abuck1220

i'd love to read more. please point to a quote from a gm saying hendry wouldn't part with hill for player X. keep in mind, however, that hendry refusing to trade hill for player X may just as easily be hendry's lack of interest in player X, as it would be his love for hill.

yet, that's exactly what they did when the cubs were 500 games out of first place, hill was striking out 15 a night in AAA and rusch was giving up eight runs per start. That's exactly what DUSTY did. Who overrode many of LR descisions. That is NOT what Piniella and Rothschild will do. And they wouldn't have done that last year either. hendry's the guy that decides who to bring up, send down, cut, etc. hill was in AAA b/c hendry, at least to some extent, wanted him there.

yet, that's exactly what they did when the cubs were 500 games out of first place, hill was striking out 15 a night in AAA and rusch was giving up eight runs per start. Perhaps you missed it, but I remember an article about the work they were doing with Hill down at AAA. Hill failed pretty miserably in his first stint up with the Cubs last season, certainly worse than what Rusch was expected to do at the time. Remember, Rusch hadn't sucked that way the previous two seasons, so the expectation was that even if he struggled, he wouldn't struggle all year, and he would likely be better than what Hill did his first time up. When Rusch continued to suck and when Hill accomplished what his pitching coach wanted him to accomplish, I think it was spotting the fastball with consistency or something like that, then he was brought up. It is a perfectly logical time line. When you know the facts and have a fair view of what was reasonable to expect Rusch to do, what Hendry did makes perfect sense. yeah, if you buy the whole 'see, hill just needed to work on _____, which we knew all along, which is why we sent him to AAA, and now he's good, excuse me while i pat myself on the back' routine that baker/hendry/rothschild were selling. i don't but that. the reason hill improved last year was b/c he got more experience, not b/c he learned a secret magic trick in AAA. he was doing the same thing in AAA after his demotion as he was before. it was just a matter of getting more work in at the big league level. do you really think they'll send a healthy miller to the pen at hill's expense?

yet, that's exactly what they did when the cubs were 500 games out of first place, hill was striking out 15 a night in AAA and rusch was giving up eight runs per start.

This analysis defies any and all logic, abuck. Hendry stakes his reputation on Hill long before he makes good at the major league level refusing to include him in deals that would have brought back much better players than Jay Gibbons, but now that Hill has shown he can be dominate in the bigs, he'll give up on him, drop him out of the rotation for someone with a low base contract like Wade Miller and give him up for a "turd". If you really believe that, be my guest, but don't expect anyone else to take your comments seriously. first of all, i've never heard from hendry himself that hill was off limits (ie refusing to trade hill for dunn)...that was all speculation, as far as i know. i don't think i've ever read a quote from hendry giving a strong endorsement of hill. second of all, his refusal to put him in the rotation last year while rusch was throwing scored batting practice tells me that he doesn't think the highest of hill. it took a complete roster collapse and hill pitching like johan santana for the second half of the season to even bring hill's name into consideration for '07. i flat out don't think the cubs value hill that much. and the way they treated him last season tells me more about how they value him than what hendry allegedly refused to trade him for. also, hendry knows his job is on the line this season. and if you think he'd rather stake his job on rich hill than wade miller or jason marquis, then i guess we disagree. if z, lilly, marquis, miller and prior are all healthy, i don't think there's any way hill makes the rotation.

by the way, i'm glad to see that someone took rusch's spot as the guy who can't be taken out of the rotation no matter how much he blows because the cubs paid him big money. except marquis is paid more and is signed for longer. good stuff.

i wouldn't be shocked if hill somehow doesn't make the rotation...wouldn't surprise me in the least. if z, lilly, marquis, prior and miller are all healthy (probably not real likely), i think that's your rotation. the cubs have shown a desire to go with 'proven' guys time and time again, and i see no reason why they wouldn't do it here. plus, no matter how much marquis sucks, there's 20 million reasons not to bump him to the pen. hill starts in AAA (or is traded for a jay gibbons type turd) if all those guys are healthy.

third worst deal of the offseason behind pierre and meche.

all it took was 60+ million to make '07's rotation marginally better than '06's!

I think you should give credit where it is due if you agree with that assessment. except hendry is stockpiling crappy pitchers...nobody that's going to help land arod.

i'd rather have nothing than newhan.

and get on base 45% of time. bonds is still a great hitter, and he's not as bad as people make him out on defense. he's much more likely to be worth 16 million dollars during his contract than soriano is to be in any season during his. no he's not. no matter how extraordinary he may be, he's not going to be doing anything in about one third of the games the Giants play. and he'd still be more valuable than most of the cubs' hitters. than maybe you should have said "most of the cubs' hitters" in the first place instead of saying "Soriano." I have little doubt that Bonds in 2/3 of the Giants games will be more valuable than Mark DeRosa in a full season. i didn't say soriano. you're getting confusing me with tree, who wants to be just like me. maybe you should read a little more carefully since we're giving out advice.

and get on base 45% of time. bonds is still a great hitter, and he's not as bad as people make him out on defense. he's much more likely to be worth 16 million dollars during his contract than soriano is to be in any season during his. no he's not. no matter how extraordinary he may be, he's not going to be doing anything in about one third of the games the Giants play. and he'd still be more valuable than most of the cubs' hitters.

http://www.mlb-rumors.blogspot.com/ that's ridiculous. i don't even know if he deserves a guaranteed contract.

sorry, but building a 90+ loss team with a $95 mil payroll means you're not a good gm, bad luck or not. and neifi perez is not a great guy to have on a team. unless your team is a junior college team.

on espnews.

would you have done Hill for Garcia because thats basically what the Phils did- hill is better than both floyd and gio...and he's better than the two of them combined. i was just making the statement that as far as organizations go, KW would have asked for Hill for Garcia just as he asked for Floyd- I just dont know why everyone feels we can get players via trade without giving up value- Floyd doesn't have much value. look up his numbers. young, cheap lefty under club control for a while with alot of upside.......yeah, no value there- not trying to argue but the same description could be made of Hill- I just am constantly amazed at the over-valueing done by Cub fans concerning prospects and unproven commodities such as Hill- yes, Hill looked good for 5 starts at the end of a "play it out" year- i'm not going to annoint him a #2 and untouchable as many here have and even Hendry. Would you do a Hill+Jones for Hudson? no way in hell. more than one source has projected hill to out-perform hudson in 2007. and that's not even considering cost, control, the fact that you're including another player, etc. downplay hill's 2nd half all you want, but the fact remains he was one of the best pitchers in baseball during the second half (by the way, it was much more than 5 starts). floyd hasn't sniffed the big league success that hill has had. same can be said for his AAA numbers.

spend that money on bonds.

would you have done Hill for Garcia because thats basically what the Phils did- hill is better than both floyd and gio...and he's better than the two of them combined.

never thought I'd hear that phrase uh, don't be so sure about that... the gil meche sweepstakes...where the winners are the losers.

that's a lot of years and a lot of money to spend on a project. especially for the royals. this signing may be worse than pierre's...

it really bugs me that the cubs have no interest in bonds. hendry's seems willing to throw a few mil or so at floyd, who is every bit as likely to break down as bonds and will not be nearly as productive. and now that meche appears to be out of the picture (whew!) the cubs have saved themselves about $10 mil for next season. if you combine the $10 mil the cubs were willing to threw at meche and the few million they will eventually give floyd, you could likely get enough money to sign bonds. my anger will be increased tenfold if the cardinals end up with bonds.

geez...meche has done absolutely nothing to merit that type of deal. in fact, if you just looked at his numbers and ignored the fact that he's supposedly loaded with potential, you wouldn't want to extend anything more than a NRI...low k's, very high bb's, very high hr...awful.

did everyone forget how much the cubs have sucked over the past couple years?