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No way! I thought you needed to play like four months in the bigs! It's 130 AB's, 50 innings, or 45 days on the roster before September call-ups.

YOU'RE bitter...I'M bitter. UM/OSU would be essentially meaningless if you guys had just beaten Iowa, because you'd have clinched a Rose Bowl berth by now. This has been said multiple times, but how is it true? If Michigan beats OSU it leaves them and hypothetical Illinois tied, with Michigan winning head-to-head. The Big 10's tie-breaker scheme is similar to what one would do in a pee-wee football league. Throw out the head-to-heads, throw out point differentials, anything objective that might determine who is the actual best TEAM in the conference. Whoever hasn't won it for the longest is simply declared the champs. And that would be Illinois this year. That's the third tiebreaker. The first is head to head, the second is overall record.

I think it's a little too convenient of a deal to be true, but it does have a lot of elements that are true. First, there is nobody in that deal that any of the 3 organizations are particularly attached to. Church, Drew, Dempster, and Murton are probably the 4 biggest, and all 4 of them have been involved in trade talks at one time or another. So it's not like it's unlikely that any of those clubs would give up those players. At the same time, the Red Sox part of the deal doesn't really match up very well. I think the Nationals are receiving a little too much and the Cubs are receiving a little too much and the Red Sox aren't receiving enough. The only way that rumor would be true is if the Red Sox really have taken a liking to Marshall or Cedeno, which is possible. Also, it's hard to say how much the Red Sox want to get out of the Drew deal. Their desperation might make them be willing to take less. So I believe this deal is fair enough that I wouldn't be absolutely shocked if it was actually reported, but it also seems contrived at the same time with the amount of players involved. It seems like somebody just took the 3 teams, mixed around their spare pieces, and then declared it a trade. It might be a trade that helps all 3 clubs and it's fair, but trades like that simply don't happen very often. Also, I believe a lot of people were speculating on the Marquis deal before it went down, so that's not a big point for the credibility of the person.

He said the Cubs were approaching a deal with Matsui, although he didn't know the length or the dollar amount. Of course, he reported this last night, and there's nothing yet.

Yeah, I heard a minute or two of that. They were wondering why every player busted for steroids weren't being prosecuted. They brought up Mcgwire as a counterexample. I wanted to scream at them that steroids weren't the reason that Bonds is being prosecuted, it's that he lied about using them to a grand jury. Mcgwire never did that, nor did pretty much everybody on the Mitchell list (another thing they brought up wondering if the feds are going to go after all of them too). It was a really, really poor argument, actually worse than ESPN usually is.

Yeah, he was one of 5 GMs to vote against it. LOL. Probably the same 5 GM's who have yet to embrace OBP, also. Voted for: Kenny Williams, Brian Cashman, Pat Gillick, Dan O'Dowd , J.P. Riccardi, Josh Byrnes, Jim Bowden, John Mozeliak, Billy Beane Ed Wade is one of the other 4 who didn't vote for it. Doug Melvin also voted against it. I didn't find anyone else who revealed their vote. BTW, on a related off topic note, instant replay is still a long way from coming into the game also. There is no plan, and it has to be approved by several more groups before even formulating a plan. It will be a couple years at least. Edit: Sorry for all the edits. I'll keep editing this as I find more G.M.'s who voted for or against.

Trading Lee would almost certainly makes us a better team next year because the Cubs could upgrade majorly at another position and then plug Ward in at first base. It would have to be somebody young and productive though because the Cubs would then have to go free agent shopping for a first baseman after the season, and the good ones don't come very cheap. I'd also be very sad to lose Lee, but I understand that sometimes you have to make the hard decisions if you want to get better. People like Lee don't usually get traded though because of perception. If the Cubs didn't make the playoffs next year, even if they put a better product on the field, fans are going to point to the Lee move as the reason why. Perception wise, it's hard to win from the deal and easy to lose from it.

The Cubs don't have nearly enough payroll for all that (that's 30 million added between CF, RF, and SS and the Cubs don't have nearly that much money). If one of Matsui or DeRosa plays SS (creating a Matsui/Theriot platoon), and it lures Fukudome over, it's not horrible. It's still not a great situation, but it's not doom and gloom either. If Matsui and DeRosa end up sharing time at 2nd, or if Fukudome doesn't come, then it become horrible.

It's possible. However, even Daryle Ward will get involved with the stolen base frenzy if Kendall is Milwaukee's C next year. Now, let's not get out of hand. Kendall was able to throw some people out on delayed steals, and with Ward, every steal is a delayed steal. :D

A lot of Texas fans consider OU to be their biggest rival now. And as someone knowing people from both the USMA and USNA, I can assure you that the Army-Navy game is the most important game of the year for both teams. The Notre Dame game will probably be much tougher for Navy to win than the Army game will be, but I would guess that if you'd asked everyone on Navy's football team who they'd rather beat this year, at least 90% would've said Army. The thing about that is now that Navy has beat ND it won't matter as much. I look at it this way. If Army is 1-11 and their only win is over Navy their coach will probably stay. If any of those other teams are 1-11 no matter who they beat their coach is gone, biggest rival or not. You could say it the opposite way though. If Army went 10-2 or 11-1 every year but continued to lose to Navy would the coach keep his job. The answer is definitely! That isn't the case for some of the other schools on that list.

Senior

Could this be the year that a team with 2 losses could win the national title? There are 8 teams currently at the top of the BCS standings with 1 loss. At least 2 of them will be knocked out in the Big 12 scramble. Oregon could go down tonight. That leaves LSU, West Virginia, Ohio State, Arizona State, and that remaining Big 12 team for 2 spots. 4 of those teams could conceivably lose making a 1 loss team and a 2 loss team playing for the national title. Also, if it does come down to 2 loss teams there are going to be a million of them that want their shot.

There is no type C anymore, so I'm not sure what to call Matsui. He's not an A or a B (remember, each of the categories were made more exclusive this year, so there's actually only a few infielders at all classified as an A or a B).

It's hard to say, but just because he retired doesn't mean he doesn't want to come back. He retired last year, but at the same time he officially "retired" he said that he would welcome offers. There was simply no team who was willing to offer him a job.

It isn't even really true. The NFL has a much higher arrest percentage than the NBA. The NBA just has huge perception problems that are hard to overcome. Even if most of them aren't true (and I've heard of a lot of strange ones) they are still very damaging.

I don't get it. His trade value is only that which people will give up for you. Whether you think he's worth something or not, his actual trade value is only the best package you can get. The way I read it, Baltimore didn't realize what they had with Bedard until they saw the talent that teams were willing to give up to get him. Now that they know what teams are willing to give up to get him, they want to sign him to an extension instead of trading him. I think the opinion of how good (or bad) Baltimore ownership is probably factored into you reading it that way. It seems to be simply saying that Baltimore weighed Bedard's value on their team and Bedard's value on the trade market and decided they'd rather have Bedard rather than whatever they could get for him. If they truly didn't value Bedard, don't you think they would have jumped at the first team who in their minds offered way over value?

I don't think that excludes Michigan-Ohio State because I've heard many fans on both sides say that game is more important than their season. Also Cooper was fired because he couldn't beat Michigan. When Tressel was hired, did he say he was going to put them back into national contention? Did he say they were going to have a great season? No, the first thing he said was that it was only 300 something days until they beat Michigan, because that's what the crowd wanted. Carr's approval rating started sliding bigtime when he started losing to Ohio State. I think Army-Navy may be the best experience in college football. It certainly is a game to remind national viewers about what's important and to have great competition and intensity. I also think it is one of the great rivalries, but it actually suffers because the fanbase for both army and navy have their priorities straight most of the time. They realize there are more important things then the game, and the game doesn't dictate how the rest of their life will go They aren't as irrational as many Michigan-Ohio State and Auburn-Alabama fans. That's great for them personally (and I think other rivalries go too far many times) but it does push them below the other rivalries.

A lot of Texas fans consider OU to be their biggest rival now. And as someone knowing people from both the USMA and USNA, I can assure you that the Army-Navy game is the most important game of the year for both teams. The Notre Dame game will probably be much tougher for Navy to win than the Army game will be, but I would guess that if you'd asked everyone on Navy's football team who they'd rather beat this year, at least 90% would've said Army. I've heard different on the Army-Navy thing. I've heard the last 7-9 years, Navy has been going into the first day of practice saying that "This is the year we are going to beat Notre Dame". As far as Texas, I agree with you that it is a growing number of Texas fans which almost made me disqualify the rivalry, but still from hearing from Texas fans (and I have family in that area) many would say that their biggest game is Oklahoma, but the game they would hate to lose is A&M. If A&M doesn't get their act together soon though that rivalry will be just about gone in about 5 years.

When I first looked over the list, I saw 3 rivalries that really jumped out at me: Alabama-Auburn Michigan-Ohio State Texas-Texas A&M There are several reasons I threw out other rivalries. 1) One team really considers it their biggest game of the year while the other team doesn't (Army-Navy even got thrown out using this criteria, although Army will probably return to being Navy's top priority once again next year). 2) To get in the elite rivalries, fans almost have to care more about winning that game than winning overall. That throws out all the Florida games, the Notre Dame-USC game, Oklahoma-Texas, Cal-Stanford, etc. 3) Alums of the school and fans of the school have to be passionate about football. Some of the small school rivalries are really nice, but simply don't compare to millions of people and whole states who hate each other. So that got me down to 3. I then eliminated Texas-Texas A&M because in the last few years the importance of the game has really dwindled for Texas. A&M would still rather beat Texas than win anything else, but the scope of the rivalry has really dwindled over the last 10 years. Finally with the last 2, from being around fans of all 4 teams for quite a while, Ohio State-Michigan is just on a different level. They really hope that the other team goes 0-12 ever year. In Alabama, the Iron Bowl is huge for bragging rights, but it really doesn't extend through the whole season like the Ohio State-Michigan rivalry does. I've heard numerous people who don't even like to travel in the other state just because of that game. So the Iron Bowl is awesome, but my vote has to go to the OSU-Michigan game.

Here is our winner. Jenkins is seen as an absolute last resort and as a platoon player. The Cubs' No. 1 target is Fukudome. He has yet to say he's coming to North America. That's a huge, huge decision in Japan. On Crawford, the (Devil) Rays don't need to trade him. He has a favorable contract, and they, like all teams, could use a left-handed hitter. They'd have to be blown away by an offer, and the Cubs aren't going to blow them away. This stuff about Hill and Marmol and another guy for Crawford is nonsense. My guess is that once Fukudome says he wants to come over here, the Cubs will go hard after him. That doesn't mean they'll get him, but they're prepared to make a good offer. I look for the payroll to be about $115 million, by the way. Thanks for the update Bruce. What kind of offer would you see the Cubs making to Fukudome, and who do you see as the most likely fall back option? Well, it won't be Soriano money, but it'll be a good offer. I'm not sure of numbers. On the fallback, let's not discount a trade, whether it's the unlikely Crawford scenario or another avenue. (The Rays also are a difficult team with which to deal. They have a hard time pulling the trigger.) It's not a great or attractive free agent market, so the Cubs are very active in pursuing trades. I'm told some big-name players will be on the trading block all around baseball. But again, it takes two teams to make a deal. Bruce, if you're still here, do you see the middle infield as being set now, or are the Cubs still possibly looking for an upgrade there? Is Theriot the confirmed starter? Are they going to make it an open competition between Theriot, Cedeno, and Infante? What are they trying to do with DeRosa with the Matsui talk?

Rosenthal reported that the Cubs were likely to pick up Trachsel's option. Obviously, a few days later that turned out not to be true when the Cubs declined it, but there was a lot of hand wringing here during that time. :D

If I was confident that Hendry had the ability to land a decent RF, I might not be making nearly as much noise. I'm glad Jones is gone, but at the same time I wouldn't have minded him as a 4th outfielder if Murton could have been packaged in a deal to improve elsewhere, and as protection for Pie if Pie poops the bed. If I'm the GM, Jones is my insurance policy if I can't get Crawford or Fukudome. Once I have an upgrade in RF locked up, THEN I consider trading him, and only when I feel like I'm getting value in return. Only a day after Jones was traded, Minnesota traded us a PTBNL for Craig Monroe, the right handed version of Jacque Jones. Monroe is set to make nearly as much as Jones in 2008, and the Cubs aren't giving Minnesota any salary relief. Granted, Jones came from Minnesota, and they may not want him back. But, if you are a major league team in need of a cheap outfielder, you really aren't throwing yourself under the bus to trade for Jacque Jones. There will be many teams this offseason trying to position themselves for cheap outfield help like Corey Patterson, Geoff Jenkins, Shawn Green and Luis Gonzalez. Those teams that aren't willing to pay the price or the years to grab what's left of the lousy free agent class towards the end of this offseason might have been willing to cough up a half way decent prospect for Jones. To trade him for the likes of Omar Infante is assinine. With the addition of Infante, the Cubs have now had every crappy utility middle infielder in baseball in the last 10 years. The list is actually quite scary. If that's the best he could get for Jones, then he was better off just keeping him. I'm certainly not convinced that the 2.5-3m savings of not having Jones will be spent wisely. If Prior and Wood are both back and Fukudome is in RF, I'll give Hendry a flyer. But, it will never change the fact Hendry gave Jones away for next to nothing. First, the Twins only traded for Monroe because they plan to release him and re-sign him to a much lower salary. In fact, that's what the whole deal is contingent upon. They would never have wanted to take on Jones's money unless the Cubs paid half of it or more because of it being guaranteed. Second, Hendry tried to wait until after the big names in free agency to trade Jones last year with little success. That had to be in his mind when he was working moves this year. I do agree with you that the moves that are remaining will dictate what happens with Jones. If that extra 3 million is spent on a useful player (and I would lower that definition all the way down to Geoff Jenkins, who would simply be Jones again) then it's a good move. Infante may have value still (due to his age and his home/away splits), but you're right in that he's not a very valuable chip at this time. One thing that Infante does do for the ballclub is fill some specialty roles. Now they don't have to keep Angel Pagan on the roster to platoon with Pie, nor do they necessarily need a backup SS on the roster all the time. That allows the bench to hopefully be filled with more good hitters. At the same time, that's only worth so much, and so the 3 mil will still be the key to the trade unless Infante shows that he can keep up his away numbers all the time when he's taken out of Comerica.

The Cubs should be interested in Jenkins. They should have him on the priority list behind Fukudome and Crawford, but if neither of those pan out Jenkins is a decent backup plan.

Anybody think he's putting a little too emphasis on career numbers? That would explain the projections for Soriano and DeRosa. Also it explains why Murton and Theriot are a little high because of Murton's 2005 and Theriot's 2006 partial seasons respectively. Ramirez hasn't dropped below 900 in 4 years, and now he's going to drop 30 points from last year even while hitting 9 more home runs? That doesn't make that much sense. Pie understandably goes down from his crazy projection from last year, but I'm not sure it was enough. Crawford's projection also seems low considering his last couple years and his age.

Yeah. We're getting somewhere in between 2.5 and 3 million savings from the Jones trade at this point. oh okay, the tigers are paying the third portion ($1.33M) of the bonus payment too? I forgot about that when factoring in the savings; I just thought of the $5M salary next year. Yeah. I don't know who is handling what of the bonus or salary, but the 2 million is coming out of the 6.33 number instead of just the 5 million salary.