Clem Fandango

Philosophy on new GM: Someone with strong focus on player development, analytical expertise, and comes form a winning culture Do you have a list: Don't really have a list Timeframe: Get it done as soon as you can after the season

Ricketts on ESPN right now

But what if he demands that Crane Kenney be fired?

I lost patience with Rick Porcello in my fantasy league. [expletive] that guy. He's a former top prospect whose younger than many of our current top prospects. If there was a realistic way to get him, I'd be all for it. I would be, too. It's a smart baseball move. I was just being silly. That being said, I do think he got rushed way too early. He skipped AA and AAA and came to the majors at the age of 20 and had success probably due largely in part to tams not having accurate scouting reports on him. While the league made adjustments, he apparently hasn't. According to Fangraphs he throws a Fastball, Slider, Curveball, and Changeup. Those typically are strikeout pitches, yet he's not a strikeout pitcher. He has a terrible K/9 rate, but he doesn't throw pitches that are generally considered "pitch-to-contact" type pitches. And his average fastball velocity sits somewhere between 90-93. He pitches in one of the best pitchers parks in the majors and he's getting shelled. He's been a little unlucky this year, but he hasn't really taken the strides people were expecting him to take. He's taken several steps back and not forward and that's probably why people are growing tired of him and I can sympathize with that to a degree. However he's only 22 and has a top of the line pedigree and people need to have patience with him. If the team is growing tired of his inability to perform they shouldn't trade the kid, they should send him back to the minors to hone his skills. I imagine he's got a crap load of options left given how little time he spent in the minors. Getting rid of him would be really dumb, and the Detroit fans who think they should do that are, by the power of deductive logic, really dumb.

My concern is that if there is this much negative publicity, it could impact who we hire as the next GM. I have no reason not to believe the media members that Kenney could be issue in the hiring process. They are around the Cubs and have their sources....I obviously don't. I understand there are no specifics other than what they are writing. Why would there be this many people lying? Again, where there is smoke, there's fire. All this nonsense about Kenney making Hendry give out 8 years to Soriano, was it not proven that it was the Tribune ownership who wanted him to give that out? Yes, Kenney was apart of the Tribune, but people are acting like it was Kenney alone who did it when wasn't it the Tribune ownership as a whole who pushed it on Hendry? The Tribune was terrible ownership and yes, Crane Kenney is a leftover remnant from that terrible ownership, but if the OWNER of the team says Crane Kenney doesn't have any involvement with baseball related decisions, I'll take his word over a bunch of sports writers who, by and large, are [expletive] terrible at their jobs.

I lost patience with Rick Porcello in my fantasy league. [expletive] that guy.

I do seem to recall Miguel Cabrera doing that long before Bryce Harper, though

There's a Buster Olney article on Insider about Andrew Friedman and the Cubs are brought up. Don't have insider though so I couldn't read the whole thing. Anyone want to paraphrase if there's anything written about the Cubs specifically?

No, he's running the Cubs. Don't you read the papers?

For some reason I keep forgetting that Marlon Byrd exists

Yeah, this is kind of heart wrenching. Still glad he's out the door, though.

I agree to an extent, but if Soriano is moved we have this to look at for FA's: Beltran will still probably fetch $10 mil per year, albeit for a short contract. Cuddyer could be an interesting option, but will probably also fetch more than Sizemore will get. I think of everyone else on the list the only other person who pops out (Not counting Swisher as he'll likely be retained), is Josh Willingham. He would probably come cheaper than Sizemore as he's generally flown under the radar. He needs to get out of Oakland. Yeah, I might be on board for Willingham instead. He'd probably be cheap and productive. He'll be 33 though, kinda older than I thought he was

In that case, signing Sizemore to a two year deal at a reasonable low-risk/high-reward type price might be worth the gamble. Looks like those guys are a couple years out from making the majors. If the Cubs were to splurge for Pujols or Fielder and had a hole to fill in LF and Sizemore were available for that, yeah why not? Having Sizemore, Pujols/Fielder, Castro, Ramirez, Soto, and Jackson in the lineup sounds pretty fun. Plus it will make all the women in Chicago extra horny.

Do we have any guys coming up through the system who can man LF that he might block during those years? I'm assuming we don't.

As a Soriano replacement in LF, sure (assuming we can move Soriano). Center field belongs to Brett Jackson, as far as I'm concerned.

I beilieve his actual title is "Executive Vice President for Baseball Operations" for the Rays. Or "The guy who turned a terrible team into a perennial contender in the toughest division in baseball without a huge budget because he's good at his job" of the Rays

Subsequently:

Agreed. Jimenez's first half of 2010 was amazing, but it was obvious it wasn't the real deal considering he performed closer to his career splits the 2nd half. He's still a really good pitcher, but the Cy Young caliber performance he put up last year was a bit of an aberration it seems. The Rockies did well to sell high on him, even when he was performing poorly.

Also, Thome was and still is awesome. His numbers last year were ridiculous and he was only a part time player. Prior to tonight he played in 63 games this season and drew 31 walks... those 31 walks would be good for 3rd best on the 2011 Chicago Cubs. That's 12 less than our entire bench combined.

yeah i know he has always been a good guy (charitable off the field) and he was beloved in cleveland and well-liked in philly (don't know much about his time with the white sox or twins, but i assume it's the same). and umfan is right, this definitely flew under the radar. i knew he had a shot at 600 coming into this year but didn't realize he was so close. i'm sure there would have been more attention if he'd hit 599 tonight and then were sitting on that number for a couple of games, but still, his dad and family have been travelling with him for a while to be there when he hit #600, so there was always the chance he could hit 2 in a game. Disregard the breaking news graphic, as it wasn't there at all this week... but here is where ESPN had their "Thome-counter"

http://espn.go.com/chicago/mlb/story/_/id/6864438/chicago-cubs-pitcher-carlos-zambrano-wants-remain-cubs

It's a topic of discussion in the Transactions forum, actually http://www.northsidebaseball.com//forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=59777 They cited performance and him batting in the .240's, but the GM said he needs to learn all the aspects of being a major leaguer, which insinuated that they demoted him for skipping out on a charity team function, which he skipped out on sort of because the Marlins apparently dicked over his own charity function and had already been to one function that day and Wes Helms, their union representative, told him he could skip it. Helms was later released by the team that day, and Morrison subsequently demoted. That is the speculation as to why they may be filing an appeal over the demotion.

Well just for shiggles, what would the Marlins need (besides an adequate replacement)? Now that I think about it, actually, Morrison came up as a 1B but moved to the OF because he was blocked by Gaby Sanchez. If the Cubs were to target Morrison it could be as a long term 1B solution if they miss out on Fielder or Pujols (or Berkman if they choose to chase after him)

That being said, it would make me very happy if he were to somehow wind up in the Cubs organization, but the chances of him being traded are probably next to nothing