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I guess this depends on who you ask. Given soriano's past it was very probable that he probably wouldn't put up those numbers again. And frankly he was due for some DL time. If he consistently was putting up numbers like 05 thats one thing. But he wasnt. Also I thought he changed his age just before or after the contract. I guess I'm wrong. Either way its pretty well evident that Soriano's contract is a joke. Hendry out bid himself by 20-30 million if the reports are correct. 'nuf said. yes I know what his contract is. I don't think its that bad and neither does fangraphs amongst others. If we can agree that cameron and rios are comparable then its not crazy to think that Cameron at 37 should make less than Rios at 29. Rios' contract might be tolerable to certain teams if he can maintain his production, but it doesn't really fit in with the budgets that the White Sox have been set with for a while now. They've got an old team that's going to need a lot of turnover, so unless Reinsdorff is going to open up the wallet and expand their payroll, paying $12 million a year for Alex Rios isn't in their best interests. Even though they are the fifth oldest team if you look at average age they arent all that old at key positions. konerko is the key guy they lose this year and they may get a home town discount or just start viciedo over there next year. Pierzinski could be had again for cheap or Donald Lucy could take over. If anything they have young(er) guys that will be eligible for free agency for the first time in Quentin, Floyd,and Danks in 2013 ,Alexie Ramirez 2012, Edwin Jackson 2012. This could be the drawback of the Rios contract but given the current bargain basement market of free agency they will be able to sign or resign guys at marginal prices and mix in the occasional more expensive player and bring up prospects. I really don't see it effecting them that much as they get to keep most of their current team for the next three years of the remaining four years on Rios' contract.

maybe if you read the part where I said "signing soriano was stupid because..." rios makes 9.7 mil this year Cameron made 10mil last year. Given last years options for free agent centerfielders it looks better. from fangraphs: http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/revival-by-rios-his-contract-and-yes-sample-size/

no signing soriano was stupid because you're buying the guy at the height of his talent. A guy who had a career year, who also had never seen the dl and a guy who was rumored and later confirmed to be 3 years older then he claimed at the time. etc. I guess rios is a bit overpaid and his ops leaves something to be desired. But how is he any different than mike cameron a guy most people were clamoring for last off season? I didn't see anyone say he was overpaid. Take away last year from Rios and they are pretty comparable.

eh, Manny will help that team. There offense has been explosive lately and yes they probably need a middle reliever more but their DH production has to be pretty low overall. I still don't understand what they saw in Mark Kotsay. I don't know about always getting his guy but I really can't fault Kenny's last two waiver deals. Peavy was a solid albiet risky pick up but the reward probably outweighed the risk. Its easy to now to see Peavy as an aging injury prone starter last year it didn't seem so clear. Rios wasn't the player we saw last year so they were right to think he was due for a bounce back. They definitely needed a centerfield so I thought it was a decent move for them last year until I saw how lost he looked, however in limited time. But given his production this year its was a solid move. Especially if he can repeat this year going forward.

unfortunately with the way this team is built I don't think just succeeding at the major league level is a viable option at first base, a premier power positions. given all the long bad contracts we have and the lack of run producers it really seems to be key that we get a power hitting first baseman. Unless you think Johnson will show Dunn type power I will have to pass.

Disagree with you. Fuku's contract is a sunk cost. Colvin's contract in comparison is minimal. Colvin is younger, will be cheaper and is under team contract for longer than Fukudome. The team should be thinking about the future not this year. Colvin should be playing first, with Kosuke in RF. Nady getting ABs is what makes no sense. Getting a team to take a portion of Kosuke's contract would have been easier if he were playing as he is every day. And it is not sunk cost, or at least it didn't have to be. It's the same sort of stupidity that sending Z to the pen the second times was. And what if Kosuke can't be traded? Then we have the same problem going into 2011. Actually, Nady getting starts makes plenty of sense if they're thinking of bringing him back, especially if they're determined to move Fukudome. Nady's performance over the last month+ hopefully shows that he's recovered from his surgery, which would make him very valuable. I really am hoping Nady can revert to form. I don't see why not as many guys take a while to come back from tommy john. He was quite the hitter his last year with the pirates. I still wouldn't mind seeing colvin get a start at first just to see how he looks at first just in case.

what the heck happened to Searle? He looked really promising in high A last year was he injured?

All depends on how they do this postseason. Girardi took heat after 2008 and it will happen again if they finish behind Tampa and/or get knocked out of the playoffs early. I can't understand why a manager can get so much hype for winning with $200 million dollar team with by far the most talent in the league. I think the thing is that Torre went 8 years without a title with the highest payroll. So its not necessarily a slam dunk. Secondly, i think Girardi's more impressive feat was what he did with the marlins team he managed that collectively made less than A-rod. Granted having a young Hanley, Miguel Cabrera, and pre- injury pitchers Anibal Sanchez and Scott Olsen really helped but he seemed to take an active role in the development of the young players. Plus he's proven he can handle the prima-donnas. If he's interested I have to believe he's the number one choice as long as money isn't an issue.

2007: 125 games, 519 PA 2008: 137 games, 602 PA 2009: 116 games, 459 PA 2010: 114 games, 329 PA I stand corrected. I thought he had a major injury like an elbow or shoulder problem? Maybe he just played through it. Also wasn't he supposed to play first in this series? Or did Quade nix that idea?

Also I think we can attribute at least some of his recent dip in performance to fatigue since he has never played this many games before. He's been injured almost every year since we drafted him.

Personally, I like giving shots to guys who don't come with a ton of baggage in terms of being a "name" manager and all the ego and history that comes with it but do have at least some managing/coaching experience on the MLB level. I'm not exactly sure what Trammel did with the Tigers can be considered managing anyhow. I was surprised how candid Hendry was about it but, recently in the news Trammel did seem to indicate that he was happier as a bench coach. I believe after his last bad stretch. I think Brenly is the obvious choice but most likely will be spurned in favor of Sandberg. I'm torn about Sandberg. I'm not sure why all the hate for him. Why has he been so bad? What kind of in game moves does he make that are wrong.

The cubs just recalled hoffpauir so I'm guessing that colvin or soriano aren't considered options at 1st base by management.

what if he comes up and is respectable? Can you depend on him next year based on the small sample size?

better or worse than ankiel?

Dunn will be overpriced? If he gets something close to the 4/60 deal he's looking for, yes, he will be overpriced - and I'm a pretty big Dunn fan. And I think he may get something similar to that since the other best free agents on the market are Jorge Cantu and maybe Russell Branyan. Pena. given his off year he might be cheap. given his off year he might also suck. The D-lee deal isn't bad the 19 year old looks promising. It seems like hendry prefers quantity to quality though we always end up getting two or three really green a-ballers back. Maybe its his organizational philosophy because this is the same way we sign players out of latin america low bonuses many signings and up until recently in asia. I would have liked to have seen a position player at second or first coming back given that first is an organizational hole right now and i'm not convinced by our in house second base options for next year.

Ok this is the last I'll say about this cause he's bout gone anyways. But the playoffs and the the streches run in 04 are probably the most pressure sitauions he had as a cub. Were you guys at any of these games? Do you not remember the media scrutiny? You could cuut the pressure with a knife. Yeah the guy hit .545 in08 when no one was on base but was empty with runners on 13 chances in those six games. 04 empty down the stretch. Yeah the day to day stats say he was decent in clutch situations. But he did virtually nothing to help the team in the most key spots of his cubs career.

no the difference here is micro vs macro. If you choose to look at cumulative stats to tell you how clutch a player is then you are fooling yourself. A "clutch" situation vs. cardinals and the same situation vs the nationals is, inevitably not the same. Arguably there is nothing clutch about even a grandslam vs the nationals of the past 5 years. Nor is a clutch situation in the playoffs the same as in the regular season. if a player is a decent hitter than over a season or tenure with a team the law of averages weighs out in his favor but it hides the fact that there are possibly smaller trends that have occurred or are recurring. maybe against a team or a particular type of pitcher or key situation. I'm not trying to look at the bigger picture of what he has been as a player. for the most part he has been pretty good. I'm looking at the high pressure situations he has had as a cub. when the pressure was greatest for the team and for him as a run producer. The 07,08 playoffs are obvious, the 04 collapse too, this year he is no where to be found early now he starts hitting after the pressure is off, etc.

thanks but I posted his complete lines for some of the down years. no rbi's with men on base is a lazy mans way to look at his hitting with risp in the playoffs which is not available for some reason.

You didn't point out any trends. trend = correlation with events over time. so all of that stuff didn't happen when the pressure was on? ok fine. You collected a bunch of scattered occurrences to back up your point while ignoring all of the ones that disproved it. You discovered no trends; only different times when he played poorly under a myriad of different circumstances. The only workable conclusion someone could take from your rambling, sloppy argument is that "sometimes Derrek Lee is not a good hitter." Its not sometimes, its that these situations are all connected by way of being pressure or clutch situations. show me other similar situations where he hit the cover off the ball and I'll believe you. But, I suspect you can't or else you would have posted them by now. no one has said anything remotely significant to convince me otherwise. the only point of relevance was that he finished last year on a tear. Granted he sure did that. However, i replied that he was pretty poor in producing vs over 50 teams and against the only team that mattered, the cardinals, he was down right horrible. That should at the least temper that statement. you haven't said anything to disprove his playoff woes, or the drastic stretch in 2004 or the fact that he sucked this year.

You didn't point out any trends. trend = correlation with events over time. so all of that stuff didn't happen when the pressure was on? ok fine.

His still calling has nothing to do with anything. You can plug EVERY baseball player EVER's name into this discussion and that last part would be at least somewhat true. We all know Lee has sucked terribly this year, but your ridiculous argument that he only does well when there's no pressure has been thoroughly shot to hell. shot to hell by what? someone saying lol or jesus? i gave you several examples that you have ignored quite possibly the most pressure situations he has been in as a cub and hes folded up. 2004 0 for the last 17 games! No Rbi's in the playoffs 07 and 08 in 13 chances. He may have finished last year on a hot streak but his numbers sucked against the only team that mattered .268 .300 .393 .693. And of course this year. Middle of the order hitters on a top 5 payroll team should be better than this

I think it's hilarious how you guys fall in love with a player. I bet your still calling for rich hill right? The guy has done virtually nothing to help this team get over the hump. and Hasn't come through when we needed him to be the producer. That's not a three hitter. Plus everyone with a brain knew that April was going to be our key month that year because of so many divisional games and even though we came back to get into first place in august it came back to bite us. Why don't you at least acknowledge that he's failed at key times. I can say he's had fantastic streches but he always seems to wilt in the pressure spots. He may have hadthat one hit for the marlins but he was 3 for 28 the rest of that playoffs. You may say coincidence or revisionist I say trend.

This just seems like typical lee to me. He shows up in the boxscores when it no longer matters. It happened this year and to a degree last year. He played great in 05 when it didn't matter. When it comes to crunch time as in the post season, the guy has zero rbi's with the cubs and 8 total in 100 at bats. Hes just not a legitimate star, team leader, nor a three hitter. Unfortunately year after year we were left to depend on him in this capacity. If only we had more Jaw jutting, forward leaning, scruff of the beard type winners like Darin Erstad or Scott Brocius. Nice sarcasm but this was hardly a post about having more hustle-type "winners." How does that make us better? Its about getting some consistent hitting out of the three hole and having a real run producer in our line up. jesus why don't you elaborate and enlighten me as to why having a legit run producer is a bad idea. I have had this argument about lee before: 2010 first half .233 avg overall .227 w/risp. 2009 April hes no where to be found we finish the month 10-11. Normally not a big deal but we played a lot of division games that month and it put us in a whole from the start. ALso finishes the season with only 30 rbi's against teams with a record of .500 or more. His line against the cardinals that year .268 .300 .393 .693. not so hot from the three hole. 2008 we win the division. Get to the playoffs no RBI. Yes he hit .545 but was still 0-4 with runners on base. He also had a key error after the Derosa error to extend that ridiculous second inning. 2007 bit of a power outage for lee. but we still win the division. No rbi again. 0-3 with runners on in game 1, 0-4 with runners on in game 2, 0-2 with runners on in game 3 2006 injured - not sure if he ever would have been the guy from 05 again anyways but this definitely hurt his numbers. 2005 go's absolutely nuts. I'm chanting mvp at a game where he goes 4-4 against the marlins with two doubles a single and a homer. Awesome! Too bad we were pretty much out of it from the start. his peak year with the cubs. 2004 did most of his damage from the 5 and 6 hole where he probably belongs. Was terrible from the two hole. Absolutely wilted during september when he produced a .217 .338 .357 and 0 rbi in the last 17 games in a season where we lost out on the wild card the last week of the year.

I read some where no less than a year ago that some of our scouts have been working for the cubs for 20 plus years! Given how bad we have been that has to be a huge part of the problem.

This just seems like typical lee to me. He shows up in the boxscores when it no longer matters. It happened this year and to a degree last year. He played great in 05 when it didn't matter. When it comes to crunch time as in the post season, the guy has zero rbi's with the cubs and 8 total in 100 at bats. Hes just not a legitimate star, team leader, nor a three hitter. Unfortunately year after year we were left to depend on him in this capacity. If only we had more Jaw jutting, forward leaning, scruff of the beard type winners like Darin Erstad or Scott Brocius. Nice sarcasm but this was hardly a post about having more hustle-type "winners." How does that make us better? Its about getting some consistent hitting out of the three hole and having a real run producer in our line up.