KingCubsFan

Which is better? 1. Zambrano, Lilly, Hill 2. Oswalt, Jennings, Williams

Nope. Go back and look at the actual usage. Jenks didn't become a fulltime closer until halfway through September, and even when Hermanson took over for Takatsu, Marte was used in "closer situations" far more often than an ordinary setup man. In fact, there are interviews with Kenny Williams in which he acknowledges that the club was using the bullpen in such a way, but he refused to call it "by committee" because of the negative connotations associated with it. There's a whole article about the White Sox 2005 bullpen usage in the BP archives. Marte had 4 saves the whole year. And Guillen made it very clear that, if it was all lefties, he would bring in Marte. That's a lot different than using a bullpen by committee

This never works in practice Except for the 1985 Cardinals, who had four different guys with four or more saves and none with more than 19. Except for the 2005 White Sox, who got four or more saves from four different pitchers (Hermanson, Takatsu, Jenks, Marte). From May 11 to August 24, Marte was brought in about 1 out of every 6 times a manager normally brings in his closer. From August 25 to September 13, Ozzie Guillen used three different pitchers (Jenks, Marte, and Hermanson) in save situations, with Marte getting 1 out of every 3 calls. I really don't care if one guy is called "the closer" or not. But I blame Tony Larussa for the way modern "closers" are used, only working the 9th inning in save situations. The best reliever should be used when it most benefits the team, and sometimes that would be the 8th inning or even the 7th inning if that's when the opponent's heart of the order is batting. If I had Mariano Rivera, I'd rather use him against Pujols, Edmonds, and Rolen than save him for Juan Encarnacion, Aaron Miles, and Yadier Molina. Was it Joe Buck who started preaching the idea that the last 3 outs are the toughest? If so, it's just one more reason to hate Joe Buck. I don't know much about the '85 cardinals, but the White Sox 2005 season is a poor example. Just because numerous people got saves does not mean that the relievers did not have set roles. Takatsu started out as the closer, sucked, and got pulled. Hermanson then came in, succeeded, and then got injured. Jenks followed after that. Guillen didn't just go strictly by matchups all the time. Ask the Red Sox how successful it is to not have a set closer.

This never works in practice

Not sure if this has been posted anywhere else...

S ERA 1999 CWS 69 0 0 0 67.2 58 34 27 8 38 80 5 3 28 1 6 3.59 Howry's done it before

It was quite informal, as he was wearing jeans and a t-shirt and spoke in slang. In all honesty, I think this is a matter of semantics. I'm guessing a formal trade request involves a written letter from the player and the agent with lawyers involved (so as to avoid any possible breach of contract). I remain convinced that Jones let Hendry know he wants out, and Hendry let Jones know he was willing to try to oblige, if he just remained quiet on the matter. Nothing formal need be involved. Plus, would Muskat really know anyways? Not like she's tops on Hendry's list of people in the know. I'm sure Jones let Hendry know that he'd rather play somewhere else next year, and Hendry asked Jones to keep it quiet so the Cubs had a chance at getting the most value possible for him. They're not doing a very good job of keeping it quiet considering Jacque is never mentioned as a player on the team next year, and Lou and Hendry are constantly talking about how they need a LH bat for the outfield and a CF. It's as if Jacque doesn't exist.

He hasn't played there in about 6 years, and hasn't played CF regularly for almost 10. Plus, i think he's had a lot of leg injuries

Wow. You're not biased or anything. I mean, it's not like he won a World Series. He totally caused his pitchers to have freakishly good postseasons. Saying he's a lucky version of Hendry is an overstatement. He is not a good GM, and I would not be happy if he took over for Hendry. He what? "Caused his pitchers to have freakishly good postseasons"??? Explain that one to me, because I think every GM on the planet would like to know how Kenny did that. Saying that Kenny Williams only won a WS because his pitchers had freakishly good postseasons is an overstatement as well. He traded for Contreras when nobody wanted him, stuck with Garland when everybody wanted to get rid of him, made a trade for Garcia, and signed Dye (who turned out to be the World Series MVP) early in the offseason to a ridiculously low deal. He got lucky in a lot of ways, but he should also be credited for making the moves that he did. Part of the reason his pitchers had "freakishly good postseasons" was because, talent-wise, they were capable of doing do. Williams assembled that talent, picked a manager whose coaching staff allowed that talent to develop, and watched them roll through the playoffs. A lot of luck involved, but not entirely

DePodesta? The man that brought LA its second worst season since moving the franchise there in 1958? I understand why people are intrigued by him, but he didn't exactly perform all that well in LA. To say there are no other options is pretty shortsighted. DePo won the division his first year there and got rid of some lousy contracts. Then one bad year and he is gone. He wasn't fired for performance, but for personality and others' ignorance. He was fired because his team tanked and then he couldn't hire a manager Wasn't he fired in October? It seems rather quick to pull the trigger for that reason. I don't really understand the affinity for going out and getting a manager right away, especially if you're a guy like Depo who comes from the philosophy that the manager is just a middle man. If you hire Depodesta in the first place, you have to know that he's going to do things a little different. He was unable to get good candidates for the job, apparently, and it upset McCourt

DePodesta? The man that brought LA its second worst season since moving the franchise there in 1958? I understand why people are intrigued by him, but he didn't exactly perform all that well in LA. To say there are no other options is pretty shortsighted. DePo won the division his first year there and got rid of some lousy contracts. Then one bad year and he is gone. He wasn't fired for performance, but for personality and others' ignorance. He was fired because his team tanked and then he couldn't hire a manager

DePodesta? The man that brought LA its second worst season since moving the franchise there in 1958? I understand why people are intrigued by him, but he didn't exactly perform all that well in LA. To say there are no other options is pretty shortsighted. You are correct, but you have to realize he's the one person from Moneyball currently not a GM, so a lot of people see him as the only option. If you're going to take someone just because they're affiliated with the A's organization, at least pick David Forst.

Look at Suppan's innings over the past eight years and the rest of his stats over the past four seasons. He's been the model of consistency and is not at all the gamble the other SP's have been thus far. With Suppan you know what you're getting: ~190 IP ~110K ~60 BB ~4.00 ERA 31-32 Starts ~14 wins With the Cubs, you don't know that last one to be true. Also remember that he was with the Cards. Figure in the extra year of age and the change of scenery to the northside, and standard metrics project his numbers with the Cubs in '07 to be along the lines of: ~75 IP ~35K ~60BB ~6.35 ERA ~17 starts ~5 wins ~2.5 months on the DL So you're just going to throw numbers around arbitrarily? Those are based on absolutely nothing. All of the sudden his bb/K ratio is going to flip flop? Standard metrics couldn't possibly be more wrong if this is the case. So based on this theory, or metric, would Carlos Zambrano be a 30-game winner if he joined the cards? Would he then strike out 300 hitters because he was a cardinal? Would he be twice the horse and throw more innings (300?) while staying even more healthy? Yes, yes, yes and yes

And this: http://www.stltoday.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=424640&sid=dc75bbd6b45a4f3390ddc9c4d8943239

That deal makes very little sense. I'm not sure if I understand it either. Not to mention the fact that Contreras has a no trade clause

How about Jones+40 man roster player for Church+Jon Rauch? Put Rauch in the rotation

Our only hope would be for Rothschild to work some Clement magic on Hill, Guzman and Meche if we sign him

I'd be willing to bet that happens everywhere, other teams just dont make a spectacle of it like Baker did. I'm sure Dusty trashed us all of the time, and pretty much turned the players against us. Jones does have a case though, he was treated pretty unfairly from the start. I don't know where Pierre has a reason for complaint though. When he was the worst hitter in the majors for the first two months of the season, he wasn't getting booed.

He's better than any of the 2nd tier FA's and he'll only cost 5.5M. I dont know of anyone better we could get for Jones. The gap between him and Lily or Meche isn't worth giving up Marmol for alone. I'd rather get a quality cheap bat off of the bench for Jones and keep Marmol than trade for Jennings. If Marmol's included, then they have to take Izturis off of our hands so we can sign Lugo. No offense, but I'm glad you're not our GM. You just proposed trading a reasonably-priced starter for a bench player rather than a fairly young, cheap starting pitcher who, because he makes half of what someone like Lilly will get, could theoretically allow us to sign Schmidt for the same price as Lilly + Meche. Marmol is an OK prospect, but he had horrible control issues and may end up being a reliever.

Contreras has a no trade clause, and I think Garland does too Are you sure? Cot's has nothing listed for either. Contreras: http://mlb.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/news/article.jsp?ymd=20060401&content_id=1379792&vkey=spt2006news&fext=.jsp&c_id=cws Can't find anything on Garland besides something on mlbtraderumors.com

Contreras has a no trade clause, and I think Garland does too

Starting to look like somewhere in the bowels of a backroom in Orlando, Hendry got the final word that Schmidt either wasn't interested in Chicago, or only would be if the money was incredibly high, or wanted 5 years, or whatever. I agree, *sigh* I'm starting to believe this as well. If Seattle is willing to go 4/56 or something like that, it may mean Hendry would have to do better than 4/60 to get him to come to Chicago. My feeling is Hendry doesn't believe he can land Schmidt, so he decided not to try. Or Hendry is doing his best to keep his interest in Schmidt hidden and will come out and get him under the radar. I hope it is the latter, but greatly fear it is the former. Let's assume Schmidt is not do-able for whatever reason. My question is, why haven't we heard more stories or rumors linking the Cubs and Vicente Padilla in the last 72 hours? He's certainly better than Lilly, correct? And what's the difference between paying 4 years and $38M for Lilly and 4 years and $44M for Padilla? Hendry must be infatuated with this lefty thing - only explanation I can think of unless Padilla is asking for more than $11M per year or is asking for 5 or 6 year contract duration. Barring those, I see no good reason to sign Lilly without taking a shot at signing Padilla. JMO. Hoops Please explain how Padilla is "certainly" better than Lilly

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Jones: Injured Brownlie: Injured Blasko: Injured Hagerty: Injured Petrick: Injured Christensen: Injured The only one without a major injury on that list is Ryu. All those players had good stuff and put up good numbers at some point in their minor league career (except maybe Brownlie). At the time, I don't think it was a stretch to say that each of them were good pitching prospects. Ryu did have a major injury. Missed about a year and a half, and still hasn't regained full velocity. You sure about that? I thought he just had some elbow problems that sidelined him for part of a year a few years back

Murton most likely, who I would not want to part with. Beane probably looks at our farm system and laughs. He shouldn't be laughing. His isn't very good either