Elrhino

I love how "All Star" is a meaningless term, but we can freely use terms like "Top Pitching Prospects" like it has any relevant meaning. It doesn't enhance your value any because you're the "top pitching prospect" in a minor league system void of pitching talent at the moment. Also, when did people completely start throwing out the concepts of OBP and sample sizes? Because DeRosa had one good healthy year in his career, we can count on him reproducing the exact same production in 2008, therefore Roberts is at best a minimal upgrade?

I know all the cool kids are Hendry bashing, but if he is finding difficulties dealing with the Angelos owned Orioles, that puts him in the same category as 27 other MLB general managers. The Bedard traded was all but finished at least 5 different times over the span of 2 months, and the Orioles REALLY wanted to get rid of him.

Larry Hughes was on XM Radio's baseball channel on Sunday and said there is even a chance Fukudome could bat leadoff. He said Soriano isn't absolutely entrenched there. They're going to evaluate and play around with the top of the lineup in spring training.

Hendry has been dangling him for months, and I don't see anyone lining up the block to take him off his hands. Either none of the mlb front offices recognize the obvious greatness of Matt Murton or Hendry isn't selling him cheap.

Look beyond DeRosa's 2007 season and look at his entire career, and it might make more sense. I'm afraid those just assuming we're going to get 2007 production and/or 2007 health from DeRosa are going to be in for a rude awakening. (and I was one of the few who liked the aquisition last year). DeRosa is a great compliment player, but he's not someone you want to build around and depend on. Any trade with the Orioles is a long shot because their front office is such a disorganized nightmare. The Bedard trade could/should have been done weeks ago before Angelos finally bumbled and stumbled his way to approving it. Troy Patton's arm problems are already begining to appear again. Looks like a torn labrum. I wonder if that puts any more pressure on them to aquire a young southpaw starter.

We need a platoon for Pie, just so we can blame Lou for irratic playing time when he's hitting below .310 OBP to help us sleep better at night.

Uhm, no, I'd rather not bring back the guy with the career OBP under .300 who is coming off an 8 HR season. Might as well bring back Macias while we're at it too. Corey wont come back to play baseball for Chicago ... as opposed to what? Unloading boxes at the UPS dock?

Byrd is garbage. Surely there is a cheaper price for garbage to be found elsewhere.

Farnsworth should only be mentioned sparingly, if at all, and never in mixed company.

The Rangers would do this deal in a second. Imagine if you had Marquis suck (with a much worse contract) combined with Manny's attitude. They ran out of patience with him last year. There are stories out that there about him ignore pitch calls and just make pitches up just to spite the manager, and getting shellacked in the process. In the interviews I heard (living in Dallas) of Ron Washington and the Rangers brass at the end of the year they were making no secret that they were going going into the offseason looking to dump him off to whoever would be willing to take him. I also think he and Lou would make it about three weeks before one of them had the other in a headlock.

Three overvalued (by Cub fans) garbage pieces for a bad player? Well, I don't know what assurances we have of Roberts continuing to produce post Mitchell report (other than there's no reliable test for HGH), but he's significantly better than Pierre. However, guys like Eric Patterson and Jake Fox do appear to fit into the overvalued garbage prospects criteria ... and likely Gallagher as well.

I would rather keep Murton than Pie, too. However, we could find a lot better value for Pie/Gallagher that Brian freaking Roberts. For instance, Pie/Gallagher would be a real nice start on a Khalil Greene trade. I know PetCo is not a hitter friendly park, but why is everyone salivating at the prospect of having a guy who also put up a .322 OBP on the road last year?

I wouldn't mind Pie for Roberts at all. Until Pie shows some semblance of plate discipline at any level, I'd much rather keep Murton if it's believed Fukudome can show himself to be even adequate at CF. I also wonder if maybe we aren't taking for granted a bit that DeRosa will be able to sustain his 2006 numbers and health. He hasn't exactly shown that he's a dependable 140+ game starter. While the difference between DeRosa and Roberts might be marginal, the difference between Roberts and Fontenot is immense. And having DeRo as a supersub grants Lou so much more flexibility and provides so many more contingency plans for when things go wrong.

Completely putting aside whether or not the Cubs should trade for him and all that entails, I'm pretty disappointed that the Mitchell would put something that flimsy in his report.

He's not a bad righty platoon corner outfielder, but as long as Murton is on the roster he's not really a great candidate for the Cubs.

I have no problem the Cubs letting him go if he wouldn't agree to a team option, and I really have no problem with Prior wanting to start fresh somewhere else. He's like OJ in the Naked Gun. Let's see ... shoulder, elbow, achielles, hit by a line drive, bad case of the flu that caused him to lose a lot of weight ... any belief that he was going to be healthy in the next 12 months is complete fantasy. The slim chance of return on investment was going to come in '09 or not at all. Plus, I know it's believed by some that he just has a flawed throwing motion, and I would have to say that the injury history highlights that there probably is something wrong. http://www.chrisoleary.com/projects/Baseball/Pitching/RethinkingPitching/Essays/MarkPriorPitchingMechanics.html I think the chances of Prior making the Cubs eat crow are about as good as Corey Patterson's were. Maybe less, and that's saying something.

I hope the player is as good as his agent is. He may have doubled his reported value in the last 3 months without doing anything.

He's officially decided he's reached a decision that he will soon announce that he's about to decide.

For eons we've all beaten our heads against the wall because Hendry has completely dismissed the importance of .OBP, especially in front of our run producers in the middle of the lineup, and then Hendry (theoretically) makes two moves that would dramatically improve the .OBP at the top of the lineup and shows signs that he might be evolving and turning the corner and we're still ready to crucify him. Isn't it pretty obvious that there's absolutely nothing Hendry could REALISTICALLY do to make some people happy at this point? Lou was kvetching late during the year about the lack of .obp at the top of the lineup, lamenting that you can't just tell guys who have been free swingers their entire career to start taking walks. It's something you have to address in the offseason, and I really wouldn't be shocked at all to see both Roberts and Fukudome persued to bat #1 and #2 in the lineup. Hendry seem to go out of his way to get what his manager wants, for better or worse in the case of Dusty, and when he locks on the goal he's pretty steadfast. I see the lineup as follows 2B Roberts RF Fukudome 1B Lee 3B Ramirez LF Soriano C Soto CF Pie SS Theriot I'm not saying I would have Theriot start at SS over DeRo, that's just what I see the most likely scenerio.

You have got to be kidding me? Beane traded garbage for Barrett so he could get Damien Miller to handle his young pitching staff. Stole Barrett, that's a good one. Yes, nobody is a bigger believer in how a catcher "handles pitchers" than Billy Beane. Obviously Miller made a huge impression, considering he let Miller walk after one year. Barrett proceeded to hit .800+ OPS for us for a couple of more years while Miller was "handling pitchers" in Milwaukee. Are you kidding? Seriously, Barrett spent all of two days on the A's roster during the off-season before he was traded to the Cubs. It was almost like a three-way deal. He was then released by the Cubs and resigned at a lower rate than he would have gotten during arbitration. The Cubs didn't have anything the nationals wanted. Beane knew exactly what he was doing and who he was getting. So Beane "knew" he had a catcher who had three future seasons of .800+ OPS, and the best he could get in return was Damian Miller and a little cash? Wow, now that's a stupid trade. No, he wanted Miller to handle his pitching staff. It is not rocket science here. And yes Beane values defense. Just because you "knew what you were doing" in your mind doesn't mean you didn't get fleeced., and Beane got fleeced in that deal. I'm sure Hendry thought he "knew what he was doing" when he made the Pierre trade.

You have got to be kidding me? Beane traded garbage for Barrett so he could get Damien Miller to handle his young pitching staff. Stole Barrett, that's a good one. Yes, nobody is a bigger believer in how a catcher "handles pitchers" than Billy Beane. Obviously Miller made a huge impression, considering he let Miller walk after one year. Barrett proceeded to hit .800+ OPS for us for a couple of more years while Miller was "handling pitchers" in Milwaukee. Are you kidding? Seriously, Barrett spent all of two days on the A's roster during the off-season before he was traded to the Cubs. It was almost like a three-way deal. He was then released by the Cubs and resigned at a lower rate than he would have gotten during arbitration. The Cubs didn't have anything the nationals wanted. Beane knew exactly what he was doing and who he was getting. So Beane "knew" he had a catcher who had three future seasons of .800+ OPS, and the best he could get in return was Damian Miller and a little cash? Wow, now that's a stupid trade.

They weren't just freaking awfull, because we traded garbage for garbage. No one is questioning that we've traded for some bad players, but we've usually haven't given up anything but garbage to attain them. We didn't demolish Corey Patterson's value, he just turned out to be garbage and garbage doesn't have any value.

He also gave him away for nothing. How does that make it a good trade if you gave up nothing to get him and turned around and gave him away for nothing? Because getting 3 years of above average offensive production from the catcher position isn't nothing.

You have got to be kidding me? Beane traded garbage for Barrett so he could get Damien Miller to handle his young pitching staff. Stole Barrett, that's a good one. Yes, nobody is a bigger believer in how a catcher "handles pitchers" than Billy Beane. Obviously Miller made a huge impression, considering he let Miller walk after one year. Barrett proceeded to hit .885 OPS for us while Miller was "handling pitchers" in Milwaukee.

Anyone could have made those trades. Baltimore failed to come to terms on a long term contract for Lee after he was traded by the Marlins. I supposed Hendry gets credit for the first person to say, "I'll take him". Aramis was traded after questions about his "make up" and ability to play defense. Two things that still haunt him today. Hendry should get credit for the Nomar deal, but again Boston couldn't get rid of him fast enough. But all that is beside the point, Hendry has demonstrated repeatedly that he's real good at putting together mediocre to terrible teams, year in and year out. Frankly, I want more. Funny how those deals became hindsight "no brainers" that anyone could have made, but the board nearly melted down when they were made going on and on about how badly we were fleeced. Because we gave up Bobby Hill and Hee Seop Choi who were "just as good, but cheaper". Who gives a crap about what "the board" thinks? I wasn't here when Lee was traded. I think the Aramis trade was not universally panned. But it is all completely beside the point. Only pointing out the difference between a real baseball general manager and us. A real baseball general manager's stupid decisions are on record. Meanwhile we call all make absolutely ridiculous claims like "Hee Seop Choi is just as good as Derek Lee, but cheaper" and they just vanish into thin air when they turn out to be laughable. Or even worse, deny it altogether and say that "anyone could have done it".