fromthestretch

That's an expensive mentor. Agreed. I would think they could somehow get someone like Ausmus for a lot cheaper than that.

It's probably Flores.

True but they still market him as a starter, along with Chamberlain whom both have not had success as starters. If Samardijza was a Yankee after his first season, he would've been on the cover of SI or would have been talked about alot when trades came around. Same thing can be said about Angel Guzman, I guarantee you he would be talked about a centerpiece for a trade if he were with either club. I can't argue that.

What deals have Hendry and Cashman done in the past? Keep in mind that Hendry is generally very good at trades. I would not be in favor of acquiring Melky, though. Stick with Cameron. I know Brian Cashman and the Yankees dont give up guys for nothing. And Hendry very rarely gets taken in trades. He's backed out of deals for plenty of players he's wanted because the opposing GM was asking for an arm and a leg (or more). Melky is vastly overrated, along with all the other supposed young studs the yankees have in Hughes, Chamberlain, Cabrera, etc. The media blows them up but none of those guys has had a decent season other than Chamberlain. Not to nitpick, but Hughes was dominant as a reliever this season. Obviously though, he would have more value if he was successful as a starter.

For future reference, if you don't want to pay for Play Index on baseball-reference, Baseball Musings has a decent tool you can use: http://www.baseballmusings.com/cgi-bin/DayByDayDatabase.py

2003-2009 wins leaders: Halladay 111 Santana 111 Sabathia 106 Oswalt 104 Pettitte 101 Lowe 100 Zambrano 100 Beckett 98 Buehrle 96 Garland 95 Moyer 94

How did that prove your point? Zambrano has a better winning percentage than 41 of the the 68 pitchers in the HOF. Are you saying that Zambrano is a HOF pitcher? $2 million+ per win in 2009. What a bargain, Hendry. Oh wait..his VORP and WHIP were great. =D> =D> If you're going to be close-minded and insist on looking at wins, you should realize that the Cubs were 18-10 in games Zambrano started.

The best part about this deal from Boston's standpoint is that it's only two years. You have to wonder if Scutaro can repeat his success from last season. He just had a career year as a 33-year old, and that was preceded by two seasons with a sub-.700 OPS. I think they overpaid, but then again someone was going to give him $5-6 million per year. A team like the Red Sox can afford to do that moreso than most teams.

Yet when the Phils do it, the same folks are full of praise. Actually no, many of the folks have pointed out it was too much. But you don't care about facts you just want to cry about unfair treatment of the great Jim Hendry. There absolutely is a double standard at work here (both in this thread and on the board in general), and I don't mind pointing out the hypocrisy of it. I'm not going to argue that there are people that will criticize Hendry regardless of what he does. However, the number of people with that mindset is a lot lower than you think it is and certainly doesn't represent this board as a whole.

As I posted above, Polanco is not average-to-slightly above average offensively, and a switch to 3B makes his defensive value uncertain. Whatever control issues Grabow may have have not prevented him from being effective. The past two years, perhaps. However, relievers, especially ones of the non-elite variety, are very unpredictable. When you also factor in Piniella's lack of patience with relievers that have control issues (and aren't named Marmol), the signing becomes a bit more puzzling. On top of that, the Cubs have a variety of other left-handed bullpen options.

As I posted above, Polanco is not average-to-slightly above average offensively, and a switch to 3B makes his defensive value uncertain. Whatever control issues Grabow may have have not prevented him from being effective. He's a mid-.700s OPS hitter with the ability to kick it into the low-.800s with some luck. He's average at that position. Defensively, he was well above average as a third baseman. Even if you factor in regression due to age and a few years away from the position, he's still a good bet to be above average there. Again, comparing a third baseman to a middle reliever is ridiculous. Furthermore, when you're still ignoring the fact that the Phillies are only paying $1 million more per year for Polanco than they were for Feliz. Polanco is slightly younger, is better offensively, and won't be much of a downgrade defensively. This is simply not a bad signing for the Phillies. His ability to play multiple positions well also makes him a tradeable asset in the second and third years of his contract if the Phillies feel the need to offload him for some reason.

The reason is simple, Hendry didn't sign Polanco. As I've posted often, some posters criticize Hendry for every transaction he makes or doesn't make. Look at the criticism he's getting in the threads about Padilla and Ankiel, even though Bruce pointed out that the rumor about Padilla is false. That's not it at all, but keep believing that if you wish. The fact is that Polanco is an average-to-slightly above average offensive everyday player who is capable of playing very good defense at a couple of infield positions. Grabow is a middle reliever with control issues. On top of that, Polanco is probably a better fit for the Phillies than he would be with the Cubs. He's only making a million more than they were paying Feliz, so it's not like they're adding a ton of salary at that position. Furthermore, he'll provide better offense than Feliz without much of a drop in defense. All that said, I'm not sure I'm a fan of a three-year deal for him. If I was a Phillies fan, I'd probably prefer a two-year deal with an option. Doubt that would've gotten it done though.

That's a pretty big IF. He's a solid power bat off the bench that can fill in at the corners every now and then.

Dotel was a dominant setup man from 2001-2003. He's currently a mid-3's ERA guy, with control issues and a knack for giving up homers. Still strikes out a lot of hitters though.

That's horribly inaccurate. 2009 Soriano: 2.97 ERA, 1.057 WHIP, 6.3 H/9, 0.7 HR/9, 3.2 BB/9, 12.1 K/9, 75.2 IP Wagner's AVG ('06-'09): 2.35 ERA, 1.057 WHIP, 6.8 H/9, 0.8 HR/9, 2.7 BB/9, 11.2 K/9 And when Soriano wasn't closing out games, they had Gonzalez, who was no slouch. What the Braves were missing in 2009 was anything resembling decent offensive production from their outfield.

It's possible to have a good closer for much less than $7 million. Teams can and do successfully develop closers in-house. It's like people think that only relievers with Major League experience can handle the pressure of the ninth inning, when that's certainly not the case.

No one is cherry-picking stats. We're simply taking a deeper look than the three-year splits you posted. So trying to qualify your generic three-year splits is cherry-picking? OK. I never said it was the only reason to dismiss him, just that it's a reason for caution, considering where he's been playing half his games the last three seasons. There are certainly other things that raise a red flag, such as a low walk rate, his age, his mediocre-at-best defense.

No one is cherry-picking stats. We're simply taking a deeper look than the three-year splits you posted. The discussion has evolved. No one is looking at this as an "either Granderson or Byrd" option. As you said, Cameron has been discussed, as well. I'm sure there are other options to consider. Personally, if Byrd was willing to take a one-year deal for $5 million or less, I wouldn't be against it. However, he's going to get more years and more money than that. As for Cameron, even if age does catch up to him offensively, he's still a much better option defensively than Byrd.

While I agree that would be good to get from CF, that's the HIGH end of what to expect from Byrd. More than likely, you'd probably get an OPS in the .770-.790 range. The one good thing I can say about him is that he hits lefties and righties pretty much equally over the course of his career. To me, he's just not the bat the Cubs need, especially for the money and contract length he wants.

I think Seidman is crazy to call Byrd a 4th OF. While we would all love to see Granderson on the Cubs, I don't think Byrd is a bad option. Of course, you would have to factor in the cost (in prospects) of getting Granderson with the cost (in dollars and years) to get Byrd. 2007-2009: Byrd - .295/.352/.468/.820 Granderson - .277/.350/.499/.849 Looking at those numbers, there aren't many teams that wouldn't love to have Byrd's numbers for their CF. I think it's a tough decision if you're talking 3-4 players from Marmol, Vitters, Castro, Casner, Jackson, etc. for Granderson as opposed to $16 - $18 million over 2 years for Byrd. Byrd is a 32-year old that benefited greatly from playing in Texas. Away from that stadium, his slugging percentage is around .415 over the past three seasons. If the price for Byrd is $16-18 million over two seasons, then pass. You can't just look at what a player does on the road and call that his true talent level. The majority of players play better at home than they do on the road. Just this year there was a .037 point difference between road and home OPS across the league(.267/.340/.429 home to .258/.322/.406 away). Not to mention, if you believe in Baseball-Reference's park factors, Wrigley Field is a more hitter friendly park than Arlington is. I'm aware of that, and I never called it his true talent level. However, his differences were much greater than .037: 2009: .133 2008: .139 2007: .201 Furthermore, he's 32 and is going to demand a multi-year deal worth a few million more annually than he's ever made in a single season. His OPS over the past three seasons is .820. On top of that, he's probably a tick below average defensively in CF, where his offense would have more value. Would you really want to wager that kind of money that he's going to continue to produce at that level in a Cubs uniform over the course of a multi-year contract? Let me put this another way, were you happy with the production the Cubs got from Jacque Jones in the first year of his contract? I ask because that's most likely the high end of what Byrd would offer in terms of offense, and it would probably cost the Cubs more than it did to get that from Jones.

I think Seidman is crazy to call Byrd a 4th OF. While we would all love to see Granderson on the Cubs, I don't think Byrd is a bad option. Of course, you would have to factor in the cost (in prospects) of getting Granderson with the cost (in dollars and years) to get Byrd. 2007-2009: Byrd - .295/.352/.468/.820 Granderson - .277/.350/.499/.849 Looking at those numbers, there aren't many teams that wouldn't love to have Byrd's numbers for their CF. I think it's a tough decision if you're talking 3-4 players from Marmol, Vitters, Castro, Casner, Jackson, etc. for Granderson as opposed to $16 - $18 million over 2 years for Byrd. Byrd is a 32-year old that benefited greatly from playing in Texas. Away from that stadium, his slugging percentage is around .415 over the past three seasons. If the price for Byrd is $16-18 million over two seasons, then pass.

I don't know that much about Purdue, but Tennessee has been shooting lights out from outside so far - only 51% from inside the arc, but 47% from outside it. They also run the usual Bruce Pearl style - fast, heavy pressure and trying to force turnovers and get quick shots. I haven't seen much from them this year, but from listening on the radio and from talk around the program, they're playing much faster than last year. Scotty Hopson has been the star so far, shooting 59% from the field and 63% beyond the arc. Tyler Smith and Cameron Tatum have been quite good from the field as well. No true point guard, though, (but Melvin Goins might become that) and the inside guys aren't huge. Sounds like they could cause problems for Purdue with no Lew Jack and no other true PG. Isn't another one of their guards banged up as well? Not that I know of, unless someone got hurt last night.

LewJack did not play. Purdue didn't look that bad. Completely manhandled St. Jo's in the 2nd half. What is that trophy in your sig? I would assume Big Ten Tourney from last year. Personally while it's something to be proud about it isn't something I would I would go around bragging about how you got a trophy or showing pictures of the trophy. Brag about winning but not about the trophy. I don't know if that makes sense. Kind of hard to explain. Why wouldn't a picture of the trophy be a decent visual representation of winning the Big Ten Tournament?

And I would bet some mediocre to bad team offered him more money at some point and he chose to sit out rather than go to a team he wouldn't have the chance to get to the WS with. And that is quite possible. However, I never said it was just about the money. I've acknowledged the fact that he also wants to play for a winner. I think both of those are the two main factors for him. I don't think he'd sign with a winner for much less than he feels he's worth, just like he won't sign with a crappy team that might offer him what he's asking for (or more). I also don't think he gives a rat's behind where he is in the rotation, so long as he is in the rotation.

The fact that someone is the #1 pitcher in a rotation doesn't necessarily guarantee that he will be in the biggest games. With injuries and off days, it's impossible to make that happen all the time. Where egos might come into play more would be the postseason rotation. And I will bet that money is a much, much, much bigger factor into a free agent's decision than where they are in the rotation. 1. Of course it doesn't guarantee they pitch in the bigger games but teams will sometimes mess with the No. 5 starter's rest so the ace can go in a big series. Also I said it is mostly about the postseason rotation. 2. As I said, in Pedro's case money is not a big factor. His case is rare. He has already made load so of money and showed this season he will take a small contract to go to a contender. Most FA's obviously take money first or at least factor in heavily. Pedro will probably be looking for 1-teams winning likelihood, 2-position in rotation, 3-money. I doubt where a pitcher is in a postseason rotation is a huge factor into where they are going to sign. As far as Pedro, I think he's more focused on having a guaranteed spot in someone's rotation, regardless of whether it's the first or fifth spot. And to say that money isn't a big factor for Pedro is, to use your word, naive. No one was giving him the $5 million he wanted last season, so he sat out a couple months. If he thinks he's worth $3 million to someone this season, he's not going to settle for $1 million. He will if its a team he thinks he can win with. He didn't come back for the money. He came back to win (both a WS and prove he can still win games as a pitcher). If the Giants offer 5 million and the Phillies offer 1 million I'm pretty sure he will go to the Phillies. You're completely ignoring the fact that he sat out for half the season until a team surfaced that had both a chance to win and came close to meeting his salary demands. His salary with the Phillies wasn't far off his original demands. It was simply prorated plus some additional bonuses.