tkenm356

True. I feel dumb for making a trade of Ordonez and Kelvim Escobar for Huston Streeet at the beginning of Fantasy Season. Then again I never expected Maggs to have this much productivity, as I'm sure no one else in this world did.

What really hurts is that a lot of those doubles probably could've been home runs but his power has been lacking. To me, that's troubling, as I'm sure it is to many others as is evident by the DLee homer watch thread. Of course I'd love to see him break the record, though... hell, any record

1) I hear you on the singles thing, and I won't refute it. I will say that if given the opportunity to play a full MLB season worth of games, he has the speed to potentially steal 80+ bases and score well over 100 runs, which is pretty good for a guy who only hits singles. FWIW, Jose Reyes only hit 30 doubles last year and has an ISO of .187, and he had no problem scoring 122 runs, and I'm sure no one gave a crap. Guzman averaged about 10 or 11 doubles every 250AB. Stretch that over the span of 680AB or so and that's roughly 30 two baggers. Throw in the fact that'd he'd take second 80% of the time through steals and you could double that number. Ichiro had an ISO of .094 last year, would you put him on your team? 2) A .359 career minor league OBP really isn't enough to write home about, you're right, and I know comparing MLB and Milb stats is unfair since it's a different skill set/level, but that .359 OBP would make him probably the 2nd or 3rd best on the team at getting on base. Not to mention he'd take more walks than anyone else on the team, something everyone has been barking for years now. And FWIW, for every level his OBP has been .359 or higher in the minors, he has totaled 1158AB, with an average OBP of .371. For every level his OBP has been less than .359 he has totalled 488AB with an average OBP of .323. Point is, whenever his OBP has been low it has been because of a lack of time at that level, whereas when he played out most of a season at a certain level, his OBP was great. 3) Macias spent 9 years in the minors, this guy's been there for 5. Macias is trash because he has proven he is trash. Guzman hasn't been given the chance to prove anything. 4) And the OPS thing, it's all depending on what you want out of your lead off hitter, of course everyone wants a lead-off hitter who can have an OPS of .850 or better, but those guys are few and far between.

You missed that he hits for about as much power as Theriot, he'd be a disaster in a corner OF spot. In fact, all things considered he's remarkably like Jose Macias. 1) Everyone on the team doesn't have to hit for power. When you have Ramirez, Lee, Soriano, and Barrett you get plenty of power, it'd be nice to have some speed in the lineup that can get on base (Theriot and Guzman could provide that). Plus it'd give the opportunity to move Soriano out of the lead-off spot which everyone seems to want so badly. 2) Don't ever compare anyone to Jose Macias, it isn't fair. Macias has achieved his own level of sucktitude. Plus you can't compare him to Macias considering Macias has sucked for almost 8 years in the majors, and this guy has 83AB in the majors 3) How would he be a disaster in a corner OF spot? If I had a dollar for every time I heard someone say we should move a CF to a corner spot or a corner OF'er to CF over the last few years I'd be raking. Hell, people are throwing the idea around of trading for Teixeira and moving him to the OF and people seem okay with the idea, how would moving what Baseball America describes as Texas' best defensive outfielder to a corner spot be a disaster?

Do we really need an OF'er? And if so, should we go the proven veteran route or the young prospect route? If Sosa is the best option at the break, I say take it. I'd welcome him back with open arms. And if possible, see if we can swing Freddy Guzman in the deal as well. Baseball America has him as Texas' best defensive outfielder and fastest baserunner, yet he's not one of their top 10 prospects. His minor league #'s are encouraging. Despite having a career minor league AVG of only .280, his career OBP is .359, but it could be higher if he hadn't moved between levels so much each year. He averages roughly between 30-40 BB's for eveyr 250-280AB in his minor career. Extend that out to about 650AB roughly as a full season lead-off hitter and that's a good chunk of walks (70-90BB). He could be the 2008 starter in RF since I would assume we'd be renting Sosa. Hell I'd say screw getting Sosa, let's go for Guzman. Unless of course I missed something about the guy (injury, for example), he lookes pretty darn good to have in our system, and probably wouldn't cost a whole lot. http://www.thebaseballcube.com/players/G/Freddy-Guzman.shtml

Fixed for the Holy-Crap-How-Can-This-Be-True factor

TruffleShuffle....sorry for the random question, but who is in and what is that signature pic of yours? I'll take this one... It's from an episode of Scrubs, it's JD (Zach Braff) and Julie (Mandy Moore) posing for a picture in homage to their mutual like of Harry Potter, if I'm not mistaken (and I'm not, damnit!)

Is that a coincidence or did they intentionally restructure their pitching rotation to accomodate this?

Overrated yes but not awful. The Cubs are paying a guy 15 million a season for the next 8 years for the same kind of production up to a similar point in their careers. With a quality top of the order player(Alomar, Molitor) Carter was a good middle of the order hitter I know this is kinda de-railing the thread topic at hand, but Carter was a career .259 hitter with a career .306OBP and .770OPS (only topped an .800OPS 5 times in his 16 year career). Now if you want to argue that he was good in clutch situations, I won't dispute that... but he wasn't that good overall. He hit a lot of home runs and drove in a bunch as well when he had the benefit of hitting in a stacked lineup, and in his prime he stole a decent amount of bases. That was about the extent of it. I'll admit he's not an AWFUL player, but yeah, he was overrated. Still....... what did that have to do with Cubs misery, though?

As much as I hate the Cubs this year, you're right. A hot streak for almost any team in this division could put them in 1st. Unfortunately, I don't expect that hot streak to come for the Cubs :(

It's the truth. Fortunately I'm already pretty numb, and I'm only about to turn 29. 2003 and 2004 (I was at the Mets game where the collapse really began) made me really angry, but now I don't bother. It helps that I root for Philadelphia teams too, because they're just as useless. Once you accept that the Cubs will always be bad and will never win another World Series, you can just take these losses with a laugh and a shake of the head. I echo lemmyhearya sentiments. I have seen the collapse of 69, the 70s and early 80s, collapse against San Diego in 84(my favorite player leon durham being the goat), a good young looking team in 89 turning to crap the next couple of years, a GM saying it is better to have 2 good pitchers(Greg Hibbard and ?) than one great pitcher(Maddux), Joe Carter hitting a gamewinning HR for Toronto, the collapse of 2003, Prior and Wood going from part of the best rotation the Cubs have had in my lifetime to nothing, the collapse at the end of 2004. Even when the Cubs are on the cusp of greatness it eludes them. I certainly dont get to worked up anymore about a game on Friday night in LA. I know we traded Carter back in '84, but what does him hitting a home run in the world series nearly a decade later have to do with the Cubs? With the exception of his home run, rbi totals, and sb totals in his earlier career, Carter was a pretty awful player

Good job on picking up Berkman, now go pick up Lowell as well. Also, are you in a league withg unexperienced fantasy players? I can't believe someone dropped Berkman and no one has picked up Lowell. I'd go ahead and drop Bill Hall for Lowell. Hall will bring you a lot of strike outs, and not much else worth while. Meanwhile, Lowell is a doubles machine with a high average, high RBI and run total, and his OPS is .959, much better than Hall's .776

I was going to go with something more like that Prior game back aroun when Sammy walked out on the team: http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/CHN/CHN200409300.shtml Complete game, 3H or less, 15+K, 1R off a homer...... Cubs lose either 1-0 because our offense forgot how to hit or 2-1 in extras because the bullpen sucks (and the offense forgot how to hit)

To think..... I actually had faith in this one

This is unreal

Not to mention, one good year as a closer doesn't solidify your place in shut down closer greatness. Please see RE: Worrell, Todd (2003); Mantei, Matt (2003); Cordero, Chad (2005); Williams, Mike (2002)

Pass. Dempster and Guzman? No thanks you. I'd rather have Dempster, truth be told. Dempster looks bad because he had that crappy game against the Mets and that game against the Cards where he gave up 3. Both of which were non-save situations. Outside of those he's given up only 2 runs all year. He's not as bad as people think. The greatest pitchers in the world have bad games every year. You can't be shut down automatic all the time. We don't need Cordero, and if we're going to replace Dempster with another closer, I'd rather see it done with one of our young promising pitchers like Guzman or Cherry

According to Cot's Baseball Contracts, The Phillies paid Abreu $1.5M to waive his no trade clause. It says he still has a complete no-trade clause, and I would assume the Yankees would again have to pay him money to waive it, unless waiving the clause in the first place means it's now void? Does waiving a NTC mean it no longer is effective with the contract?

I agree. I was just showing that number for the heck of it, not building a case around it. It's the Jeff Blauser rule. Yeah, I figured everyone feels that way, I just couldn't let it stand :)

They definitely are growing to dislike Abreu here, although considering how good he was for them when they made the trade, I'm not sure they are itching to get rid of him. Dempster and Jones are owed $17.25 m for the rest of 2007 and 2008, combined. Abreu is owed $13.25 for the rest of this year plus the $2m buyout, or $27.25m for this year and next combined. Obviously Abreu is going to cost more for the rest of this year $11.25 than Jones and Dempster ($6.75m). It's possible the Yankees would be willing to even out some of the money. And in the for what it's worth category, Abreu's career line in Wrigley is .352/.433/.759 Could be an intriguing development if it's true. Also it peeves me when people say "We should get this player, he kicks ass in Wrigley" when the stadium has little to do with that fact that these players dominate our pitching staff, not our ballpark Regardless, I'd welcome Abreu with open arms.

They're not too pleased with Bobby Abreu are they? Screw the A-Rod speculation. Only way we get any shot at him is if a) He becomes a much hated man again and b) We give them Zambrano Abreu is perfoming like crap, he's way better than that. a trip back to the NL might be what the doctor ordered. Any chances we'd be able to buy low on Abreu packaging Dempster and a couple other players?

No, no, and no. As much as I love Z (and hate him, this year), Fielder will be a Top 5 1B talent this year... he already is right now. PECOTA had him hitting 31HR 101RBI with a .292AVG I'd say he's on pace to shatter that (at least HR and RBI). He's on pace for 40 or so HR already. Z is on pace for bubkis EDIT: According to Yahoo!, Prince Fielder is the #1 first baseman in the game right now fantasy wise. I would not buy low on Zambrano if you're giving up the best 1B in fantasy right now. As far as 1B go, I'd offer him Helton for Zambrano, who is rtanked the 10th best 1B. Zambvrano is not worth a Top 5 talent, at least not right now. As long as you have Gonzalez backing up Fielder that's fine. You can afford to sit Fielder/Gonzalez during their slumps cause they each back each other up well. Zam,brano plays eveyr 5 days so you're bound to start him every chance you get, and his inconsistency can and probably will hurt your team's ERA and WHIP EDIT #2: I just realized that you and I both have the same 1B tandem. I have Fielder and Gonzalez in another league of mine as well

After he is traded and signs a long term deal with the Cubs, he will be 38. How much production will he have left at that age? 8-) I'd rather have Aramis at his $75M contract than Cabrera and the $150M+ contract he'll command :) Why not both? You only live once! Cabrera did start out as a corner outfielder........ now I get it!

Ken Griffey, Jr. - Arguably the most dominating player in the entire 90's decade. I don't care if injuries did stint his career numbers, Griffey was the face of baseball for a long time before everyone started tugging on Jeter's jockstrap Craig Biggio. - I just think he'll go down as legendary because of his devotion to the Astros and the fact that he was such a remarkable player in his prime. If anyone hasn't looked up his career numbers lately, take a look, you might be surprised just how good he was. Jeff Bagwell - Same vein as Biggio, even though he retired. I just looked at his numbers and I never realized that he used to steal so many bases, not to mention his OPS during his glory years was simply outlandish Frank Thomas - I think his career and legacy with the White Sox will easily make him a legend. Even though he's battled injuries over the last few years, last year he proved that when he's healthy he can still rake Ivan Rodriguez - I mean, come on now. Arguably the greatest defensive catcher of all time, and he was pretty darn good offensively in his career. Greg Maddux - If we're going to be talking about players who play the game today (or recently, in Bagwell's case) who will become legends we talk about 50 years from now, not putting Maddux on that list is [expletive]. 17 straight years with 15 or more wins. 19 years with at least 13. 2-time 20 game winner, 4-time Cy Young, twice he finished in the Top 5 in MVP voting. Mike Piazza - Arguably the best offensive catcher of all time Eh, I'm tired of doing research. Will we hold all of them in the same vein as we do Mickey Mantle or Babe Ruth? No, probably not, but the people who never got to see them play, like our grandchildren, might. Cause in the end, all we have to go on with the legends of yesteryear (for most of us) are the numbers and what a bunch of journalists who never got to see them play write about them

After he is traded and signs a long term deal with the Cubs, he will be 38. How much production will he have left at that age? 8-) I'd rather have Aramis at his $75M contract than Cabrera and the $150M+ contract he'll command :)