goonys evil twin

I'm going to believe Bruce on this. "No such offer" might just mean it's not 3/44. The Cubs could have offered 3/27, and both Peter and Bruce would be right. The question is whether Bruce thinks the Cubs made any offer at all. Peter's version of the story wasn't a strong reiteration of the 3/44 story. In fact, I may have missed the exact words but he might have said something like "there are reports the Cubs offered a 3-year deal" instead of outright claiming they offered a 3-year deal.

Manny to the White Sox is possible? Or did that refer to Drew? When talking about Manny, he referred to Boston getting Drew done soon (or first maybe), then referred to the White Sox as possible destination for Manny. He talked about SF, but said he didn't think they'd have what it takes.

I wouldn't put too much stock in those reports. Why? Uh, maybe because no such offer has been made. Gammons talked about it, but all he said was the Cubs offered a 3-year deal. He talked about the other teams more so than the Cubs. Although he did list the Cubs as possible. Bruce, do you think an offer was made, but the reported number is wrong? Or do you think there was no offer at all?

No, but he's a nice bench player. Boston has him for about $2.5m next year. He's the kind of guy you can plug in an emergency at 1B or 3B.

Manny/Drew/Boston talk, something intense will begin after the weekend. white sox possible

I wouldn't put too much stock in those reports. Oh man, I already put my 401k into the Schmidt plan.

Care to relate the convo as it comes on? I would, but I have to go to class. Hopefully someone else can turn it on and relay it. blahblahblah, hall of fame, blahblahblah why do people care about this crap? Talk about the players who matter today, not what writers like to debate with each other.

Radio or on tv? tv just said he's coming on soon to talk about this, as well as Big Mac.

Likewise, you can't develop all 25 players on your own, and you have to plug in guys like Soriano, Lee and ARam when you can.

It most certainly is not. It most certainly is. They are randomly voted upon by unreliable writers, the same guys who arbitrarily decide what stats are worthy for determining who should make it.

Did I miss the trial?

And these signings aren't taking away any of our current crop of prospects either. Theoretically, if any of these guys work out, it will make the big contracts all that much easier to handle in future years. If they start trading their best pitching prospects for relievers and bench players, then the future is in jeopardy. But, if they hold onto those guys, or only use them in trades for really good regular contributors, then we're fine.

To care enough about Pete Rose to fret over his hall status is borderline ridiculous. I don't really care. But I like debating HOF-worthiness. Pete Rose is not somebody worth debating in that respect, unless you want to debate whether his gambling should keep him out. Seconded. Rose not only was a good hitter but also won several gold gloves, as well an an MVP award. I agree, to debate his Hall-worthiness is quite foolish. to include things like gold gloves and MVP awards into the debate is foolish.

Quite possibly, but not necessarily. If they bid $25m and that counted against the theoretical budget of $125m this year, then that's bad. But that $25m represents an investment that could possibly make the franchise more valuable over time. oh, and I completely agree with your collar popping statements

You can do more than that. You have to sell a lot more than just the contract. Epstein convinced Schilling to go to Boston after he had said he'd never go. Hendry has to do more than just layout a contract and say, "it's up to you." He should convince Schmidt that he's building a legit contender that will win big in the next few years. The contract itself is the most important thing, but you can't just stop there.

I would have killed for the Yankee's lineup last year, too. I would have killed for 97 wins as well. People forget that the best pitching didn't win the playoffs. It's luck, timing and a lot of other stuff. But having a great offense is not a bad thing. Slightly above average pitching won this year. And that's probably why so many slightly above average pitchers are cashing in. But don't kid yourselves into thinking the Yankees were a bad team because they were all offense. They won 97 games.

Hey, Jason! Chicago is only halfway! More like 3/4.

To care enough about Pete Rose to fret over his hall status is borderline ridiculous.

Well, they are both big and beefy, I'm not sure either would fit well behind the other.

http://www.northsidebaseball.com/PremiumForum/viewtopic.php?p=1119472#1119472 viewtopic.php?p=1119472#1119472

But you do have Izturis in his place who had an OPS of .613 to Cedeno's .610 And Izturis significantly underperformed his 2006 PECOTA My prediction is that Izturis won't be playing too much if he puts up a similar month to the last couple to the last couple seasons. The Cubs simply cannot afford to allow that. My hope is he isn't on the opening day roster but I doubt that will come true. But if he is on the opening day roster, then it's probably too late to get a real upgrade. Therefore, if he puts up a month similar to the last couple seasons, the Cubs won't really be in a position to upgrade, other than going to Cedeno or maybe Theriot, neither of which is a lock to be better. Which is reason number 1 why I hope the Cubs can pursuade Lugo to goin the club. My hope is that they are telling the media it is for CF but it is really for SS. If they get Lugo they can afford to go with a lessor talent in CF, almost. Lugo doesn't provide near enough offense to offset a lesser talent in CF.

igawa's japanese team has until friday to decide whether or not to accept the bid. we're not waiting for them to determine who made the largest offer - that's already known by the commissioner's office and igawa's team. So they posted him without giving any previous thought as to what would be an acceptable bid? I would find it hard to believe that they didn't have a minimum in mind that they would accept in exchange for giving up their rights to him. You would think that they've already thrown some crap at the wall on that one. I think they have already determined what would be acceptable. But there is still a lot of due diligence that goes into decisions involving this much money. First and foremost, I would think they would want to be absolutely certain that the winning bidder would end up signing the guy, so they wouldn't have to give the money back. That doesn't make any sense. They don't get paid anyways until the guy is signed. They already made the decision to post him for money, and they should already have had an idea how much they were looking for at a minimum. There's no risk in accepting the bid and having the team end up not signing him. Then they're back where they started, with nothing lost that wasn't already sunk in the decision to post him. No, it does make sense. They wouldn't want to accept a bid from a team that didn't end up signing the guy. If they suspected the winning bidder was just bluffing other teams, I'm sure they'd go to MLB to try and get some assurances that the winning bidder was legit.

But you do have Izturis in his place who had an OPS of .613 to Cedeno's .610 And Izturis significantly underperformed his 2006 PECOTA My prediction is that Izturis won't be playing too much if he puts up a similar month to the last couple to the last couple seasons. The Cubs simply cannot afford to allow that. My hope is he isn't on the opening day roster but I doubt that will come true. But if he is on the opening day roster, then it's probably too late to get a real upgrade. Therefore, if he puts up a month similar to the last couple seasons, the Cubs won't really be in a position to upgrade, other than going to Cedeno or maybe Theriot, neither of which is a lock to be better.

igawa's japanese team has until friday to decide whether or not to accept the bid. we're not waiting for them to determine who made the largest offer - that's already known by the commissioner's office and igawa's team. So they posted him without giving any previous thought as to what would be an acceptable bid? I would find it hard to believe that they didn't have a minimum in mind that they would accept in exchange for giving up their rights to him. You would think that they've already thrown some crap at the wall on that one. I think they have already determined what would be acceptable. But there is still a lot of due diligence that goes into decisions involving this much money. First and foremost, I would think they would want to be absolutely certain that the winning bidder would end up signing the guy, so they wouldn't have to give the money back.

I think in any trade for an established pitcher, we are going to have send a top prospect back. And if they take Dempster, I think they are doing us a favor. So I would say Veal or Gallagher for sure, and then a project like Guzman or Marshall. Remember, Hendry really isn't on our side anymore. He has a one-year time horizon. There's no way we'd give up star potential along with our closer and a young pitcher with decent production and decent potential for an average starter. Maybe not. But "average pitcher" is becoming more and more valuable in GM's minds. Especially GM's who need to win some games right away. If average pitchers are going to be getting well over $10m per season, then average pitchers are going to cost star potential in trades. With average pitchers costing so much nowadays, wouldn't that in turn raise the demand for decent major league ready prospects and guys like Marshall who can reasonbly be expected to put up a 4.50 ERA? Marshall's value (and the value of other similar prospects) should go up as well when crappy veteran pitchers get more and more overpriced. I think average pitchers who have shown a consistent ability to be average to above average over the course of 200 innings several years in a row are going to be significantly more valued than injury prone young pitchers who are inconsistent and have never shown they can put up a 4.50 ERA over 200 innings. Marshall cannot reasonably be expected to put up a 4.50 ERA over a full season.