don_kessinger_was_good

Can Carlos play 1B on days he doesn't pitch? He's a better hitter than either Mabry or Neifi or Restovich. Plus, he's a switch-hitter. He can also cure cancer. Play Carlos!

restovich has been tearing up iowa too. he has to be better than bynum Only issue I see is that I don't know whether Restovich is currently on the 40-man roster or not. If he isn't, you'd sure think they could safely take Reyes off of it, but someone like Craig would no more about this than me.

Contusion=deep bruise. Good news if true, he shouldn't need to be DL'd.

If Lee and Eyre are just out a couple weeks, we can deal with that. Walker has been red-hot, you can play him every day at 1B and platoon JHJ and Neifi at 2B. Call up Restovich if Lee must go on the 15-day DL (we need the RH power bat for the bench). I really like Eyre, so I hope this is short-term. If it is, we can compensate with Williamson covering the 7th, and Sponge Bob taking over the 6th for him.

The deal with Jones this offseason is that he had one confirmed offer on the table from KC--it was for 3/15. He also had a rumored deal on the table from the Pirates, and the Cardinals were supposedly interested in him as well. Hendry trumped Jones' KC offer by a million, and Jones' agent jumped on the offer and sealed the deal. At the time of the signing, Juan Encarnacion and Preston Wilson were still unsigned, not that either of those were much better options than Jones. Hendry panicked, no doubt about it, and clearly overpaid both in terms of $$ and length of contract. He's going to regret this one, if he hasn't already. I know we do.....:-(

You cannot have contracts and bonuses based on statistical achievements like number of wins or ERA, it's not allowed by MLB or the union. You can use numbers based on health, like innings pitched or games started, but that's it. Similarly, you can't base a position player's deal on the number of homers hit, or the batting average, etc..., but you can use numbers related to health and durability like games played and plate appearances.

Considering there is zero chance Kerry Wood returns, and Mark Prior is completely unreliable, I'd say the Cubs should hang onto a competent starting pitcher like Greg Maddux. Given his age, he'd probably be agreeable to a one-year deal with a second-year option. The money is moot, as he's already getting $9MM and he wouldn't get much more than that, if at all. So sign him, and if you think more of the young guys are ready to pitch in the bigs, like Guzman and Hill, then you send someone like Glendon Rusch away, not someone like The Professor.

Who is this Kerry Wood guy of whom you all speak? Does he play for the Chicago Cubs or something? I've heard of a guy named Kerry Wood that is in the Simulated Baseball Hall of Fame, but I tend to follow real baseball with the Chicago Cubs, so I don't follow things like make-believe ballplayers all that closely. I prefer to focus on the 2006 Chicago Cubs starting rotation of Carlos Zambrano, Greg Maddux, Glendon Rusch, Sean Marshall and Jerome Williams. It looks pretty good so far.

Even odds Greg Maddux, the 40-year old man, ends up leading the Cub staff in victories this year. Big Z would still be the favorite, but Greg has a nice head start on him. The main four guys in our bullpen are AWESOME.

Sign him.

Do not trade Williamson, at least until mid-July when teams are desperate for help and will overpay. With Wuertz struggling in ST, I think Williamson is even more valuable to us. We have four reliable relievers in Dempster, Howry, Eyre, and Ohman, I want that fifth guy and Williamson is it. The guy for us to trade is probably Jerome Williams, if he has any perceived value. Given how Marshall and Guzman looked in ST, and with Miller bound to pitch at some point too, I don't see where there is a spot for Jerome on this team. It's not like we'd be throwing in the towel on the Hawkins trade if we dump Jerome; Aardsma is looking great right now and back to his form of two years ago. We can dump Jones after June 15th. Think of a trade that helps us get rid of him and let's say, Jerome, for SOMETHING of value in return. I'd settle for a couple decent prospects for the two of the them.

Sanchez was an all-stuff lefty that couldn't throw strikes or spot his pitches. He was nothing. Connolly was an interesting guy, and a good gamble for Sanchez. Jon has soft stuff, but he throws strikes and knows how to pitch. Excellent control. Unfortunately, a soft-tosser needs to be REALLY good to advance, especially in the Cubs' system, and a rotator cuff setback makes that unlikely for us. So in the end, it's another case of young minor league pitchers, as happens 90% of the time, not panning out. No big whoop. I wish Connolly success whereever he lands though. BTW, the Cubs' impatience with Connolly is almost surely driven in part by a pure numbers game, too. We have a LOT of starting pitchers in our system, and at the AA level, I'm sure the Cubs looked at the candidates and made the decision to give the time to others. Mateo's return certainly did Connolly no favors.

I think there's a veteran in the Dominican that might be able to help us out some in RF.

Time to give Hendry a little credit. If we're going to skewer him for doing things like JVB for Ciamarella (sp?) and one of my personal favorites, Bear Bay for the egregiously-bad Cliff Bartosh, then you need to give him credit for something like Bynum for Koronka, which I think is quite the steal given that Koronka is a complete zero. Hey, that was a nice run-on sentence there, too!

Would this be a good time to remind everyone of all the folks clamoring for Hendry to sell high with Rich Hill this winter? Geez, the guy is just too wild to be an effective big league starter. What a waste of a bargaining chip. At least we have Marshall and the Gooz, that's promising at least.

Cubs: 1. Ryne Sandberg 2. Bill Madlock 3. Sammy Sosa 4. Billy Williams 5. Fergie Jenkins 6. Andre Dawson (can't leave Hawk off my list) Non-Cubs: 1. George Brett 2. Nolan Ryan 3. Carl Yastrzemski 4. Johnny Bench 5. Cal Ripken, Jr.

Maybe Lincoln can get together with Carmen Fanzone and Dwight Smith and form a little jazz combo.

Leave Sammy alone.

How about Andy Sisco for that bullpen job? Oh, wait.......

Pagan simply must be on the opening day roster, period. He's earned it, he can help this team off the bench. I really like what he's done in Arizona. Grissom to the glue factory, plz.

Williamson isn't going anywhere, at least until July as Vance pointed out. By then, we'll know if we're contenders or pretenders, and if the latter, Williamson is just one of several veteran players that will likely be dealt. Other July trade bait candidates if we're sellers, IMO: Slappy, Hairston, Walker (if he's still here), Williams, and Wade Miller. You MIGHT even include Kerry Wood and Greg Maddux in that list, since neither is signed for next year, if either one asks for a trade.

Honestly, will people cut Murton some slack at this point? Sheesh!! No one is going to force him to the bench, all the kid does is rake, at every level. What has he done in a Cubs uniform that DOESN'T inspire confidence? He destroyed minor league pitching last year. He comes up to the bigs and hits over 300 with nearly a 400 OBP. Now this spring, he is playing every day and batting over FIVE HUNDRED. Oh yeah, he played in the fall league too, and ripped it up there as well. Dude is not only going to start 150+ games, he will be our 3rd best hitter. I predict he will be hitting 5th in the order before Father's Day is here.

I'd like to see the Cubs trade Pierre, move Jones to CF, and put Nixon in RF, defense be damned. It's not like Pierre is a gold-glover, anyway. Murton, Jones and Nixon would be a pretty decent OF from an offensive standpoint. For leadoff, you could platoon Hairston and Walker at 2B, having JHJ leadoff on the days he plays. When Walker starts, give Cedeno a shot at leadoff, though frankly, Murton would be the better bet. Matt is a better base stealer than Cedeno, and a significantly better hitter with higher OBP. As to who the Red Sox would want for Nixon, and what we'd be willing to offer, hard to say unless they'd be at all interested in Slappy.

My sentiments exactly.

The odds of getting top players after the first round isn't real high. The sample size of big winners is small for everybody, and the picture is heavily influenced by a couple of big names, Pujols for Cards, Oswalt for Astros, Dontrelle for Cubs, etc.. Going back to 1987 enlarges the sample size, but at the same time the people who were scouting and coaching for the Cubs in 87-95 isn't very relavant to what's happened since Hendry took over and what will happen in future. If a couple of people from Justin Jones, Ricky Nolasco, Sisco, Sean Marshall crowd work out as good major leaguers (which is entirely possible, barring injuries), the Cub production could look pretty favorable. My point being, there is some luck to this. So you should keep trying? Also, obviously even though not many pan out, many still end up being key parts for trades. Bobby Hill was key guy for getting Aram. Brendan Harris and Justin Jones were key components in getting Murton and Nomar. Right. Over a thousand kids are drafted every year. There are less than a thousand players on all the big league rosters. If the average tenure of a big leaguer is 5 years (and I think that's the approximate number), then that means there are roughly 150 jobs available in turnover every year. So really, if an organization has a hit rate of one good prospect for every six or seven picks, they are doing an outstanding job.