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Fontenot hasn't come out of nowhere. His minor league numbers have always indicated he could hit. Why it took the Cubs this long to bring him up is a mystery to me. Fontenot has come out of nowhere. There are plenty of minor league players that hit well and still aren't considered good prospects or able to adjust to the majors. I don't seem to recall Fontenot in the top 10 of any prospect lists recently or reading in any reputable publication that he was MLB material (Certainly he has had his supporters on this board, and Kudos to them). Great to see him having a break out year, and taking advantage of his opportunities. He's not a top ten prospect and it's not likely that he's going to be a star that would warrant recognition on prospect lists. But his MiLB numbers have shown that he has an ability to contribute offensively. A 2B with an .800 OPS in 2 years at AAA should have been given a long hard look to start for this team coming into this year. But instead we went out and spent valuable $ on DeRosa (I'm not saying he's terrible, but does is value to the team justify the difference in cost?). But no, Fontenot did not come out of nowhere. If the Cubs didn't realize that there was a very good chance that he could be successful at this level, they're idiots. But they did the same thing at 2B than they did in the OF. They didn't add difference makers with the money they spent. And they blocked guys who had a good chance to be valuable contributors at low cost. It's moves like this that waste valuable money and should have cost Hendry his job by now.

F - condescending and arrogant, but not enough so to require suicide...at this point

I swear I think a third of your all time posts are derisive of me i swear two thirds of your posts are worthy of derision. You are being a jerk and your negativity is really spoiling a light hearted thread and competition. Isn't abuck from Iowa? If so, that would explain a lot. Leave him to his misery. FTR- I lived in Iowa for most of my life, I just managed to escape. I spent most of my life there too. And there are many many many worse places to live. If nothing else, in Iowa, you can always find a good steak (or chop, for those that don't eat red meat).

The RF problem was created last year when for some stupid reason Hendry felt Jones was worth $5 million a year when the market was saying otherwise. I no longer hate Jones simply because he's just doing what many of us thought he'd do when Hendry decided he saw a superstar when the rest of us saw Jones as just mediocre. I would suck at the major league level but I'd sign a $15 million contract too if Hendry offered it to me. So I blame the managers and Hendry more for playing him than Jones for sucking which is what we knew he would do when signed. Murton should be sent down since he seems to be pressing when at Wrigley, and it's not due to lack of playing time because his numbers should be more similar whether on the road or at home if it were due to lack of playing time. He is really not any better this year than last year and I think has regressed in some areas. Hopefully, he'll go to Des Moines and work on what he needs to work on and come back to help the Cubs. Again - that doesn't solve the RF problem. If he goes back to AAA and tears it up for a few weeks, unless Jones is traded, we'll still have 4 corner OFs. Even if Jones is traded, we'll have 3 LFs. Sending Murton down doesn't solve anything. It's just the easiest way for Hendry to get rid of one of his several corner OFs.

They don't have to "convince" Floyd to be a bench player, they need to TELL him that. Floyd doesn't make playing time decisions; Lou does. Well, Lou needs to start making better ones. For all his talk, the vets get a lot of playing time.

Yes, this. I don't understand everyone saying "thankfully - finally he can go to AAA and get ABs." What? The guy earned the right to start over hacks like Floyd and Jones last year. He's 25 and just hitting his peak. He shouldn't have to go to AAA to get ABs. He should have been in LF from day 1, put him in the 2-hole, and go to work.

I wouldn't call that worst case scenario. Worst case is Murton doesn't regain his stroke, Floyd scuffles but racks up just enough service time to guarantee his option, and Jones stays. Even if Floyd is great for 2-3 weeks, his chances of reaching those goals are not great. Right, but that's not really the point. The point is this move hasn't solved anything for us, long term. And, in my opinion, makes us worse. No it hasn't solved anything longterm. But it sets the table to figure out the RF problem. They weren't going to give Murton more time until he showed something, and he's not going to show something until he plays a lot. The only spot for that to happen is AAA. I don't see how it makes them worse. They sent down their 6th OF who wasn't getting any playing time but was pretty bad whenever he did play. Figure out the RF problem? What do you think they're going to do? They're going to play JJ until someone, anyone, takes him in a trade, and then they're going to play Floyd. That doesn't really solve the problem. Neither of them should be starting. And by worse, I mean you take away a 25-year-old with the ability to put up a .365 OBP and .800 OPS and replace him with a has been and a terrible player. In the short term, it might be fine. But Murton, if given regular ABs and just put in LF (Soriano in RF is the obvious step here, at least give it a try) could easily have improved. He's 25 frickin years old. Was last year a fluke? Maybe. But that's the kind of year that most teams would love to have from a guy that's basically a rookie and it's the kind of year that would earn you the right to lose your spot the next year. So instead of letting Murton face ML hitters and see if he couldn't improve as he hits his peak, we beat down his confidence, shake him around, make him a platoon player, move him to RF so the fans can boo him whenever he misplays a ball, and then send him to triple A so that Jacque Jones and Cliff Floyd can get more ABs. That's making a team worse.

I wouldn't call that worst case scenario. Worst case is Murton doesn't regain his stroke, Floyd scuffles but racks up just enough service time to guarantee his option, and Jones stays. Even if Floyd is great for 2-3 weeks, his chances of reaching those goals are not great. Right, but that's not really the point. The point is this move hasn't solved anything for us, long term. And, in my opinion, makes us worse.

I share your feelings, but think this is the best, for now. The key is making sure Floyd is the one playing everyday, and not Jones. Building up his trade value is not working. Trying to get him to regain his form is not working. Jacque stinks, Floyd at least stands a chance of putting up some numbers. I'm fine with letting Murton play everyday in AAA for a few weeks, get his stroke back working with Joshua, and then call him up once Hendry straightens out the Jones problem. My problem with this is - what happens if Murton kills the ball in AAA and JJ is gone in 2/3 weeks? You bring him up and platoon him with Floyd so he gets 1 or 2 starts a week? What needs to happen is give JJ to anyone that will take him, let Murton start every day and make Floyd a reserve (spot starting). Sending Murton down to AAA doesn't fix our problem b/c you still have to get rid of JJ and Floyd (or convince Floyd to be a bench player) in order to bring Murton back up. Once Murton returns he's got to play 2 out of 3 games at least. If Floyd plays everyday for the next month, he's going to be hurting big time by then, and it will be easy to sit him for Murton. I hope you're right, but there's no guarantee. Floyd could run off 2/3 good weeks himself and then Hendry going to think his long sought-after love is producing just as he thought and he'll do anything to keep him in the lineup (including keeping Murton in AAA). I know that's probably worst case scenario, but w/ Hendry, I've come to expect that kind of thing. I've known this was the likely result of Hendry's mess all season and it still pisses me off.

I share your feelings, but think this is the best, for now. The key is making sure Floyd is the one playing everyday, and not Jones. Building up his trade value is not working. Trying to get him to regain his form is not working. Jacque stinks, Floyd at least stands a chance of putting up some numbers. I'm fine with letting Murton play everyday in AAA for a few weeks, get his stroke back working with Joshua, and then call him up once Hendry straightens out the Jones problem. My problem with this is - what happens if Murton kills the ball in AAA and JJ is gone in 2/3 weeks? You bring him up and platoon him with Floyd so he gets 1 or 2 starts a week? What needs to happen is give JJ to anyone that will take him, let Murton start every day and make Floyd a reserve (spot starting). Sending Murton down to AAA doesn't fix our problem b/c you still have to get rid of JJ and Floyd (or convince Floyd to be a bench player) in order to bring Murton back up.

I don't see how anybody could possibly think it's not about the lack of consistent time. No kidding. Good track record in the minors. Good player in basically a full year in MLB. Suddenly can't find it when he's put in a platoon of sorts (a very random one, at that). Seems to me, if you're looking for a culprit, you have to at least start w/ the lack of consistent playing time, don't you? He was playing well in a platoon in July/August of last year. He played well in a platoon in July of 05. That's 3 of the best 5 months of his career in the major leagues. Murton showed consistently before this year that he could play well when he wasn't getting every at-bat. I don't see why that would suddenly change this year. His 2 best months last year were August and Sept. He had 82 ABs in August and 92 in Sept. We didn't face nearly enough LH starters in August to get him 82 ABs. He was certainly getting days off, but he was seeing a heck of a lot more playing time than he is now.

Nice.

It's a wonder the Cubs haven't developed dozens of fantastic prospects using this method. We have a good, young LF - let's acquire 2 LFs in the off season! Can never have too many LFs.

I don't see how anybody could possibly think it's not about the lack of consistent time. No kidding. Good track record in the minors. Good player in basically a full year in MLB. Suddenly can't find it when he's put in a platoon of sorts (a very random one, at that). Seems to me, if you're looking for a culprit, you have to at least start w/ the lack of consistent playing time, don't you?

Wolf should have ran and flaunted that avatar. Likewise, I think OMC is costing himself votes in his poll by not going back to a rotation of his "girls of Ole Miss" sigs.

If CardsFan had borrowed Wolf's avatar, he probably would have a few more votes.

12 team 5x5 roto, had 1st overall pick (autopick): C - McCann 1B - Pujols 2B - Kendrick SS - HRam 3B - Ensberg OF - Markakis, Burke, Alou Util - DLee B - Gomes, O Hudson, Inge, Shealy, Murton SP - Webb, Bondy, Sheets, Haren, Scott Olsen RP - Jenks, Howry (In my defense, I only ranked about 150 players and my last 6 picks were all dropped almost immediately) But became: C- McCann 1B - Fielder 2B - Kendrick SS - HRam 3B - M Cabrera (acquired for Pujols) OF - Swisher, Upton, Markakis Util - DLee B - Willits, Nady, Pie, Guillen, Delmon Young SP - Webb, Haren, Sheets, Bondy, Hamels RP - Jenks, Paps (also acquired for Pujols) DL - Myers

To think, before this post, I was going to support you to the end...

http://i98.photobucket.com/albums/l273/jnelson_21/NDvUM.jpg http://i98.photobucket.com/albums/l273/jnelson_21/NDvUMboard.jpg

I do not look forward to getting beat by you tomorrow Andy. It's funny it's LSU fan vs. N.D. fan. Too bad your team can't beat mine. :lol: Are we tomorrow already? I thought I was a 6 seed. (ETA: I guess not. Didn't realize I was ahead of so many) I wouldn't count yourself out yet. I've been known to ruffle feathers before. I won't pretend that the fact of this tournament being in June rather than, say, September doesn't help though. :D If you weren't facing an LSU fan, turning your back on the Irish would be enough to lose my vote.

funny how when murton can't hit for beans, everyone says it's because he's not getting regular playing time... when jones can't hit, it's because he flat-out sucks. You know that's a BS comparison. Murton has 1 season in the majors and put up very solid numbers, especially his .365 OBP, which this team really needs. Oh, and he's young. JJ has 7.5 seasons in the majors before this year and was really good like once, solid a couple times, and sucked a lot of the time. And Murton's starts have been much more sporadic than JJ's. JJ has started regularly lately as Hendry is trying to show off the goods for sale. Unfortunately, by letting him play, his stock is only dropping.

If my catcher was calling my game with an almost 8 run average, the very least thing i would do would be to punch him in the face and send him to the hospital. Another great reason to hate Barrett, besides defensively sucking and a craptacular .246/.303 performance. You don't think Z shakes guys off and throws whatever the hell he wants at this point?

So you'd take the guy who drives in fewer runs, and scores fewer runs (if the preferred OBP is lower, and his HR are lower, he will score less) all because you don't like the average? This makes no sense. What makes no sense is you seem to think a players OBP and HR totals a mainly tied to their runs scored production. You can have lower OBP and HR's and still score a truck load of runs. The point is you specifically said you would prefer the player with a lower RBI total but claimed if he changed his style he'd hit more. It's nonsensical. R and RBI are team oriented. The only thing a player can do to affect his R and RBI totals are produce OBP and SLG. In his defense, 285/360/510 is better than 234/365/490. I'm not sure if that's tkenm's main point or not, and I don't agree with judging players on RBI or Rs. However, I do think a team is better off with the former numbers. It's not my main point. My main point originally was that Dunn's OBP should be higher considering the amount of walks he takes, and said if he just hit for better average instead of trying to clobber the ball, his OBP and OPS would skyrocket. I had mentioned that if he did that he'd probably score more runs and drive more RBI's in as well. Never once did I judge a player based on runs and RBI's, some people just assumed I did and the debate turned to a runs and RBI debacle. Do you think Dunn goes into every season saying, "alright, let's hit .234 again!"? It's not like he's trying to not hit for average. But he's patient at the plate. He tries to murder balls in his zone and takes ones that aren't. so he gets a lot of XBH, lots of walks, and lots of Ks. The net result is a guy with an .891 OPS. If every single player on our team took that same approach with those results, we'd score a hundred zillion runs.

I was joking about the CY's for Marshall. I hope he has a great career b/c he's a Cub, but I wouldn't necessarily predict great things. But we're not really tearing him down for not being great in his first year in the majors, are we? The kid was 23 for all but 1 month of last season. When Lilly was 23 he made 9 starts in the majors (for Montreal - and with worse numbers than Marshall last year). I have no idea who will end up with the better career, but if you're saying that Marshall's ceiling is sub-4.00 ERA, 1.07 WHIP, roughly 8 Ks/9, and 4.3 K/BB ratio (Lilly's stats today per Y!, which is better than he's been his entire career except his 100 IP for NYY and OAK in '02) - where do I sign?

This is what happens when you have Led Zeppelin and The Beatles meet in the semifinals rather than the finals. man has a point