goonys evil twin

I would try the same thing with Harvey, Dope, Moore, and others. I'd like to keep either Hill or Williams, and I would like to keep Cedeno. But they would not be deal breakers in my mind.

And in my mind completely negated by the garbage he threw both before and after those 2 fluke plays.

So what you're saying is that comparatively the Pierre deal totally sucks for the Cubs. No dude, Bradley isn't a prototypical leadoff hitter, Pierre is.

I don't see what conventional wisdom has to do with it, and I don't see how there is NO WAY a 35 year old third baseman could be slower laterally than Todd Walker. What does his age have to do with anything? I watched Walker play almost every game last year. And I can truthfully say that there can't be many players in baseball slower than him. He's ugly white guy slow. Age and middle infield range do not go well together. It has a lot to do with it. There is a reason so many good young middle infielders turn into decent older third baseman and left fielders.

Only Nolasco and Guzman on that list has a difficult to replace upside, and Nolasco is already gone. Marshall, Gallagher, Ryu and others are down there waiting to climb the list. EPatt could be rostered as early as 2007. None of these guys is a can't miss prospect, or an extremely highly rated prospect. They are all very similar to somebody else in the system maybe a year behind. The Pierre trade was more painful, considering they gave up a similar package just without the bat, and it was for a much less impactful player. The Cubs don't have a star studded system, they have a depth filled system. The best way to use prospect depth is by trading it, before you lose them to Rule 5, before they crap out, and before Dusty gets to run them out of town. The top 2 prospects would still be here, as would be the rest of the top hitting prospects, and several arms.

It leaves them strapped for additional moves, this year. But they are already in desperation mode for this year, and have to improve somewhere. And they would still have a boatload of young prospects to take over these guys roles next season. They don't have the luxury of wating for something better to come along. At this point it might come down to seeing which team wants to deal first, Philly with Abreu (keeping Cedeno at SS) or Baltimore with Tejada (signing a 3rd tier RF).

It does feel sort of like we are emptying the shelves, doesn't it? Only of the oldest prospects. Cedeno is expendable if you are trading for a stud SS. I'd like to keep one of either Hill or Williams, because I see them contributing to the team this year. Guzman's best value to the team might be in a trade for stud, going to a team that wants a guy with huge upside. This would open up several 40 man spots for the next wave of young prospects coming through, and it also keeps all of the youngest prospects, like Pie, Harvey, Pawelek. The only good bat leaving is Cedeno, and they would still be left with lots of arms in the system. I might try and get them to take a combo of Ryu and somebody else instead of one of the arms, but, it's still intriguing. You would have to get another starting pitcher, somehow.

I don't see the Cubs getting Tejada's numbers from the OF spot, because I see them getting Jones/Wilson/Encarnacion (or similar) whenever they actually get around to signing a RF.

OK, anyone else out there hear this for cryin out loud??? Sorry for the delay, cpu issue: Patterson, Williams, Hill, Cedeno, and Guzman. I might be able to live with that, but would like to keep either Cedeno or one of the pitchers who can help this year, Hill or Williams. Pierre Walker Lee Ramirez Tejada RF - even a Jones/Wilson/Encarnacion on the cheap Barrett Murton Would be a pretty good lineup.

Yes, college football saturdays are over, but there will still be a hungry football audience ready to perk up the ratings.

Not saying he has great range, but (with Todd) we're talking about replacing a player (I like him but..) who might have the WORST range at 2b in all of baseball. Miller's not that bad...is he??? Are you buying the company line of how terrible Walker supposedly is at defense? Have you ever seen Jeff Kent out there?

I don't see what conventional wisdom has to do with it, and I don't see how there is NO WAY a 35 year old third baseman could be slower laterally than Todd Walker.

Burnitz can give you .280/.355/.470? He hasn't done that outside of Coors this millenium. The Cubs should have platooned Burnitz with another bat. I'll never understand why the guy had to play every game. That's easy. He is a proven veteran and had a big contract. You don't sit proven veterans who are used to starting everyday and make a lot of money.

I think Mueller would be a pretty bad defensive option for 2B, certainly no better than Walker, possibly worse. He'll be 35 this season, and has only played 29 games at 2B in the past 3 years. He is supposedly going to get a 3 year deal, which I wouldn't want to see the Cubs match. I like Buelly, but I don't see a fit.

I am as confident in my opinion that Walker won't be back as I am in my opinion that some third rate RF will be on the team and that is inverse to my confidence in Jim Hendry getting the job done as GM.

It's Chad Hutchinson's fault.

very slim chance Corey is on the opening day roster. The cubs want to go another direction at 2B other than Walker. Jones is an option, but one of many. I missed some of what he said about Colletti, SF, LA, Bradley and the Cubs. But I think he said something about there not being a great willingness to help each other out between SF and Colletti, although he might have said something about a bad relationship between former Cubs employee Colletti and the Cubs. Basically he made me a sad panda.

I don't think Bradley is a good choice for RF either. He's just a much better option than Jones. Bradley should be the CF, with Patterson and Hairston as fallback options, and somebody good should be the RF.

I don't see why they need to expand the payroll anymore, as it just means more raises for guys like Rusch, Neifi and the rest. They have plenty of money available, assuming the $100-105m payroll, to acquire a big time RF. They had plenty of money available in the offseason to greatly improve upon the 2005 team, but as of now it looks like Hendry will just fritter it away on marginal upgrades. That is what is really frustrating about this organization. They have one of the biggest fan bases (if not the biggest) in the world. And yet they still refuse to do what it takes to win. Mark Cuban where are you?????? I think you're missing the point of what I wrote. Ownership isn't the problem. Ownership hasn't been great, but their job is to hire management, and give management a high enough budget to win. They hired Andy, who by all accounts should be a great baseball executive, and they pretty much stayed out of his way, which owners should do. They gave him time, and an ever increasing budget to get the job done, but the results have not been there. The Cubs problem is a management issue, it's not cheap ownership. This isn't the Wirtz family. Over that time Andy has made the franchise much more solid overall, so he's done a good job, for the most part. But they haven't achieved nearly enough success as they should have. So, it's hard to really get pissed at ownership for being cheap, because they aren't, and it's hard to get pissed at them for sticking with Andy, because the team is much better off now than they were before he was hired. The biggest problem has been Andy sticking with Hendry and Baker, and an out-of-date belief system that hasn't brought enough results.

fixed Bradley WON'T even play but for half the season! He's only played over 100 games TWICE in all his years. Has someone put some special tonic y'alls juice that makes you fall in love with a guy who A) Is a proven headcase and a cancer in the clubhouse and B) averages ONLY 76 games a year!! This would be THE typical Cubs pickup! Just say no! I'm not saying Jones is a better baseball player, but i DO know that he more than likely isn't going to call reporters "uncle tom's" or throw things at fans, scream at umpires, and i DO know that he'll more than likely play OVER 76 games this year. If Jones plays more than 76 games for the Cubs this year, that would be a bad thing.

No, see the point is playoff football is different than regular season football. You can get away with winning just with defense in the regular season. But in the postseason you will need your QB to make a play. And that is where the argument for Rex comes from. We know Kyle can't make that play. We don't know if Rex can, but at least he has a chance.

I don't see why they need to expand the payroll anymore, as it just means more raises for guys like Rusch, Neifi and the rest. They have plenty of money available, assuming the $100-105m payroll, to acquire a big time RF. They had plenty of money available in the offseason to greatly improve upon the 2005 team, but as of now it looks like Hendry will just fritter it away on marginal upgrades.

I'd rather platoon 'em both, except for the fact it would would most likely mean they'd both play and Murton would sit.

Looks like we have another self annointed martyr. That lineup would not easily be top 3. It would also have to come with significant bench and pitching upgrades to justify the money Hendry would have spent on it. Your numbers breakdowns only take into account the best possible scenario. They are more likely to have 4 sub 800 OPS players than 6 over 800 OPS guys. Why do you care if somebody doesn't like the direction Hendry is going?

What was a ridiculous statement? The puke one? Wasn't he just expressing frustration about the thought that the Cubs, with all their resources, are looking like they will fill their huge RF hole with a less than huge bat? What's wrong with being disgusted by that?