davearm2

That's not a tough one at all. Anyone with any concept of what constitutes a statistically significant sample would never draw the conclusion you have based on a handful of ballgames. Look there's nothing that Hendry (or any other GM in baseball) can do to make his team... injury-proof cold-at-the-wrong-time-proof choke-proof were-great-in-the-field-all-year-but-suddenly-cant-catch-a-cold-proof cant-find-the-plate-and-then-serves-up-a-salami-proof So in light of those basic realities, I'd sure love to see what your plan to "fix" the Cubs, and make them into an invincible postseason force looks like. 4 Jim Leyritz clones + 4 Scott Brosius clones! Or maybe Hendry needs to stock the roster completely with hitters that absolutely hammer very good pitching. That ought to play well in the postseason. Not sure it would work in the regular season though, when the pitching isn't as good. So that could be a problem.

That's not a tough one at all. Anyone with any concept of what constitutes a statistically significant sample would never draw the conclusion you have based on a handful of ballgames. Look there's nothing that Hendry (or any other GM in baseball) can do to make his team... injury-proof cold-at-the-wrong-time-proof choke-proof were-great-in-the-field-all-year-but-suddenly-cant-catch-a-cold-proof cant-find-the-plate-and-then-serves-up-a-salami-proof So in light of those basic realities, I'd sure love to see what your plan to "fix" the Cubs, and make them into an invincible postseason force looks like.

Surely you're aware that the Cubs finished the regular season with more wins than the Phils and the Dodgers. Schedule strength does not explain the difference. So again I'll ask, how do 3 games provide a better indication of team strengths and weaknesses than 162 games? Whether folks want to accept it or not, the best team doesn't always win. Now that doesn't mean the Cubs should not endeavor to get even better. They absolutely should. But make no mistake, they were (and probably still are) the best, deepest, and most complete team in the NL.

The notion that a team could have fatal flaws that go virtually undetected over 162 games, but then suddenly are exposed in three games, is flat out comical. If the Cubs' offense was such a problem, then it would have become abundantly clear over the course of the regular season. To think otherwise is silly. They are playing the same game in October as they were for the first 6 months of the year, after all.

The Reds have been wearing the "team to watch out for" label for the last decade, it seems.

Anyone else find it curious that one year after ripping the awful condition of the OF at Wrigley, calling it full of craters and dangerous and so on, Dunn's begging to be a Cub. I guess he must be a huge fan of the Sodfather.

Where's Prior on that list because those were similiar pitchers to marquis maybe 3 years ago. Currently, only Byrd and Lohse are even in the same ballpark. Maybe Livan Hernadez but that's it. Those are all guys that are viewed as back-of-the-rotation starters. Marquis is also viewed as a back-of-the-rotation starter -- by the Cubs and by everyone else. The point remains that nobody's going to break out a $10M/yr contract for Marquis when these other cheaper options exist. I'll say it again -- if other clubs around baseball thought Marquis for $10M looked like an attractive option, then Hendry wouldn't be having so much difficulty dealing him. Just try and refute that.

If some team out there thought paying Marquis $10M to pitch for one year (let alone multiple years) was a good idea, then Hendry wouldn't be having such difficulty trading him. Assuming he repeats last season, it's hard to imagine a market that doesn't exist now would suddenly materialize a year later. Show me a previous example of a 32 year old starting pitcher, without injury concerns, accepting arbitration. It's really that hard for you to imagine a market for Marquis? Please now. Do some homework on starting pitchers contracts and tell me there won't be a market for a guy like Marquis. That's gibberish. Nobody is saying he'll get the same contract, but he will get a much better offer than a 1 year deal like arbitration. Here is the homework you asked for. Signings of similar pitchers last year (or a few from two years ago). Paul Byrd rhp 2 years/$14.25M Shawn Chacon rhp 1 year/$2M Shawn Estes lhp 1 year/$0.55M Josh Fogg rhp 1 year/$1M Mark Hendrickson lhp 1 year/$1.5M Livan Hernandez rhp 1 year/$5M Orlando Hernandez rhp 2 years/$12M Jason Jennings rhp 1 year/$4M Jon Lieber rhp 1 year/$3.5M Kyle Lohse rhp 1 year/$4.25M John Patterson rhp 1 year/$0.85M Odalis Perez lhp 1 year/$0.85M Tim Redding rhp 1 year/$1M Mark Redman lhp 1 year/$1M Kenny Rogers lhp 1 year/$8M Kip Wells rhp 1 year/$3.1M Randy Wolf lhp 1 year/$4.75M Offering Marquis arbitration would lock him in at around $10M. He'd be foolish not to take that.

If some team out there thought paying Marquis $10M to pitch for one year (let alone multiple years) was a good idea, then Hendry wouldn't be having such difficulty trading him. Assuming he repeats last season, it's hard to imagine a market that doesn't exist now would suddenly materialize a year later.

2005 and 2006 were not included in the calculations that led to Howry being a Type A. They only use the most recent 2 years.

Oakland reportedly offered the most money, and Furcal turned it down.

I for one am going to laugh my ass off if Teixeira spurns one of the winningest and highest profile franchises in MLB in favor of spending the rest of his career in baseball purgatory so he can add an extra $10 or $20M to what is already guaranteed to be a contract that will put an end to all of his monetary needs for several lifetimes.

Baldelli has essentially missed the last two years and is now suffering from some rare and difficult-to-identify condition. So to stand up and declare with any degree of certainty what level of production Baldelli is capable of now is pretty foolish in light of the circumstances. Furthermore "when healthy" loses meaning when the definition of "healthy" that applied four years ago is in all likelihood gone forever. It should also bear mentioning that Baldelli's unusual health issues make him somewhat uniquely suited to the AL and DHing. That's not to say that he couldn't play the field, but rather that having no choice but to do so as an NL player would raise the level of uncertainty to another level.

If Hendry could trade Reed Johnson for a little something (or package him with Pie/Hill/Marquis/whatever) and then sign Baldelli for the same $$$ as Johnson, that'd be a pretty slick little upgrade on the RH 4th OF/Fukudome platoonmate spot. Seems like Marcel and Bill James wOBA projections for '09 were the measuring stick in the Gathright thread. Baldelli's are .346 and .336; Johnson .326 and .329.

I don't think the staunchest supporter of this move wants Gathright to be given a chance to start. It's pretty much the last spot on the bench or bust. Even if the Cubs traded Pie in a mega deal for Peavy, I still don't see the need for Gathright. He'd essentially replace Pie, who didn't have a roster spot to speak of, either. And if the plan is to bring in someone to play RF, the logjam in the OF means one of Micah Hoffpauir or Joey Gathright is the 25th man. In the AL, you can hide a speedy, defensive OF with little bat on the end of your roster, because PH's aren't nearly as needed as in the NL. That you need a productive PH to bat for the pitcher generally two times a game should make the decision quite easy for the manager. Hoffpauir, to me, is way more valuable at the end of the bench than Joey Gathright. If you need to bat for the pitcher in the middle of an inning with a runner on, then Hoffpauir is obviously the choice. But if you're making a pitching change and need to double-switch because the pitcher is due up first in the next half-inning, Gathright is better both because he's the superior (and more versatile) fielder and also because he makes for a better leadoff guy (assuming both can maintain similar OBPs, which is certainly open to debate).

Yeah, he's an interesting option, but I wouldn't trade that package for him. And we'd have to blow the Pirates away with an offer to get McLouth. Why not? Pie and Hill are apparently both completely dead to Lou, and Marquis is a guy they're trying their darnedest to dump.

I'm sure folks will be underwhelmed by this option, but Luke Scott might be a real good fit. Maybe we send them something like Marquis Pie and Hill. They need starters and Pie was obviously on their radar. Scott's cheap and despite his age has several affordable arb years left. Great LH half of a platoon, with DeRosa picking up the starts in RF vs. LHP. Then you spend the $10M or whatever Bradley would've cost on Ben Sheets instead.

nilo, are you using any type of positional adjustment on these? i strongly doubt Gathright's more valuable as a corner OF No, I didn't really do anything positionally. The only statement I made was that Gathright defensively is a 1 win CF and a 2 win corner OF which is a pretty well established translation from CF to corner OF. So, if you want to compare apples to apples (or Gathright to other corner OF options), then use 2 wins on defense for Gathright. Now, with that being said, I'm most definitely not in favor of signing Gathright and calling it a day for RF. What I am saying is that Gathright does have value. He would fit in perfectly if we get Bradley as a pinch running double switch defensive replacement and would give us more flexibility to take advantage of and create highly leveraged situation (with his speed and defense) as well as give rest to injury prone players when the game is in very low leverage situations. Wait a minute here. You just laid out for us a bunch of win stats that indicate Ibanez = -1, Abreu = 0, Dunn = 1, Bradley = unknown, Gathright = 2. And then you followed that up with, "I'm most definitely not in favor of signing Gathright and calling it a day for RF." So do you not believe your own win estimates? The numbers you laid out don't really pass the smell test, and you seem to confirm they're bogus with the followup quote.

Car jumping thing explained

Is he familiar with any players that DON'T suck? Probably none from his Tampa days ;)

I haven't seen it mentioned yet, but Lou is familiar with Gathright from their days together in Tampa. That probably played a part in this.

Yanked around? The Dodgers topped his offer and MacPhail put the kibosh on upping the offer. Furcal and his agent bear no blame here.

Seriously? Turning prospects into Lee, Ramirez, Harden, etc. has been a problem?

In other words, if only Dunn made contact more often. I stand by my statement, DH was designed for hitters like Dunn. Put him in the lineup (not in the field) and he'll hit 40 HRs, strike out 200 times, walk about 100 times, and not much else. Putting him on the field diminishes any positive offensive numbers that he produces. I think it'd be more accurate to say that DH was designed for fielders like Dunn. ;) The larger point is that Dunn's offensive game has some deficiencies that his slash stats don't immediately reveal, and that some folks seem reluctant to concede. That said, Dunn's OBI numbers have improved quite a bit the last few years. He used to be very near the bottom of the league, and now he's up into average territory.

RE: Dunn vs. Morneau. OBI% to the rescue (OBI=Others Batted In). Morneau: 9.0% 22.3% 42.2% 19.0% Dunn: 9.9% 13.0% 32.1% 15.6% In English, Morneau knocked in 9.0% of runners on first, 22.3% of runners on second, 42.2% of runners on third, and 19.0% of all runners on. Dunn was worse in every category except runners on first (owing to Dunn's higher # of HRs, naturally).