davearm

I don't mean to blow off the draft picks entirely. Just mostly. Draftees will give the bigleague club nothing for many years. As a general rule (and yes I know there are exceptions), figure something like 3 years development time for a college kid, and 5 years for a highschooler. That's *if* these draftees even reach the bigs. For intents and purposes, that seems darn close to nothing.

im sure people said the same thing about Maddux in 92 They didn't trade Maddux though. People wouldn't be nearly so bent on the Maddux situation if we had, say, Chipper Jones to show for it. And people would be more bent on it if we had, say, Todd Van Poppel and 1 less year of Maddux to show for it. Serious question here. If you were Jim Hendry and Carlos Zambrano looked you in the face and said, "I'm leaving after this year", what would you do? Would you keep him, pray you win the WS in 2007, then watch him walk for nothing? Or would you trade him now for the best package of young players you could get? Reasonable minds can disagree here, but I'm taking the latter every time. Getting nothing but a draft pick or two for Z would be disastrous.

im sure people said the same thing about Maddux in 92 They didn't trade Maddux though. People wouldn't be nearly so bent on the Maddux situation if we had, say, Chipper Jones to show for it. i know we didnt trade him but he was pretty much told we can get more players in the amount it would cost us for you. Those players didnt do much of anything to remember I think it's disingenuous to say that this situation is analogous to Maddux. Indeed. Having 2 or 3 elite prospects, plus $15M or so to reallocate to veterans, is a completely different circumstance than just having the $15M to spend.

That's not a bad thing. In fact in this day and age, it's almost a positive. Recovery rates are excellent, recurrence is infrequent, and sometimes guys even pick up a MPH or two. Seriously. TJS is not nearly the stigma it used to be. It's not a stigma at all, really.

im sure people said the same thing about Maddux in 92 They didn't trade Maddux though. People wouldn't be nearly so bent on the Maddux situation if we had, say, Chipper Jones to show for it.

There's just no way you get that much for Z when he is a budding (and likely VERY costly) free agent. I would do it for Weaver and Kendrick alone. I disagree, come July someone would pay mightily to add Zambrano. Except Weaver + Adenhart + Kendrick is paying mightily x10. Weaver was one of the 10 best rookie starters last year. Adenhart is one of the 10 best pitching prospects. Kendrick looks like he's going to be Tony Gwynn v2.0. I'd take any two of those guys for Z and not look back. Reasons? a) The injury risk is real. There's legitimate cause for concern here: the weight issue, the back issue, the overuse issue. b) The risk of losing him to FA is even more real. I don't like how this situation is shaping up. Not one bit.

Murton was a product of the Red Sox, not the Cubs. I hope Wilken turns things around, but the Cubs farm system is currently below average. I don't understand. 10 yrs from now hopefully no one will remember where Murton was drafted. They'll remember where he made his name. Is Ryne Sandberg a Phillie? I agree with your posts most of the time but Hendry picked Murton out of a million. He does deserve a little credit on that trade. I wish someone would come out and say he seen a little something in Murton. Where's Bruce Miles when you need him? If I remember correctly, Murton was originally taken from the Red Sox in order to be sent to the Expos, but at the last minute they changed their mind on Murton and asked for Brendan Harris. Matt Murton fell into the Cubs lap. I'm a big Hendry supporter, but I don't believe he deserves all the credit! You don't remember correctly. Baseball America's 2005 Prospect Handbook says "The Expos weren't interested in getting Murton from the Red Sox in the trade, so Hendry offered to give up Harris and take Murton at the last moment." Perhaps the Expos didn't explicitly ask for Harris instead of Murton, but the situation did still kind of fall into Hendry's lap. I will grant him the credit for capitalizing on it, but it's still partially due to sheer dumb luck. Thanks for finding that Rob - it would have driven me crazy! I also agree with your comments. The Expos not wanting Murton was not the issue. The issue is that they REALLY wanted Harris and Hendry did not want to include him in the deal. The Twins part was set with Justin Jones for Mientkiewicz. The Cubs were in agreement to send Cabrera and Mientkiewicz to Boston for Nomar. However, the Expos were holding up the deal for the Cubs to get Cabrera because they insisted that Harris be included and Hendry didn't want to do that. Theo really was motivated to get the deal to go through because he needed a first baseman in Mientkiewicz and wanted to get rid of Nomar. He sweetened the deal for the Cubs by adding in Murton to the Cubs / Red Sox trade if the Cubs would give in on including Harris to make the Expos trade work. I guess you could say that Murton fell into Hendry's lap or you could say that he took advantage of Theo's urgency to get the deal done in order to extract some more value. To me that is what makes a good negotiater. In retrospect it all seems rather silly that the Expos and the Cubs were making an issue over Harris who turned out to be nothing special, but it worked out well for the Cubs. That's not how Jim Hendry recalls things. I've also heard versions of the story where things happened so quickly in the final minutes, that Theo Epstein didn't realize Murton was going to the Cubs (he knew Murton was in the deal, but thought one of the other teams was getting him).

My biggest concern is that it could be Pie. That would kill the deal for the Cubs, IMO. Why would Pie have to be named later? Seems to me that PTBNL would point to a 2006 draftee, or a recent signee. Basically anybody else could be swapped immediately. or a pool of existing players to choose from by a certain date, and I would not want Pie to be in that pool. I'm still not seeing why, if the M's want Pie, and the Cubs are willing to deal him (and I don't think they are, FWIW), he wouldn't be included in the deal right away.

The same can be said of Carlos Zambrano. That he has no secondary pitches and there's no telling how his arm will react to a full season's worth of pitching? There's no reason to invoke Carlos's name. He sits and 91-92 due to great movement. I thought the bolding made it pretty clear that the comparison was based on each guy having similar velocity, and not the other stuff you latched onto. The point being, of all the reasons to be guarded about Samardzija's future, velocity isn't one of them. If Samardzija ultimately busts, it won't be because he "sits at 91-92 most of the time."

My biggest concern is that it could be Pie. That would kill the deal for the Cubs, IMO. Why would Pie have to be named later? Seems to me that PTBNL would point to a 2006 draftee, or a recent signee. Basically anybody else could be swapped immediately.

The same can be said of Carlos Zambrano.

It definitely appears that the Sox were trying to bully the Rox on that Helton deal. Lowell and Tavarez is a joke, unless they're taking on all $90M left on Helton.

Not that anyone really needs this level of information but here goes anyway... Drawing a linear trendline through (67, 88, 89, 79, 66) yields a slightly downward-sloping line of the form: y = -1.1x + 81.1 The key piece of information here is the -1.1. It tells us that if the 5 year "Hendry trend" continues, the Cubs should be expected to win 1.1 fewer games every year going forward. In year 6, the Cubs' win total projects to ~75. So the guy who drew that perfectly flat line through the datapoints was actually being generous. :(

Hendry's said repeatedly that he's not looking at bringing in any OFs on multi-year deals, because he doesn't want to block Pie. We've also heard a lot from Lou about wanting to have a real flexible roster with lots of bench depth so that the starters can be given more days off. Given that, I think we can take at face value the notion that Floyd represents a 4th OF / bench depth / insurance, with the incentives becoming an issue only in a worst-case scenario with lots of injuries.

That'd change things. ;)

I guess I'm not explaining myself well. I could imagine the PC is to announce that Samardzija has chosen baseball. Seems a bit unlikely IMO, but it's definitely a possibility (and honestly it's as good a theory as any on what this whole thing's about). The part I don't get is why folks think some new/different contract would come attached to such an announcement. It's already all laid out what he'll be playing for if he does indeed choose baseball.

That's a possibility I guess. I don't see the need for a presser for something like that though. Especially not one involving McDonough. My best guess is an extension for Zambrano.

I'm not saying you're wrong, but IMO the Cubs have already given Samardzija big money. $7.25M represents the largest signing bonus ever given to a draft pick (not counting the Matt White "loophole" situation).

I'm not getting this line of thinking. Samardzija has already signed a contract with the Cubs that will pay him something like $7.5M over the next few years if he simply shows up with his spikes and glove. Why would some new contract be needed if he's formally decided on baseball? i don't think that's true. Indeed it is http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/draft/news/261750.html

I'm not getting this line of thinking. Samardzija has already signed a contract with the Cubs that will pay him something like $7.5M over the next few years if he simply shows up with his spikes and glove. Why would some new contract be needed if he's formally decided on baseball?

Good luck taking that argument to a courtroom. The judge would laugh you out the door. Put me in the camp that says even considering how the arb system is set up, making 9 mostly crappy starts and spending the better part of the year on the DL does not warrant a raise.

I would be shocked if they gave Prior more than 1 year at this point. There's no reason to offer it, unless he's willing to take peanuts in the 2nd year. Maybe they offer him an incentive-laden deal similar to Wood and Miller? Prior's still two years away from free agency. There's really no need to get creative or go more than a year (and IIRC Hendry has never gone more than a year with a guy more than a year away from FA). My guess is Prior will get the same in 2007 that he got in 2006. He's not in line for a raise, nor will he have to take a paycut.

If you can grasp why there's no such statistic as "winning hitter" or "winning fielder", then you can begin to comprehend why it's pretty silly to name a "winning pitcher". And from there, it's a short trip to understanding why wins and losses are a poor way to measure a pitcher's performance.

Mike Fontenot never had a future as a utilityman, because he doesn't do any of the things you'd want a utility guy to do. He can't really play anywhere other than 2B (ruling out the utility part), his defense is average at best (ruling him out as a late-innings defensive replacement), he doesn't run particularly well (scratch pinch-running). If he can't hit enough to stick in MLB as an everyday 2B (or at least a platoon 2B), then he's out of luck. It would appear that with the Cubs anyway, he's out of luck. I don't see why you think defensive replacement and pinch running are the only uses for a bench player. If he can hit enough to be a quality pinch hitter, then a player is worth keeping around. A bench player's greatest asset is his bat. There's practically an unlimited supply of all glove no stick guys that can be brought in, there aren't many that can hit. I have no idea if Fontenot could, but his minor league numbers suggest he at least stands a chance. If he came close to replicating his minor league numbers in the majors (obviously not a guarantee), he'd be a perfectly suitable bench option. But I'm interested in this Kinkade guy on the bench. Career .350 OBP in the majors, 102 OPS+, and solid minor league numbers. With minimal compensation, a guy like this has a chance to provide some help from the bench. It's splitting hairs I suppose, but a "utility" player is different than a "bench" player. Theriot is a utility player -- a guy that offers lots of flexibility and can do a lot of different things well, but isn't the first guy you'd look to in a pinch hitting situation. Guys like Daryle Ward and Randall Simon and are the polar opposite -- great PH options that are barely passable in the field and on the bases. I don't see Fontenot providing nearly enough utility to be a utility guy. And he doesn't offer the kind of power you'd want in a guy that is primarily a pinch-hitter. So IMO that leaves his only real chance at a MLB career is as an everyday (or perhaps platoon) 2B. He doesn't earn his keep in any other role.

Mike Fontenot never had a future as a utilityman, because he doesn't do any of the things you'd want a utility guy to do. He can't really play anywhere other than 2B (ruling out the utility part), his defense is average at best (ruling him out as a late-innings defensive replacement), he doesn't run particularly well (scratch pinch-running). If he can't hit enough to stick in MLB as an everyday 2B (or at least a platoon 2B), then he's out of luck. It would appear that with the Cubs anyway, he's out of luck.