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Wow, the 2:30 action could have a lot of good basketball in it. I had Xavier in the Sweet 16 even though I thought there was a decent chance of them losing to Georgia because there was nobody else among Purdue, Baylor, or Georgia that I felt at all good about going to the sweet 16. I'm not too concerned about my bracket this year. This time, I'm rooting for all the double digits.

To be honest, I'd rather keep that spot for roster flexibility. Upgrading your 6th bullpen guy doesn't end up making that much of a difference because that low in the bullpen shouldn't be getting important innings anyway. If we're trading Wuertz for something else, than Marte makes more sense as a 2nd left-hander.

I certainly hope not. Roberts has been historically terrible at the end of the season. If the Cubs traded for him now, they would try to counteract him wearing down by resting him more and giving DeRosa at-bats. If the deal doesn't happen until the trade deadline though, the Orioles aren't going to be resting one of their few marketable players very often. Basically, because of his history, I don't care how Roberts is hitting at the All-Star Break. If he is still with the Orioles at that time, I don't want him until at least next winter.

Dempster has 1 year left at 5 million. That expiring contract would definitely make teams more interested than Marquis who has 2 years left on his deal. My hope would be that Marquis and Lieber are in the rotation. Marquis will still benefit quite a bit from this wonderful defense behind him, so even though he'll likely have another bad FIP number at the end of the season, his ERA has a good shot of being pretty decent. Lieber will love the defense along with the ballpark that he's been so good in. He's also the one who has consistently stayed in range that is fine for the 4th/5th starter, so unless the spring had showed that he had fallen off the cliff (which it certainly hasn't, the low walk totals especially have been very encouraging) he should be given a chance to replicate those numbers once again. Dempster on the other hand is much less affected by the defense, and that makes him a poorer fit for the Cubs rotation. His problem is going to be if he can keep the walks down. My guess is that Dempster would be a roller coaster ride all season. He'll have higher than normal wonderful starts, and he'll have higher than normal awful starts. As for as trading Marquis, if it comes to that I think he'd go to the Orioles or maybe the Angels.

Ouch! i think that was a compliment, actually. you're not going to put him in the first tier (ie Victor Martinez, Jorge Posada, etc.) at this point in his career, so I think the writer was saying that outside of drafting a superstar catcher, you could do worse than Soto on your fantasy team Yeah 1st tier guys would be Vmart, Martin, McCann, Mauer, Posada. So they are saying he has as much upside as the #6 C in baseball. I could see Soto being just as good as Martin and McCann when you look at his skills overall. They might be better offensively, but doesn't Soto have the edge defensively? The article is for helping people with their fantasy baseball leagues. And I don't think Soto has an edge on Martin defensively. He probably does on McCann.

Lopez is pretty bad defensively. He has all the tools to be good, but has never put it together especially at short. At one time, his bat made up for those shortcomings. BTW, I'm not saying he might not be a bad buy low candidate. I was just answering the defensive question, and that really is that he is pretty decent at 2nd, but a pretty awful defensive SS.

Dempster went: 5.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 7 K The Cubs only have 4 hits on the day. 2 from Theriot (including a triple), 1 from Ramirez, and 1 from Blanco. The other Cubs highlight is that Fukudome threw out a runner at home.

Brian Cashman and Theo Epstein put up with the Santana trade from early November to the beginning of February when Santana was finally dealt to somebody else. And the Twins didn't even have a reason to wait on the trade like the Orioles did with the Bedard trade. Plus the thing that ended that trade is Minnesota decided that they were going to stop negotiating, ask for final offers, and make the decision right then. If they hadn't decided to do that the Yankees and Red Sox might still be waiting at their door. At the same time, I will say again what I said then. Opening Day. If the trade isn't done by then, the negotiations should stop and just let the players play for at least 6 weeks. If the Cubs still need Roberts after that period, they can always revisit it.

Not really. I wanted to imply not a blowout, and not usually a deficit either. If I really felt closers came in with only 1 run leads every time, then of course I would advocate that the best reliever be there. I know they don't do that though, and that's why I said in ideal situations your best reliever should not be your closer. To me, reliever importance should be this: 1 run lead tied 2 run lead 1 run deficit 3 run lead 2 run deficit etc. Closers typically only pitch with 1,2, or 3 run leads, but only occasionally in a tied ballgame. I'd like my best reliever to pitch earlier and primarily pitch in 1 run lead, tied, or 2 run lead ballgames. The best reliever also typically will have more flexibility than the closer, in which the best reliever will be well suited into coming in games with runners on in addition to the easier job of starting an inning, while closers only have to do that easier job.

This pretty much sums up my thoughts on the situation perfectly. Serious question: How can people watch LaTroy Hawking blow a whole season in one week in 2004, and then come back and say that it essentially doesn't matter who the closer is? The closer shouldn't be your best reliever, but he definitely has to have a certain mindset and willingness to close I agree. Closers have to be 2 things. 1) They have to be good mentally, and 2) They have to be a good reliever. Closers always come in with a small lead, so they are in almost all the important games. That doesn't mean your closer should be your best reliever. In fact, the ideal thing is to have 3 or 4 guys who are strong enough mentally to be closers and who are all pitching in only tight games. If you do this, then you can pick the 3rd or 4th best one to be your closer, and save your top 2 for situations with runners on. You also want to save your high strikeout guys and low walk guys for coming into games with runners on. Your other 3 or 4 relievers pitch when you have a big lead or a 2+ run deficit. The Cubs are blessed in this department. I believe all 3 rumored can close as far as having the mental makeup. When choosing between them, here's my thought process: Marmol is your best reliever, so you really don't want to waste him at closer. He also is your best strikeout guy, so he is your best choice to bring in when you need a strikeout in the 7th or 8th inning with runners on. Wood is a high strikeout guy, but he also is a high walk guy. That's not a good attribute for someone who you want to bring in with runners on. Wood is much better when he's allowed to start an inning, put runners on, but get out of the jam due to his high K rate and good stuff. IMO, if he can pitch back to back days this makes him the ideal closer. He always gets to start the inning and has free reign to get in and out of jams, and he's also effective in that spot. Howry has experience closing. He's not as big of a strikeout guy as Wood or Marmol. He's also a guy who you like to start an inning with, but for a different reason. He gets hitters out by precise location rather than good stuff, and so if he's brought on with runners on it's easier for hitters to get a bat on the ball for sacrifice flies or other things like that. At the same time, I would not put Howry into the closers role for this reason. We saw last year that he is either on or he's off. If his location is right, he can be dominating. When it's wrong and he gets into jams, his straight fastball continues to just catch too much of the plate and he usually has to get pulled before the inning is over. Managers don't have quick hooks for their closer, so I think Howry is a bad choice for the closer candidate. Let him pitch the 7th or 8th, and pull him out if after 2 or 3 hitters he's doing badly because his control is off.

Now that's an interesting combination that I don't think we've heard before. I think that is very fair for Roberts and Payton. The Cubs cave on Ceda, but then insist on including Marquis. The Orioles then insist to throw in Payton. I wouldn't even mind too much if the Cubs threw in a lesser included prospect that is outside their top 10 list.

I think that's the best solution, and I wish they would warm up to that idea. Neither Lou or Hendry seemed enthusiastic about the idea though. Lou is just moving Fukudome there as an emergency backup in case a trade falls through. I definitely agree with you that it would work though. That is a potent lineup against a lefty, and even if you take Roberts out it still is potent. Your 2nd worst hitter is out of the lineup on those days, and your worst hitter is much, much better against left-handers than right-ahnders.

Murton can't play CF. Hendry's not looking for a right-handed corner OF, he wants a right handed CF to complement Pie because of Pie's massive splits.

Lilly may have had a career year, but I'd call what Hill and Marshall did progression I'd probably call Marshall's a career year. He just doesn't have the stuff to be able to get much better than that ERA. His progression now would be to try to match or come close to that production over a longer number of innings. Hill was definitely progression. It would be a major disappointment if he didn't at least match those numbers this year.

since you were too busy to notice, only the Padres and Red Sox gave up less runs than the Cubs last year -- 17 teams scored more runs than the Cubs last year Accounting for Career seasons by Lilly, Hill, Marshall and a great half by Marquis. Replace Marshall and his sub 4.00 ERA with Dempster and his career starting ERA in the mid 4's, and then expect a regression by Lilly and we'll see where we stand. If Demster makes 32 starts with a 4.75 ERA this year, the Cubs will have a much better 5th starter than they did last year. Those numbers will improve if Dempster does that. The only thing we know about the other 4 starters is that Lilly will probably go down a little bit. The other 3 are decent options to go up or down, with the inclination being that Z and Hill will probably go up a bit and Marquis will probably go down a little bit. The rotation numbers will not likely go down significantly unless there's at least 1 injury.

Bayless was back for the conference tournament, where Arizona crushed OSU by 40 and lost a close one to Stanford. The actual RPI number makes very little difference. 12-4 in a BCS conference is still 12-4 in a BCS conference, and the 4th best conference by RPI. There's just no ignoring that, and the crazy situation of the conference tournament basically destroys the importance of it, aside from Georgia getting the auto bid. Essentially, since January, Kentucky has been, by far, the better team. RPI matters. The Committee mentions it when they want to bounce a team out near the end if it comes down to it. If anybody wants to know about how the committee selects teams and what criteria they use, this is probably a good thing to read Last year about a month before the tournament, they let the media come in and play like they were the committee and make a bracket. Here's a story about it: http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/columns/story?columnist=katz_andy&id=2758650 And if you're interested in the first link, here's another one: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/columns/story?columnist=forde_pat&id=2758770&sportCat=ncb There are a couple other links from other people involved in that process that has some otherwise not covered info that I can dig up if you want to read more. It's really quite fascinating IMO. And as for RPI, It was a nice read but we're talking writers, not the guys that made the decisions. Yes, but they were forced to do things just like the committee does them, and there were people there telling them how to proceed and what discussions were appropriate and what discussions were not.

Bayless was back for the conference tournament, where Arizona crushed OSU by 40 and lost a close one to Stanford. The actual RPI number makes very little difference. 12-4 in a BCS conference is still 12-4 in a BCS conference, and the 4th best conference by RPI. There's just no ignoring that, and the crazy situation of the conference tournament basically destroys the importance of it, aside from Georgia getting the auto bid. Essentially, since January, Kentucky has been, by far, the better team. RPI matters. The Committee mentions it when they want to bounce a team out near the end if it comes down to it. If anybody wants to know about how the committee selects teams and what criteria they use, this is probably a good thing to read Last year about a month before the tournament, they let the media come in and play like they were the committee and make a bracket. Here's a story about it: http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/columns/story?columnist=katz_andy&id=2758650 And if you're interested in the first link, here's another one: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/columns/story?columnist=forde_pat&id=2758770&sportCat=ncb There are a couple other links from other people involved in that process that has some otherwise not covered info that I can dig up if you want to read more. It's really quite fascinating IMO. And as for RPI,

Here's what the selection committee chair had to say about Arizona: The committee does have the ability to take mid-season injuries into account, especially when the results are clearly better when they were healthy. If Dayton had been healthy at this point of the season like Arizona is now, they probably would have gotten more consideration as well. Here's the committee chair's thoughts on a few other specific teams: http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/ncaatourney08/columns/story?columnist=katz_andy&id=3297287 BTW, the schedules are now out. IU plays the 9:40 game, which seems to be tradition for them. I'm not sure I've ever seen IU get a first round afternoon game, and most of the time they are one of the last games of the night.

The only reason they cited cubs.com was to get the quote from Lou. There was no analysis in there.

Still waiting.... Because they're Arizona and they're a historic program. Unacceptable to me. The NCAA loves to fellate Arizona. ASU beats Arizona twice....with ASU having better conference record and better overall record....and is out? Screw that. Non-conference SOS. According to one site, Arizona had the 4th hardest in the entire country. Arizona State had the 296th hardest nonconference schedule. The committee has consistently told teams that if they want more consideration, they need to go out and play at least a decent schedule in the nonconference. Arizona State didn't, and they're out because of it.

Billy Packer once again showing his bias for the ACC. He does this every year.

Where did you see that? On the selection show-they just revealed the entire East region.

Well the obvious answer would be no because of how cautious they've been with pitching him over 1 inning at any point since coming back. Maybe this season he's stretched out enough to where he can - but I really think they won't want to take any chances. That said, I'm sure he could handle it. They weren't very careful with him pitching more than 1 inning..he went over 1 inning 6 different times last year. What they were careful about was pitching him back to back. He went in both halves of a doubleheader on September 15th, and that was the only time he didn't have at least a full day off between outings.

At this point, it kinda looks like the B10 is the least of the issues with the mess down in ATL at the SEC tourney though. But yeah, it is a small problem for them, but all they have to do is have 2 scenarios. ILL or Minny in at a 13 seed or the bracket as it would otherwise be. Not a huge deal. The only problem is all the bracket rules. They can't just put Ill or Minn anywhere, they have to put them where they won't meet another Big 10 team in 1 of the first 2 rounds. And there's a lot of Big 10 teams swirling around those types of seeds (3-6) so it likely won't be a matter of just swapping 1 team out and 1 team in. They will create 2 scenarios for it, but it will take a little bit of work to get it right. I just saw the 2 fouls called for White in the last 4 seconds and was able to replay them a few times. I thought the first call was absolutely horrible (if anything, they could have called a foul on White for pushing his guy in the back), and the second call I agreed with.

It's the absolute worst case scenario for the committee. They absolutely hate when a team who isn't going to make the tournament otherwise makes the Big 10 final. It causes massive problems for the bracket because the Big 10 final doesn't end until about 25 minutes before the bracket is scheduled to come out.