CubColtPacer

Choi was good. 1B is a tough position. If you limit it to 50 games started or above Choi would probably be the leading candidate (Karros would be right there as well but Choi had the bad few games in 2002 which probably breaks the tie). If you're willing to go lower than that then Mabry would be the top guy.

I don't agree with this. The Bears led by 7. If it was a 1-6 point lead, then you take timeouts to avoid losing the game without getting the ball. Worst case scenario with a 7 point lead is OT. And the Bears were at home, so I have no problem with the way it was played. Home teams have virtually no advantage in OT (I saw one statistic that said they win 51% of OT games). The question becomes what advantage do the Bears get by not calling timeouts? It didn't hurt the Vikings. They still had plenty of time to not hurry and call their entire playbook. And it had a potential benefit to the Bears with a good kickoff return to have time for more than a couple plays.

The tiebreakers are simply awesome this year. Denver is the #5 seed as of today but they don't control their own destiny while two other teams behind them do. And then of course look at how Denver can make the playoffs: 1) DEN win + NYJ loss or tie + BAL loss or tie 2) DEN win + NYJ loss or tie + PIT loss or tie 3) DEN win + NYJ loss or tie + HOU win 4) DEN win + BAL loss or tie + PIT loss or tie 5) DEN win + BAL loss or tie + HOU win 6) DEN tie + NYJ loss + BAL loss + PIT loss 7) DEN tie + NYJ loss + BAL loss + HOU loss or tie 8) DEN tie + NYJ loss + PIT loss + HOU loss or tie 9) DEN tie + NYJ loss + PIT tie + HOU tie 10) DEN tie + BAL loss + PIT loss + HOU loss or tie 11) DEN tie + BAL loss + PIT tie + HOU tie 12) PIT loss + BAL loss + HOU loss + JAC loss 13) PIT loss + BAL loss + HOU loss + NYJ loss 14) PIT loss + BAL loss + JAC loss + NYJ loss 15) PIT loss + HOU loss + JAC loss + NYJ loss 16) MIA loss or tie + NYJ loss + BAL loss + HOU loss + JAC loss or tie I'm not sure I've ever seen a team with 16 different scenarios to make the playoffs in the last week. This could be made very easy if the Jets and Ravens do win on Sunday. Otherwise this race could be one of the most complicated ones in history.

I am somewhat fine with the Colts resting starters but the way they did it was exceptionally poor. Announce that you're going to rest them before the game if you're going to do it. Or if you're not going to do that, then pull them early. Pulling them when playing a couple of more possessions would have very likely won the game is terrible. It was still a close game and the Jets would have been careful not to throw any cheap shots late in the game. There was little danger and as the game went along the chances for going undefeated grew bigger and bigger. The only way I would have supported pulling them that late in the game is if another offensive lineman had been hurt and they decided to be careful because of that. But the offensive line starters didn't even come out of the game! The Jets have a chance of getting this break twice in a row. They moved the Jets-Bengals game to Sunday night. If everything goes as expected on Sunday, then New England will very likely have clinched the 3 seed over Cincy based on SOV earlier in the day (obviously needs a NE win as well). Cincy still has a mathematical chance to catch them in that but they need almost everything to go their way next week. So if that happens, the Bengals will also have the situation where they can lay down versus the Jets and then play them in the first round.

I'm not trying to support Hendry other than the fact that some of the suppositions about how easy his job should have been are probably incorrect. He didn't walk into a great situation and he didn't have this massive payroll advantage for his entire tenure. It would have been an amazing GM job to completely overhaul the offense (which is what was needed because when he got the team the offense was both not that good and the only good players were aging quickly) and have the team rebuilt to have them solidly in the playoffs during 05/06. Hendry did do a decent job of rebuilding that offense, but he also destroyed the one thing the Cubs had going for them when he took the job by hiring Baker and letting him destroy the young arms. That led to the terrible seasons in those two years. Since then, he's done a mediocre job of spending money and building a team. There have been some extenuating circumstances, but he still has plenty of reasons to lose his job. He's easily replaceable. But he hasn't done such a horrible job that it should be a no brainer that he loses his job either (we've seen several GM's around the country that are that bad). He's just one of those guys in the middle tier of GM's who is going to lose his job one day because he hasn't done enough.

Opening day payroll and win totals during the Hendry years: $79,868,333 88 $90,560,000 89 $87,032,933 79 $94,424,499 66 $99,670,332 85 $118,345,833 97 $134,809,000 83 Thanks for the effort. That's pretty similar to what I was looking for, but I do note Goony's observation that the payroll is affected by other parts. Since Hendry took over the team, only once has he been able to match the level of production he got from the 2003 and 2004 team. That's not good. Especially if you take into consideration the significant increases. 50m doesn't buy what it used to. And speaking of 50m not buying what it used to, if you take the Yankees out of the equation, how much of an increase do the other 29 teams show over that same timeframe. I'm not referring to each team individually, but rather all of them combined. I sense that payrolls are smaller today than they were in 2003. They were handing out ridiculous contracts on just about every team between 2000 and 2003. While the Cubs have enjoyed a nice increase over that time, most other teams have reduced their payrolls. In addition to what Davearm said, it looks like that other than the Cubs or the Yankees, the other 28 teams have increased their payroll by an average of around 15-16 million over that timeframe. 8 teams have cut payroll while 19 have increased (1 team was almost exactly the same). 12 teams of those 28 have raised their payrolls by 20 million or more. 10 teams of those 28 have raised it by 30 million or more. 5 of those teams have raised it by 40 million or more. Now if we were looking at just the last couple years, the Cubs payroll was exploding a lot faster than other teams. Before that it was pretty normal growth.

They only hold the tiebreaker over Miami and Houston if they don't tie with them and another team. So, the Titans will make the playoffs at 9-7 if no team other than Miami OR Houston finish 9-7, but not both of them. Well, they have the tiebreaker over Houston regardless. But Miami is a different story. And there are lots of scenarios that could possibly involve the Dolphins. They could win the division, which would be bad for Tennessee as Tennessee cannot beat NE in any 2 or 3 way tiebreaker. They could possibly beat Denver or Baltimore in certain tiebreakers which would then cause Denver or Baltimore to eliminate Tennessee. So if either Denver or Baltimore win their 9th game the Titans also want them to win their 10th game just to avoid that scenario. And NE beating Jacksonville would be very helpful for the Titans because it not only gives the Jags a loss it also makes it impossible for Miami to win the division.

It affects both in the markets these cities are in. In Chicago for example, they originally were going to see their game, the Packers game, and the Cincy-San Diego game. Now that their game is moved, they'll see their game, Miami-TN, and probably the Detroit-Arizona game. Both games ended up changing because they don't want to play a game on the other channel at the same time the Bears are playing.

Now the whole country will get to either see the Falcons-Jets or Cardinals-Lions. And now even less people will be able to see the Cincy-San Diego game (since the Philly market will likely be shifted to the 1 pm CBS game since their game is now at 4:15). I really wish it was a CBS doubleheader tomorrow.

I can always appreciate your level-headed observations and you are probably more accurate with the reality than most of us, but the last sentence in the above quote disturbs me a bit. You make it sound as though all trades happen because a team has personality issues with someone, when we really don't know why players are traded. Teams trade players they like all the time. Kenny Lofton sure bounced around, as did Reggie Sanders. I don't think anyone can honestly say that each time Bradley was traded was due to his misconduct or poor behavior. Do we honestly know why he was traded from Montreal to Cleveland? Zach Day was a pretty nice return for Montreal in exchange for Bradley. How about the trade from Cleveland to LA? Franklin Gutierrez and a PTBNL is a pretty decent exchange, also. I don't remember any issues until he actually got to LA, where a fan hit him with a bottle or something. He lasted 2 years in LA before LA traded him for Andre Ethier, another pretty good trade. I recall the Cubs being interested in him then, also. They loved him in San Diego. And they loved him even after he got himself hurt. The one issue was actually a pretty legitimate complaint on Bradley's part, and no different than just about any other situation a typical player goes through. The manager was simply trying to get his player away before suspensions became a part of the equation and in the process, Bradley messed up his ACL. Freak accident, but no one in San Diego turned on him. I don't remember any problems in Oakland, either. Texas loved having him there, and it sounded like for the right price they might want him back. Sure, he's had issues time and again, but I can't agree that all of the trades or team changes are because he's a marked man that no one wants. I have no idea why he was traded from Montreal. I know he had been suspended in the minors for spitting gum at an umpire, but ultimately the Expos situation is uncertain why they decided to trade him. Here's a link to why he left Cleveland (and he had plenty of issues there and the article has brief references to several of them): http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=1773330 Basically the end was when he got into an argument with his manager and it was bad enough that he was barred from training camp and quickly traded. Here's a link to why he left the Dodgers: http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=2258032 Bradley had multiple suspensions in 04 along with a confrontation with a reporter. He also didn't get along with Jeff Kent and claimed Kent was a racist which was the stated reason for the Dodgers eventually trading him. The police also had to come to his house for domestic violence calls 3 times in 05 after he had been arrested for another incident in 04. In Oakland, everything was fine for a while until Bradley was battling some injuries. Oakland wasn't willing to guarantee him playing time as they had a crowded outfield when he got back and Bradley was upset about that so Oakland ended up DFA'ing him (they later were able to trade him before the 10 days were up). Here are some quotes from that story: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/06/22/SPGH6QK00S1.DTL I don't believe San Diego got rid of him because of his attitude. The ACL incident was well publicized but the Padres seemed to support him through that and I believe they offered him a small contract even with the torn ACL. Texas wanted to keep him but was unwilling to offer more than 1 year and Bradley wanted multiple after the 2008 season. And the Cubs got rid of him for off the field attitude reasons. So that's 4 out of 7 teams that seem to have gotten rid of him because of off the field problems, 1 that is uncertain, 1 that is unlikely, and 1 that just wasn't willing to offer multiple years. I didn't say that every team he's been with had gotten rid of him because of his attitude. But several teams have.

We know that Bradley has been knocked off of 4 teams because of personality issues (Cleveland, LA, Oakland, and now the Cubs). It's uncertain if that played into the situations in Montreal or San Diego, and with Texas it's pretty clear that it was a contract issue. So I would agree with you that there are certainly other reasons for Bradley to have changed teams, but the majority of teams have ended up moving him because of his personality. Some other random thoughts from reading the last couple pages: Bradley certainly did own up to his mistakes in the media. The things he said that ended up causing him to get traded were all about how people were affecting him personally. Bradley blamed himself multiple times for his struggles on the field. Silva has an unmovable contract now but if he does have 1 decent year the Cubs probably could save 5-6 million more by trading him and eating some of the salary after 2010. The one thing I am happy about is that Hendry's quotes about the trade pretty clearly show that they consider Silva a rehab project and probably won't stick with him too long if he is struggling. This was a business decision. Although I do agree that the Cubs may have a strong enough brand that Bradley couldn't have put the dent in the fanbase like he could have in a smaller city with less of a following even if everything did go wrong. To try to justify this in baseball terms is futile in my opinion. At the absolute best, Silva will be worth just a little less than Bradley over the next couple years. It's a very bad baseball move. This was strictly PR and trying to avoid the disaster that could have happened if the Cubs struggled again with Bradley in 2010. I'm not sure anymore if it was a good business decision (like I said, the Cubs might have a strong enough fanbase that fans wouldn't have been gone from the Cubs for long) but it certainly wasn't anything but that. As I've said before the Cubs desperation couldn't have caused this. The Mariners got a bargain because the Cubs weren't willing to hold onto Bradley. For every other team in the league, the fact that they weren't willing to offer the Cubs any better of a package then this shows that teams really weren't willing to take a chance on Bradley for more than minimum salary. Any team who was willing to give the Cubs just a little bit more salary relief could have had him and all but the Mariners passed. Bradley's value around the league was low because teams weren't willing to guarantee him enough money that it would be hard to cut him if things went wrong. The Cubs desperation had very little to do with every other team's offer besides the Mariners, and we have no idea if it affected Seattle's offer or not.

I would agree. It's a bad deal regardless. But Silva still has a decent chance of being close to mediocre. And that has value for a starting pitcher. I'm hoping the Cubs will be willing to release him if he struggles and doesn't show any bounce back from last year. That's my biggest worry of the trade that they will give him way too long of a leash. But if he does come back, he could easily be worth 4-5 million per year and a roster spot and the Cubs would have only wasted 6-8 million on this deal. If he doesn't and the Cubs are willing to release him, then they are out 16 million. The biggest problem is if they let him have negative value for most of 2 years clogging up a roster spot. It's definitely a bad trade, but it's how the Cubs handle it that could turn it from bad to absolutely horrible. And Silva has a chance of making it only bad if he can pitch like he has for a decent percentage of his career. His contract is so ridiculous because his upside is mediocre. But he doesn't have a horrible chance of reaching that upside like he has before.

Bruce says this is a serious rumor but it isn't finished yet and the Cubs may get some financial relief out of it: http://blogs.dailyherald.com/node/3114

Nah, that's just him messing up there. Silva is owed 4 more million than Bradley so it's the Mariners who would be sending money if they were just trying to even the salaries out. This is a bad move without any other players in it. It's an absolutely horrible move if no money is exchanged or if the Mariners are just evening out the money.

The one thing I disagree with is that I don't see the Big 10 going back to 16 conference games with this move even if they use basketball divisions. I really cannot see them using divisions at all in basketball because there is still so much emphasis on winning the regular season Big 10 crown that isn't quite the case in some other conferences. For that some reason, I can't see them going back down from 18 conference games.

I don't think the Titans-Rams Super Bowl is as good because of how boring it was for the first two and a half quarters. It was field goal try after field goal try and several of them weren't made. Plus the Rams were dominating on the scoreboard (16-0). The last 3 minutes were amazing, but it just doesn't match some of the other Super bowls in this decade.

Not that I want to see it on the list, but the Bush Push game could just as easily be on it, and I'm sure there are a slew of examples that fans of other teams could come up with too. I agree that ND-USC game should be on there. That game had it all and it had the added pressure of supposedly being a USC team for the ages. Big plays on offense, defense, and special teams. Both coaches went for 4th down gambles (Carroll went for a 4th down inside his 20 yard line). The huge drive by ND to take the lead with just a couple minutes left. The 4th down conversion by USC to get it down near the goal line, then the fumble out of play that originally ended the game, and then the Bush push after time was put back on the clock. In my biased opinion, it was definitely a better game than Texas-Texas Tech. They probably didn't put it on there because the USC-Texas game was just as good and that game was for the title. The games that stood out for me from that list as the best are the 2006 Rose Bowl, the two Patriots super bowls, the Colts AFC Championship victory, the 2001 World Series game 7, the 07 Fiesta bowl, the 08 Olympics, and the 09 Big East game.

Byrd is a meh signing for me. He's probably a 750 OPS ok at defense CF outside Texas. He hits right-handers and left-handers about the same. Is that a guy to get excited about? No. He is probably a decent stopgap for the position though. It would also improve the Cubs OF defense and gives them more flexibility with 2 at least decent hitters on the squad that can play CF. The main thing for me with Byrd is the years. He's too much of a risk with too little upside to give more than 2 years to. I'm ok with giving him a decent chunk of money but it better be a short deal.

It looks like it is Ted Lilly.

If Cameron signs I would hope we just keep Bradley. Bradley is better than Cameron and keeping Bradley wasn't an option then, so I don't know why it would be an option now. I don't know I would say that Bradley is a better player than Cameron. Bradley has the better upside while Cameron is more consistent. It's pretty close on who is more valuable overall. I would agree that the free agent options have little to no bearing on their decision to trade Bradley though.

Yeah, way too much money for Lackey. But ESPN will somehow overlook the amount and say "Theo did it again." Way too much? He's a better pitcher than Zambrano and it's less money. At the very least, it's overpaying a top of the rotation starter, instead of some schmuck. Is anybody signing better free agent pitchers for less? It's hard to compare Lackey and Zambrano because of the difference in leagues. If Lackey had signed with an NL team, would he have been a better value than Z? Z's hitting adds a lot of value compared to Lackey. Their injury histories are similar but Lackey has ended up being gone for more time than Z. And Lackey probably would have a few less innings in games in the NL because the Angels had the luxury of pitching him very deep into the game in a lot of close games. Lackey has much better control but has been more hittable and gives up more home runs the last couple years. His opponents OPS is also higher than Z's the last couple years. From a quick look, it looks like Z would probably have the better value if they were both NL pitchers while Lackey would have the better value if they were both AL pitchers. It's really hard to compare them because their strengths (Z's hitting, and Lackey's ability to conserve pitches and go deep in games) both suit their individual leagues so well. But Z's contract was signed in a much better economic environment. What's the excuse for Lackey's? I do agree with your one point though. If you're going to overpay, make it for an impact player because they don't come around enough. Even if Lackey is not better than Z, he is still an impact player unless there are real big concerns about his injuries.

The Titans only win 2 tiebreakers if they win out. They don't have to worry about Houston if both win out because the Titans have a better divisional record, and they would win a 2 way tie with Miami because of the upcoming head to head game. Every other team (Denver, Jacksonville, Baltimore, Jets, Miami in a 3 way tie, Pittsburgh) will all have better conference records than Tennessee. If they finish tied with Jacksonville, Jacksonville would eliminate them based on a better divisional record anyway. New England would be better in the tiebreakers as well if they were thrown into the mix. So the Titans are going to have to have a lot of games fall right in order to have a shot. They are mathematically alive but the fact that all 7 of their losses came in the AFC is really going to hurt them. I would agree that based on schedules, Denver and Baltimore are the teams I have the hardest time not seeing get to at least 9 wins, and if they both get to 9 wins the Titans are gone. If the Colts rest starters the Jaguars or Jets could easily get there as well.

I don't want to create a firestorm here, but I'm guessing that if the Big 10 had to pick only one site to hold the game every year they would put it at Lucas Oil. Soldier Field could have bad field conditions by the first week in December (unless they put in the turf) and the Big 10 probably doesn't want the perception of having potentially horrible weather in their championship games. We already know the conference likes Indianapolis. Plus Lucas Oil is just a tiny bit bigger so more tickets can be sold. I'm not sure if the Big 10 would follow the SEC model of picking one site or the Big 12 model of moving it around though.

Splitting the divisions would be tough, and that's especially true if the new member is part of the eastern half of the Big 10. If they put rivalries together they could end up seriously unbalancing the two divisions. Also it would mean going right back to playing four opponents only once in basketball. I still think it would be overall a good move with the right school but there are definitely challenges.

Oh please. Everybody can harp back on some report they heard to defend anything. Yeah, reports were dozens of teams were interested in Bradley this year as well. Dempster was a 31 year old with 1 good year under his belt as a starter. Are of those guys were much better free agent targets and were always going to get much more money. There is no comparison. Dempster had the best year of any of them. You've never seen teams be willing to overpay based on one amazing year coming from a pitcher with good stuff? And it wasn't just one report. Pretty much every single report had those three as interchangeable. In fact, there were lots of people here who wanted Burnett or Lowe instead of Dempster precisely because they were going to be around the same amount. Dempster ended up signing first, Burnett got the guaranteed 5th year because the Yankees knew that the Braves wouldn't give it, and then Lowe was signed as the only choice left by the Braves. There has been no indication at any point that Dempster was seen as inferior to the other two. Saying otherwise is more of us putting a value on consistency which many GM's don't have (they are much more easily coerced with the possibility of what may be that comes from a career year).