davell

The Nats don't have a great system, but hopefully we get a couple of guys who are at least top 30 guys for them anyway.

Hey, Mark Peel. Who's Mark Peel?

Good find. I missed this segment somehow, as far as stuff to listen to and it's the one that interests me the most. I don't really disagree with how the Cubs approach Latin America. I want to see some big names signed, but trying to project 16 year olds is one of the hardest things possible to do most likely. I think it's kind of a "Moneyball" type approach in signing quantity over alleged quality. May be smart to do, but since we're not a small amrket team, I want to see some of the larger names signed as well. Listening to it right now, I'm guessing that Silva and Cabeza are going to start in Peoria......Wilken also said he'd rather have a position player than a pitcher, if it's worth it. But, he's basically a best available type guy.

I don't think Wilken would say one way or the other, if he IS planning to spend alot of money on the draft. It could cause other teams to change their strategy as well. I hate saying it, but I don't think we'll truly know what our draft plans are until we're probably 10-15 picks into the draft. As much as I want them to go ahead and say we're committed to the draft and will spend tons of money on it, I totally understand if they lay low and just show us. As for the comment about 2-3 good rounds, I kind of take that as their are that many 1st round talents available this year, which kind of seems to be the case, according to most. If the Cubs can get 2-3 1st round talents out of this draft, and add some typical "Cub" type overslots after that, I guess I'll have to consider it a success.

Found comments from a guy who was there. Lots of interesting stuff here. Some major league stuff on youngsters in here as well. Quade was asked if Cashner would be in the rotation this upcoming year and he answered excitedly "YES!" Then he caught himself and mentioned he'd be competing with the other guys. This is cool though, at least Quade sees him as a starter. About all we can ask for here. Hayden Simpson was bedridden for 3 months with mono. He's at Camp Colvin now and won't be pushed too hard at the beginning of the year. Probably means EXST, followed by a late assignment to Peoria. If it really drags, could see Boise even. LeMahieu has put on 20 pounds of muscle this offseason and it shows. Tim Buss runs the camp and there are 38 players at Fitch Park right now, with the results(starting with Colvin last year obviously) getting around, there are more players and agents asking about this and wanting to get involved. Darwin Barney has put on 18 pounds. Supposedly looks better, but not as noticeable as LeMahieu. Michael Brenly has lost 20 pounds on some sort of chicken breast diet. Colvin hasa checked in at 220. Doesn't look quite as ripped as last year, but still has a month to go, so he's got time. Very polished when asked questions evidently. Trey McNutt has been invited to big league camp this spring. First time this has been mentioned anyway. Questions on Vitters meshed together and this is what was discerned from the guy writing all of this down(did seem very knowledgable, FWIW too) Vitters problems are mostly mental. Still is taking a HS approach to baseball, instead of adjusting to the minor leagues. Still, kind of in a shell around his teammates as well. Scott Maine credited Maddux with his promotion from Tennessee to Iowa and then to Chicago last year. Mostly had to do with throwing certain pitches in certain situations and Maine listened to him. Mark Riggins said Jay Jackson was under consideration last year for a callup a couple of times and said he WOULD be called up this year. No dropoff or injury last year, it was "just baseball" according to Riggins. When asked questions, Chris Carpenter was very candid and thoughtful. Jackson evidently kind of copied Carpenter's answers, but would then make changes by the end of his response. Clearly wasn't as comfortable as Carpenter anyway. Jackson looked much better than LeMahieu though, who gave very quick, short answers and just didn't seem comfortable at all. Didn't help he came on right after Darwin Barney, who's excellent at this kind of thing. Jackson was introduced as a swing man who can either start or relieve. Riggins said Jackson's secondary pitches were all a bit more established than Cashner's when he was moved to the pen. When he's brought up, it will most likely be to fill a need, rather than prepare him for a certain role. Vine Line said that LeMahieu will be playing 2B, SS, and 3B, "whatever his body grows into". But it appeared to this guy the Cubs want him at 3B, due to the added bulk and learning to pull pitches, they just need to talk DJ into it. Seems like conjecture from the original writer here, but one we can probably all see coming, all the same. Leaning towards 3rd Base with Lake as well evidently. Nothing else mentioned with him that seemed to be from the Cubs anyway. Originally reminded this guy of Jose Hernandez and seems to think that the comparisons are getting closer actually. No word on Szczur. Cubs are in touch and don't expect a decision to be made on him for another month. Wilken says he can play a solid CF, steal bases and hit. Wilken thinks Reggie Golden should move quickly through the system. Says he has lots of power. A couple of comments implied that they seem to think of Ryan Flaherty as a potential reserve than as a atarter in the majors. Wilken predicted that wooden bats will dramatically change college baseball this season and said he expects .280 hitters going in the early rounds of the draft, with much lower home run totals. Fleita made a comment about players needing to get pushed out of their comfort zones on occasion and sometimes they get worse before they get better. Wilken admitted that Hendry told him to take lefty bats in 2009 if there was someone close to the same value in that draft. No idea if that is still being enforced now. Cubs consider Twins and Braves the premiere organizations for drafting and building players. Thinks Cincy has done an excellent job of late with drafting, same with Tampa, but wonders how they'll do without all the high picks. Also thinks Texas has done very well. Wilken said the Cubs will make EXTRA EFFORTS INTERNATIONALLY this upcoming year, to try and replace some of what was lst in the Garza deal. Excellent news here. Wilken's thumbnail sketch of 2011 draft. Lots of strong right handed pitching, lots of catchers, not a lot of middle infielders, some solid corner guys. He projected 2 or 3 "good" rounds, followed by decent depth. That's about it, but thanks to whoever it was that gave us a very detailed account of this.

The more I read on the situation(and asked Bruce on his blog) it appears as if Ricketts basically deflected this to Hendry. He said that Jim decides where to allocate the money for baseball operations and it depends on what they perceive to be the talent level available. Hendry at least said they'd be signing more and more better players at a higher rate than before, so maybe they'll show this side of things more attention. But, part of me thinks this is just lip service until I actually see it. The breakdown I did earlier in this thread shows me that the Cubs have 16-17 million left over from where they were last year as far as baseball budget goes and if they are not lying about having the same money, then this is close to what the budget will/should be for the draft and Int FA.

We've got the money coming off the books. The question is whether or not either one lasts til then without a new contract. Yes, I think we'd be players for either of them if they become available. I look for Pujols to get locked up before ST, but I do think Fielder will be out there next year. Only way he won't be is if the Brewers fall out of the race early and he gets dealt to a team that extends him before he hits FA. I think this is all very doubtful though as I think the Brewers are as good as anyone in the division this year.

I want to hear something from someone other than Hendry on this honestly. Yes, it's cool he said we'd sign better players at a rate better than we've done in the past, but I'd feel better if we heard there was a much larger commitment to this from either Wilken or Ricketts. I've been scouring sites today, but haven't found anything whatsoever from Ricketts about this. I can't believe NO ONE would be asking him about this, considering his prior comments about building the system up.....

I could see him dropping because of signability concerns. With this being as good of a draft as it appears to be, Starling and Archie Bradley both could drop, because teams will have to see a HUGE separation in talent in order to drop possibly 3-4 million MORE on one pick and eat up their budget in the process, just to keep these guys away from football. They can add 3-4 upper level talents for basically the price it COULD cost to pry these guys away from football.

One year for 3 mill. Solid deal, thought he may get half a mill more or so personally.

I guess I'll bump this, so it can be the official thread for this weekend. Evidently, Hendry and Kenney got the ceremonial "Rothschild" boo at the start tonight......

Lebron probably shouldn't be bringing up karma again anytime soon at least.

By the way, if you count Kei Igawa(4 mill, gotta go somewhere), the Yankees are spending around 40 million for their bullpen in 2011.

Since this is possibly the last year before they go to a true slotting system with picks, I'd expect quite a few teams will spend more than normal on their draft picks, in order to get a true influx of talent. Maybe the Rays spend upwards of 20 million this year? I'd say it's possible with all these picks anyway. However, it's not like in the past, where they typically have gotten their talent from the very front of the draft. Scouting will have much more to do with it this time, even though the draft appears to be great.

And on que, Grant Balfour is about to sign a multi-year deal with the A's. Their pick is protected, so the Rays will get their 2nd rounder and a supplemental 1st for him. This will give the Rays 11 picks in the first 89, according to MLBT......I don't think that includes Qualls either.

The Rays had the 24th, 32nd, 38th, 50th, 54th, and 57th picks. With the Yankees signing Soriano, you can now add the 31st pick to that. It looks like the supplemental pick for Soriano will be 40th or so as well. Somehow, the Rays can get a supplemental pick if Chad Qualls signs with another team and it looks like the Pads are about to sign him. Which leaves Grant Balfour out there, who was a Type A actually. I figure the only way another team signs him is if it's a team that's already given up their 1st and maybe their 2nd rounders as well, but anyway, who cares? The Rays look like they're going to have NINE picks in the first 65, in the best draft over the last decade. Definitely apparent now as to why they've cut payroll as much as they have, if you ask me.

Who does he go ahead of? Arroyo I could see, but the rest are right around as good as Marcum (Cueto, Z, Garza) or better (everybody else). Other than moving him ahead of Arroyo, I have no problem with where he is. Dempster and Garza should be flipped, though, and I'd put Z ahead of him as well (if for no other reason than Zs bat). I'd go: 1. Wainwright 2. Gallardo 3. Greinke 4. Carpenter – gap – 5. Dempster 6. Zambrano 7. Garza 8. Cueto 9. Marcum 10. Garcia Top 4 are pretty interchangeable. Yeah, you're right. I'd put Marcum ahead of Z, Garza, Cueto, and Arroyo, but he's definitely in that same tier even if I did put him higher and I fully admit that it's debatable as to me putting him higher than those others, which is why you said they're all in the same tier.. In the end, I guess that I'd rather try judging an overall staff differently than how this was laid out.

I like taking Austin in the 2nd personally. He's obviously got 1st round talent and my guess is he'd play hard in order to get the eventual big contract. However, I do think he's probably a guy that once he gets it, he'll let off bigtime at that point.

I think it meant he messed up in his deodorant commercial.

Latest walterfootball.com mock had some interesting movement in their latest mock. First, the Bears have Castonzo, Austin, Greg Little, and Daniel Thomas. I can live with that, nothing really new here either. But, the interesting items were Gabbert going 10th overall. Maybe the QB position isn't going to be strong enough to make teams reach this year? They also had Mallett falling OUT of the 1st round, due to character concerns. Also, gotta hand it to Raisin, now Tyron Smith is starting to show up as a mid -1st rounder on lots of mocks, including this one. Still, wonder if he doesn't beef up to 300 before the combine, if it hurts his draft stock somewhat, but hell, if he does, maybe he becomes a borderline top 10 pick? Mark Ingram lasts until the last pick of the 1st round is fairly interesting. Just because I think the NFL is more of a passing game now than it's ever been and with the committee approach in lots of places, I think we're seeing RB's devalued quite a bit as a whole. Not necessarily Ingram, just RB's should be a very solid value for teams in the 4th-7th rounds, in my opinion.

If we went the FA route with a RB, I'd like Michael Bush. That said, I think he'd be pretty expensive and we could probably spend that money more wisely than on a RB. No idea what kind of cap hit we'd take in releasing Chester either(if any, after new CBA). That said, I think it's very possible to find solid value in the middle rounds of the draft for a RB. (Obviously, since JA passed on Starks last year in the 6th)

Sam does suck. But, he's smart. And the Cubs organization, as a whole evidently, still isn't.

"In the bottom of my heart, I would probably scrape together every penny I have to pay for a chance to do this." Koyie Hill, ladies and gentlemen. He's willing to pay us to let him play.

I like this at least.

Blackmon is staying in school. With him and Floyd BOTH staying in, I doubt we'll have much of a shot at Baldwin anyway, assuming he does a solid job at the combine.