Cubswin11

Heading to the Wisconsin-Marquette game today. Should be a close game, though neither teams are that good this year. Excited to see Sam Dekker in person.

2 Years $15.5mm, reportedly.

LOL, Lions. http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/nfl-shutdown-corner/few-major-problems-detroit-lions-2013-calendar-134608581--nfl.html

I wouldn't lose much sleep if any or all of Campana, Rusin, Raley, Dolis, Beliveau, Clevenger, or L. Castillo were cut/DFA'd. If Soriano/Barney/Marmol are traded this offseason yet I could see at least one of those guys in the group I mentioned being included to help free up space.

I think looking and comparing Rizzo's/Jackson's OPS' is missing the point, Jackson clearly has a contact problem when facing advanced pitching while Rizzo doesn't. Rizzo never had a k% over 23% in the minors and his highest k% occurred in 29 games in 2010 at A+ he was promoted to AA that same year and played in 107 games and got his k% down to 21%. When he had his call up with the Padres and struggled his k% was 30%. Jackson's last two years in the minors at AAA (2011 for 49 games and 2012 for 106 games) his k% was 29.8% and 33.8% while he struck out at a 41.5% last year in his time in MLB. Jackson clearly has a much harder time making contact as he has moved up and faced more advanced pitching. Rizzo's k% stayed in between 17%-23.7% for his entire minor league career (his 2 AAA season's he had k% of 21.5% and 18.3%). Jackson's k% has ranged from 18.9%-33.8% and his k% got higher every time he reached a higher level and presumably better pitching.

These are the kinds of posts that make me stick around NSBB

That would be my guess that they are going to go after one of the remaining good OF FA (Hamilton, Bourn, Swisher) or are thinking they can make a trade for one that's available (Upton, Soriano?, Choo, one of the Royals guys, etc.)

Hamilton ends up staying in Texas and the Mariners sign Bourn... My prediction is that the Brewers go all in on Hamilton and go back to the team that scores 12 runs per game but struggle not to give up 13. Aoki/Gomez Weeks Braun Hamilton Ramirez Hart Lucroy Segura Would be a very good/scary lineup to face, that would easily be the best 2-6 lineup in baseball.

5. Paniagua 6. Vogelbach 7. Maples

Navy and red? Awful. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Must be trying to challenge the Bucks with the worst color scheme in sports Navy and Red is not a terrible color scheme.... You're right. When I saw Navy I got Carolina Blue and Red picture in my head for some reason, it's been a long week/I'm running on fumes this morning.....

They should just call them the Saints too and make Brees and assistant coach or head cheerleader or something.

He seems to be a perfect fit for the Cardinals. Short, little, gritty white dude. I fully expect him to torment us once they get him into the pixie dust

Navy and red? Awful. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Must be trying to challenge the Bucks with the worst color scheme in sports

Enjoy PIT then, Jason

Jesus [expletive] Christ, NO. Just NO, NO, NO to Franceour

Chavez to the D'Backs. 1 year $3mm

The gap between Cabrera and Barney isn't that much when you have the former for 2 years and the latter for 4... I guess, but that's expecting the Diamondbacks to put an awful lot of faith in defensive metrics. We could also let them hold onto Skaggs and get rid of Bauer, with whom they seem determined to trade off.

Then "FIP/XFIP" would be wrong; he's filthy. He has over 400 MLB innings pitched & less than 350 hits... Not by luck, it's by great pitching. Okay, Joe Morgan. He has pedestrian K rates, walks around 3/9IP and allows a lot of balls in play on top of giving up HR at a good rate. His low ERA's definitely point to some luck when you look at his peripherals. If he was striking guys out a much higher percentage then I'd say that the H/IP numbers indicate great pitching are somewhat sustainable. But given what we know about his K/9, BB/9, LOB% and the amount of balls he let's get put into play he's getting more lucky than being "filthy." I'd say his FIP/XFIP is rather correct in assessing him.

Being discussed in the minor league thread. There are some intriguing arms. viewtopic.php?f=3&t=60917

Not only were they the worst, I'm pretty sure they had one of the worst run differentials historically for a playoff team. They also had a crazy W/L record in 1 run and extra inning games.

Is this today or tomorrow? Nevermind, found it. Tomorrow (Thursday 12/6 @ 9 a.m. CT)

Is that unusual? Wisconsin seems to make a living off of turning 3-star lineman and a decent set of RBs into a tough ground game. I don't recall seeing them at the top of many team ranking lists That pretty much is the norm. Wisconsin/surrounding states aren't exactly high school football hotbeds and it would be a pretty hard sell to 4-5 star guys in the south/west to get them to Wisconsin over the other likely schools they had at their choosing. Plus if they were drawn to the Midwest Michigan/ND/OSU are obviously going to have the upper hand.

I know it's been discussed in the past, but we should be pursuing Hellickson aggressively. Their acquisition of Escobar might make Barney a less attractive option for them, but then again, Zobrist will be 32 in May, and is a free agent after 2013, and he could be an expensive one, so they might consider flipping him. Barney, DeJesus, and Vogelbach for Hellickson? He definitely fits what we are looking to acquire. But what's the big appeal with him, other than he had a good minor career/ is young? So far at the ML level his FIP/XFIP have been about 1.50 points higher than his ERA, he has very average K% and k/9 movies and he appears to have average velocity (average FB is about 91 MPH). I get that it can take time to figure it out, but he seems to have average stuff (from a velocity standpoint) and his FIP/XFIP points to him getting lucky/over performing his real ability. Tampa Bay's defense is a factor. Most of their pitchers outperform their periphs. Hellickson is a bit of a strange case, though. He induces a lot of weak contact, something you might typically assume will adjust, but he has managed to maintain the trend for his two years now. The other major issue is his strand rate. He pitches considerably better with men on base (3.74 FIP compared to 5.14 FIP with empty). With men in scoring he gets even better (3.47 FIP). Maybe he's tougher to pick up in the stretch. Maybe the sequencing is better. Maybe he's just been lucky...Probably all of the above. I didn't think about the defense thing, but should have. They definitely have been at the front of the creative defensive positioning/alingment thinking. That's interesting about the strand rate. You're probably right that it's a combination of all 3, but if we would be giving up good players/prospects for him I hope it's the sequencing/harder to pick up the ball thing rather than it being he is just getting lucky as that certainly won't stay a constant over his career.

I know it's been discussed in the past, but we should be pursuing Hellickson aggressively. Their acquisition of Escobar might make Barney a less attractive option for them, but then again, Zobrist will be 32 in May, and is a free agent after 2013, and he could be an expensive one, so they might consider flipping him. Barney, DeJesus, and Vogelbach for Hellickson? He definitely fits what we are looking to acquire. But what's the big appeal with him, other than he had a good minor career/ is young? So far at the ML level his FIP/XFIP have been about 1.50 points higher than his ERA, he has very average K% and k/9 and he appears to have average velocity (average FB is about 91 MPH). I get that it can take time to figure it out, but he seems to have average stuff (from a velocity standpoint) and his FIP/XFIP points to him getting lucky/over performing his real ability.

That's interesting. I wouldn't have guessed Lake had that much value (not that Escobar is anything great but he has been above league average, had a few well above average years, for his career at a premium position and has a fair contract). I wonder if other teams across the league value Lake as highly? As for the second bolded part (Franceour)...... http://assets0.ordienetworks.com/images/GifGuide/michael_scott/The-Office-gifs-the-office-14948948-240-196.gif