davell

Until July 2nd of next year, a team can still go crazt and spend whatever they want to spend on IFA.

If, and to me, it's a very big IF, we miss out on Darvish and Prince, we have 2 options as far as I'm concerned: Piece together a possible division winner by adding guys like Beltran, Kuroda, and Edwin Jackson, trading for the best 1B we can OR we can trade Garza, Marmol, Soto, and Marshall for young talent and sign Soler and as much else that's left from the IFA as humanly possible. What I don't want to happen is us adding Carlos Pena on a 2 or 3 year deal, signing Joe Saunders and maybe Jeff Francis to the rotation and call it an offseason. Because that puts us squarely right back in the 70 win area again most likely.

If we truly want Prince, we'll go get him. There is nothing coming out in the media, whether it's from the Cubs or not, that I'm going to believe. It's just how Theo operates.

I don't expect Fielder to sign before the Darvish announcement. Nor do I actually think any of the front offices that are in on Darvish actually know whether or not they have won the bid for him. And then, with next week being right around the corner from Christmas, I see the Fielder saga dragging into early January possibly. Holding up quite a few plans, from more teams than just the Cubs. It just seems like an extremely late developing offseason and with Spring Training coming up, I can see agents waiting things out, possibly getting a team to ante up more, just so they'll have their roster set quicker, heading towards the season. Prince and Edwin Jackson look to me, to be the big beneficiaries here.

Good question. I'm sure there's a rule somewhere for it, but with teams placing bids down to the penny, odds are ridiculously low it'd ever happen. My guess is the team receiving the bids would allow the player to negotiate with both teams.

There's plenty of chatter this morning that the Blue Jays have won the bidding process. The New York Post is citing "multiple" sources, yet none are named and the word "probably" was used in front of "have won". Jom bowden has said he's heard the same thing. NYP mentions no number has been attached to Cubs bid yet. I'd post links, but on my cell. Still, a non story? I've thought all along the Jays would get him, but I can't help but still have some optimism here.

I am starting to think Castillo is a future starter in the majors. Utterly average starter, but a starter nonetheless. 30 mill though? Not close. Cespedes? Damn right, I'd do it. Because the potential is supposedly there for much more than a very average player. 60 mill? Now that's a risk. The scout you're listening to on that one is putting his job on the line. I'd take the strength in numbers approach personally. I'd take Soler and quite a few other IFA over just getting Cespedes. Yeah, he's not going to help immediately, as Cespedes probably will, but he may be just as talented and we could add quite a huge group of bigtime young talent to go along with him. For less than Cespedes alone. Go ahead and let the Marlins spend big on him, because they WILL be driving the price way up.

The other Cubans available that I'm aware of are the 19 year old lefty pitcher, Geraldo Concepcion. He was Cuban ROY this past season. 3.36 ERA and 53 K's in 101 innings. Armando Rivero is a 23 year old RP and Henry Urrutia is a switch hitting OFer. I know nothing about them at all. There's also Anelkis Garcia Speck, the 22 year old lefty pitcher we were supposedly considering drafting last year in the 1st round. But he was taken out of the draft as quickly as he was put in. I think he had falsified his residence to get quicker signing status or something like that. At any rate, he's still unsigned as well, although it's possible he's not even eligible as of now, for all I know. But he was a guy looking for 15 mill or so.

For what it's worth, Jorge Soler, the 19 year Cuban OF is expected to get over 20 mill himself. Jim Callis compared him to Bubba Starling in a way. Further along though, but probably winds up in RF, even though he has speed. Callis said he'll be ranked somewhere in the 11 to 20 range in their top 100. So, he'd immediately become our top prospect basically. Worth 20 mill? I say yes, since he can still sign a major league deal and adding a guy with this type of talent amps the system up quite a bit. In my mind, he's more important of a "get" for us than Cespedes is.

The answer to your 1st question is as long as guys sign before July 2nd of next year, they are exempt from the IFA signing budget. This includes Jorge Soler and all unsigned Latin American prospects that didn't sign earlier in the year. Same thing with Pac Rim guys, other Cubans. Everyone. Answer to your 2nd question is Cubans 23 or older are exempt from the IFA spending limits as well. What I hope this means for the Cubs is spending bigtime on what's left out there. Soler, Concepcion, and the 4 or 5 big bonus Latin Americans that I know haven't signed yet.

Knobler just tweeted Ham Fighters are expected to accept bid right before Tuesday deadline. I guess this probably means we aren't going to hear anything until then now. Why the hell would they wait?

I think this has bombshell written all over it personally. From whoever he sold to, to the NFL's drug testing system being a complete sham. Plus, as soon as the first batch of names come out, those guys may very well implicate more and so on. Don't get me wrong, it probably won't affect business for the NFL at all, but it'll be funny watching ESPN trying their best to NOT cover something football related.

I think it means we know whether or not we won out on Darvish. If we lose, I think we'd still go after Fielder, perhaps with a little more invested in it. If it we win on Darvish, I think we probably still go after Prince, but maybe try and get him closer to our terms. Shorter term, media marketing dream, blah, blah, blah.

I can't believe how much play this is getting. We were also connected to Buehrle, Bruce Chen, Capuano, and Harang. We didn't sign those guys and we're not going to sign Crisp either.

If he sucks, his name takes care of all anyone needs to say.

Stolen from a PSD guy..... Dempster: Coach, who's pitching tomorrow? Sveum: Yu Dempster: But, I jus threw yesterday Sveum: No, not you, Yu! Yu should already know that by now Dempster: Why should I know that? Sveum: You shouldn't know that. Yu should know that! Dempster: Who, me? Sveum: No, not you. Yu!

I understand the thinking, I really do. But I think signing a FA WR could go terribly wrong. You're looking at $25Mil guaranteed and about $50Mil over 5 years for any of those 3 WRs. D Jackson clearly has some issues, whether team, production or character related. V Jackson is going to be 29 and has had some off field issues along with contract disputes. Bowe is young, but he's disappeared for games at a time or seasons at a time in 2009. He's had several games with 3 or fewer catches. He's had several games under 35 yards. Obviously with a draft pick you take some risk too, but not a $25Mil guaranteed risk. Plus, it's not like the offense is in do-or-die mode. Very young nucleus on offense all around. Improved greatly this year without a top talent at WR (when Cutler was healthy). They have time to develop a WR. As for the OL, I think everyone would love the Bears to go out and sign a very good offensive lineman. But I don't think that's realistic. If they were going to sign someone, they would have done it this offseason. Now, they finally have some young talent on the OL. Webb has been greatly improved this year. He's 23, they aren't going to toss him aside. Chris Williams was playing like a top 5-10 OG in the league before he went down. His first year starting at LG from day 1. Carimi isn't going anywhere anytime soon. Lance Louis has struggled recently at RT, but there's no reason he can't still have a strong future at RG. And at C you have both Garza and Spencer under contract. I think you could see a Peter Konz (Carimi's UW roommate) or a mid-to-late round OL picked up, but I don't think the Bears will spend at the position, considering they have 7 players (including Edwin Williams) who have played at a decent level at some point on the OL this season. I'm OK with how the line showed progress on an individual level. Webb, Louis, and Williams all showed some semblance of improvement. Adding Carimi to the mix is kind of like having an extra 1st next year. I'm not expecting a star to be added here, but a starter, who may be capable of playing both guard and tackle. On the WR note, I'll just disagree about having time to develop one. Our offense needs to be firing next year on all cylinders. Because our D's window is closing, even if we draft heavily there most likely. Just as we're seeing with the Cubs, these WR's all have some sort of flaws. But they also have been bigtime producers and would certainly make teams gameplan differently against us. I honestly think it should be our one "must have" through FA. We've certainly got the cash to do it anyway. To me, it's time to take a risk or two.

Nothing on Darvish, but in that thread over on PSD, the insider menttioned we're willing to pay 80% of Z's deal and can't get a sniff.

Theo and Jed have both said they've talked to just about every free agent there is. Reason being they don't want someone thinking they're a second, third or fourth choice, if it comes down to it. If an agent wants to use us as someone who's checked in on someone to the media, who cares? Our guys are thorough, probably a few traits out there that could be considered worse.

His stats look solid. He's probably a better option than Barney. A sign and trade with the Yankees? Kind of interesting, but I wouldn't reimberse them any money, nor would I give them much of a return whatsoever.

Definitely possible. A Garza/Darvish combo would be pretty solid. But, I could see where Theo would want to offset some of Darvish' cost, trade Garza, and get more cost effective guys in return. Including another potential ace type. Maybe put some of that saved money into Fielder or somewhere else. My honest guess though, is he just wants them as a 1-2 combo.

It's highest bid. For what it's worth, PSD insider has heard varying reports, nothing concrete. Personally, he's not a fan and if bidding is 50 mill plus, hopes we don't win. Thinks he's a diva and may only have 2 major league pitches.

My honest guess is we WILL sign another OF. But, it won't happen until we know whether or not we're able to land Cespedes.

Heyman tweeted the rumor of at least one bid in excess of 50 mill.

A lineup of DeJesus, Crisp, Castro, Loney, Stewart, Byrd, Soto, and Barney would be laughably bad. That said, it's just not happening.