RichHillIsABeast

If my choices were Taveras and Pierre, I'd keep shopping. :lol:

Willy isn't better than Pierre, at all. He's worse. How brilliantly Hendryific would it be if the Cubs ended up with a worse CF than Pierre next year. Not to mention, between Willy, Juan and Corey, they'd have gotten rid of the 2 better options in favor of the worst. Seriously, if Willy plays CF everyday, the only improvement for next year is Soriano over Jones. And while that is a near lock for improvement, it's not a lock to be immensely better. So, once again, we'd be counting on health to make this team better. I don't think Willy Taveras is a worse player than Juan Pierre. Willy can steal bases at a reasonable rate, draw a walk (career minor league .294/.368/.376 hitter), plays good/great defense, and doesn't have a noodle arm. His salary is a small fraction of Pierre's. If I had to take one player for 2007 in CF, I'd take Taveras. I don't think Taveras would be a bad option at all next season, provided it was only to keep a place warm for Pie, who could make the team out of ST or any time during the regular season. Taveras would be easily movable, or we could just stick him on the bench and not worry about his paycheck. If the price for Taveras gets anywhere near what the Nats are wanting for Church, we should pursue Church. He is by far the superior player.

NSBB posters' blood pressure?

That's not what I said. If you disagree or think something isn't right, then say so when it happens, instead of vague generalizations that don't accomplish anything more than you coming off with condescension. Haha, where in the world did you get that? I'm talking about making remarks about groups of people as a whole, whether they're pro-stat, anti-stat, or think stats aren't real. But if it makes you feel better to invent a pro-stat task force that snuffs out any opposing opinion, feel free. There's a lot of people who debate here passionately, if you don't bring it strong(no matter what your opinion is), people are going to call you on it. And I'm sure that when I claim that a trade is unrealistic you will be right there to defend my right to say so. Right, TT? Oh please, you know this board leans pro-stats. I don't see a group of anti-stat or pro-scout people here to argue with every pro-stat comment that is made. You can be sure that any semi-denouncement of stats will draw more than a few opposing posts in short order. I don't need to invent anything. Are you that clueless as to your posting environment? Not that this board is bad. Far from it. But it is what it is. Pro-stat. Sometimes overwelmingly so.

First point of order. The proposal you're mocking was Murton, Marshall, Dempster, and Ohman for Dunn. Hardly the poster(DKWG for anyone that cares) living in a fantasy land trying to rip off another team. If you're going to use a hyperbolic example to make a point, please get it right. What really rubs me the wrong way is when people make generalizations like you just did about the entire board. Do people come up with unrealistic trade scenarios? Of course. Do people bash Hendry for a lack of moves? Of course. However, those are not all the same people. This is a very large message board, literally thousands of people are registered. Just because you see a lot of ill-advised trade proposals and see a lot of Hendry bashing does not mean it's the same people. And then, even if it is the same people, it's not even close to an arrogant POV. A lack of moves by Hendry does not prove that there wasn't anything worthwhile available. A person can have the opinion that Hendry should have made moves to improve the team, and simultaneously suggest a trade that he/she thinks will improve the team(however realistic or unrealistic they are). First of all, I just made up an unlikely trade scenario off of the top of my head. If I actually took someone's trade scenario, I'm sure someone would point out that I am "attacking a poster," which is an obvious no-no here on NSBB. The fact that it was even close to an actual trade scenario proposed by someone is hilarious to me. Second, it's not a generalization. You want me to keep a list? I'm sure you'd/others would find a way to point out how pathetic that is. And, yes, it is pretty arrogant to think you know more than scouts/baseball insiders who have decates of experience in baseball. Yes, I do see a lot of Hendry bashing and ridiculous trade proposals from the same people. It's all good. Keep doing what you're doing. It's not fostering an atmosphere of diverse opinions - just a bunch of posters debating points of contention from the same side. This board is very specialized, and I enjoy reading it, but geez, anyone that expresses an opinion that is borderline anti-stats and they get dogpiled on. It's absolutely amazing.

No I dont think Bruce was calling people stupid, however your little " obvious point" crap and how people here need to think about that here, I do think was a direct slam at posters here. Most of those trade proposals are good for a laugh. Marshall, Dempster, and Ohman for Dunn!! Oh, and throw in Jacque Jones for Ryan Freel. lmao Fantasy GM can be fun, but it quickly goes overboard. The thing that really rubs me is some of the posters making these ridiculous trade proposals are arrogant enough to criticize Hendry/Cubs on their lack of moves. Blasting moves that have been made is ok. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but creating fanciful scenarios to discredit another's POV on baseball deserves ridicule.

What's the big deal with having undeclared firearms in a home? It's amazing that isn't unconstitutional. Democrat controlled states are wonderful. Bastards are going to hurt our defense. Unacceptable. Priorities, people. Priorities. Super Bowl or bust.

I don't know exactly what the Nats have asked for Church, but it's likely they've started with Rich Hill. They're famous for this kind of stuff. It's possible a trade could happen late in the off-season or during spring training. I've not heard the name of Gross mentioned with the Cubs. Schuerholz complained about that crap in his book. Some GMs think it's fantasy baseball time come trade time. He also mentioned that Hendry doesn't do that and he's a great guy to deal with, expects to give and get value and doesn't waste time making ridiculous offers and negotiating down to a fair price.

Sounds like Pie has been batting ninth and facing a lot of lefties, that's why his numbers are down.

Where do you come up with this stuff? I agree with him. You can't just go to a 4 man rotation b/c it makes statistical sense. If we brought guys up through the minors using a 4 man rotation, the mental approach and physical approach (limiting pitch counts, getting your body adjusted to the different strain and healing processes) would be different. Expecting to take a crowd of guys raised on the 5 man rotation to go to a 4 man rotation and put up similar numbers and avoid injury is silly. I'd be all for going to the 4 man rotation in the minors and raising the next gen of pitchers on it, but converting current ML pitchers to the 4 man is just asking for injuries. Except in the playoffs when it really counts. BTW: I'm not supporting a 4 man rotation. My question had nothing to do with a 4 man rotation. It has to do with the bolded above. That's also only going to happen for a handful of starts. Hopefully the body can stand it. It's a risk, but most teams feel like taking it. You may never get another shot at the WS as a player. Ah, sorry I misunderstood you, CubinNY. IMO, the routine thing is important from a physical aspect. From a mental aspect I think you could adjust fairly quickly. Guys go back and forth from the rotation to the pen all the time (and say it is tough mentally, but they do it).

Where do you come up with this stuff? I agree with him. You can't just go to a 4 man rotation b/c it makes statistical sense. If we brought guys up through the minors using a 4 man rotation, the mental approach and physical approach (limiting pitch counts, getting your body adjusted to the different strain and healing processes) would be different. Expecting to take a crowd of guys raised on the 5 man rotation to go to a 4 man rotation and put up similar numbers and avoid injury is silly. I'd be all for going to the 4 man rotation in the minors and raising the next gen of pitchers on it, but converting current ML pitchers to the 4 man is just asking for injuries.

In hindsight, I think 111MM (51MM posting, 60MM contract) is very reasonable for a ML ace. Too bad we didn't throw out a ridiculous bid for Matsuzaka.

I was one of them. And I'd still rather have Cedeno than Furcal. But I'd rather have Furcal than Cesear, so now I wish they'd got the contract done. It would also mean they wouldn't have signed Soriano and maybe have gone after Drew. It's the freaking butterfly effect. :spin: If you still want Cedeno rather than Furcal, and you want Furcal rather than Ceasar, does that mean you want Cedeno starting at SS in 2007? Not necessarily. I was thinking about cost and production. Furcal is obviously the best player of the three. I still think Hendry would have picked up Slappy though. The Cubs had no viable alternative at CF after Patterson was traded for two sticks of bubble gum. We just have to hope Izturis has a break out year, just like last year we had to hope Cedeno would carry his good winter league numbers into the season. The Cubs are dependent on "hope" more than other team I can think of. Gotcha. Didn't Hendry say at the time we were pursuing Furcal that he'd like to have both Furcal and Slappy? I doubt he'd have gotten put over the barrel like he did at the trade table. That would have been nice.

Punching Judy? She deserved it! :wink: The Lugo school of battery. Punch 'n' Judy.

I was one of them. And I'd still rather have Cedeno than Furcal. But I'd rather have Furcal than Cesear, so now I wish they'd got the contract done. It would also mean they wouldn't have signed Soriano and maybe have gone after Drew. It's the freaking butterfly effect. :spin: If you still want Cedeno rather than Furcal, and you want Furcal rather than Ceasar, does that mean you want Cedeno starting at SS in 2007?

And then we would have had about 100 pages on what a jerk Hendry is for letting someone outbid him on Soriano. I'm not happy about the contract, but Hendry (and Piniella) decided he was the man that they needed and he went out and got him. It certainly doesn't look like the money has hindered him from signing other players. Low OBP, high SLG. OBP isn't everything. It's all about how many runs Soriano creates, both by driving guys in and being driven in. Typical leadoff hitters are next to worthless getting guys in. That's a huge waste of baserunners. Soriano is much better than some punching Judy who can get on base at a .360+ clip.

lmao

You do watch the team make mistakes and are powerless to do anything about it, even more powerless than a beat writer who has frequent contact with the team in question. Hello ulcer!

Sounds like we're in no great hurry to sign Floyd either, which IMO, is a good thing. Give Murton 600 ABs. Jones/someone platoon in CF would be fantastic. Other than LH bat, we're set until the trade deadline.

All I wanted to show is that players can improve in the majors beyond what they produced in the minors. Pagan can do the same, albeit at a much reduced level. The physical tools are there. Who thought highly of those players? The stats community? Nope. Scouts did. And it's the Cubs scouts who targeted Pagan. Scouting has it's flaws, but sometimes they're able to see stuff stats don't predict. All stats do is predict future performance based on past performance, irregardless of the extenuation circumstances. That's a serious blind spot. Scouts have issues too, no doubt. Too much dreaming and not enough actual production in many cases.

Some guys don't figure it out until they get older. Why? I have no clue. Pagan was always thought better of by scouts than he performed (who saw him with more power potential than he showed in the minors). That's why he kept moving up levels, not b/c he actually produced. Kind of like how EPatt got his AAA promotion after putting up mediocre numbers in AA. Someone saw something in his game that merited a promotion. Then he caught fire (obviously EPatt had previous minor league success at lower levels). Guys get promoted because of other things than statistical production. I don't think Pagan is going to be good, but he's shown the ability in flashes to be a very solid bench option. He has power. You can see it in his swing. Fluid, non-uppercut, with decent bat speed. The home runs will come. A lot of guys will never develop that power b/c they put too much backspin on the ball with their golf swings. Pagan doesn't suffer from that. I don't think his ST outburst was a fluke. The 5 HR he hit in 150 AB or so in 2006 wasn't either. Likewise I think Murton will develop more power. You can just tell by the way he swings.

please provide me with a better predictor of future performance thanks! Why? Do you think minor league stats can be equated to major league performance absolutely? If so, you have your opinion already. great answer. you've really provided a lot of support for your position. Be reasonable. It wouldn't matter what he or anyone said to you. Your opinion won't ever change. Thanks for keeping an open mind! give me something to keep an open mind about. you're saying that bad minor league players can turn into good major league players...throw some names at me. No. You added the descriptions "good" and "bad" to this discussion. There are tons of minor leaguers who put up better numbers in the bigs. I never said Pagan was going to be a world burner, just that he'd be a productive ML bench player. Chris Carpenter didn't put up good numbers in AA or AAA. He's one of the best pitchers in baseball and has been for some time now. Robinson Cano, Alfonso Soriano, Jose Reyes Those are all guys who showed ok to great improvement in the bigs compared to their career minor league numbers. No, I don't think Pagan will turn out to be a stud, but a .775 OPS or better bench player with decent SB totals? Sure.

please provide me with a better predictor of future performance thanks! Why? Do you think minor league stats can be equated to major league performance absolutely? If so, you have your opinion already. great answer. you've really provided a lot of support for your position. Be reasonable. It wouldn't matter what he or anyone said to you. Your opinion won't ever change. Thanks for keeping an open mind!

i would love to see a list of guys who had a .700 career minor league OPS and ended up being decent big league players. please do list the myriad examples of this. i have a stat to show that he's not. career minor league OPS (2,500+ PA's): .705 career major league OPS: .701 funny how that works out. It's pretty frustrating when you intentionally misread what I write and regurgitate what I didn't say so you can attempt to prove your point to yourself. I said there are a myriad examples of players who had minor league numbers that didn't translate, not .700 OPS guys who ended up being decent big league players. I pointed out that there are ballplayers who the stats guys find that scouts don't and ballplayers that scouts find that stats guys don't. Pagan is an example of this, IMO. Why on earth would Pagan's minor and major league stats be a counter to this argument?

It's only fair? Says who? The reason for discarding the worst month is not b/c it is the worst month. It is b/c it was his first month in the bigs. All I'm doing is ignoring his initial ML action, not throwing out months based on performance. When we talk about Murton do we throw out his one horrible month and his best month when thinking about the numbers he puts up next season? Nope. People tend to look at his 2nd half or just flat out ignore his horrible June as he was "making adjustments" or "Dusty forced free swinging on him." Funny how Murton gets that break from a lot of NSBB posters, but Pagan does not. I actually don't ignore Murton's June or just pay attention to his second half. I don't see the purpose of throwing out 1/8 of his ABs when he has so few ABs itself, it limits an already limited pool of evaluation. The reason Murton gets a break from posters and Pagan doesn't? Better minor league stats, better major league stats, better season last year, more PAs so we can better judge his ability. Sorry about that, Raisin. I didn't mean to suggest that you characterized Murton's play that way, just that a certain method of reasoning was used on a board favorite and denied one of the lesser players. Murton shouldn't get a break b/c he is better than Pagan (in evaluating his stats). We should use the same reasoning when evaluating each player. I don't care if Murton or Pagan slump early on in their ML careers as it is an adjustment stage. Why can't people view Pagan's 2006 as a breaking in period? Because he doesn't have a minor league record of mashing the ball? The Cubs scouts seem to really like the kid and they've been right before where the stats community was down on a player (Jacque Jones for example). Scouting and stats are both imperfect methods and some solid players are picked up by one side and not the other. I think Pagan falls into the category where the scouts will find a decent ML bench player (and fringe OF starter) where the stats guys see a career minor leaguer.