KingCubsFan

I have to think that with the rash of age-related discrepancies that came out a few years ago, most of the guy playing under an assumed age have been corrected. It's kind of like with steroids - there was a huge crackdown on it, a bunch of players got caught, and now most of it has been cleared up. Pujols is so high profile and finding out he's older than he says would be such a big story that I'd think if there were anything to the rumors, there'd be more than just rumors at this point. Don't most of the discoveries come after the player is coming back from his home country in the offseason? Pujols' whole family came here when he was young, and now he's a US citizen.

No way they'd do it. Garza is good, but he's probably not worth a top 5 prospect.

The Cubs should. Neither one of those guys are impact players, just good, cheap players. If you're trading Garza, you'd want to get at least one guy that has the potential to be an All-Star.

That doesn't seem right. A bad week and a half at the beginning of the season won't knock almost 100 points off your OPS. Regardless, my concern is due more to the 40 walk dropoff.

So do you attribute this year's poor performance (by Pujols' standards, of course) to bad luck, as opposed to a sign of a sustained age-induced decline?

So you'd prefer to keep our 24 year old starter with mediocre stuff who just got rocked in AAA for a 22 year old middle infielder with good AAA numbers?

Dempster's been worth every cent we've paid him, and the two pitchers could not have had more different career arcs at their respective age 30 seasons, but otherwise, this post is spot-on. Not sure that he's been "worth every cent," but overall he's been pretty solid and certainly isn't an albatross contract.

I agree if he could play right field (which I think he could). I think right field is the most important outfield position defensively at Wrigley.

This idea is intriguing. Especially since Theo knows the Red Sox inside out, perhaps this would be a possible destination for Garza, Marmol, or Marshall. Trading Marmol as a replacement for Papelbon would be fantastic.

I know you're saying it sarcastically, but it's true. Teams (and fans) have a much higher threshold for transgressions when the player is really good. That's why it's not fair to compare Z at this stage of his career to athletes like Jordan. A better comparison would be Terrell Owens.

I'm not going to say he's equivalent to Pujols, but Mike Napoli will be a free agent next year. If you don't sign Pujols this year, you could give him something like 5/80, and still have plenty of money for two of Greinke, Cain, Hamel, Danks, etc.

My position is that calling them average for the coming year is, in most cases, either based on a reliance of what I consider to be questionable metrics that don't tell the whole story (FIP, defensive ratings) or fails to account for a likely continued decline given the age and skillset of the players involved. Given the information available, I think it's more likely then not that they won't be average next year. Obviously we have a fundamental disagreement on the realistic performance of most of our players, and hopefully I'm wrong and you're right.

I'd do Z and $18 million for Morrison, but I doubt the Marlins would.

I don't disagree. But the important thing is signing the right player to a longterm contract. I know it's common for people to point to his FIP as proof that he was unlucky. But his BABIP didn't stray too far from his career average. What really killed him was the increase in line drive percentage. That could be luck, but that could also be a decline in his stuff, which wouldn't be too surprising given his age. I don't have a problem with Dempster, but it's not a given that he'll go back to a mid 3's ERA. This is another assumption that isn't the guarantee you paint it to be. Samardzija has been nothing but awful as a starter. It would be nice if he could build on last year, but it shouldn't be a surprise if he struggles again as a starter. Cashner shouldn't be counted on for anything. Z and Wells could be average, but it's just as likely they repeat last year. Yep. I don't get the acceptance of Barney. After April, he was the worst or second worst regular second baseman in baseball offensively. We're basically relying on questionable defensive metrics to derive value from him. He's a guy that needs to be replaced. Again, guys on the downside of their careers that weren't even average last year. They're probably not going to get better next year, and they may get worse. I don't really have a problem with the bullpen, but it's the easiest part of a team to build. The problem isn't just that we don't have stars. The problem is also the fact the best-case scenario for a lot of our players is that, if everything breaks in our favor, they're average. We need players with higher ceilings than that.

Even paying Pujols $30 million a year doesn't automatically kill their flexibility to change and improve the team down the line. Again, this is a big market team that can handle having a $130-$150 million payroll and ideally could handle an even higher one down the road. It's not an either/or proposition. Never said it was. But putting 20-25% of your payroll into one player will certainly limit your flexibility to an extent.

Just to be clear: Is it your desire to intentionally waste the next several years fielding teams with absolutely no hope of contending while we wait for prospects that aren't even in the system yet to reach the majors? Once that first crop of theodrafts reaches the majors, which would realistically be 2015 at the earliest*, would it be worthwhile to make that big acquisition while those kids are still rookies and not likely to be big contributors? Or do you wait until they've had a couple years of big league experience so they can contribute (in 2017)? Or at that point, do you start to worry that you need to save cash for when they all hit their arbitration years together and start to get expensive? How many years do you want the cubs to be pathetic before it's the right time to invest in a star player? *Figure drafted in 2012, signed at the end of the summer, two years of playing experience, reach the majors full-time for the first time in 2015. So just because we don't sign Pujols or Fielder, we're throwing away the next several years? I think all he's trying to convey is that, given the Cubs' blueprint under Epstein, we should be in a much better position to field a consistently competitive team in a few years, whether that's through our own homegrown players or players obtained from other teams in exchange for our prospects. Once we're in that position, it would really suck to be constrained from acquiring star players because we have a 36 year-old Pujols tying up $25-30 million in payroll and producing at a rate that is replaceable at a much lower cost. Under that theory, it might be better to maintain as much flexibility as possible so that we can address certain needs when we're in a better position to compete long-term. I don't necessarily agree that we should avoid handing out long-term contracts (Fielder would be a good fit), but I'm surprised at how quickly people dismiss Pujols' down year, given the huge drop in walks. His age has always been a question mark and, coupled with some serious injuries throughout his career, I wouldn't blame Epstein for passing on him. If we do not sign any impact players between now and 2015, it will be very hard for us to compete within the division, let alone compete for a title. We have very few real holes on this team. The big issue is a lack of impact talent. Fortunately, there is impact talent available at the places we have holes. We should be very competitive if we plug the holes with the high end talent. We obviously need impact players, but again the question is whether it's more beneficial to maintain flexibility so that we can better address needs a few years down the line, as opposed to giving the money to guys with legitimate longevity question marks simply because we have a hole at first base. I see both sides of the argument. But I disagree that we have very few real holes on this team. This is a bad team, plain and simple. Outside of shortstop, catcher and Sean Marshall, there's not much there. Particularly in the rotation.

Just to be clear: Is it your desire to intentionally waste the next several years fielding teams with absolutely no hope of contending while we wait for prospects that aren't even in the system yet to reach the majors? Once that first crop of theodrafts reaches the majors, which would realistically be 2015 at the earliest*, would it be worthwhile to make that big acquisition while those kids are still rookies and not likely to be big contributors? Or do you wait until they've had a couple years of big league experience so they can contribute (in 2017)? Or at that point, do you start to worry that you need to save cash for when they all hit their arbitration years together and start to get expensive? How many years do you want the cubs to be pathetic before it's the right time to invest in a star player? *Figure drafted in 2012, signed at the end of the summer, two years of playing experience, reach the majors full-time for the first time in 2015. So just because we don't sign Pujols or Fielder, we're throwing away the next several years? I think all he's trying to convey is that, given the Cubs' blueprint under Epstein, we should be in a much better position to field a consistently competitive team in a few years, whether that's through our own homegrown players or players obtained from other teams in exchange for our prospects. Once we're in that position, it would really suck to be constrained from acquiring star players because we have a 36 year-old Pujols tying up $25-30 million in payroll and producing at a rate that is replaceable at a much lower cost. Under that theory, it might be better to maintain as much flexibility as possible so that we can address certain needs when we're in a better position to compete long-term. I don't necessarily agree that we should avoid handing out long-term contracts (Fielder would be a good fit), but I'm surprised at how quickly people dismiss Pujols' down year, given the huge drop in walks. His age has always been a question mark and, coupled with some serious injuries throughout his career, I wouldn't blame Epstein for passing on him.

Given that Anderson won't pitch most of next year and is coming off of major surgery, I wonder if we could get him for less. He wouldn't help next year, but I'd still give up a good amount to have him for the future.

Given what it took to get Garza, I don't think we have enough. Plus he's probably at his peak in terms of value. I'd like to see if we could get Alex Cobb though.

They won't be bad at all, but they were a 90 win pythagorean team that won't have any payroll flexibility, even without Fielder. Plus I don't think they can count on getting 155 starts from their Top 5 SP like they did this year(including 95 from Greinke/Marcum/Gallardo), which is just an insane number. Their top 3 have been pretty healthy throughout their careers, so it's not insane to think they won't make roughly 30 starts each next year again. Plus Greinke won't be as unlucky as he was last year. If Gamels can put up around a .800 OPS at first (certainly possible), they're probably not losing much from this year overall and still the best team in the division even without Fielder.

No, he had an .800+ OPS against righties both in 2009 and 2010. I think it was the year before where he had some crazy reverse split.

Valentine seems pretty outspoken. I'd rather have a first-time manager who will buy into Hoyer and Epstein's philosophy and do what he's told. Preferably someone from a sucessful organization.

Unfortunately, there probably isn't an option that can approach Ramirez's production, but Stewart has posted some pretty good OPS's against righties, and his upside is higher than any other third baseman we have in the system. You sleep on the Vitters, though Stewart probably plays better D. I figured Vitters would be brought up, but go look at Stewart's minor league stats. He was successful at every level.

Unfortunately, there probably isn't an option that can approach Ramirez's production, but Stewart has posted some pretty good OPS's against righties, and his upside is higher than any other third baseman we have in the system.

By Chen I meant Wei-Yin Chen, a 26 year old Japanese pitcher who projects to potentially being a #3 starter and would be about $10 million cheaper than Buerhle (an estimate). And yes, Francis has the upside of Buerhle or a little better, but he's only 31 years old, will come far cheaper and with less commitment than Buerhle, and at worst is likely to be a 2-3 WAR pitcher and at best could be nearly a 4+ WAR pitcher. Buerhle's age concerns me on a 3/36-39 deal. Got it. I agree on Chen, provided the price isn't outrageous. Disagree on Francis, though. I don't see how he's better than Coleman or Rusin.