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As others have stated, you aren't going to "sell high" on Marshall. Nobody is going to give you much for a set-up man. they may be willing to deal some good prospects for marshall because he is cheap, controlled for another year, consistent, has closer "stuff," and is relatively young. Unfortunately Hendry doesn't seem to want to listen. He is clearly delusional about this team's chances of competing next year and his ability to move soriano. The fact of the matter is we wont be able to improve at third base, first base, and starting pitching all in a single off season. That would require a whole ton of money and luck to be able to convince the best free agents that the cubs still have chance to be a WS contender. Basically Hendry doesn't want to trade anyone from this god awful team except for Reed Johnson which will garner little return, Soriano who is probably untradeable given his slump and also will garner no return, and possibly marlon Byrd. 20 games under and he wants to keep the core intact, ridiculous. this: and this: most people knew this: and then there is this: Darwin Barney is untouchable? really???

BA's take at the time. Bourn and Costanzo were both considered above average prospects at the time, although neither was considered a Top 100 guy. After the trade, they were 5 and 6 on BA's Astros Top 10 List, which featured the immortal JR Towles as the #1 prospect in that system. Towles came up #53 on BA's Top 100 list that year and was the only Astro on it. Bourn's turned out phenomenally for the Astros, but in terms of how that deal looked at the time, if the Cubs get an equivalent return for Marshall as the Astros did for Lidge, I'd be kind of iffy on the deal. Towles moved 3 levels that year and looked the part, so its not like that was unfounded. I would say that it was a real solid return for a guy who looked really shaky that year. Lidge blew 8 saves in 27 chances that year. Marmol has blown 7 saves this year but has been so dominant at times that I have a hard time believing he doesnt eclipse Lidge's value. Same for marshall.

It just seems to me that we have so many holes to fill that it would be ok to trade an elite reliever like Marshall and receive a couple nice prospects that could help us out next year. That would be okay, but it won't happen that way. Teams don't trade MLB ready prospects for relievers in July. Teams do trade mlb ready prospects for closers. Case in point Matt Capps for Wilson Ramos and joe testa (reliever prospect). The phillies gave up Bourn and Constanzo for Lidge which was a nice size haul at the time. I have to believe that Marmol is currently valued as high or higher than Lidge when he was traded.

It just seems to me that we have so many holes to fill that it would be ok to trade an elite reliever like Marshall and receive a couple nice prospects that could help us out next year. And its not the money for next year its that if we are going to try to resign him after next year it will cost us. Plus he is at his peak value right now and we have bullpen depth. Marmol I think is still highly valued around the league. When he is on he is the best stopper in the game, whether that is as a closer or if he is that key inning guy like he was for us in 08 with woody closing. I think alot of teams still see him as an elite reliever despite his recent blown saves

Many of you may get pissed at even suggesting this ... But, if teams are willing to give up good talent for top relievers like Heath Bell why not take advantage of this? Heck throw marmol into the mix, too. Especially with the emergence of Russell as an excellent loogy and Samardzija coming into his own. Our upper level minor league teams are quite depleted or full of guys playing over their head and we need ready prospects to supplement with free agent signings. Plus Marshall is only under control for another year and about to get really expensive. In reality, our possibilities for competing next year is questionable because of our lack of starting pitching depth. Chances are the cubs cannot afford a starting pitcher along with picking up Aram's option and pursuing a stud first baseman. Why not move these guys in order to improve in areas where we dont have any depth?

that song needs to go. Not only is it annoying but it is also poorly written. In boston cubs fans sung that song after the one win we got and it was damned embarrassing. Worst of all it just seems to add to the negative image of cubs fans.

why is searle just getting back to being a starter? a couple years back he looked like he would be a solid piece.

I may get flamed for saying this, but I'd rather spend in this area in some ways than on the major league roster at this point. With the way things are going, with teams locking in their best guys for an extra couple of years, it's making it very hard to find bigtime FA's who are going to be in their prime for most of the contract they're going to wind up getting. You don't have to have a 135 mill major league payroll to consistently be a true contender, if you ask me. If it takes dropping the major league payroll down to 120ish or so, but have the ability to consistently spend bigtime thru the draft and IFA, then I'm actually all for it. The pipeline would be continuous and while you'd have to pay big money to keep some guys obviously, you'd also consistently have the cheap production needed to go around it at all times as well. In a perfect world too, you wouldn't be shelling out humongous money on volatile FA pitching either. You could home grow it and always have more on the way up as well. Ive always thought that even when the Cubs do spend big money on FAs, a huge thing that separates us from teams like the Yankees and Red Sox is that fact that they seem to be able to constantly produce superstars from their farm system in addition to their FAs and trades, and we simply have not come close. Not much homegrown talent to get excited about from the Cubs in recent years. Hopefully thats a trend that can soon be reversed. that is a great point. People seem to forget how good the yankee farm system was in the mid 90's. They developed two legit HOFers in Rivera and Jeter and a pretty awesome catcher in Posada. The cubs always seem to sign the flavor of the month guys as well though. We dont go after elite talent like a Texiera or A-Rod (insert roids joke here) or CC Sabathia. These are guys are elite because they have been consistent producers year after year. The cubs always seem to target those second and third tier guys who are coming off of a big season hoping they can be consistent. We also overpay because in part we pay for the hype. And then we are stuck with guys are overpaid and age as quickly as that guy who drinks from the wrong grail in Indiana Jones 3. Guys like Soriano, Bradley, Todd Hundley, Jeff Blauser, Danny Jackson, Dave Smith, Kerry Wood (03), etc. immediately come to mind. But then thats where your point comes in the cubs sign a big name and then put it all on them to produce. The yankees sign a big name then put them in a line up with other big names.

The Cubs didn't seem to get much pitching in the draft, either. After Maples and Jacquez, there are maybe a handful of guys who are kind of interesting, but seemingly no one with those kinds of ceilings. Injuries have saapped pitching depth this year, too. Losing Whitenack to TJS hurt. McNutt's blister problem has been disconcerting, although he could finish the season strong. Simpson still doesn't seem to be fully recovered from mono, plus there have been whispers about his shoulder. that is why I didnt understand the cubs picking Baez when we could have gotten someone like Jungmann who will most likely move quickly for the Brewers. This I believe will turn out to be a big mistake. When you dont have pitching at the higher levels it makes no sense not to draft college pitching especially when good ones are available. I get that the draft is not an exact science and that the cubs decided to target overslot highschool guys. But jesus did we really need to draft 3 catchers in the first 16 picks in comparison to 4 pitchers?

is a bullet to the head an option?

What is the difference here? the hate bandwagon.

I'm not sure, maybe it was the hall of fame speech and all of the ejections but Sandberg seems to be a lot more vocal these days. I wouldn't put it past him calling out guys for not playing the game the right way. But then again he may not have to. When a Hall of Famer says something do players tend to listen more than if a career minor league manager with zero major league experience does? Does a HOFer immediately command more respect than someone like Quade who took the grunt path to the majors? Of course that really didnt work out that well for Ted Williams' stint with the Senators. Either way sandberg wasnt making this team better this year.

I was on the Aramis bandwagon early in the year but ive now I'm leaning toward the pick up his option crew. Yes, I'm fickle. But his play has been too darn good to ignore and this streak he is on is unbelievable. The real question is who you can get back for him. In other threads it has been established that the cubs pitching depth on the farm is largely lower levels and besides McNutt and possibly Struck there isnt much to look forward to above high A. We really need to retool the farm with guys who are close to the majors. On the flipside, if ricketts is serious about pursuing a Pujols or a Prince Fielder it would be in our best interest to keep Aram. Realistically, Aram and Fielder next year dont make this team a playoff contender without also adding some pitchers as well. The key question: How much payroll room do we have for 2012 if the cubs pick up Aram's option?

a couple weeks back one of the morning radio shows was talking about how Quade seems to let the veterans off the hook when they play bad. Or at least he wont voice his displeasure to the media about it. Its seems like a peculiar way to manage a team that has had poor play from veterans and rookies alike.

It's really misleading to talk about how much Soriano was worth the past 2.5 years when he obviously was injured for the majority 2009. That and your numbers aren't true. Fangraphs has him with -.1 WAR in his injured '09, 3.0 WAR in '10, and 0.6 WAR in '11. Even including his injured '09 as relevant, AND for some reason averaging that 0.6 as if it's a full season in the average, you still don't get 1 WAR per year. Maybe you meant to quote someone else but I did not at any point post any thing about Wins Above Replacement. I was only talking about dollar value based upon play. So yes my numbers are true.

I left out the obvious part that I figured I didn't have to go over it yet again because it's such common sense and it's been covered a zillion times: yes, if we lived in a fantasy world where a team was willing to take Soriano and his paycheck the Cubs should do it...but we live in the real world where any trade for Soriano would involve the Cubs almost certainly paying for at least half of his salary. So you either have Soriano (again, not blocking anyone in the system and not depriving the Cubs of a spot for an impact FA signing) for $18 million or, say, Willingham for all intents and purposes at least for $14 million (and Christ, he's awful this year, and he'd be 33 himself if the Cubs picked him up for next year), because there's almost no way the Cubs are pawning off Soriano without paying something like $9-12 million dollars a year for the rest of his contract. It's just not realistic. With or without Soriano, the Cubs are almost certainly paying WAY too much for their LF production for the next 3 seasons. you think willingham would cost 14 million for next year? by what math. [edit] he's making 6 million this year. he would have to go on quite a tear :roll:

Actually you said it would create hole, which we have established it wouldnt. we arent talking about whether they can actually move him or not. I have already said its unreasonable as well. What my point was, is that the cubs seem focused on trying to move these guys. However if they were to move him. Freeing up money obviously means spending it wisely else where. Like on resigning aramis and chasing a firstbaseman and cheaper guys that can replace or better Z and Soriano's numbers and international scouting. If they spend wisely its always to their advantage to cut their losses on bad contracts.

at league average Zambrano has value but its really minimized by that contract. Like I said he has been overpaid roughly 20 million over the last year and this year if he keeps it up. That said I dont disagree with their interest to move him and replace him with another league average pitcher that would be much cheaper.

if this is the case then he should have gotten rid of Hendry last year. that would really make no sense to let him be the gm this year and then tie his hands when effectively screwing yourself for next year. While I'm not a big fan of Ricketts and I dont think he is a very savy team owner, I doubt that he would be so short sighted. I really think that it comes down to the fact that the guys we want to trade no one really wants because they havent been playing well, carry enormous contracts, and perceived baggage. What "enormous contracts?" Why do some people talk about this team like it's riddled with Soriano-esque contracts, yet only Soriano has a Soriano-esque contract? no one is paying fukudome even half of his salary to pick him up. Soriano is virtually unmovable and zambrano has been bad this year and is getting 18 million this year and next year. These are some mighty overpaid individuals. I would love to see some one take these guys but really who wants to pay this much for mediocre play? Trading Zambrano creates a hole in the lineup that they likely can't fill next year and he hasn't been that overpaid in the grand scheme of things. Fukudome is gone after this year regardless so who gives a [expletive] if nobody wants to trade for him (and he wasn't all that overpaid for most of his contract)? So that leaves us, again, with Soriano as having the only "enormous contract" and even that isn't that big a deal anymore with all the money coming off the books after this year and the next (coupled with it not being likely that they could match or exceed his production via significantly cheaper FA next season). My point was that those are the guys that the cubs would like to trade and that no one is interested because there contracts are big and they have been playing like crap. Z may have played well the first few years of his contract but so did soriano. it doesnt make it any less difficult to move him now. And with the way Z has played this year it would be better to move him then keep him. Z made 18 mil last year was valued at half of that. This year he is valued around one third of his contract. So given his play he has been overpaid about 20million between last year and this year. What do you think next year will be like? yes fukudome comes off the books this year but its still a guy they want to move that no one else really wants. I'm sure they would like to at least get a crumb for him because he wont garner a draft pick. He made 14million last year and fangraphs had him valued at 5.2 million and he has been much worse this year especially on defense so yeah I would say he's at least been grossly overpaid these last two years. (fangraphs had him valued at zero but I have to believe thats an error) this article pretty much says the same thing about Z and soriano I have been saying. However he thinks that fukudome may be tradable albiet for very little in return. However in the time since this article was written Fukudome has been on a pretty bad slump .233/.300/.274/.574 which may be enough to scare teams off http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/the-cubs-are-selling-but-will-anybody-buy/

Sandberg said that he would come back in a recent interview with Waddle and Silvy. I think I saw a note about it on mlbtraderumors

I agree and its certainly nice to see that Archer has regressed a bit since we traded him.

if this is the case then he should have gotten rid of Hendry last year. that would really make no sense to let him be the gm this year and then tie his hands when effectively screwing yourself for next year. While I'm not a big fan of Ricketts and I dont think he is a very savy team owner, I doubt that he would be so short sighted. I really think that it comes down to the fact that the guys we want to trade no one really wants because they havent been playing well, carry enormous contracts, and perceived baggage. What "enormous contracts?" Why do some people talk about this team like it's riddled with Soriano-esque contracts, yet only Soriano has a Soriano-esque contract? no one is paying fukudome even half of his salary to pick him up. Soriano is virtually unmovable and zambrano has been bad this year and is getting 18 million this year and next year. These are some mighty overpaid individuals. I would love to see some one take these guys but really who wants to pay this much for mediocre play?

I don't think so. This is the first year in a long time that Ramirez has been able to stay off the DL, he's still injury prone and getting older. He's also a pretty bad fielder and that's not going to improve. I'd rather upgrade elsewhere with that money we would save on him and see if a Baker and Flaherty platoon will stick or something like that. 3B has been so awful this year and in recent year that may not be too terrible. I was really hating on Aramis earlier this year but would be fine with picking up his option at this point if he really doesn't want to get traded. If not we will almost certainly be going with Flarhety Baker platoon and hopefully that could be productive. But if what has been said about him waiving his no trade clause at the waiver deadline is true then we should most certainly go through with it. He is at the height of his value in terms of play but also because of the lack of quality third base man available. He offers the best opportunity to get back some really good prospects.

cubs.com is now reporting that if he is traded his option automatically vests. But that he is not interested in being traded. http://chicago.cubs.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20110718&content_id=21957962&notebook_id=21959486&vkey=notebook_chc&c_id=chc

cubs.com is also now reporting that Aramis is not interested in being traded. He says he doesnt want to move his family. But for those looking for something to go on he may have cracked the door open by saying "right now, I'm not interested in any trade" still it doesnt sound like he is interested unless the perfect situation arises. http://chicago.cubs.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20110718&content_id=21957962&notebook_id=21959486&vkey=notebook_chc&c_id=chc