Mephistopheles

It won't. And it will fall to below .350 for the rest of the season, considering he's never finished over .350 in his career (not even in 05).

I am sick and tired of your batting average driven thought process, but you're not completely wrong. Batting average is a load of crap. Never use it in a debate again in your life, trust me. There are essentially two things that are important to contributing runs for an offense, the ability to hit for power and the ability to not get out. Yes, both are persistent abilities. Derrek Lee has been better at the former than Prince Fielder, but Fielder has been signficantly better than Lee in power production. It's not as if Lee has 20 home runs to Prince's 30. Derrek Lee has eight. EIGHT. Obviously there's a tradeoff between OBP and SLG. There are several statistics that can gauge a player's contributions using both. The most well-known one is OPS, simply OBP + SLG. Derrek Lee gets beat on this metric, 992 to 925. Another commonly used one is marginal lineup value rate (MLVr). This is the basic offensive rate stat used in VORP. A watered down simple way to calculate is to use runs created for a team of 9 league average hitters (using only OBP and SLG) and then replacing just one of those 9 hitters with the hitter in question and finding the difference between the two on a per game basis. Prince Fielder beats him here: .364 to .323. A third commonly used one is EqA. EqA is found by using Raw EqA (TB+H+1.5(BB+HBP)+SB)/(PA+SB/3+CS) and putting it under several different transformations. Derrek Lee is beaten once again, .326-.319. So using three different all-encompasing offensive statistics we find out that Prince's strength (home runs) outweighs Lee's all-around offensive savvy. That said, if Lee's home run total would have been twenty and his OBP didn't slip he'd be a lot more valuable than Prince. Unfortunately Lee's OBP has been over .380 once in his career and it's sitting at .422. I'm not so sure expecting it to stay there is the smartest thing to do. Unlike Prince he's not a budding superstar at the age of 23. Adding in defense, right now they're close in terms of production. Expect Prince's walk rate to spike and then he'll certainly better. They're striking out similar. Theyre walking similar. Lee's just hit a lot more singles and has a HUGE lead in BABIP -- not something that's sustainable. In fact, the ONLY reason Derrek Lee has a higher OBP is his .406 BABIP. That's going to regress. It's an inevitable reality. Once that goes if the power doesn't come back, Lee's going to be an average to below average first baseman. That's not a typo. Prince is certainly safer.

Do you have difficulty with reading comprehension, too? Or maybe you can find where I insulted you? I said your unfounded criticism of the Royals was idiotic, I did not call YOU an idiot. Read before you get on your high horse, please. questioning somone's reading comprehension is essentially calling them an idiot, even I know that.

does carrie musk rat lurk here? because shes an idiot. I SEE YOUR FAKE WANNABE CHANGE THE WORD THINGY FOR RAT AND MUSK Muskat that probably proves shes here and complained.

hey guys im mgl. that's what some of you think, at least.

stop using batting average

Based on what? The fact that Prince Fielder has shown he can keep his numbers up for a full season? I may be a homer, but you know generally what you're going to get with Lee. A solid, consistent player with MUCH better defense than Fielder. That's why I want him. There's more to baseball than fantasy stats. Fielder isn't a DH. And he hasn't been around long enough for us to know if he can keep this pace up. He probably will, but there's no guarantee either way. But like I said, it's just one man's opinion. If you don't want Lee, fine, but don't criticize other's opinions simply because they don't see things the way you do. im pretty sure i have every right to criticize someone's opinion. If you don't want it to be criticized, don't post it. You can keep dreaming that Prince isn't better than Lee, but remember it's just a dream. Your nightmare of Prince being better than Lee is reality. Show me where I said Lee was better than Prince. Please, show me. I'd like to see it. I never once said that. And I won't say it. All I said is I'd rather have Lee for the rest of the season. You said this: A. You're an idiot if you didn't think you would be inferring that you thought Lee was better. B. If you are saying Fielder is better, and you prefer an inferior player like Lee, what the hell are you trying to say? You want to lose?

So you're saying that defense means nothing? Why even give them gloves then? it means very little in the greater scope. Lee's better but not enough to justify the lack of power Lee has possessed.

Possibly. But Lee has historically been WAY better later in the season than he is in April and May (.261 in April and May, .291 the rest of the year). If he follows suit, I think he'll be just fine. here's a newsflash. Prince Fielder is going to end July with 33-35 home runs -- a figure that Derrek Lee has passed over a full season ONCE IN HIS CAREER and stop posting batting average. It's worthless to me and everyone here. Batting average is a joke. its stupid. it doesnt even tell you how often you get a hit.

Based on what? The fact that Prince Fielder has shown he can keep his numbers up for a full season? I may be a homer, but you know generally what you're going to get with Lee. A solid, consistent player with MUCH better defense than Fielder. That's why I want him. There's more to baseball than fantasy stats. Fielder isn't a DH. And he hasn't been around long enough for us to know if he can keep this pace up. He probably will, but there's no guarantee either way. But like I said, it's just one man's opinion. If you don't want Lee, fine, but don't criticize other's opinions simply because they don't see things the way you do. im pretty sure i have every right to criticize someone's opinion. If you don't want it to be criticized, don't post it. You can keep dreaming that Prince isn't better than Lee, but remember it's just a dream. Your nightmare of Prince being better than Lee is reality.

you, sir, are one big ass homer. while it's possible that Lee outslugs Prince the rest of the season, it's not very likely.

real baseball includes home runs...... come on get a clue.

i thought our brains were past the part where there are no AAAA players. Only MLB players who dont get a fair shot. Cedeno's fine and the best we got.

bp: cedeno should be starting. no doubt. if you're against this you're against winning.

Well A was Carl Hubbell as you know. He was 31 at the time.

mephandom, would it be a bad idea for me to read the last ten or so pages from today? is it that poorly thought out?

1. Billy Beane 2. John Schuerholz 3. Mark Shapiro 4. Terry Ryan 5. Asmodai

it is fine

But none of those options are proven. If we could get a guy like Biggio - maybe a first-year Hall of Famer - there would be no stopping us from making the playoffs. Biggio is a veteran. He's played in the World Series. He won't crack under pressure during the stretch run. Theriot and Fontenot will probably lose control of their bowels if the Cubs are playing meaningful games in September. I like the Kendall move, but we need more proven veterans to catch the Brewers. Biggio? Are you kidding me? Come on God (allegedly God) gave you a brain for a reason. Use it.

Jason Kendall batting from career game #1590 (May 30, 2007) to game #1625 (Jul 15, 2007) G PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB IBB SO HBP SH SF GDP SB CS BA OBP SLG OPS +---+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+-----+-----+-----+-----+ 36 136 127 14 36 8 0 2 10 5 0 6 0 2 2 1 0 0 .283 .306 .394 .700 the walks will come

to be fair I Split G GS PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB IBB SO HBP SH SF ROE GDP SB CS BA OBP SLG OPS BAbip sOPS+ tOPS+ Split +-+------------+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+------------+ 1st Half 73 72 298 261 26 69 10 0 1 22 23 2 26 8 3 3 5 7 5 4 .264 .339 .314 .653 .287 73 84 1st Half 2nd Half 70 69 328 291 50 94 13 0 0 28 30 0 28 4 1 2 2 12 6 1 .323 .391 .368 .759 .355 101 114 2nd Half last season

im kinda gettin worried. anyone have tonights game on tivo? check the celebration at the end. see if marsh is out there.

But can you see the Cubs offering Kendal arbitration? He'd surely accept. hopefully someone signs him before. he probably wont be. its just something that could materialize.

I forgot about that. Then there's probably about 3 left. The A's may not pick it up.

the future? unless im mistaken he's a free agent after this season. I don't think he's a very good player anymore but this isnt the worst deal hes done. the money isnt an issue for the Cubs and its a buy low chance. there's a pretty damn good chance kendalls obp is .340+ the rest of the season. power? no but as long as hes not an auto out im happy. I'm talking about for this season. How much money can we add before the deadline? Whatever that theoretical number is, this takes a chunk out of it (unless we got the A's to eat a ton of money), making it harder to pick up an actual difference maker, instead of a guy that can't out OPS Izturis. he has about 4 million left. the cubs gained 1.5 mil out of the barrett deal. dumping izturis and/or jones would make the money issue back at zero. Really? Just four million? I was thinking it was something more like six. That makes me feel a bit better. I still would have rather just let Soto try to do his thing because I really think he can outdo what Kendall has done so far. If the Cubs aren't going to do that, I guess we just have to hope that Kendall can get on base a little bit, because we sure as hell know he isn't going to hit for power. another thing to consider is that this last offseason he was a type a guy. he probably wont this year, but hell certainly be a b.