jersey cubs fan

No conflict for me. I want the line first and foremost. I have felt that way for 3 years, back when everybody was so hung up on the GD TE position. Give me a line and the RB will follow.

It's not just Brown. They lost people at every level of the defense. The loss to Dallas killed them physically and ruined the season. SD- Lost Dusty D and Mike Brown... BTW the best rb in the nfl ran 17 times for 25 yards. Dallas- Lost Vasher, Tommie Harris hurt is knee, and Rube Brown lost an arm and an ankle. So then against Det- We blame grossman, play Griese who then throws 3 ints, and Kitna burns a secondary starting 3 new players, oh and btw... Kevin Payne breaks his arm... I can continue. Don't forget Briggs, he was hurt vs Dallas, 2nd half I believe.

That last point is a myth. They didn't have a running game in 2006. Sub 4 yards per attempt. Pathetic. The D can be dominant. Contrary to Peter King's absurd opinion, they were devestated by injury in 2007. He wouldn't take much to vault them back up to dominant status. Likewise, while they currently don't have an offensive line, there's no reason why by September 2008 they can't have a decent one, and that is going to be the most important aspect affecting your third point. The running game might not have been great in 2006, but it was still somewhat existent. Enough to make teams somewhat respect the PA pass. Also considering the fact that the Bears don't figure to be major players for any top FA lineman, and todays commment by Angelo in the paper that he prefers veteran olineman(basically indicating that if an Olineman is drafted high, he won't start), I think a capable Oline by next season is a pipe dream. The running game sucked in 2006 and nobody respected it. Grossman was able to lead the offense through the air early, but then teams decided to concentrate on stopping the pass because they never had to worry about Jones, or Benson, killing them.

How much help can that be for a guy whose eye has never been a problem and for whom contact isn't much of an issue?

It's possible to still get value out of his career. The key is to keep him around for his peak years, limit the financial commitment, and be prepared to cut ties when he becomes expensive. Jacque Jones level production, at minimum wage, and as the 5th or 6th best bat on the team, isn't bad. That's especially true if he's a CF. You'd then have to commit financially to having greater production elsewhere. Ideally you'd trade him as he approaches 30 and before he hits his last year of arbitration. Maybe you can sucker some team into getting quality. But even if you just let him walk, by and large that would have to be considered a successful investment. the problem is, what if felix pie turns out to be a good everyday player. i mean, i guess that's not a problem, but colvin will in no way be good enough to man one of the corner spots. i suppose he could be a 4th outfielder, but I'd just rather trade him now before everyone realizes that he isn't that good. Fukudome and Soriano aren't going to allow him to play a role in the corner. If Felix turns out to be good, you trade Colvin. But that is a long way away, and by no means anything close to a certainty. As you pointed it, it's not really a problem. I look at it this way. I think Colvin is a low risk low reward guy right now. I think he's a safe bet to do something at the major league level. So, you try and strike gold with Pie for now, and keep letting Colvin develop - this also allows you to delay his arbitration clock, and makes it easier to keep him during what should be his peak years.

It's not just Brown. They lost people at every level of the defense. The loss to Dallas killed them physically and ruined the season.

That last point is a myth. They didn't have a running game in 2006. Sub 4 yards per attempt. Pathetic. The D can be dominant. Contrary to Peter King's absurd opinion, they were devestated by injury in 2007. He wouldn't take much to vault them back up to dominant status. Likewise, while they currently don't have an offensive line, there's no reason why by September 2008 they can't have a decent one, and that is going to be the most important aspect affecting your third point.

pardon me?

It's possible to still get value out of his career. The key is to keep him around for his peak years, limit the financial commitment, and be prepared to cut ties when he becomes expensive. Jacque Jones level production, at minimum wage, and as the 5th or 6th best bat on the team, isn't bad. That's especially true if he's a CF. You'd then have to commit financially to having greater production elsewhere. Ideally you'd trade him as he approaches 30 and before he hits his last year of arbitration. Maybe you can sucker some team into getting quality. But even if you just let him walk, by and large that would have to be considered a successful investment.

It's amazing how many beat writers insist he deserves more, and use his annual salary in comparison to others as the reason. Annual salary is meaningless in the NFL. It's the guaranteed money that matters. Hopefully this is a team friendly extension, because Brian Urlacher post-2011 isn't going to be able to sniff the jock of Brian Urlacher pre-2008.

Not yet. The bears haven't done anything yet. why do the bears continue to condone mass shootings? Condone? More like promote.

Soriano's numbers do not inherently drop just by not leading off.

And many just couldn't wait for any individual to buy the Cubs from the evil corporation. Actually, the only video I saw was when he was talking to employees and muttered under his breath more or less. I didn't see one at a major press conference.

i will say it yet again, the cubs had the 5th highest payroll in major league baseball last year. renaming the ballpark isn't necessary to be financially competitive; renaming the ballpark doesn't guarantee anything except that the ballpark has a different name. I totally see your point, and I agree. One could argue that the Cubs' payroll should be much higher -- more in Red Sox territory -- due to a huge media market and such a large following. But that isn't really related to this discussion. Except for the fact that Boston is the lone baseball team for an entire region of the United States and that region has a hell of a lot more money than the region the Cubs represent, and share with several other clubs.

I know what you mean. Baseball teams never pour money created by additional revenue streams into increased payroll, payroll always remains flat regardless of how much money they make. Especially the Cubs.

You can thank Adam Dunn for that. Dumbasses had him batting 6th. 6th was only Dunn's 4th most common spot in the batting order last year (56 AB's). He was primarily a #5 hitter last year. Yeah, I guess it's weird, but it was also a fluke. 6th was lower down the list in 2006 and 2005. Being the 3rd highest position doesn't seem that weird to me. The NL does have some teams foolishly looking for speed at the top of the lineup, which can lead to worst hitters, with lower OBPs, than perhaps should be up that high.

No, it doesn't make sense at all actually.

That's an interesting question. 2007 average OBP's 7 spot: AL .326, NL .326 8 spot: AL .301, NL .325 9 spot AL .302, NL .241 Then again, the NL is kind of weird. The 3 highest OBP spots? 3rd, 4th, and 6th. 3rd and 4th makes sense, but 6th higher than all the others is very strange IMO. Well, the NL is the league with a team dumb enough to bat a 6 hitter like Soriano in the leadoff spot. ;)

Wait, hold on a second. You have to expect at least a .330 OBP out of the 7 spot and a .320 out of the 8? Are you talking about any team in general, or specifially the 2008 Cubs? In 2007, the average NL team had a .326 OBP. 6 teams were over .330, the Cubs were 7th in the NL, below average but above the median level. The average 8 spot was .325, with 7 teams below .320. The Cubs were tied for last at .294. I'm not sure why people are insinuating Soriano was somehow "screwed over" by the lack of help at the bottom. But I'm also not sure why anybody would expect him to have many more opportunities. They are almost certain to have Felix Pie and some other people providing an extremely limited amount of OBP at the 8 spot. Without Roberts around, they are probably going to have the catcher spot in the 7 hole, which probably means 100-120 games of Soto and 40-60 games of Blanco or Hill. And that probably leaves them with an OBP somewhere around .305-325. Probably average of below average. The 9 spot is the 9 spot and it doesn't matter much, as the Cubs will likely continue to be in the .220s. Their bench is probably not going to be any better than it was last year. Soriano is not going to get many more opportunities to drive in runs than last year. Soriano at leadoff is clearly a waste of his talents, and he's always going to have fewer RBI than he should, given his productivity.

clearly corporate, they paid for that (i'd say it's underutlized there) there are no naming rights deals in place at Turner or Wrigley Yes, everybody knows there is no deal in place. That's not the point. What is in place is a tangible connection between a stadium's name, a man's name, and a company named after said man.

No. It is named for Wrigley the man himself. In no way other than the commonality of the name "Wrigley" is there any effort to sell Wrigley's chewing gum products: no Wrigley logos, advertisements, &c. People fail to get this. "Durr, Wrigley's a corporate name too." No, it isn't. Yes. Yes it is. That's the advantage of naming a company after yourself. It's like saying Turner Field isn't a corporate name. Or Coors. I'm sure there's plenty of others. The point stands about actively marketing the product within the ballpark, though. I'm sure they do that at Turner and Coors. Of course, as has been talked about, the Wrigley corporate name isn't even really found on their products anymore. I'd imagine that 8 or 9 out of 10 people who chew their gum don't even know that it's made by Wrigley. Wrigley's name is pretty obvious on Orbit, and I think all of their products. My dog's name is Wrigley, and people around here usually associate it with the Cubs, but often ask "after the gum?" The point stands about actively marketing the product in the stadium, but the point also stands that there is a tangible association between Wrigley Field and the William Wrigley Jr. Company.

pretty much, it's "oriole park at camden yards"... but camden yards is a neighborhood in baltimore. calling it sears park at wrigley field just seems completely redundant, basically it's just naming the ballpark twice. Yes, but I think that's eventually what they will try to do as some sort of compromise. Just using Boeing as an example, I think it will be something like this: Wrigley Field presented by Boeing. Boeing's Wrigley Field. Wrigley Field at Boeing Stadium/Park (this would make more sense if they acquire some land around the stadium and make it all one big "park", plus rebuild the grandstands. The Wrigley Field part would be the field itself, bleachers and scoreboard. Some names to keep in mind

No. It is named for Wrigley the man himself. In no way other than the commonality of the name "Wrigley" is there any effort to sell Wrigley's chewing gum products: no Wrigley logos, advertisements, &c. People fail to get this. "Durr, Wrigley's a corporate name too." No, it isn't. Yes. Yes it is. That's the advantage of naming a company after yourself.

1) the Bears offer was a pretty fair one 2) who in gods green planet is going to give him a Branch-like deal? David Haugh is absolutely convinced the Bears must pay whatever it takes to keep Berrian. These beat writers must have an in with Bernard or something. What is the logic in feeling forced to keep your best receiver at all costs in order to maintain your offensive production when your best receiver has never put up good numbers and your offense has always been poor? Of all the sports, the NFL demands that smart teams do not overpay players, and it has been shown repeatedly that free agents are relatively easy to replace. There are very few irreplacable players in football - most of them are quarterbacks. Very few play receiver.

He definitely is IMO...but I'm thinking maybe they were trying to dump salary. I believe he was owed 2.4 million next year. Dumping salary for a 6th rounder is BS though. I'd like to hear an explanation on that move. take the $2.4M and use it for someone who is actually good at hockey. sounds like a solid plan to me. It does make sense don't get me wrong, but I just think they could have gotten more than a sixth round pick for him. I don't see how they could have gotten more. He's an overpaid has been. His only value is supposedly in his locker room presence. There was obviously no lack of teams making trades, so if it was possible to get more for him, I'm sure Tallon would have gotten more.