dew1679666265

This is by far my biggest concern for '09. Yeah, the starting lineup is only marginally worse than last year (at worst). The bench and bullpen are the biggest downgrades, though.

2002: 2003: There's three DL stints in the 02-04 seasons. He was healthy all year in 05, but was suspended for the final week of the season because he got pissed off. And for whatever reason it is that he's averaged less than 100 games a year since 2002, he still has. There are reasons - mostly injury, sometimes suspension. But he's a very, very good bet to miss a lot of time this year.

In 2007 when we traded Izturis who was our second middle infielder from June to September? Mike Fontenot was our only middle infielder for half of the 2007 season. Izturis got traded on July 19th. Scott Moore came up for 5 days, and then Cedeno was put back on the major league roster on July 24th. He then went back down on August 21st and came back up at the beginning of September. From what I remember and can piece together from the transactions they made, the Cubs only had 1 middle infielder for slightly over a month cumulatively. 9 days near the beginning of May, two weeks at the end of May, those 5 days in July, and the 10 days at the end of August. Of course, a big difference between this year and that year was that the Cubs had options they could bring up from AAA very easily (Fontenot and Cedeno), which made it much easier to carry 1 middle IF for a few days. They don't really have that luxury this year and so they'll likely have to sign a veteran to fill that spot. And Hoff is really the only guy who can go to the minors.

Well the Cubs still didn't sign anyone, and if they do it could very possibly be for a minor league deal. Hoffpauir could battle that guy for a roster spot this spring. Personally I don't see Aurilia/Millar or anybody else really jumping at the chance to sign with the Cubs. Since neither would get much money per year, and probably won't get alot of AB's. So they won't go with two backup middle infielders? That's completely against Lou's MO. He's likely to have a injury at some point, but long term is still very debateable. Plenty of major league hitters have had three poor seasons of health, and been ok after that. Personally I feel Bradley playing in a small ballpark like Wrigley, and playing RF full-time will keep him healthier then years past. In years past he played alot of CF and had to play in much bigger ballparks. Also keep in mind Bradley DH last year finally let him rest his body, and fully recover from a bunch of those injuries. The guy is probably 100 percent healthy for the first time in years. I don't think Hendry is stupid, he wouldn't give Bradley the contract he did, unless the doctors truely felt he can stay healthy. And that "fully healthy" will last how long with Bradley? He's been injury plagued his entire career pretty much. Since 2002 (omitting his first two years when he didn't have a full time job), he's averaged 99 games a year. That means in an average year, he'll miss 63 games. That means he's likely to incur a long term injury.

I too have heard the battle of Teague is down to UT and Bama. Andrew Bone of TI (I believe) was adament when he said Alabama has and should pull off a "surprise recruit who is committed to another school." Some speculate the "surprise recruit" could be Teague, or it could be Greg Reid, or could be either Barkevarious Mingo, or even Kenny Bell. My guess is....with Ed Stinson committing to Bama today, you can eliminate Mingo. So the "surprise recruit" Bone is talking about could be Teague, Reid, or Bell. My money is Teague, but Bama has made up A LOT of ground on Reid in the last couple of weeks so it wouldn't surprise me it is Reid. Personally I think Bama/Tennessee are going to split in their battles for Myles/Teague. I think Bama gets Myles, and Teague goes UT. According to his high school coach, Teague is headed to UT. Won't know for sure until tomorrow. Sweet! =D>

Seconded Yea, Wigginton at $3 mil a year is far better than Miles at $2.5 mil a year. Plus, given our platoon situation at second and the likelihood of Bradley getting hurt in right (and Wigginton being moderately passable there, I believe), he would have gotten pretty decent playing time as well.

Everybody here seems to be 100% sure that Bradley will get injured at some point during the season. Call me naive, but I have a feeling he'll stay healthy. You definitely are incredibly optimistic then. Bradley hasn't played 100 games in the field in a season since 2004. That's also the only year in his career that he's played 100 games in the outfield (granted, a couple of those were early in his career and weren't injury related, but still). Including his time as a DH, he's played more than 100 games three of nine seasons in his major league career. He's about as sure a thing as you're going to get for a long term injury.

It depends on how you look at it, but our LH power hitter off the bench currently is Hoffpauir, replacing Fontenot. Yes if Fontenot gets hurt then we have Miles at 2b. But if DeRosa was used in RF, Cedeno would have been used in that spot anyways. You name DeRosa for all these postions, but there's still just one DeRosa. When Fontenot played, DeRosa often filled in the outfield. Instead this year Fontenot will be at 2b, and Hoffpauir playing the corners when needed. With DeRosa still around, he would have been the starting second baseman. When Bradley was hurt, DeRo would have shifted to right and Fontenot would have started full-time for whatever time Bradley was out. Now, though, we have Fontenot starting at second and, when Bradley gets hurt, we'll have at best Hoff and at worst Gathright filling in for him. I don't see where Cedeno fits into the equation in either spot. Also, if we still had DeRo, then if one of our second basemen got hurt, the other good one would fill in. Now, we have to hold our breath all year that Fontenot stays healthy all year (and is productive). Otherwise, we're stuck with Aaron Miles getting many at bats. Again, Cedeno doesn't fit into the equation. If Hoff isn't sent down, who is? They just signed Gathright, Bako's the only catcher, Reed isn't going down and neither, sadly, is Miles. The tendency under Lou has been 12-13 pitchers and two infielders. That means someone will have to go to make room for another infielder. If not Hoff, who? And DeRosa had a career year that was supported by a pretty major tweak he made to his swing. Miles didn't do anything like that. He just happened to have a good year. Could he repeat it? Sure, but then he's only about as useful as Theriot and I don't want to pay Theriot $2.5 million a year. Power, also, is not completely necessary, but it's awful nice to have. If you have no power, you better be great at getting on base and Miles isn't - even last year he wasn't.

Because the Cubs feel Fontenot is ready now, why keep a guy on the bench if you feel he can improve your line-up now? The fact that Fontenot has never had more then 250 AB's in a major league season, is the reason why he deserves more. Fontenot being a question mark is only a matter of opinion. All Fontenot stats in the majors, minors, and predictions for 09, would show that Fontenot shouldn't really be that big of a question mark. Significantly downgrade the bench is also something I don't understand. But I guess people would feel that way if, they thought Miles can't out hit Cedeno, and Hoffpauir can't hit like did last year for another 100-150 AB's. Otherwise the bench really isn't that much different from last year. The Cubs like there younger players(as MLB experience wise), and feel they will be better then the guys they have next year. This isn't the first time they have done this though. They have replaced Izturis with Theriot, Soto with Kendall, and Pie with Jones over the last two years. Just in the past the young players weren't replacing players as good as DeRosa, so it appears more risky. It's a pretty huge caveat that the players who were replaced in the past weren't productive players and DeRosa is. I see no reason to dump a known quantity (DeRo) for relative peanuts in order to play an unknown quantity (Fontenot) when the goal of the franchise is to win now. And the bench is most certainly worse because of this move and it's quite simple why: Fontenot moves to the starting lineup and is replaced by a bad player - Aaron Miles. Miles isn't replacing what Cedeno would have done for us, he's replacing what Fontenot would have done for us. While I'm not sure what Fontenot will do with 400 or so ABs this year in a starting role, I've seen that he can be very valuable off the bench. All Miles has shown most of his career is that he can hit a single 28% of the time he steps to the plate. That's a definite downgrade. And keep in mind that with the oft-injured Bradley in RF, having DeRosa to fill in would be very nice for his DL stints. Instead, we have to hope that Joey Gathright can fill in somewhat reasonably. Hoff is likely destined for AAA because we need another middle infielder.

But the Cubs wanted to get Fontenot regular AB's at 2b. There wasn't any other way for the Cubs to do that without trading DeRosa. How could the Cubs justify, making Fontenot the starter, and DeRosa the supersub next year? DeRosa had one year left on his deal, why couldn't we keep him that one last year to see if he was still highly productive and then turn 2B over to Fontenot then? Why did we have to downgrade at second and significantly downgrade the bench just to get ABs for a guy who has never had more than 250 in a season and is still a question mark? Rebuilding teams trade very good players away for junk so they can play cheaper, younger players. Not teams who expect to compete for a World Series. Had we gotten some very good talent for DeRosa, that'd be one thing, but we didn't. We got decent minor league relievers. What happens if everybody gets hurt this year? Then things will go bad, but thats unlikely to happen. If for whatever reason Fontenot struggles or gets hurt, then we add a 2b midseason. It's not that hard to get a 760-780 plus OPS 2b without giving much. Because we couldn't start Fontenot and keep DeRosa around on the bench. Fontenot getting injured is far more likely than "everybody" getting hurt. And if Fontenot goes down, will we have the resources to go get a good to very good second baseman? Will there be one available? And a .760-.780 would be a pretty decent downgrade from what we got last year (and worse than the projections I've seen for DeRo this year). Just for the heck of it, though, there were 13 starting second basemen to top a .760 OPS last year. Some were the usual names: Brian Roberts, Dustin Pedroia, Ian Kinsler, Dan Uggla and Chase Utley. Others were guys that we could never acquire cheaply: Alexei Ramirez, Jose Lopez, Clint Barmes and Kelly Johnson. So that leaves us with these guys who we could bring in to deliver the significant downgrade at 2B: Placido Polanco (.767), Kaz Matsui (.781), Ray Durham (.812) and Ronnie Belliard (.845). I'd much, much rather have Mark DeRosa as a super sub than rely on making a desperation trade (or signing, I don't know if Durham and Belliard are even under contract) for any of those guys.

The bolded I don't recall being prevalent views on the board. They were the opinions of some, but I saw them far less often than the opposing viewpoints. And what about those of us who disagreed with most of that? We can't complain when we see things we don't like? We're supposed to just not have an opinion on things? People can complain if they like and other people can refute those complaints. I've defended Hendry for most of his entire tenure and still think he's a pretty decent GM, but I don't like the moves he's made this offseason. I hope he proves me wrong, but until that happens, I'm not going to sit back and have no opinion on things. Some people choose to use their opinions as statement of facts and use it as an argument ignoring that those opinions are often wrong as people have tried to point out. I don't understand the dislike of posting opinions and arguing those opinions on a message board about Cubs baseball. What do we discuss if not our feelings on the Cubs roster as currently constructed?

Expressing your opinion about a move or the offseason is fine. But to go on and on about how much you hate this offseason is a little overboard. We all know you dislike this offseason, and we all know that many feel it was a bad offseason. But fans felt that way about alot of offseasons and were wrong, so right now lets just give Hendry the benefit of the doubt and see what happens. If the Cubs do regress alot, and these moves don't work out. I'll be right with you guys saying he did a really crappy job. I just don't understand why people can't be patient, and see what happens. They already assume these moves all suck, and the Cubs downgraded without giving them a shot. I'm just trying to remind people that they are often wrong, and there's a decent chance they could be wrong about a few things this offseason as well. I don't know, I just can't go through an offseason without having an opinion and expressing it. I have stats available to me with which I can judge a players ability and I use those to determine whether I like a move a GM has made or not - I may be wrong, but just because I might be wrong doesn't mean I'm going to mindlessly accept anything and everything the GM does. Like I said, I hope Hendry and the players prove me wrong and Aaron Miles is an all-star and Milton Bradley never misses a game as a Cub, but the stats they have compiled over their careers tell me that's very unlikely.

The bolded I don't recall being prevalent views on the board. They were the opinions of some, but I saw them far less often than the opposing viewpoints. And what about those of us who disagreed with most of that? We can't complain when we see things we don't like? We're supposed to just not have an opinion on things? People can complain if they like and other people can refute those complaints. I've defended Hendry for most of his entire tenure and still think he's a pretty decent GM, but I don't like the moves he's made this offseason. I hope he proves me wrong, but until that happens, I'm not going to sit back and have no opinion on things.

I think the first two projections are on the low end of what he'll do. The .802 is fairly realistic, though I think it's very reasonable to expect him at .815-.820 this year. That'd be a drop of .30 OPS from last year (roughly) and about .20-.30 points better than his 07 numbers.

Pretty sure Griffey signed as a FA with Cincy No. I believe Griffey and Cincy agreed to rework his contract so that much of it was deferred to fit into Cincy's budget. I think they're still paying him upwards of $10-$15 million to sit at home (or play for someone else). o 09:$16M club option ($4M buyout) o $57.5M in salary deferred at 4% interest, to be paid 2009-2024,  $5.5M of 2000 salary deferred  $6.5M/year of 2001-2008 salaries deferred o acquired by White Sox in trade from Cincinnati 7/31/08, Reds and White Sox splitting cost of Griffey's remaining 2008 salary and buyout of 2009 option So only about $5 mil a year plus 4% interest? Less than I thought, but still funny.

Completely agreed. Dumping DeRosa was a bad, bad idea. We really only need to Fontenot to be healthy. The right-handed half of an adequate middle infield platoon should never, ever be a problem. I'm not terribly concerned if Miles gets hurt, but even still, who will we replace him with if he does? The random, slap hitter Hendry will likely sign as the final bat off the bench? We still have to find a way to get to an .800-.850 OPS (what DeRo would likely give us). And if Fontenot goes down, we're in a world of trouble at that position.

The fact that he's been improving the last couple of years makes me think there's even more room to fall. So the fact that he's been successful means he's more likely to collapse? I don't follow you. Plexiglass principle. Having several seasons of increasing production in your 30s is a good sign that you are due for some regression to the mean. And I never said "collapse." A slight regression keeps him still a very productive second baseman, though. The only way dumping him for moderate relief prospects was a good idea is if he utterly collapses. And I don't think that's likely. That's a completely different issue. How so? My argument is that the second base position has been downgraded from last year. Even in the off chance that the starters are similar, the depth is certainly worse. That's a very legit and relevant argument. The original discussion was about the starting lineup. If you want to have the depth discussion, I agree with you completely. I'm talking about second base as a whole. The starting lineup can be very affected by an injury to one of our starters if we're banking on having both to hope for a match in production. I think it's a valid argument whether we're talking about depth or not. If you're counting on two players combining to give you the production of one, then you have to assume (may not be safe) that both will be healthy. Otherwise, your starting lineup will suffer.

Pretty sure Griffey signed as a FA with Cincy No. I believe Griffey and Cincy agreed to rework his contract so that much of it was deferred to fit into Cincy's budget. I think they're still paying him upwards of $10-$15 million to sit at home (or play for someone else).

The fact that he's been improving the last couple of years makes me think there's even more room to fall. So the fact that he's been successful means he's more likely to collapse? I don't follow you. That's a completely different issue. How so? My argument is that the second base position has been downgraded from last year. Even in the off chance that the starters are similar, the depth is certainly worse. That's a very legit and relevant argument.

I just hate seeing a good team get worse for no good reason. There was no good reason to dump DeRosa and bring in Aaron Miles. We're still easily the best team in the Central, but we're not as good a team as we were last year. That's not the way to excite a fanbase after a monumental collapse in the playoffs. I don't like the decrease in the margin of error. A couple significant injuries for large portions of the year and we're no longer easily the best team in the Central. I'm looking at players like Bradley -- totally unknown how many games he'll give us. Ramirez -- what if his legs get chippy on us again? Zambrano -- how's that shoulder going to be this year? But, I suppose it could happen any year. I'm not freaking out or anything, just not feeling quite as comfortable as I hoped I would. Those things could happen any year, but last year we had the depth to survive them. This year, when Bradley misses significant time, we'll have Reed Johnson playing everyday or Joey Gathright getting a lot of ABs - instead of DeRosa playing in right. If Aramis misses significant time - we'll have Aaron Miles in the starting lineup every day. Injuries can always happen, but we've left ourselves in a worse position to handle those injuries. And at the same time, brought in a guy (Bradley) who is very, very likely to suffer a significant injury.

Yea, a career worst 101 ERA+ is pretty awful. The WHIP's not where I'd like it to be, but three straight seasons with ERA+s of 174, 134 and 123 are pretty dang good. I don't hate trading him, but I have a feeling it's going to be similar to the Hill dump - just get him off the roster and get nothing for him. If we get somebody of real value, I'll be ok with this.

And that's where we'll just have to disagree. I see them as projecting virtually identically. I just think you have to assume too much about Fontenot continuing the same success as last year over twice the ABs. He may do it, but it's an assumption. I'm a big believer in platoon situations, and I'm very bearish on 34-year-old middle infielders. The fact that he's been improving the last couple years makes me think he won't completely collapse this year. And what happens if Fontenot gets hurt this year? We have the joy of Aaron Miles starting a whole lot for us. Had we kept DeRosa and one 2B got hurt, we'd still have a productive player left at that position.

I just hate seeing a good team get worse for no good reason. There was no good reason to dump DeRosa and bring in Aaron Miles. We're still easily the best team in the Central, but we're not as good a team as we were last year. That's not the way to excite a fanbase after a monumental collapse in the playoffs.

And that's where we'll just have to disagree. I see them as projecting virtually identically. I just think you have to assume too much about Fontenot continuing the same success as last year over twice the ABs. He may do it, but it's an assumption.

Miles would be getting significantly fewer PAs in such a platoon and would be decently productive facing LHP. He'll hit singles 28% of the time and get on base a little. He doesn't fill me with excitement.