhaps in time, he will come up with a breaking pitch. If he's got a hard sinker and developed a K-quality breaking pitch besides, you could have a pretty good value. 3. I think he's had several games in which he pitched OK for a while and then gave up damage in his final inning. So his overall numbers may be overly influenced by his bad last innings. That may reflect his past as a reliever, and if he continues to start, perhaps he'll be better built up by next year. More likely his eventual role will be relief, in which case how he does in the 4th or 5th inning won't matter much. Obviously he's nothing great now, and he'll need to put some things together to become a useful major-league pitcher. But it's possible that some of the components are there that if he can improve his breaking ball, and/or his control, and/or his endurance, he could become interesting. He's 22, so may be that he doesn't have much improving left, and what you see is what you get. But maybe he's got a lot of untapped potential and has a higher ceiling that we'd expect.

A guy gave a report on him back in July I think, and said he was mid-90s. Guy goes to a lot of Tennessee games, liked him a lot better than Veal or Samardz.

Isn't it almost a given that he'll have to switch positions? I might have Craig wrong here (he might think Flaherty has a chance to stay at SS) but I think the question is more of will he give up SS already or will they give him one more shot. Yup, I think it's "almost a given", based both on pre-draft scouting and on Boise errors. Probably a question when, not if, he'll move. But the discussion was placement for next year. Cal has him listed at SS, so while I think an eventual move is almost certain and a move by next spring is perhaps likely, it's not a given that he'll be moved by next spring. I do think that sometimes the BA scouting reports are wrong, or differ from what a particular organization thinks is possible defensively. Or what I think is sometimes wrong. I didn't think Theriot could play SS; Lou thought he could, and he's OK. When the Cubs drafted Khalil Greene, the BA reports seemed to be very clear that Greene wouldn't play big-league SS; whaddya know he not only plays SS but fields it very well. So perhaps there's an outside chance that Cubs see Flaherty differently and more accurately than BA, and think that he may be able to make it as a big-league SS. Again, I don't think it's at all likely, either that he will be a satisfactory defensive SS or that the Cubs expect him to be. But I think that sometimes taller infielders get underrated defensively. They don't look as quick but may sometimes cover as much ground. And scouts see so many tallish amateur SS's who end up outgrowing the position that they may assume it will happen to everybody. So I'm not sure there isn't a 1% chance that perhaps Flaherty will stick. Last, even if BA and 29 other teams are convinced, that doesn't mean the Cubs are. If the Cubs did think he might have a shot at SS, that possibility might place him a little higher on their draft board than would be true for most other teams.

Looks good. Finesse: 1) I'd add Ascanio, if no surgery. 2) While I'd like Samardz back in rotation, prepping to replace Marquis or whomever gets injured (whichever comes first), I expect Lou to claim him for bullpen. 3) I strongly anticipate Veal's rotation days are over. I think he's at the stage where they'll try to groom him for his eventual role as a Loogy. I hypothesize that will happen in AFL and is the reason for his assignment there. 4) This isn't to your point, but assuming no Samardz, I'd project Cardidad as the best rotation prospect on the staff, better prospect than Atkins, or fillers like Mathes. Obviously a comparably weak and thin-on-real-prospects roster as applies at current Daytona. Key questions involve perhaps the three best prospects on your list: 1) Will Castillo repeat or promote? I hope he repeats, he's got time and I want him really ready. But assuming the Cubs keep Blanco, next year might be his last, so they might want Castillo at AAA next year ready to step in as backup Catcher in 010. 2) Jackson: I'd keep him at Daytona, myself, and tentatively project the Cubs will do so as well. The kid's only 20, and has only compiled 41 innings in A-ball. If he dominates in a playoff game or two, and rocks in camp, maybe AA. But I'd guess that his success has been sufficiently brief that he may not pick right up next spring, and they may want to see how he looks at Daytona next spring, and promote only if/when he shows he can sustain the effectiveness he's had this year. 3) Maestri: Rotation or relief? I'd like to see him stay in rotation, myself. I think the system is short on rotation pitchers (assuming Guzman, Samardz, and Cashner are all destined for relief). So with Marquis one year and Lilly two, I think there may be opening for a nondominant back-of-roation starter. I'd like to keep Maestri in that pool. As always, what gives in A-ball is very hard to predict. But I agree with some of the key questions: 1) Cashner start or relieve, Peoria or Daytona? Hope he starts, and hope he earns Daytona. But he'll need to make a lot of improvements relative to present wildman to justify. 2) Flaherty: stay at SS or position switched? Peoria or Daytona?

9 days.

I'm actually still somewhat interested in Barney. The saber guys suggest he's hit in some bad luck. The following suggests that his luck-adjusted average should be .287, with a .340 OBP. http://www.minorleaguesplits.com/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?pl=446381 That's not great either, obviously. And with 19 errors, it's not like he's a gold glove defensively. But if he'd be hitting .287 with a good OBP and very hard to K in A+ first year pro, I wouldn't consider that bad for a potential good-glove middle infielder. I think he's got a shot to be a Theriot-style player. Not likely to hit as well, but an alert hustler with little power but who K's so little that he can hit for decent average. Obviously most guys who hope to be Theriot-style guys don't end up as successful, but Barney's got a shot. Surprised to see Veal in there. Obviously he's a wildman who needs all the experience he can get, and perhaps needs any hope that he can that a new pitching coach can somehow find something to help him out. But very, very rare to have a guy with 140 innings absorb even more innings. I may be just imagining, but I'm going to hypothesize that they've given him his starting innings, that AFL will be his introduction to his permanent conversion to relief. Time to do what he can to blossom into a passable Loogy. The other thing, I suppose, is showcasing for trade. Berg and Veal can look like pretty-good-stuff guys at times. If they were to happen to put together a few good innings in AFL, which crawls with scouts, maybe they could trick some other team into overvaluing them?

http://www.minorleaguesplits.com/cgi-bin/org.cgi?org=Chc Is a nice site for finding minor league splits and stats stuff. They do have a park adjustment, and a "luck" adjustment. By their stats, Rosa has been a modest beneficiary from his park, and has been a strong benefiary of good luck. They calculate his actual OPS to be about 50 points too high. http://www.minorleaguesplits.com/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?pl=489266

If I believed he was really 22, I'd have him on my top-ten list for sure. For a guy with his fastball and his anti-walk control to be doing what he's doing in AA with so little previous experience, that would be definitely top-10 stuff. Maybe it's true, and it will be yet another happy surprise. (Haven't we had an endless supply of pleasant surprised this year?) But I can't ever remember a time when a guy had two ages listed when the younger age was actually correct, except when lying older enabled a 14- or 15-year old to sign sooner, which doesn't appear to apply here. I'd assume baseballcube and minorleaguebaseball.com get their info from the bulk official mlb player databank, which is less likely to have it wrong. But I suppose transcription errors can turn up anywhere.

Jeff Beliveau seems to be something of a lightweight Rich Hill. Beliveua is at 43K/25BB/30IP. Remarkable, but not quite up to the 50K/39BB/29innings Hill had at Peoria during his second pro season.

Cashner with 2.0 WHIP for the night, his second best outing. That's an improvement, since his WHIP has been up around 3 overall. Kind of a puzzle that he's been so easy to hit. I figured he'd be wild and have too many walks, but I'd assumed his stuff would be hard to hit. But he's allowed more hits than innings in four of his five Boise outings. I imagine his control is so extremely lousy that he probably needs to just throw fastballs down the middle to keep from walking everybody. I guess even in NWL guys can get hit 95 mph fastballs if they are down the middle. Kind of disappointing, but o well. Hopefully it will gradually or abruptly get better, sooner or later.

Caridad with another excellent outing. That guy has really come on over the year, and has been consistently pitching deep, solid games without many walks. I'm guessing he has a very good fastball. A lot of guys need to nibble, or else they'll get hit pretty hard, they need to paint corners. To pitch as effectively as he does without walking guys, either his command is quite good (iffy), or else his stuff is so good that he doesn't need to locate it that great. That's my guess, regarding his fastball. If he had a real good breaking ball, he'd have more K's. So my guess is that he's got a high-level fastball, and an unrefined but developing breaking ball. Given that he's 24, nobody's going to think what he's doing is worth much relative to his age. But given how little pitching experience he has, perhaps he has more improvement left than a 24-year-old with 400+ college/pro innings behind him. Dark horse for cracking the top-10.

I agree with that, I expect that if Hendry could well be interested in moving Marquis and replace him with Marshall. Why might they try to trade Marquis? I can think of several possible scenarios. 1. They need money to stay under budget while at the same time buying outside talent. Comment: If this is the reason, then they'd only be able to trade him if somebody else takes on much or all of his contract. If you have to eat much of his contract, or accept a comparable contract in return that you maybe don't really have any use for, the motive will be unfulfilled. 2. They need money to afford to retain Edmonds, Johnson, and/or Blanco. Same logic as above, will only happen if a trade really does help them dollar-wise. 3. They simply want to have Marshall in, either because he's a 2nd lefty, or they just think he's better, or whatever. No financial motivation. Comment: IN this case, a dump trade, in which we pay much/most of his salary, could make sense. Obviously it will be much easier to move Marquis if the receiving team is paying $2-5 instead of $10 on him. Or if the bad salary that we get back in exchange is a reliever/reserve type guy, rather than a guy who's accustomed to starting and will have attitude problems being used little. 4. See idea three, only with Samardz as the guy they want to replace him with. 5. The motive isn't about money, or about upgrading the staff. But the motive is that they can get somebody they think will be helpful. A lefty reliever? A RH reliever to take the role Howry was intended to fill? If Edmonds is going to cost too much to retain on the short contract we'd like, perhaps a LH CFer assuming that Pie really isn't a big-league player. It's an old idea, but Marquis for Crisp, for example. 6. The motive isn't about money, but about attitude. Not sure there'd be any such motive, but it's possible that Marquis isn't the most coachable and enjoyable guy to have around. Not likely, but you never know. Summary: Some of those motives might apply, but will anybody trade for him such that our motive is satisfied? Can you get somebody back who would help us more than Marquis? (Motive 5) Can you get somebody to make a trade such that they are taking on significant boost in salary and we are getting significant payroll relief? (Motives 1 and 2)? Very questionable. In the absence of finding an eager trade partner, I expect they'll keep him. Pitchers get injured, even if Cubs have been spared this year and last. If you dump Marquis, then Marshall, Rich Hill, and Samardzija stand as pitchers 5, 6, and 7 in whichever order. Assuming that Hill is wildman, and that they want Samardz in relief, they may not want to go so thin on rotation pitching. I'd think it would be much easier, if nobody will make a good trade for Marquis, to just keep him. Keep Marshall as an emergency/utility pitcher. Hope that Hill comes back, but if he does it's a surprise treat, not something that you need. Be free to let Samardz polish his rotation pitching in Iowa, or to reinforce a hard-throwing bullpen (Wood, Marquis, Sam, Guzman could give you some pretty good velocity, and with Gaudin might be a real force.) Unless he's really a clubhouse cancer (which I don't think is true and have no reason to suspect), and unless there is more market for the man than I expect, I think he's back.

Wow, my negative Veal comments must have done the trick!

That's possible, I suppose. But man, I hope we've got ten guys more promising than Veal. If he's one of our top ten, that would speak more to the weakness of the farm than to the quality of Veal. Hard to be very interested in a prospect with bad numbers across the board. His WHIP is awful (1.51), his HR's allowed are awful (15 HR in the anti-HR Southern League), his K's are mediocre and continue to decline, his ERA is high, and his FIP-ERA is worse. He'll turn 24 in a couple of weeks, so age is not in his favor. And there is nothing to indicate that he's really getting any better. He's had the same problems that he's always had (high walks, high HR), with no sign of anything getting better. (He does get more groundouts than he used to, but his one signature, the ability to K guys, has vanished.) I think he's still got a shot to eventually blossom into a Felix-Heredia type lefty reliever, though.

Interesting to read. One of the details of interest was that the Cubs not only paid him big but were considering drafting him as high as the 3rd. One might ask that if he's been so baseball-obsessed, that perhaps despite his age he won't improve all that much physically. For all his heart, will he be up to it physically? He's shown little power at bat. But guys who can hit the ball on the nose, who have a great eye, and who have great instincts and do everything to improve, those are fun prospects to cheer for. Would be wonderful if he turned into a Fontenot or Giles as a hitter, and proved to be a smart, jazzy catcher.

Obviously badnews is trying to balance potentially excess enthusiasm. But I think his point does have considerable merit: there are lots of guys who put up impressive numbers in the Northwest League, who don't produce in full-season. The leagues get a lot harder, and if you don't improve you can drop your numbers pretty severely. Vitters looks really good now. The combination of his age, and his contact rate, and his projectible power, and the enthusiastic scouting reports, those all look very very favorable. But he'll need to get better. I assume that young guys will improve, and probably do so more than older guys. Vitters seems to have the scouting and the contact skill and the power potential that he could improve a bunch. But he'll need to, it doesn't always happen. Corey never really improved from age 19 on. harvey, he was young enough that improvement seemed reasonable to expect, but it never happened. Donnie Veal, he seemed young enough to improve further after his big A season, but he didn't. When Pie was excelling in AA, and was so young, I assumed he'd improve. But he hasn't, really. If Vitters just stays the same, his numbers in full-season will probably depress big-time, and etc. with each successive promotion. He'll need to keep improving. That seems very possible, but time will tell.

On Colvin, agree, more questions than answers. But it certainly is encouraging that he's kicked it in so dramatically this month. I see 4 major differences post-break/August vs pre-break, most of which have been mentioned. 1. Walks are down. His performance as a walk-taker was rather temporary. 2. K's are down. 21% pre-break, 14% post-break, <13% in August. (Last year he was >20%.) If the real guy could sustain a K-rate below 15%, that would pretty good. 3. More hits in August. When you K less and HR more, that tends to happen even apart from changes in LD or BABIP. 4. Slugging is way up. Pre-break .380; post break .562; August .709. Last year, .488. Slugging at .562 or better, that's huge slugging output. (Soriano, for example, has never exceeded .560). If he can K little, and slug much, he's going to be a major leaguer even without good IsoD. It's natural for us, who have been so concerned with his abysmal IsoD, to focus on changes he's made there. But sometimes there are other factors. A poster on my other board talked to Fleita a couple weeks ago, shortly before Colvin had a 2-HR game, and was told that Colvin has changed/adjusted his batting stance. I got the impression that this was about the time that he started to take off. This guy's info was direct from Oneri, so I think that's pretty trustworthy info. Another poster is friends with a Baltimore scout, who said that Colvin had been instructed to work on the discipline aspect. But that at some point this summer, supposedly the Cubs released him from that priority. According to this source, they wanted to let him relax and just hit away for now, but will supposedly push it again next spring. Not sure how informed a Baltimore scout would be, but interesting and plausible. The first guy I mentioned has been to dozens of Smokies games this year, and last year. He said that Colvin looked tentative for much of this season while he wasn't doing anything, but that now he looks more relaxed and decisive in the box, more like he looked last year. Obviously this is a hot spell, it won't last. But I'd project that Colvin's turn may combine the change in stance, some renewed confidence that came with getting some hits and XBH, being less inhibited and more relaxed in letting his swing fly (without the take-walks focus). But it may also be that while the period of trying to be more selective has not resulted in continuous walks, it may be that he has improved at recognizing and laying off of bad balls. Plus, even if he isn't walking much, it may be that he is showing much improved pitch recognition and plate discipline. Perhaps he is much improved at swinging at strikes; but if he's hitting the strikes now, as opposed to missing them or fouling them in June, maybe he's less likely to get to deep counts? When Colvin was drafted, he was never really presented as a power hitter. But I'm hopeful that when it plays out, he'll make it more as a power guy than as an IsoD guy. 14 HR at 22 in a pitchers league during a struggle season, 38% of hits for extras, and a frame that may never be more than slender but could conceivable still add some muscle, I think it's possible that he'll be a .200+ Iso-P guy down the road. If he hits 12 HR's a year, it will be tough to be good. But if he could be more of a 20-HR guy (or better), and can keep his K's down, he could be pretty useful. Walks are a valuable end in themselves, of that I have no doubt. But at present Colvin is getting so many hits and power hits with so few K's, it's hard to think his plate discipline isn't pretty acceptable for now. If he was flailing at all kinds of bouncing sliders, I'd assume the K's would be worse and the slugging less.

I agree with Philly, I think they will stay with essentially the same team, minor tinkering. For three reasons. First, if they cruise into the playoffs, but lose a well-played series to a good team who happens to outplay them, I'm not sure that would necessitate much shakeup. Especially if it's a cornerstone guys who lose it for you. If Zambrano loses two games in a short series, ior if Ramirez and Soto don't get any RBI's in a losing series, it's not like we'll be looking to shake things up and replace them. 2nd, money. It was estimated elsewhere that even without Johnson, Edmonds, and Blanco, that if we want to retain Dempster and Wood, we'll be up around $140 for next year. And if we spend anything to retain or replaced Johnson, Edmonds, Blanco, Howry, and Eyre, we could be pushing $150. We've got a lot of players who are worth retaining, and a lot of guys who are stable via established and inflating contracts. Barring a Steinbrenner-like owner, it's hard to imagine spending even more to add outside salaried guys. 3rd, we don't really need much. Soto, DeRosa, Theriot, Aram, Soriano, those guys have been very productive over the season. No matter what happens in a short series, they won't be replaced. Lee has been pretty good, and has a substantial contract, nothing happening there. Fukudome has a big guaranteed contract, not likely they'll be replacing him either. This isn't like the team last year, where obviously CF and RF were black holes. Or like the 03 Cubs where obviously you wanted to replace Estes. For rotation, Z, Harden, Lilly, and Dempster have all been very good. No matter what might happen in a short series, they won't be looking to shake them up. So basically Marquis and CF are the only starting spots that seem very open. All the other spots have guys who either look to be long-term fixtures (Soto, Theriot, Soriano, etc..), or else are safe via guaranteed and perhaps multiyear contracts (Lee, Fukudome). Marquis, I could see trying to move him and his salary. But even if they do, they'd likely look inside for replacement (Marshall or Samardzija), rather than spending big after Sabbathia or sheets. For CF, I'd think the ideal would be to bring Johnson back for sure (even if Pie did emerge, he absolutely needs a platoon), but hopefully Edmonds at a short-term deal that doesn't cost too much. I'd think that if Edmonds was on a one-year, or a deal with 2nd-year option, they'd like that. If Pie blossoms and Edmonds flops, Pie would get his chance. If Pie stinks, and Edmonds hits great again, you'd be glad. But that might depend on whether we can afford what Edmonds/Johnson would want. A 4th factor, there don't really appear to be any attitude or effort or style guys that need to be replaced or shaken up. By all accounts it's a very good clubhouse. Maybe we wish Soriano wouldn't hack and hope and pose so much, but he's going nowhere. Last year we weren't that good, but Fukudome was the only noteworthy offseason move, and dumping Jones while committing (again) to Pie. So even the failure to win everything in the playoffs doesn't necessitate large-scale change. So I suspect that if we cruise into the playoffs, and lose a short playoff series to a good team, I don't think that would necessitate much shakeup. Basically I think it will be status quo, with farmboys (Pie, Samardz, Guzman, and also Marshall) in line to try to potentially replace some of the expiring contracts.

Yes, but not really. There's loopholes abound to get Hoffpauir on the playoff roster if we want him there. No. Anybody on the roster at end of August is straightforward eligible. That includes not only guys on the active 25-man roster, but also guys on one of the DL's. (Chad Fox, Jon Lieber, and Angel Guzman are three who come to mind. Is there anybody else who is on DL?) So basically the 25-man guys and the DL guys provide a pool who can be directly activated. That's 28 guys. But the DL'd guys provided an indirect way for basically anybody else they want to be selected. If one of the above 28 guys is on the DL when a playoff series starts, anybody can replace him, not just one of those 28. So if Chad Fox is on the DL, it doesn't have to be one of those 28. It could be Hoffpauir or anybody else you like. If they wanted to replace Fox with Vitters or Cashner or Matt Cerda or anybody less ridiculous that you can imagine, they could. So Fox's spot provides one totally free spot. I assume that if they actually have two guys they wanted to activate, they'd have little trouble DL'ing Lieber and his perpetually sore foot and replacing him too.

I agree he's got some interest, for reasons that you and others have mentioned. But nobody has mentioned his biggest statistical problem: he's a HR guy. 22 HR's in 152 IP this year, 19HR/141 innings last year. That's pretty high. But he's got a chance to see some major-league time, certainly. And he's young enough that he might get somewhat better still. Not sure he's got enough prospect zing to be much of a trade chip at present, though.