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Yeah, I keep getting that message also..in addition, I couldn't get on to the board till about half an hour ago..going in the way I usually went (clicking message board on the main site) was giving me an error every time. I had to find another way around to get on, so there could be many people who don't know the board is actually up right now.

He said at the end of the season it doesn't say by your name how many injuries you had that year, but only what your win loss record was that year, and no matter what happens that's all that matters.

I have a feeling Hendry is gonna do some big things this off season....knowing his job is in serious jeopardy. Don't count on it. Agreed. What bargaining chips does he have to work with now? He's completely drained the minor leagues, and his major league ballclub is chok-full of junk nobody wants or bad contracts. The Trib's not going to open the coffers so he can spend his way out of this hole, that's for sure. I think he has enough money or trading chips to do the following things: 1)Sign/Trade for an impact starting pitcher (a #1 or a #2 guy) 2)Sign/Trade for either an impact CF or an impact 2b 3)Sign/Trade for a decent one of the one you didn't get in #2..probably a stopgap CF (because I think 2b will be easier to fill with a good to great player than CF, if not Andruw Jones) 4)Sign/Trade for a platoon partner for Jones 5)Sign/Trade for a back end of the starting rotation starter (#3, #4, #5) If we have to sign all of those players, we won't have quite enough money, unless the Tribune expands the payroll. If one of these is a trade or two, then all of this is possible.

Jones' OPS over the last three years at the Metrodome was .746. You and others totally dismiss the fact that it was possible his OPS was low due (at least in part) to playing in the Metrodome. I think that's a great point. Here are his numbers for 02-05, and 06 home and away. 2002- Home-.721 Away-.977 2003- Home-.822 Away-.770 2004- Home-.699 Away-.784 2005- Home-.722 Away-.793 2006 (at Wrigley) Home-.841 Away-.821 Jones moved from a park that was terrible for him, where 3 out of 4 years there was a significant OPS difference between his home park and on the road, in fact the 3 largest differences of those 4 years. Now, he's probably in an easier division for the pitchers against him (this one is just a hunch that hitting in the NL Central has been easier than the AL Central the last couple years, taking out the teams he has been on-I might be wrong on this). Also he has moved to a home park that suits him a great deal better-with that, and knowing that his lowest away OPS in the last 5 years was .770, that should probably be the lowest we should expect him out of next year. With .770 being the lowest he would be at, I think it would be reasonable for him to be close to or above .800 again next year, which for Jones salary is as I posted better than most teams in value.

How would you rank the players as far as production for the money this year out of 13 I have listed above?

I was just thinking there was some room for hope in that regard. He has been with the organization for a long time, though, so hard to say if opinions have already been calcified. At the risk of being a contrarian, I think the Cubs have been excellent at times in player evaluation. They traded Choi, Bobby Hill, and Brendan Harris while acquiring DLee, Aram, and Murton. Unlike most of this board, the Cubs were on target about Jacque's abilities. The problem isn't scouting, it's not relying on stats as well as scouting. Finding a platoon partner for Jacque, batting high OBP guys #1 and #2, etc. The management team needs balance, not a complete overhaul. *sigh*...the problem with Jones, for the millionth time, wasn't that people thought he wouldn't perform well this season. It was that we didn't think he was obtained at a good price, and for a reasonable length of time. If he maintains this same level of play for 3 years, then maybe you'll have a point. Well, this day in age I think his production was just fine for only 5 M/year. But that's THIS YEAR! Forget this year. In the last year of his deal, will he perform well enough for his salary? That's the argument. Ok, I hear you, but you can only go by what he has done so far. Nobody know what he will do in year 3, its kind of pointless to argue that right now. You can only discuss what he has done so far, which was a pretty good year. Let's sign him to a 40 year $6 billion contract What, you don't know how he'll do, he hasn't done it yet. edit: oh, and yay, I guess. All he's saying is that so far, it's been a good contract. Through one year, he has done better than comparable value for his position. Taking out all the right fielders who have not hit free agency yet (obviously, they are getting better bang for their buck) here are the qualified RF's this season: (Salaries all from ESPN-I know Jacque's is about 1 mil off, so others may be a little off as well, but for the sake of time I'm using their numbers) 1-Jermaine Dye, 5 million, 1.006 OPS 2. Vladimir Guerrero, 13.5 million, .934 3. J.D. Drew, 11.4 million, .891 4. Bobby Abreu, 13.6 million, .886 5. Jacque Jones, 4.033 million, .833 6. Magglio Ordonez, 16.2 million, .827 7. Geoff Jenkins, 7.83 million, .791 8. Ichiro Suzuki, 12.5 million, .786 9. Shawn Green, 10.2 million, .776 10. Brian Giles, 7.67 million, .771 11. Juan Encarnacion, 3.5 million, .760 12. Jay Payton, 4 million, .743 13. Randy Winn, 5 million, .721 Jacque has performed much better than his contract so far compared to the rest of the league at the position right now. Will he have worse numbers? Maybe-but if his production is at market value next year and below it the year after that, then it will be an average signing. This year, he gave greater than market value-and with the right platoon partner, the pair should hopefully give greater than market value for the next 2 years as well.

That was an unbelievable play-you've taken a great deal of heat this year Ronny, but that was a great diving catch.

It's still a baseball game where the team you support is down by 8 runs and comes back to tie the game. For the people at the game, that's still exciting-if they don't get excited about a game like this, then they wouldn't have gone at all-let them have their fun!

BTW, give a great deal of credit to both Murton and Jones in that 9th inning..Murton with the 9 pitch at bat to draw the walk and keep the game alive, and Jones battling and getting the key hit off of a tough lefty to tie the game.

Well, free baseball for the few who are watching..I have to admit, I've only seen about 2-3 innings myself :D

Hmm..I just opened his blog again, and these are the two sentences that jumped out at me. To clarify, he's talking about adding an outfielder to the current Astros team, not necessarily a general rule..but I still found it interesting.

I'm pulling for ND, but you have to admit that penalty was BS. Yeah, that was a bad call..didn't end up affecting anything though, thankfully. (Well, maybe not so thankfully for us ND fans-but I would have hated to see a bad call spring a late score at the same time)

And I hope he realizes that scoring one run at a time with speed and sacrifices isn't going to win a lot of ballgames (unless your pitching staff is remarkably good) The beauty part of that was there were no sacrifices for that run. Theriot turned a double into a triple and scored on an infield grounder. A run scoring ground out is as much of a sacrifice as a grounder to the right side that moves a runner over. Everybody applauds it, but a double or HR would have been much better. The difference is, a sacrifice is giving an intentional out-and I don't think Ramirez intended to ground out to 3rd-Theriot just took advantage of the situation.

He did a good job of working the count, but I can't call any AB where the player had a runner on 3rd and 1 out and doesn't get them home (and doesn't get on base himself) a great AB.

So does Ramirez. Should we not pay him the big bucks because of it? Yes, and here is why. A-Ram plays 3B, a position that is at a failry high premium compared to outfielders. Also, I don't think A-Ram's numbers fluctuate as extremely as Adam Dunn's. Aramis' month of April was brutal, but that has been about it. I don''t think you can really compare the two in regards to your question. I'm not arguing that he is worthless or unproductive, he is certainly productive. But at the same time, he has some pretty big flaws and his lack of consistency holds him back from being a truly elite player, imo. So, you criticize Dunn for not showing up when you think his team needed him most, yet don't find the same fault that Ramirez didn't start playing until his team didn't need him. Ramirez in April: 197/321/394 Dunn in Sept: 145/330/250 Both are pretty bad. Ramirez in May:266/296/495 Dunn in August: 188/284/416 Both had two horrible months. Ramirez began his season with two bad months, while Dunn ended his with two bad months. Season stats: Ramirez: 290/350/558 Dunn: 233/366/493 Ramirez has had a better year, but not substantially. Ramirez may play third, but he plays it nearly as bad as Dunn plays left. Furthermore, a bad play by the 3b likely affects the team more than a bad play in left. Your argument that advocates signing Ramirez while piddling away his first two months while using Dunn's last two months as proof not to acquire him lacks as much consistinecy as Dunn or Ramirez combined. I'm advocating signing Ramirez because he is the most productive player the Cubs currently have, they need to keep him. I'm not dogging Dunn, but I don't think the Cubs should give the farm for him either. I would explore other alternatives through FA before committing a lot of young talent towards acquiring Dunn. I do thnk Dunn has hurt his team the last few months, the numbers show it. The Reds have had the equivalent production of Nefi Perez playing everyday in LF since August, well maybe not that bad, but pretty close. Dunn hasn't hurt his team any more than Ramirez hurt his in April and May. And there aren't a lot of options in FA except for Carlos Lee and Soriano. Both of those will be paid more than Dunn is due in the next two years. Dunn is also younger and likely to outproduce them. And based on his last two months, now might be the time to acquire Dunn who is just now entering his prime. Actually Vance, I think you just proved with the stats that Dunn hurt his team a great deal more than Ramirez did in those two months. Ramirez's April had 135 points better in OPS than Dunn's September, and his May is 91 points better in OPS than Dunn's August. Those are pretty significant differences. You are of course correct that the two players have not had a huge difference this year (which makes the worst two months argument kind of pointless anyway), although Ramirez has been better overall. I also am not sure about the contention that Ramirez's defense at his position is as bad as Dunn's, but that would be pretty hard to compare, so I'll just leave it there.

A very, very small one. They are 2 1/2 back.

a season is a marathon, not a sprint, like i said. although the games appear to matter more in august and september, they really don't. don't let the "music of the spheres" fool you. although a pennant race may appear to be more of a race in september, it's just as much of a race in april. I agree with you, but it is obvious his lack of production that past two months has hurt their chances. if he had had bad or average months in april, may, june, and july and then great months in september and august we'd be talking about how amazingly clutch he is, but the effect would be the same. i'll take dunn over any of our outfielders. I think most people would (although the case for Murton is getting stronger) but is Dunn worth the amount that it would take to trade for him, and then the amount that it would take to pay him? I think that factoring both of those in that Dunn is not a big enough upgrade to be worth it, although he definitely would be an upgrade.

I actually think this season is quite unforgetable. A lot of those early-to-mid 90's teams were forgetable, the Trachsel years. The Scott Bullet years. This year was spectaculiar in its failure. All those 3rd/4th/5th place teams just blend together for me. There's not much worse than a 77 win season. Losing 95/96 games, that's an accomplishment. This year reminded me of 97, 99, 00, and 02-and it looks like the record will be about the same as well-those years had 94, 95, 97, and 95 losses respectively.

Hmm...it looks like Boise State has the best chance now of grabbing that minor conference bid. They have 3-4 moderately difficult games left, but if they run the table they will be in the BCS now that TCU is gone from in front of them.

Other than possibly Moore we really don't have any kids that could provide good power off the bench. Pagan might provide okay power, but not the kind of power I would want when I need a big hit late. One or possibly two, depending on Moore vets would be useful for that purpose. As far as the bolded part, I don't think thats neccessarily true. If you go after a bench player who has had only one or two good seasons that both came in the last 2-3 years then it would be true. If it is a guy who has consistently put up solid numbers off the bench other than one or two years he is a better bet to do well than a rookie who is not used to coming off the bench and is used to being an everyday player. That's pretty much why I said "Unless the Cubs can get somebody likely to put up an 800 OPS, and/or dominate against LHP or RHP specifically". If you can find a guy who has consistently put up solid numbers, go ahead and get him. I guess where we differ is our believe in the ability for the Cubs to find those players. Hendry's record has shown he wont, with Hollandsworth being his only good bench signing. I think there are enough good bench guys out there, they just need to have a big hit in a playoff game so Hendry will notice them. Technically, Todd Walker was a bench signing by Hendry also, but I understand your point that the bench has been consistently pretty bad.

I agree here with most of your argument, so let me just clarify a couple things that IMO need to be slightly amended. Theriot has been a good baserunner overall, but he's had more than one glaring mistake IMO. I assume you're talking about him attempting to steal 3rd with less than 2 outs and behind. I can think of at least two other cases where he has been picked off of first, one of those in the 9th inning representing the run for the tie. Overall, I think he's still pretty good in the baserunning department, but he has made a few big errors out there as well. I would definitely take Theriot next year for those numbers, because as you said if we can trust Theriot to put those numbers up we can upgrade other positions with the money saved. I just am not sure he could hit that line-especially the slugging. One thing that has not been completely brought up is the platoon. It probably inflated Theriot's numbers. It wasn't a straight right-left platoon, but it seemed to be rather who Dusty thought would hit best off each individual pitcher, sometimes taking into account how hot each player was, and sometimes not. How large is that effect? I don't know, but it's another factor to consider.

No, Z has 70 AB's..besides, his OPS is .581 anyway.

Why does everyone think Crawford would make a difference on the Cubs? This year he is having a career year, and he wouldn't even be an improvement over the Cubs current OF's. Crawford .303 BA/.345 OBP /835 OPS Jones .287 BA/ .335 OBP/ .839 OPS Murton .298 BA/ .365 OBP/ .811 OPS It seems like the Cubs already have 2 similar players in the OF. You conveniently left out the outfielder he would be replacing: Pierre: .291/.330/.390/.720 Crawford is only 25 so there is the potential for him to improve even more and his OPS has improved every year. :oops: I saw him listed as a LF on his stat page. Even considering there is a spot for him to fit in the OF, would you trade Rich Hill for Jacque Jones? Considering how much everyone complains about how bad Jones is and how big of a waste of money he was, it is interesting to see everyone clamouring for a guy that actually puts up worse numbers(outside of SBs). It is also worth repeating that Crawford puts up his numbers at nearly half the salary of Jones and probably at least half of what Pierre will seek, at least for 2007. You simply cannot ignore the production per dollar and the expected increase in productivity. Hill is not a sure thing. He is probably going to be very good, but he could suffer a 2007 sophmore slump. I am sure that Hill would not be enough actually. Crawford will make 4 million in 2007, Jones will make between 5 and 6 million-that's not nearly half of the salary of Jones. In 2008, they'll make about the same salary when Crawford's salary jumps to 5.25 million. If he replaces Pierre in center though, he could be a definite upgrade-just as long as it is not at the expense of our starting pitching next year, because that's a spot we'll be even more desperate at.

Yes, it does.

No Bynum or Neifi, so not quite. But pretty damn close. No A-Ram, Lee, or Barrett either. And since Zambrano isn't pitching or hitting, this has to contend. I would agree that this is definitely the worst lineup of the year. Moore, Cedeno, Theriot, and Mabry is our worst infield combination of the year (Theriot is the best of the bunch by far, especially right now, but if Ramirez or Lee were in there with Neifi instead of Theriot the infield would still be better), and when you add Blanco at C instead of Barrett, it makes it the worst lineup. Of course you know that means we'll probably score a few runs.