fromthestretch

I believe he's out with a groin injury.

Zellers don't flop. They Zeller. With some practice, maybe they can learn to Kramer. To Kramer: To flop without actually being touched by anyone. And still manage to get the call.

Zellers don't flop. They Zeller. With some practice, maybe they can learn to Kramer.

He sure as hell can't shoot them much worse than Terone.

Dammit. Barlow was doing a good job of staying out of trouble this year, too.

That can't be accurate. I can think of two off the top of my head: Rick Wilkins Henry Rodriguez ETA: SSR beat me to it.

The Cubs have several bad contracts? Several?

http://www.bleachernation.com/2011/12/29/lukewarm-stove-byrd-lidge-garza-jackson-wood-marmol-callaspo-marshall/ Given all the history, it makes sense that he'd happily sign with Hendry for well below market, but not be inclined to do so under Theo. It's possible that even the "gentleman's agreement" doesn't hold true anymore, which would be a shame. Oh well, it's just business. This might be where Ricketts Cubs fandom comes into play and he steps in a forces a Wood signing, instead of letting Theo/Hoyer make it simply a baseball decision. Also there is the omnipresent Krane Kenney in play here with his marketing wizardry that could get this done. What is "Fair Market Value" for Wood even? $3.5-5 million as a base and $2-3 million more in incentives and what not? If you deal Marmol, re-sign Wood to close at a reasonable base salary with incentives for games finished.

Lawson has some skills defensively and plays bigger than he is. Unfortunately, he's what you might call overly aggressive, which has led to significant foul trouble. Carroll is meh.

Terone Johnson is beyond terrible from the free throw line. Seriously, if someone held a gun to his mother's head and said Johnson only had to hit four of ten to save her life, he'd be better off making funeral arrangements. If Purdue has a slim lead with less than 5-6 minutes to play, he probably shouldn't be on the floor. Byrd has had a couple solid games in a row. Painter needs to continue to give him more playing time. Yeah, he might be the worst free throw shooter in the country, no joke. Unbelievable coming from a 4-Star guard! It really reduces his usefullness as a player because his bread and butter is driving to the rim and drawing fouls. He's shooting 25% from the line in enough attempts (32) to make it alarming. Anthony Johnson is at 48.5% in 33 attempts and Lawson is at 34.6% in 26 attempts, so they're not exactly lighting it up either. Unfortunately, Carroll and Marcius aren't doing much of anything, so it's pretty much all on the shoulders of Hummell, Barlow, Jackson, Smith, and Byrd at this point, with Hummel as the acting center.

Terone Johnson is beyond terrible from the free throw line. Seriously, if someone held a gun to his mother's head and said Johnson only had to hit four of ten to save her life, he'd be better off making funeral arrangements. If Purdue has a slim lead with less than 5-6 minutes to play, he probably shouldn't be on the floor. Byrd has had a couple solid games in a row. Painter needs to continue to give him more playing time.

He certainly wasn't great, but was he really that awful? .258/.322/.435/.757 BA/OBP/SLG/OPS, 24 HRs, 87 RBI and played a decent right field for 1 year/$4.5 million. According to B-R, Burnitz had a -0.9 WAR for the Cubs that year. So to answer your question, yeah...he was pretty bad.

Crap. It was already shaping up to be a tough season. If they lose Jackson, they're really going to be hurting.

I'd be all over that. what the hell would be the point? we're garbage next year anyway, and after the season he'll either have sucked and not be worth re-signing or good and too expensive to sign. Well, it might appease the fanbase a bit in what they otherwise might perceive as a terrible offseason (provided the Cubs deal Garza and don't sign Fielder). Plus, you could possibly offload him to a contender mid-season and get a nice prospect or two in return. i imagine we'd have to waaaaaay outbid everyone else in order to convince oswalt to go for that. "hey roy! how'd you like to come play on a 65-win team for three months and then get traded wherever we feel like sending you come july?" It depends. He's obviously not getting the interest he expected considering he was looking for a three-year deal and now is willing to accept a one-year deal. You could probably throw some incentives in there.

I'd be all over that. what the hell would be the point? we're garbage next year anyway, and after the season he'll either have sucked and not be worth re-signing or good and too expensive to sign. Well, it might appease the fanbase a bit in what they otherwise might perceive as a terrible offseason (provided the Cubs deal Garza and don't sign Fielder). Plus, you could possibly offload him to a contender mid-season and get a nice prospect or two in return.

Oswalt appears to be willing to accept a one-year deal. http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/2011/12/20/roy-oswalt-will-take-a-one-year-deal/

I imagine it being not much worse than last year considering that picking throws out of the dirt is something that even terrible first basemen can do fairly well. Fielder's not good defensively, but very little of that has to do with his ability to scoop up a low throw.

What? From what was said, the Jays offered him the highest amount. We will find out tonight. Again, that is what has been said. As for Pujols, the offer the Cubs gave reportedly was no where near the amount he was looking for. There was another report that the Rangers were the highest bid. I wouldn't trust any report right now until the OFFICIAL winner is announced.

Considering the amount of money he just got, he's probably so excited that he's just going around hugging everyone.

I also think the offer to Pujols was more of a PR thing than a serious offer. It's a way for them to show the fans they're making an effort to spend, even though the offer was a bit of a low-ball offer.

If we're looking at the Padres, another interesting name is Kyle Blanks. Injuries have derailed him a bit the past couple seasons, but he's still relatively young. I don't know what San Diego's plans are for him.

At least Purdue is hitting free throws today. That's a step in the right direction. And I always like when 4'2 Lewis Jackson gets over 20 points.

I'm hoping his minutes will pick up though. He is capable of hitting outside shots and has enough size to grab a few rebounds here and there. I knew he'd lose some minutes, but I didn't anticipate this much of a drop in playing time for him.

What has been severely lacking so far is Purdue's defense. Teams are figuring out how to score on them, and Painter has yet to adjust. As you mentioned, they lack an inside presence. Granted, it's early in the season, but based on what I've seen so far, Carroll has not taken the step forward I had hoped this year and Marcius really isn't developing as quickly as many thought he would. What do you think of Anthony Johnson so far? He's going to be a good one. I bet he's the leading scorer next year and makes the All-Freshman team this year. Maybe I'm too high on him... Some of the Illinois posters here were pretty down on him. I think the RS year was exactly what he needed. I like him, but I worry that he's going to struggle on defense a bit, as he looks like a stiff breeze could knock him over. I'm really curious to see how Jacob Lawson develops. They're going to need him to at least provide interior defense and rebounding, even if he won't contribute much offensively. Yeah, some of Lawson's blocks have been sick. He'll be good at cleaning up garbage around the rim but I don't think he ever develops beyond a defensive player with a few dunks and layups each game. Don't get me wrong, Purdue needs that type of player too, especially with his level of athleticism. I'm most dissapointed with Terone Johnson. So much hype, and he can get to the rim, but he has trouble finishing and is a mediocre shooter at best. He shouldn't shoot 3's unless he's wide open. He looks like he struggles with confidence. Yeah, Terone's outside shot needs a lot of work. I will say that I'm impressed with how Barlow has looked early on...offensively anyway. He's developing into more of a scorer, which is what they need. He still needs to be a little smarter about knowing when and when not to fire up a shot though, and unfortunately, he's never going to be a great 3-point threat.

What has been severely lacking so far is Purdue's defense. Teams are figuring out how to score on them, and Painter has yet to adjust. As you mentioned, they lack an inside presence. Granted, it's early in the season, but based on what I've seen so far, Carroll has not taken the step forward I had hoped this year and Marcius really isn't developing as quickly as many thought he would. What do you think of Anthony Johnson so far? He's going to be a good one. I bet he's the leading scorer next year and makes the All-Freshman team this year. Maybe I'm too high on him... Some of the Illinois posters here were pretty down on him. I think the RS year was exactly what he needed. I like him, but I worry that he's going to struggle on defense a bit, as he looks like a stiff breeze could knock him over. I'm really curious to see how Jacob Lawson develops. They're going to need him to at least provide interior defense and rebounding, even if he won't contribute much offensively.