jmajew

I think that Cabrera is about the only player that you can name who won't get a 20-page discussion on the pros and cons of a trade. I shouldn't speak so soon because if by some miracle Hendry got Cabrera, the Hendry bashers would be complaining about how much he gave up for him. Maybe so, but I think the "bashing" would be alot less than usual. Because it's CABRERA. Exactly. He would have actually gotten an impact player in or before his prime, rather than another Juan Pierre, who is just pretty good at his best and hasn't been that in three years (and who also cost us three prospects). I'm all in favor of getting Cabrera, however, if we have guys with 320 OBP 1-2 it will be kind of a waste. The most important thing this team needs to do is upgrade all of the other positions. If we can upgrade 2b, CF and get Cabrera great. But if our Lineup is Pierre, Izturis, Lee, Cabrera, Ramirez, Barrett, Jones, Cedeno we aren't in very good shape. Especially because we will probably have no money/no prospects to improve our rotation. The pitching staff is probably our biggest problem/hardest one to fix. Our offense since the All Star break has been about average. Which if we had a rotation that was worth anything we would be a much improved team.

The Cubs do not need to sign another big bat. The Cubs need to go out and fill the holes in the lineup. Lee and Ramirez provide enough pop. Our problem is not in LF. We need to find a 2b who can get on base at a 360 clip. We need a CF who can get on base at a 350 clip, which Pierre has done since mid June. We need a platoon partner for Jones so we don't get his 234 OBP against Lefties. So you can resign Pierre for 2-3 years or preferably sign Lofton to a 1 year deal. You then go get Lugo/Giles/Durham/Loretta to play second. You sign Craig Wilson to platoon with Jones. Our offense is significantly upgraded. Then you use the money you don't waste on expensive offensive players to go get 1 or 2 quality starters. Zito/Schmidt/Meche/Mulder/Maddux/Mussina/Padilla vs LH Pierre/Lofton 2b Lee Ramirez Barrett Murton Wilson Izturis/Cedeno vs RH Pierre/Lofton 2b Lee Ramirez Jones Barrett Murton Izturis/Cedeno

Considering they both bat left handed, I find that idea implausible. I didn't mean a strict platoon, just share time.

Just a thought but maybe Hendry signed Jones to a three year deal with the intent of using him for two years in RF til Pie is ready and then either trying to ship out Jones or letting him Platoon with Pie to start. Its a good possibility Jones wouldn't take anything less than a 3 year deal and if Hendry wanted to "improve" the team this year he may have had to give him that deal. With that said the Cubs need a platoon partner for Jones for next year and a new 2b with an OBP of 350-370. Then you can resign Pierre for 3 years and keep him in center. Pierre, 2b, Lee, Ramirez, Murton, Barrett, Jones/Platoon, Izturis.

Rich Hill is starting to make me feel a lot more comfortable about our rotation next year. I do, however, wish he could develop another pitch but lets not be picky here. A rotation of Zambrano, FA/Trade, Hill, Prior, Marshall/Guzman/Gallagher looks like a pretty solid rotation to me for next year. Now only if we could do something about this offense...Murton looks like he may have gaurenteed himself a spot in the everyday lineup again.

The leadoff hitter is important because he hypothetically sets the table for the middle of the lineup. A leadoff hitter with a higher OBP gives the 3-4-5 hitters a better chance to drive in a run. Or at least thats what the MLB textbook says. One more thing...The leadoff hitter generally has the most atbats in a game and definitely has the most at the end of the season. So why woudl you want someone with a low OBP have hte most atbats on your team.

Bruce, do you think that's more indicative of coaching and managing styles, or disinterest from the players? If the latter, have coaches/manager tried to light a fire under the players' butts to get them onto the field? This has everything to do with coaching and managing styles. This is simply apalling to me. I always thought the job of a manager and a coaching staff was to be teachers. If you don't have a staff that is willing to teach they don't belong in this business. That would explain why the players love Baker. He doesn't make them work as much as other managers do so their "jobs" are easier.

Did anyone else notice that the announced attendance last night was only about 33,000 and they said even less fans showed up than that. I pray that this trend continues. Maybe then it will make this organization realize that they can't keep sending out a horrible team and expect fans to show up. Does anyone else have an opnion on this? As the White Sox keep selling out or are atleast near capacity and hte Cubs are half empty I begin to wonder if the cubs will start to lose alot of fans to the white sox. People don't want to watch a team lose day in and day out. I've heard before that this city goes through cycles. How at some points in the history of the city the Cubs outdrew and at others teh White Sox outdrew. Could this be one of those turning points. With the Sox being competetive, year in and year out, and the Cubs on a downward cycle with no Sammy Sosa to draw in fans even when they are horrible, I could see it happening. Just to add I will never be a White Sox fan. I love the Cubs even when they stink. Even though i get incredible frustrated with them at times.

He's got a knack for assembling teams that would look good if, and only if, everything went well and there were no setbacks. He builds teams that could win, instead of teams that should win. So you don't think the 2004 were built to win? Prior, Wood, Zambrano, Maddux, Clement was supposed to be the best rotation in baseball. It was not Hendry's fault that year for relying on Prior and Wood. It was his fault in 2005 and 2006 for relying on them but not 2004 when they had all been healthy in 2003.

I'd like to see Theriot start the rest of this year, however, at this point I do not see him as anything more than a spot starter. I'd love for him next year to start twice a week. Once at SS and once at 2b. I think it is important to give players a day off here and there. Especially when they are not much better than your bench players. Assuming we do not drastically upgrade either of those postions.

I agree with Vance in that it looks like Giles will be traded this offseason and that he should be one of our top targets. I do not think Soriano is worth the money if we are gonna play him in LF and I do not think CLee has ever been a good enough player to make more than 11 mil a year. He has never had an OPS above 900. Why would you pay 10 mil more a year for CLee or Soriano is not a smart investment because the uprgrade over Murton is not that big. If soriano were to play second then it would make sense. Then I'd sign Lofton to play CF for next year and sign Craig Wilson to platoon with Jones. Vs. RHP Lofton Giles DLee Ramirez Jones Barrett Murton Izturis Vs. LHP Lofton Giles DLee Ramirez Barrett Wilson Murton Izturis If you get Soriano you will obviously then have Lofton batting leadoff and Murton batting second and Soriano would bat 5th vs Lefties and 6th vs Righties. Bench Theriot Cedeno Pagan Wilson/Jones C (minor leaguer) Nevin/Restovich For the rotation I would go with Barry Zito if possible but he will probalby cost too much. So I would suggest Cory Lidle and Gil Meche. Zambrano Lidle Meche Prior Hill Marshall Dempster Howry Eyre Wuertz Ohman Novoa/Aardsma/etc Obviously if we can get Zito for 10-12 mil a year I would do it and then not sign both Lidle and Meche.

If Hendry can manage to raise or team OBP next year up to 335 from the 319 it is this year our offense will be muched improved. Take into account all of our young starting pitchers will have another year of experience thus you can expect them to be better and that the NL Central is going to be so bad next year there is no doubt in my mind we should be able to compete next year. Lofton, Loretta, DLEE, Ramirez, Barrett, Jones, Murton, Izturis is a lot better than the lineup we have been putting out there this year. Everyone in that lineup except Izturis and Jones/Platoon partner will probably have an OBP of 350 or higher. I'm not saying these things will be done but i'm not going to give up hope until I see what Hendry does in the offseason.

Wow-I just went and looked up the Cubs statistics from that year, and that led me to the MVP voting that year-not only did Sosa win the MVP, but 2 other Cubs were among the 24 who got at least 1 MVP point. Anyone know without looking who those two other Cubs were? Just a guess but Kerry Wood and Mark Grace

If we aren't going to re-sign Pierre we better find a way to trade him before thursday. I don't want to offer him arbitration and then have him take it...it is best that we trade him as soon as possible. I was shocked to learn that Dave Roberts was currently that much better than Pierre. Is the option there to platoon him and Pie next year? Just a thought...

It'd be nice if Hendry realizes the value of having the two compteting opinions in the same organization. If he gets a manager that values OBP maybe they can find a middle ground and go after players who fit Hendry's mold and the new managers mold.

Carlos Lee is not worth the money he will get on the open market. He is not worth more than 10 million a year. He will probably get somewhere around 13 mil a year. To put this into context Paul Konerko is making 12 million a year and he has put up better numbers than Lee. Lee's career OBP 339 vs. Konerko 352. With that said I don't think Soriano is worth 13 mil a year either to play LF, simply because the increase in production is not worth and extra 12 mil. If Soriano were to play second I'd be more willing to pay him the extra 12 mil. Simply because we do not have a cheap option who can put up any sort of acceptable numbers at second. Lets get this straight. The problem with the Cubs lineup isn't that we dont' have enough big boppers in the middle. The problem is that we have too many blackholes in this lineup. Between Pierre, Izturis, Cedeno, and the pitchers spot we have a serious lake of depth problem in the lineup. The cubs shouldn't use all of their money on one or two players. The need to sign/trade for a decent 2b, either Giles or Loretta, need to get a CF who will be around for a year to Pie is ready, Lofton?, then go out and get a platoon partner for Jones, Craig Wilson, and sign a starting pitcher for around 10-12 mil, zito or schmidt. I think a RH lineup of Lofton, Giles/Loretta, DLee, Ramirez, Jones, Barrett, Murton, Izturis/Cedeno and LH Lofton, Giles/Loretta, DLee, Ramirez, Barrett, Murton, Wilson, Izturis/Cedeno is much better than Pierre, Murton, DLee, Ramirez, CLee, Barrett, Izturis, Cedeno.

I just thought it was interesting that the Cubs were ranked as the 3rd biggest disappointment. I also thought it was good to hear some more national media criticize the cubs. http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2006/writers/jon_heyman/08/25/scoop.friday/1.html

Actually, I think Dusty is better suited to manage in the AL. He won't have to ever take out his pitcher for a pinch hitter so the starters will all be throwing about 130-140 pitches a game. Dusty will be able to really rely on his horses.

This is what I would do. Offer Pierre arbitration-we would like him to decline, but if he accepts, it wouldn't be that bad to have him play CF for another year. Do not sign him to a multi-year deal. exactamundo! And make it clear up front in the negotiations that we're only interested in a one year deal since Pie will soon be ready. We have a winner! This is clearly the way to go. Pie is going to be a beast. The only question is will he be able to bat leadoff by 2008? Or will his abilities be better suited to bat 3-5?

If they try to make Pie into more of a slap hitter he will propably lose alot of his value. You don't want to change something that drastic because it can ruin a player. Look at Corey. He always struck out alot but was told to be more of a contact hitter and hit more groundballs. IMO that ruined Corey. You have to let a player be who he is.

I don't think anyone here is going to disagree with that. Approx the same in one category and better in the 2nd category is going to make that team better than the other. (Of course that doesn't work for the 2 teams that we've had a slightly better OBP and slightly better SLG and still have less runs than). Increasing either of them will help your team-the Cubs need OBP more, but only increasing one or the other this offseason won't help the Cubs be anything but average offensively. We need to increase both to have a good offense. Look at the A's. They have a slugging about 30 pts lower and an OBP 14 pts higher and they have scored 43 more runs. Simply looking at the OBP appears to be more important.

I'm just going to point out a few facts here. Certain teams offensive numbers. Runs, AVG, OBP, SLG. A's 583, 253, 333, 399. KC 594, 271, 335, 419 Nats 582, 260, 339, 423 MIL 582, 260, 331, 423 Cubs 540, 253, 319, 421 SF 589, 261, 327, 418 LAD 629, 277, 348, 424 Use these numbers to make up your mind. It appears to me as if teams that have similar slugging to us but have a higher OBP all have scored more runs. I hope that speaks for itself.

You would think we would have the best pitching staff in baseball because we lead th league in walks. The bases will always be clogged. Does Dusty think his pitchers giving up walks is bad? just a question, because if so he is trully not qualified for the job.

I did make a mistake. Dopiraks numbers in Lansing were amazing for one year and has struggled since. Patterson had a good year in 1999 then in 2000 and 2001 put up horrible numbers. I would think the two bad years out weigh the one good one. When it comes to Murton he has put up good numbers at every level, the great was a poor choice of words. As a 21 year old, second year player Corey put up an .829 OPS at West Tenn. It is true that his BA was low that season. But he drew just over a walk per 10 AB's (and got plunked an extra 10 times) & hit for very good power in a pitcher's league. While not as outstanding as his 1999 campaign in Lansing, that was still a very successful season for someone his age with his level of experience. However, how does his 2001 numbers warrant being called up and then in 2002 giving him the starting job? If he was that good of prospect was it that necessary to rush him up? Either way in my min the organization botched that up.

I did make a mistake. Dopiraks numbers in Lansing were amazing for one year and has struggled since. Patterson had a good year in 1999 then in 2000 and 2001 put up horrible numbers. I would think the two bad years out weigh the one good one. When it comes to Murton he has put up good numbers at every level, the great was a poor choice of words.