jersey cubs fan

you shouldn't take your phone to job interviews. Nothing wrong with bringing it, but you should turn off the ringer. i was always told to not take anything but your portfolio with you...no keys, phone, etc....but i guess that would be okay. That's a little silly. How do you get home? Park your car? You shouldn't lug a bunch of nonsense around, but there's no reason why you can't have your phone with you, assuming it fits in a pocket almost unnoticed.

I can't see Derrek getting over 30 again. I don't think its unrealistic to see Lee get over 30. Who knows why his power numbers were so bad to start '07 (wrist or any other explanations), but he was quite studly to end the season. No 2005 Lee will never come back, but I think we could hope for 04 Lee (32 HR) at least and if you think his 2004 numbers aren't bad, consider that his OBP and SLG were both higher last year. Please don't underestimate Lee's value to the 2007 Cubs because only 22 of his hits went over the fence. I would be very disappointed if Lee repeated his 2004 numbers.

you shouldn't take your phone to job interviews. Nothing wrong with bringing it, but you should turn off the ringer.

I'm more curious about their conservative take on Lee's playing time.

9/11 changed a lot of things. Nothing "changed everything". Clinton gets unfairly criticized for how he handled terrorism, the fact is it wasn't until 9/11 that America was ready to do much of anything to fight terrorism.

No, we know where that is.

There are actually several valid arguments to the contrary.

They want some games on free tv.

If I could lock in that Pie production I would.

That is one of the weirdest things I've ever read, specifically the part about 11 years. They aren't signed for the next 11 years, they are signed for the next 4 years. There is presumably only one spot available for 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011. I feel like the current management team likely has more faith in Colvin than Pie, and may even be willing to push Colvin a bit, so that he may play some in 2009.

I'm not saying I'm right, but when I think about the subject of player upgrades, I think about it in terms of performance by position on the field, not batting order. I like Brian Roberts. And if you told me that acquiring him would mean that Mark DeRosa was shifting to SS, I'd be all over the deal. But everything we have heard to date suggests that the only thing a Roberts acquisition does is make DeRosa a "super-sub." That means Ryan Theriot is still starting at SS, and I (like many others here) have a huge problem with that coupled with Felix Pie starting in CF. Their OBPs suggest we will have near 3 automatic outs everytime through the line-up. That's unacceptable for a team spending $125M. Roberts may be better that DeRosa, but the difference is slight in my opinion. The real opportunity is to upgrade at SS and/or CF. The trade focus should be on those positions and a #2 starter. Finally, someone that totally agrees with me. Using Cedeno, Marshall, Gallagher, Murton, Dempster, Marquis, Patterson, plus whatever other youngsters should have been enough to get a decent SS/CF and starting pitcher instead of a marginal upgrade at 2B. I agree with the sentiment. The problem, as I see it, is they aren't going to upgrade SS regardless. So, it's either further upgrade the lineup with the move to Roberts, or don't upgrade the lineup. I'm always looking for this team to improve. And I'm fairly certain Hendry is too (we just disagree on the best way to do go about it). I already know that Hendry is incapable of efficiently increasing the expected win total of this team. Not that I excuse the problem, it's just I'd rather see them improve than stay stagnant.

It may be a real thing, but it's value is artificially inflated. Guys who "can leadoff" are given greater market value, for no good reason. Roberts' value lies in his production numbers, not in his supposed ability to hit leadoff. There's nothing wrong with going after a player like Roberts, there is something wrong with going after a guy like Roberts because he can leadoff and thus paying a premium for that arbitrary qualification.

Care to elaborate? Yes, people on this board need to take the blue tinted sunglasses off and realize this deal is a steal for us. We getting one of the best leadoff men in baseball, an all-star and another great club house guy for pretty much nothing. You guys are blowing your loads over the 2 pitching prospects that have showed us NOTHING. You really have no business making this claim.

I think Gallagher goes in any deal..he's the centerpiece of it all. Orioles fans think that at most a name might be wrong. Other than that, they believe that MacPhail is just bluffing saying that the deal isn't official, which of course it's not. But they believe it is complete. The administrator of the site has checked with 2 different of his own sources and confirmed the deal (both sources said 100%) and he apparently doesn't post anything unless he's completely sure he won't be wrong, unlike the other insiders. Alright, so his neck is on the line. I really don't care either way, I hope this thing just ends one way or the other now. In what way shape or form is his neck on the line? This isn't some journalist who runs the risk of losing credibility if he's wrong. So a handful of Cubs fans on a message board are going to think about maybe stop believing this guy is all that great a source of information. I don't see how that equates to putting his neck on the line.

Will the offense be nice? They were the worst in the AL last year. Are Swisher and Cabrera really going to make up that much of a difference?

how can someone write that article and never once type out "Southern Methodist University'"? What if a casual fan thinks this is Southern Miss? Dumb Isn't Southern Miss USM? maybe. it's just a pet peeve when writers use the acronym seven times in an article and never spell it out. it's lazy But it's SMU. It's practically the name. SMU and USC are the two schools that are most readily indentifiable by their acronyms. I really don't think it's lazy. By the way, first paragraph:

That phone call has me starting to wonder if Roger might be telling the truth. Not me, sounds like a hastily put together and poorly orchestrated plan to play a little scratch my back and I'll scratch yours. Rogers is looking to find his own Greg Anderson fall guy.

Don't kid yourself about "3 B prospects". They were 3 of the top 8 in the Sox farm system. Being 3 of of the best in a bad bunch doesn't make them blue chippers. And a .251 hitter isn't ARod either. Swisher is a good acquisition by the White Sox with very good power numbers for a CF. If he moves to LF, RF, or 1B, his numbers are okay but not great. As you (and others) have pointed out, he is under team control at a fair price for several years which makes this a good deal. Seriously? His batting average?

Shocking that Clemens taped the phone call. I just caught a second of that one.

Who isn't an everyday 2B, and will be playing a fair amount of time at other positions, regardless of whether Roberts is here. The upgrade is simply not a straight up comparison of Roberts to DeRosa, even though Roberts has the clear advantage there. The upgrade is Roberts + DeRosa being significantly better than DeRosa + whomever. We aren't talking about trading one for the other.

Sorry man, but you're wrong. You said you don't need to look at WARP and their ages, even though both are very valid data points to consider for the discussion that was taking place. That's not out of context, it's what you said.

Jesus Christ, dude. Whatever. I'm done with this. There is a 3 year old girl missing in my neighborhood right now and you want to win a pissing contest I really never should have bothered entering. ROBERTS IS A MARGINAL UPGRADE OVER DEROSA regardless of the 3 year difference in age, the difference in their WARP, OPS+, the length of their hair and any other stat you want to throw out there. I'm done with this. Geez man, ease up. Was he supposed to know about this girl? How does that have anything to do with anything? And how is he any more guilty of pissing contests than you, or anybody else? He's laid out an argument that I don't completely agree with, but that I believe if fairly constructed and defended. That's exactly what this site is about at its best.

Then basically what you are saying is that you weren't paying attention to the whole conversation and probably shouldn't have said what you said. No I'm not saying that. What you wrote in that post was Morganish. I didn't quote everything you wrote in the thread, and I'm not saying your entire opinion is as valid as a Joe Morgan opinion. I'm saying the part about not needing to look at the numbers being very reminicsent of the type of talk Joe Morgan would use. OPS is nice, but flawed. OPS+ is probably nicer, but also flawed. Don't you see the value in looking at the deeper numbers, when possible? It may not be as easy to find, but when it's there, why not use it as part of the discussion? When Roberts' name surfaced in the beginning of the offseason, I was not excited. I thought at the time there were much better opportunities to improve the team than by going after a second baseman. However, it's January now, and the 2008 Chicago Cubs lineup looks far to similar to the mediocre Chicago Cubs lineup that ended 2007 (with Fukudome replacing Floyd/Murton's decent OBP and somewhat lacking power). I don't see any realistic SS options on the horizon, but if I did, I'd take those over Roberts in a heartbeat. The Cubs still need to get better. Roberts is not the ideal way to go about getting better, but he would very definitely make them better.

One mans marginalizing is another mans rationalizing. We aren't talking about taking some way above average starting pitcher and moving him to the bullpen. We aren't even talking about an everyday player. DeRosa, even when he plays more than he's ever played in the majors, is not an everyday guy. He is a sub 600 PA player who has shown some tendencies to decline with lots of playing time, albeit in just two years of actually playing a lot. He's 33, well past any sort of prime age, and we've probably seen the best he has to offer. He can still be pretty useful, but he's not anything close to an irreplacable cog. I've been touting the importance of improving SS for a very long time. I would much rather see the Cubs improve SS than fiddle with 2B. But even in his solid 2007, DeRosa wasn't even the Cubs everyday 2B, and the Cubs got nothing more than average production from the position. If I have to take away 150-200 PA from DeRosa in order to give 90%+ of the 2B playing time to Brian Roberts, I'm betting I'll be more than happy with the end result. Brian Roberts, with a little Mark DeRosa mixed in is going to be much better than DeRosa, with a fair amount of God knows what mixed in. Furthermore, DeRosa as the versatile utility guy should make people ecstatic when compared with the versatile players they used to employ. DeRosa wouldn't be the new Macias, DeRosa would be the fill-in Macias (and others) never stood a chance of being. I don't like all the emphasis on looking for versatility, but at least when you have DeRosa filling that role, you put a stop to Hendry looking for others and possibly filling it with incompetence.

Oh, so because I think Roberts is only a marginal upgrade to DeRosa, I'm Morganish? Wow. Have I not heard you say the same exact thing or are you of the impression that Roberts is a significant upgrade to DeRosa? No, the Morganish part is saying you don't have to look at the numbers or their ages. I think all these subjective terms, significant, marginal, minimal, really muddy the waters when discussing exactly what Roberts would mean. I happen to believe he'll be a marginally significant upgrade.......