goonys evil twin

If we get Vlad, Baltimore gets Prior, and Anahiem gets Miggy, I MIGHT be ok with it. I'm not trading Prior or Zambrano for any position player who is already past the 26-28 prime years. Vladdy has had just as many health concerns as Prior in recent years. He's one hell of a player, but he'll be 30 this year. And he can opt out of his contract, so the Cubs would have control over him for less time than they'd have control over Zambrano/Prior. If I trade either of those guys, I better get a pre free agency superstar caliber player. The only one out west that possibly fits the bill is Teixeira, who I initially wanted to draft instead of Prior.

Baltimore's GM should be shot if he makes the above A deal. If "A" was Z, Hill, Pie, and Dopriak it MIGHT be enough. That is absurd. Z alone is more than enough. Z is pre peak, Tejada is post-peak. Miggy is great, but he's not without faults. He's probably only got a couple years left being among the elite, and in his early 30's he will start to decline, and might have to move to another position within 3-5 years, where his offensive *output* is much less impressive. Zambrano has a good 6-9 years where he can be an elite pitcher, which he is right now. You're talking about a top 10 pitcher and a top 10 position player. But the position player is older, and he will fall out of the top 10 within a couple years. *I first wrote update instead of output, possibly because I was in the middle of watching an update saying the striking TWU is going back to driving the trains*

Show him Lake Michigan at sunrise and tell him it's dusk. He won't know the difference.

Maybe he should try to see if TO can be had then. I hear he can catch the ball, he's out of favor with his team, and has a below market contract. That would violate last year's theme, chemistry in the clubhouse. I also don't think he does the little things.

Platooning Pie with Jones? I don't see how that is anything close to the right plan. They are both lefties for one. So, you are either going to let Felix only hit against lefties or let Jones sit against the only group of pitchers he can hit. Pie needs to get more professional at bats in AAA. If he dominates the league, then call him up and let him take somebody's job full time. He doesn't need the Corey Patterson treatment. Sorry, meant platoon Pie with Murton, soft platoon--Murton plays against half the RHP (and of course, all the lefties), Pie gets half the RHP. Perez was my idea for a platoon partner with Jones. I think I'd still rather see Pie hit in AAA and Murton get a full season.

No shame in that.

Platooning Pie with Jones? I don't see how that is anything close to the right plan. They are both lefties for one. So, you are either going to let Felix only hit against lefties or let Jones sit against the only group of pitchers he can hit. Pie needs to get more professional at bats in AAA. If he dominates the league, then call him up and let him take somebody's job full time. He doesn't need the Corey Patterson treatment.

Actually there is considerable evidence that the White Sox do put much greater emphasis on these stats than the Cubs. The acquisition of Thome would make me believe this. Turning Lee and his $8m into Pods, Dye and Iguchi. Lee is actually much more of an old school numbers guy (the counting stats - AVG/HR/RBI). People got hung up on the .300/30/100 with him, but Kenny didn't buy the hype. Maybe because he saw the OBP/SLG as less impressive, and knew he could get the same production from Dye for much less cost, something the Cubs refuse to do. No way. KW has no clue. Pods was one of the worst OBP/OPS guys in baseball when he targeted him. If the Cubs made that move you would have crucified Hendry. Iguchi was just a cheap flyer that worked out for him. And Carlos Lee out-slugged Jermaine Dye every year of his career until last year. If KW cared, his team wouldn't have been near the bottom of the AL in OBP. No, he loves the toolsy guys, like Pods, Uribe, Rowand etc. And pitching. And it's his love of pitching that won him the title. Well, the fact that his entire pitching staff severely over achieved in 2005 while his offense dropped off significantly. Carlos Lee is overrated and overpaid. KW turned him and his salary into 3 pieces of the puzzle, one of which outproduced him on his own. KW just traded Rowand, so I don't see how you can use his love for him against him. I'm not saying I agree 100% with KW. Not at all. And I have no problem looking at tools. The problem is that is the only thing the Cubs focus on, and it kills them year after year. If they didn't have a $100m payroll to cover for their repeated mistakes, they'd still be a 75 win team every year.

I'm predicting 82-85 wins right now. If everything goes right they have a shot to flirt with 90. I don't think I'm being overly pessimistic. But there is no excuse to not have this be a 95 win season. And if Hendry goes 4 years with never fielding a 90 win team, with the payroll he has had to work with, I don't see how any sane Cubs fan can still be in his corner.

You get to a point in any negotiation where you say, "Enough, we've given it our best shot." I wonder how high they would have gone with Jacque.

They could afford it. He made 1.2m in 2003 with Boston, 4.5 in 2004 and 5.2 in 2005. He was just hitting his prime when they let him go, and instead they decided to spend that money on lesser players. 13 guys on the Twins made more than him the year after he left.

When teams trade a guy, it's not cutting. Boston didn't just cut Damon, they decided they didn't want to pay what he wanted. Are you telling me they decided to cut ties with him and were just looking for somebody else to take him? No, Walker isn't as good as Damon, but Walker was in a similar situation. Boston was tight in the salary dept that year. They were going to go hard after Schilling and find financial room for Pedro, Foulke and raises for others. They had Bellhorn making nothing in the wings, and Walker was asking for 3/15. That's not cutting a guy. Neifi Perez is a guy who was cut. Sidney Ponson was cut. But the vast majority of player movement is based on teams going in another direction, stressing one area over another, weighing cost benefits, not cutting people.

What evidence. How do we judge the proper reaction so we can then go back and see what is too much or too little? I don't see why people care so much about whether or not other fans are too harsh on the Cubs' moves. Let people vent. Then when it's all over go back and talk about it rationally.

Co stanza

Nobody cut him. Sorry. Why some teams chose to end their contractual relationship with him. Is that better or do I get homework tonight? I just think it's dishonest, unfair and leading to phrase it like "cutting him" "cut their ties", "got rid of". Guys get traded or are allowed to walk all the time. Minnesota "cut their ties" with David Ortiz because they were cheap bastards. All sorts of supposedly good guys have been on loads of teams. The story on Walker is he's good, but not special. He's a good hitting 2B, but not good on defense. I'd say he's about average, some will say below average. His value is in his cost/production. His production comes cheap. At 3/15 he'd be overpaid, just like Grudz wasn't worth such a contract, and Jones isn't worth it.

Bill Simmons wrote a funny article a few years back about the cliche storylines every spring training for every club. One of them was "the guy who struggled because of personal issues but is turning around his life and will now be good" or something close. This is the type of thing you hear every winter and spring. Your point? I basically said to take it with a grain of salt. Do you believe that Jocketty believes that he's making a bad investment? Do you? Low-risk, high-reward. Low-risk, medium reward. Ponson wasn't that good when he was highly touted.

Nobody cut him.

Bill Simmons wrote a funny article a few years back about the cliche storylines every spring training for every club. One of them was "the guy who struggled because of personal issues but is turning around his life and will now be good" or something close. This is the type of thing you hear every winter and spring.

Are they cost cutting moves or baseball philosophy? Given what they've paid for such mediocre veterans, the contract they gave Baker, the never ending stream of advisors to the GM and whatnot, as well as the money they've paid draft picks, I wouldn't say this is entirely cost cutting.

Well, in Boston they didn't want to give him a 3/$15m contract that was talked about before he left. He made 3.5 the year before and wasn't expecting the paycut he ended up taking with the Cubs. And they had a very cheap Bellhorn ready to take his place. I think Minny got rid of him because of some rift with Kelly. I think the other teams just thought they had good enough cheap young talent to replace him. I don't agree with the notion that a player wears out his welcome everytime he is traded. It's like when people say they "got rid of" some player when they trade him. These are business decisions. When a guy is getting late into his arbitration years or approaching free agency, and he is on a very bad team, especially one with payroll issues, they are going to try and trade him more often than not.

Actually there is considerable evidence that the White Sox do put much greater emphasis on these stats than the Cubs. The acquisition of Thome would make me believe this. Turning Lee and his $8m into Pods, Dye and Iguchi. Lee is actually much more of an old school numbers guy (the counting stats - AVG/HR/RBI). People got hung up on the .300/30/100 with him, but Kenny didn't buy the hype. Maybe because he saw the OBP/SLG as less impressive, and knew he could get the same production from Dye for much less cost, something the Cubs refuse to do.

I've got three words to say why this isn't going to happen, in any way, shape or form. Catch the ball. That is not something Manny does, and it is what Hendry is looking for.

If we where talking after the world series I would agree but now that Hendry has seen all his chances to make a splash wash up he might be interested. Millwood Manny Miggy Weaver Are the only hopes I have right now of Hendry being able to make this years squad any better to compete with the Cards. I say that based on what it appears Hendry is willing to go after. I don't think he's sitting back and saying, "Wow, this offseason isn't turning out all that well, I better make a splash with an impact player." He's happy with what he got. I'd go as far as saying he's ecstatic. This is what he wanted. He's had this team for 4 offseasons, he's been around this organization for a long time. This team is the team Jim Hendry wants. Manny doesn't fit in this picture. And I don't see Boston taking back what the Cubs would have to offer. They want one star, at least. Maybe not a superstar, but a star nonetheless.

Like I said, the Cubs don't care about these new fangled stats either, looks where it's got them. For the record, I've never read a single book about baseball stats. And I didn't compare Pierre to Patterson. I compared the Cubs CF last year to Florida's. Patterson was only a part of the total CF production. Pierre was virtually all of the CF production. If you replaced the Cubs CF production with Florida's production last year, then the Cubs wouldn't have been any better. Before you just go off insulting people for what they write I suggest you try and read what they actually write.

If this team is 10 wins better, Hendry didn't do a poor job. Unfortunately your claims for more wins based on the acquisitons made aren't really all realistic.