CubColtPacer

Interesting choice of day to ask about this. Apparently Cotts had TJ surgery today and will miss the rest of the season and part of next: http://muskat.mlblogs.com/archives/2009/07/cotts_has_tommy_john_surgery.html

Like I said, I'd be fine with waiting a bit. I don't think we should be desperate at this point. But, it's highly unlikely Ricketts will be able to get the sale completed, give Hendry the ok and then Hendry work out a good deal all in the span of a month. I'd love it if that happened, but that would be a complete change from the pace the sale has taken the past 2 years. The pace of the sale is going to stop instantaneously once an agreement is signed. Hendry does not need more than a day to make a trade. He could already be in contact with Jim saying that once it gets to a certain stage, Hendry has the authorization to make a move. Maybe the sale doesn't go through until next year, maybe it's done tomorrow. It still has to go through MLB offices and probably bankruptcy court as well. MLB will be quick in getting it approved, but it's hard to tell with the courts. It certainly won't be done tomorrow.

Edit. Jeff, do you know when they start counting the 90 days that a Rule 5 player has to be on the roster? Is it when rosters have to be sent in or the first day of the season? Either way, if they wanted to DL Patton, within a few days from now they could do that and already have satisfied the entire length of time of the Rule 5 stipulations. They could DL him until early August, then send him on a rehab assignment until September 1st, and then bring him back up when rosters expand and have no problems. It's 90 days active right? Wouldn't that be opening day? It probably is Opening Day. I guess it wouldn't matter anyway..90 days from Opening Day happens to line up exactly when Ramirez is coming back anyway, so the Cubs will have that option at any point during these series of roster moves. I would definitely agree that it's unlikely.

Edit. Jeff, do you know when they start counting the 90 days that a Rule 5 player has to be on the roster? Is it when rosters have to be sent in or the first day of the season? Either way, if they wanted to DL Patton, within a few days from now they could do that and already have satisfied the entire length of time of the Rule 5 stipulations. They could DL him until early August, then send him on a rehab assignment until September 1st, and then bring him back up when rosters expand and have no problems.

That's not at all what I see. He said they toyed with it in May, and he'll check back again now. Odds are, if they stuck with him through June, they will stick with him for as long as they need. That fact that they considered it earlier in the year means the possibility exists. How likely it is, however, I don't know. I can understand what he's saying though. At the time that they considered it, Patton had pitched very badly and they still had to keep him on the roster for another 4 1/2 months. Now Patton is coming off a month where he pitched well and they have only 3 months left to keep him. They're much less likely to want to get rid of him now.

Because Miles isn't on the roster right now. One of Blanco, Fox, or Patton has to go when Ramirez comes back to get the roster back to 25. Now if you want to DFA Miles before he comes back so 2 of those players don't have to be gone, that's another story. But one of those guys will have to leave regardless.

Bruce posted this in the comments section of his blog. Blanco will be the one to stay when Ramirez comes back IMO because the Cubs see him as the only backup SS on the roster (while Miles is still on the DL), which is why Fox will be squeezed out once again.

Milton Bradley has acted like he cares He has? People who don't care don't scream at umps when calls go against them, excitedly flip their bat when they walk, or smash water coolers or throw their helmets when they do poorly. Whatever has been ailing Bradley this season, having passion is certainly not a problem for him. But is it passion for the team or passion for his own benefit? As the person after me said, he gets excited when game winners by others are hit, which has to be excitement for the team. Also, people who are looking out for their own benefit don't usually celebrate walks in the way Bradley does. Also his walk rate goes up with runners on..what selfish player would let that happen? If he were selfish, he'd want to always want to drive in the run himself. Not to mention that most of the time, especially for middle of the order hitters, Bradley benefiting is the same as the Cubs benefiting. What is he actually doing that harms the Cubs but helps himself? There's no evidence that I know of that would indicate that he has been selfish whatsoever with the Cubs.

Milton Bradley has acted like he cares He has? People who don't care don't scream at umps when calls go against them, excitedly flip their bat when they walk, or smash water coolers or throw their helmets when they do poorly. Whatever has been ailing Bradley this season, having passion is certainly not a problem for him.

Baker would have cost too much in the offseason. The Rockies were asking a high price for him because several teams were after him. Him getting hurt once again this season, the emergence of some Rockies youngsters, and the fact that he's out of options is the only reason he's available cheaply now.

That is not at all the likelihood. 10 more days is much more likely to help than not help. It's 10 more days, but only 6 more games. They are going to cut short potential rehab time by a week and a half just to get him in 4 or 5 more games. That's your opinion and it's all based on where exactly Ramirez is in his rehab. How long do you think it is before his rehab wouldn't help him at all? Because he is going to reach that point in recovering from his injury. You build the strength you can, but it's still going to have problems because it's still broken. Personally, I believe that taking batting practice consistently shows that he's there. If you believe he's not, how long do you think it will take to get there? 10 days? 20? A month? I don't want Ramirez coming back with any higher chance of reinjuring the shoulder just for a few games in the middle of the year. I don't believe that's the case here though. I think his chances would be just as high in 10 days as it will be now so holding him out would be absolutely pointless.

I'd think it would improve things, probably not fix them entirely, but make them better. The point is he could get 10 more days of rest but only miss 6 games. You'd have to imagine he's going to get a few of those days off anyway, so you are eliminating 10 more days of rehab to maybe get him into 4 or 5 more games. I don't think they make that decision if they are a game back, which says to me that it's the wrong decision. That quote doesn't tell you anything though. Ramirez could get another 2 months of rest and the shoulder would still be sore. Rest and rehab will only take the shoulder so far, and we have no idea if he has reached the point where it's as good as it's going to get. The only clue that we have is that he's been able to consistently practice without any setbacks, and that is a clue that it already is at that point. The likelihood is that 10 more days of rest would do absolutely nothing for Ramirez. The only thing that would probably help him now is surgery, and he's not going to get that until after the year.

Vitters moving quickly and Ramirez exercising his opt out clause could make it happen. I'm not sure if you would qualify Ramirez declining his option as a disaster though.

Ascanio has been struggling quite a bit in his last 7 outings (4 2/3 IP, 8 H, 3 ER, 5 BB, 6 K) but I didn't quite expect him to get sent down yet. I guess they got tired of having no 7th inning guy with Guzman down and Ascanio struggling and so decided to try Samardzija once again.

Most of the time PTBNL's have nothing to do with how the major league player performs after the trade. Sometimes the PTBNL is already known at time of trade but simply can't be traded yet for some reason or another, and at other times the PTBNL is chosen from a list that was decided on at the time of trade. It's rare to have a situation like the Cubs have with Rich Hill where the player received is tied to how well he pitches. It's usually only done with players like Hill who are talented but have fallen on very hard times. I don't think DeRosa's AB's or his performance with the Cardinals will have anything to do with what quality of PTBNL the Indians get back. oh...we are still missing a player in the hill trade? Yes. We haven't received anybody in that deal yet. The deal will have to be finished with either a player or cash in the next little over a month (August 2nd). Since Hill has already made 8 starts for the Orioles, my guess is that the Cubs will get their pick of the better of the two lists of players.

Most of the time PTBNL's have nothing to do with how the major league player performs after the trade. Sometimes the PTBNL is already known at time of trade but simply can't be traded yet for some reason or another, and at other times the PTBNL is chosen from a list that was decided on at the time of trade. It's rare to have a situation like the Cubs have with Rich Hill where the player received is tied to how well he pitches. It's usually only done with players like Hill who are talented but have fallen on very hard times. I don't think DeRosa's AB's or his performance with the Cardinals will have anything to do with what quality of PTBNL the Indians get back.

Obviously they have the right to do it. I'm just not sure they should. Clearly the league agrees with you, though. So the NFL should not have the right to suspend players who commit serious violations of the law? The NFLPA would disagree with you. Sorry, that was pretty poor wording on my part. They have the right, and I have no problem with them having that right. In this particular instance, with Vick having already been in jail for a lengthy amount of time, I'm not sure there's a lot of justice being served by further preventing him from resuming his career. I wasn't meaning that they shouldn't have that right...I just don't necessarily think they should be exercising that right in this case. It might not be justice to Vick. I'm not sure how to accurately assess that question. However, the league has its own interests to protect. In this instance, that might mean keeping Vick out of the league if it's fair or not. It's far riskier to the NFL's future profits to reinstate him..a much bigger chance for prolonged outrage and distraction that way than if they just keep him away.

So how much more advanced is class A Daytona than Peoria? If Vitters does well enough we should see him in AA by this time next year hopefully. Going from Peoria to Daytona is about the same jump as going from Daytona to Tennessee. It's just the name of the league that throws people off. Actually it's not, going by what I've been told by former players. The biggest jump is going from A(-/+) to AA in terms of talent level. That's true and why I used the word about to qualify the statement (in large part because some great talent skips low A and goes straight to high A..other great talent goes directly from low A to AA, but it's very rare for anybody to ever skip AA and they tend to play there for a while, which increases the talent level). I was more referring to the fact that despite Peoria and Daytona both technically being Class A teams, it's still definitely a jump up in talent level to go to Daytona, and used that example that isn't perfect to illustrate that.

So how much more advanced is class A Daytona than Peoria? If Vitters does well enough we should see him in AA by this time next year hopefully. Going from Peoria to Daytona is about the same jump as going from Daytona to Tennessee. It's just the name of the league that throws people off. Now that they've promoted him, they've sort of committed themselves. If Vitters does well the last 2 months of the season, he'll break camp in AA out of Spring Training. If he struggles at Daytona, he has a chance of going back there but still has a chance of going to Tennessee to start next year (my guess would be Daytona if he struggles because of his top prospect status, but other prospects have moved up anyway in that scenario).

No, I'm giving credit to the Cubs because they have put a good amount of talent in the system (mostly due to the excellent 2008 draft and international signings, although the 2007 draft was pretty decent as well). The fact that they are fast rising due to the very aggressive promotions over the last year is just icing on the cake. If they were only getting promoted because of a weak system, then they would not be having success at their new levels. The fact that they have maintained their success despite such aggressive promotions is an excellent sign for their futures.

Um, how is the Cubs talent level rising fast in the minors? I don't really see how they have been doing "just fine" in the draft. They may have plugged the dike, but they aren't exactly thriving down there. Just in starting pitchers, you have 3 from the 2008 draft that are already in AA. That's awfully fast for three different ones to be there already (and the two that have been there for a while are having success, while the other just got there). In Daytona, you have a 4th starting pitcher from last year's draft who just got moved up after having success plus two 19 year olds who are doing well for their age in that league. That's what I meant mostly about rising fast. The Cubs are starting to have real prospects start to hit the higher levels of the farm system, and they have plenty more behind them in Peoria and Boise (some would say that when you add the Koreans in that Peoria and Boise have the most talent of any of the levels, although Tennessee is really starting to make a case now). With progression of these prospects to higher levels and a couple more drafts like the last couple, the Cubs system should be top 10-15 if not better in another 2 years. That's what I mean by doing fine..the Cubs system had to be completely repopulated and they have been doing that. They don't have a lot of stars, and if they don't get more stars they'll probably never reach the top 3-4, but they are on their way to having a very deep system of good prospects. And remember, they've already traded away one of their good prospects from the last couple drafts, and he has to be included when talking about how well they've drafted as well (Donaldson).

Okay, that's actually a good point when you explain it that way. Again though, it's not as if he's the one making draft decisions. He's hiring/employing the people who are, though, so ultimately it does fall under him. Although your ire should be directed elsewhere if your biggest issue is the draft. It's the snowball that keeps getting bigger because of the ineptitude that I have a problem with. The drafting has been terrible, which causes him to throw money at bad free agents because of the mistakes under his watch in the draft. I see what you're saying. But ultimately your problem is with the people that fall under Hendry on the org chart, not Hendry himself. Right? True. However, Hendry is the GM and he obviously has substantial say so as to the picks. How SOMEONE hasn't been canned with the state of the farm is beyond reason. Hendry's the boss, which means it falls in his lap. Somebody did get fired...3 1/2 years ago now. At that point, the Cubs had some talent in the high minors and very little in the low minors. Now, that very little talent is in the high minors which leads to the bad farm system rankings..but the new staff has put a lot of talent together in the low minors and they are rising fast. It doesn't make sense to suddenly fire either the scouting staff or Hendry for the results of mistakes in the draft that were made 4-6 years ago now. Both have been doing just fine in that department for 3 years now. If you want to talk about Hendry's regime in other areas, that's fine, but the drafting problems ended a while ago.

Maybe. There still was talk of how the Cubs might not be able to get DeRosa's salary cleared. And if the Indians just wanted a major league ready pitcher (like some reports were claiming) the Cubs only options were really Marshall or Marmol, and both of those were too much for DeRosa. Players like Ascanio or Wells would likely be too little. Perez's numbers haven't been up to par yet, but his age and his great stuff still would often make him overvalued by teams. Hendry might have dropped the ball on this one..DeRosa would have been a very good fit for the rest of the year. But we just don't know enough facts to know for sure. We don't know if the Cubs had the payroll, or if they matched up well with the Indians, or even how good this PTBNL is yet. I would agree that unless the PTBNL is a good to great prospect the Indians have lost in these two deals..they gave more to the Cubs than they're going to get for him just a few months later.

Marmol would be claimed very quickly. The Cubs would pull him back, but it would be pretty pointless to even try. Is he out of options? I thought he was only up and down once. He isn't out of options but he has been in the major leagues for long enough that he would have to clear revocable waivers in order to get to the minors. The Cubs could always pull him back if somebody claimed him, but they still wouldn't get him to the minor leagues. He would only have 1 option left anyway. He got added to the 40 man after the 05 season. He was sent down after Spring Training 06, and then he was sent down again after Spring Training 07. That burned two of his three options.

Marmol would be claimed very quickly. The Cubs would pull him back, but it would be pretty pointless to even try.