Larry Horse

"Cardinals outfielder Larry Walker is calling it a career. "I couldn't even breathe," Walker told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch about his final at-bat on Wednesday night. "All these emotions were going every direction. I knew it was it. I'm not coming back." The 38-year-old played 17 seasons and hit .313 with 383 homers, 1,311 RBI, 1,355 runs, 2,160 hits, and 230 steals. He won the NL MVP award in 1997, was named to five All-Star games, collected seven Gold Gloves, and led the NL in batting average three times." I never realized he had those stats. I hope this doesn't mean Giles will be in St. Louis next year.

I never ever ever thought I would see the Sox in the Series before the Cubs. The Cubs franchise was an embarrassment before this and now it's magnified. "Stupid Alex Gonzalez" (Thanks UMFan83)

That team would be a Kerry Wood 25 start season away from being neck and neck with the Cards for best team in the NL. And therein lies the problem.......

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/sports/sfl-marl14oct14,0,4808190.story?coll=sfla-sports-headlines "The Yankees' bench coach told New York's WFAN Radio on Thursday that even if both the Marlins and Devil Rays offer him a chance to manage, he might stay put. Girardi, who lives in Chicago, could have his eye on the Cubs managing job, where Dusty Baker might be on shaky ground. Girardi also is considered the top in-house candidate to replace Yankees manager Joe Torre should he leave." This is the first I've heard of this.

After rereading the quote, I was wrong about his statement. But then again, why even mention injuries?

Hendry might also want to try and remember, before bringing up the injuries again, that the Cubs were healthy the last month of the season in 04 when the wildcard was choked away.

Good point

http://www.dailyherald.com/sports/cubs.asp “When you don’t perform up to what you had hoped your own expectations were, we all look at all of ourselves and try to improve,” Hendry said. “I think we’ll go into spring training with a lot of intensity. The last couple of years, whether we had misfortune or not injury wise, we had found ourselves significantly behind the Cardinals by the month of May or the middle of May." Unfortunately, one way they could "try to improve" would be to fire the "dude". But sadly that won't happen. And also, Jim, for the love of god, SHUT UP ABOUT THE INJURIES! When you base your success on players that have a tendency to get injured, don't then bring up injuries as an excuse. That injury mantra is getting very old.......

And all I'm asking is why is that. When there are so many factors that go into whether a team wins or losses that are completely beyond the control of the GM, why is the win loss record, a corrupted catch-all figure, an accurate barometer of the job that a GM has done? Is it too much to ask that you respond to that? You don't need to write a "5 paragraph" essay on it like I'd be inclined to, all I want is some semblance of a response, and not just "we disagree, I'm cool with that". For someone that holds and publicises an opinion, you're strangely reluctant to talk about it. Why? "I still will stick to my opinion that when a GM puts together a team and that team succeeds then he gets credit. And a team that succeeds usually has a good win/loss record." There, that's my reasoning. There are "so many factors that are completely beyond the control of the GM" that in my eyes, wins and losses are what I look at. Every GM has do deal with the "so many factors". Atlanta was able to bring up 17 rookies and still win the division. Once again, I would look at the win and loss record due to the players brought in by the GM to come up to the conclusion he did a good job. I look at all the moves that Williams made. The players he brought in played a part in the Sox winning 99 games. That's why I said he did a good job. I look at a correlation between players brought in and 99 wins. Those players were brought in by the GM. "The only means for judging a GM, in order of importance, are the effectiveness with which he converts resources into talent, the extent to which he facilitates the conversion of talent into performance, and his input into the determination of resources." And what is the end result of that statement? Wins and losses, which is how I judge a GM.

When I read what you wrote it sounded an awful lot like a personal attack, or maybe more accurately, a bunch of unwarrented insults. Well why, Goony, as it interests me so, don't you enlighten me as to which parts you found particularly unsavoury. Or, better yet, actually focus on the gist of my argument. I mean, sure, what I wrote is absolutely plagued with some of the worst personal attacking since October 2003 Don Zimmer, but in there, somewhere, if you look closely enough, you might just be able to find me making a point that has so far been untouched by even your critical eye(s). Diffusion I see your point. You don't think a GM can be judged on wins and losses. I do. That's nothing to get "riled up" about. We disagree. "Criticising the bits that purposefully contain no substance at all (and only exist because I find parodying your argument more fun than just stating blandly what your argument is) for being insubstantial. Is that the best you can do? How about actually addressing the actual meat of my argument, the actual basis of my disagreement?" I don't want to or need to "address the actual meat of your argument, the actual basis of my disagreement". You disagree with me, big deal. You've gone to rather great lengths to show why you think you're right. OK, I get it. I still will stick to my opinion that when a GM puts together a team and that team succeeds then he gets credit. And a team that succeeds usually has a good win/loss record. There, that's my reasoning. I'm sorry I don't have a 5 paragraph description to justify my stance. I really don't feel it's necessary. And no, I'm not worried about my opinion holding any sway with people. I'm not here to get everyone to see things my way. I'm certainly not going to take every post I see that differs from what I've posted and angrily demand an explanation. You have your view on this and I have mine. That's all.

Me too, Vance. I see Furcal and that will be it for big signings. Granted, the FA class is thin but I would like to see at least a mention of the Cubs regarding Giles. Maybe a trade is in the future......

http://www.signonsandiego.com/sports/padres/20051010-9999-1s10padnotes.html "The Red Sox signaled they could be a suitor if right fielder Brian Giles enters free agency next month. Persons close to Giles expect to hear from the Cardinals, who might lose right fielder Larry Walker to retirement. The A's pursued Giles when he was in Pittsburgh and employ one of Giles' closest friends, catcher Jason Kendall."

i thought we were supposed to look past the complicated numbers. Sure. Let's. 99 wins. Any questions? No, but one massive complaint. This is just an expansion on what I wrote earlier, but here's how a baseball team works, baseball philosophy 101... Resources > Talent > Performance > Wins Yadda... I look at it like this. 99 wins means the manager did a good job, and the GM who picked the manager and gave him the players also did a good job. Well you need to get your eyes tested. The Yankees win 99+ games just about every year. And I'll tell you now that they have by far the most ineffective GM in the game, and I don't think a huge deal about their manager either. They win at the resource level, and just about manage to not haemorrage away all of their advantage going from resource to talent to performance to wins. Now the Yankees are a very exceptional example, but the point is that 99 wins on its own means absolutely nothing. It bears absolutely no reflection on its own upon the GM and the manager. It only implies. If you want to find out whether the implication is true, you need to look at the actual job that the GM and manager did in a lot more detail. It could well be that the implication is true, and in this instance I'm not saying it's not. But I'm not going to say that it is simply because you and a bunch of other people childishly scream "99 wins!!!!!! Kenny Williams is GOOD!!!!!!! I want him as CUBS GM!!!!! I heart Williams!!!!!" Now you immediately contradict yourself, and throw in a tired "good teams have good luck" Tim McCarver-esque cliché for good measure. If a GM can't control luck, and luck is a huge factor, and it's possible that the White Sox were lucky this year, why all the drooling over Kenny Williams? Or have you come to the conclusion that the White Sox weren't lucky this year? On what basis? Show your working. More grossly simplified conclusions based on absolutely nothing. You'recome to your conclusion and aren't able or willing to say why beyond throwing out tired stuff about how "he won 99 games, therefore he must have done a good job". That's rubbish. How do you know that without Williams the White Sox this year wouldn't have won 107 games, or 91 games, or whatever? That's the only thing that matters. The effect that Williams had. Not that he just happened to be "in charge" when something happened. Why's that? Because they're extremely efficient at converting reasonably limited resources into talent and then into performance, that and they've seemingly got a grip on the conversion of performance into wins. Seemingly being an important word, because I don't know if they do. The consequence of all that is that they often win a lot of games. But they're not good because they often win a lot of games. They're good because they do the things that conveniently often lead to winning a lot of games. There's a big distinction that is so often overlooked in America's quest to boil everything down into black and white, good and evil, whatever. You're force-fed the most tired oversimplified watered down rhetoric. And you eat it. Perhaps because three supersized McDonalds meals just isn't enough. Oh, no, more oversimplication! You just don't get it. Wins and losses probably are the bottom line, but that doesn't mean that they should be. You can only judge a GM by the efficiency with which he converts resources into talent, and by the people that he appoints beneath him. None of that gives him total control over the win loss record though. Therefore winning 99 games doesn't necessary make a GM any better than one that won just 89, or 79, or 69. You can only judge someone upon the things that are within their control. Fernando Alonso, a Formula 1 racing driver, spent a season with Minardi in 2001, a team with one of the worst cars in the sport, and he didn't score a single point all season. In fact, he didn't finish 8 of the 17 races, and finished in 10, 11, 12, 13, 13, 13, 14, 16 and 17th positions in the races he did complete (20 cars start the race, top 6 at that stage scored points). By your kind of a logic, all that makes him a bad driver, since you can only judge him by wins and losses and all that. I mean, he can't be that good, he didn't even get to the end in 8 races, he never finished higher than 10th in any of the others. Useless. Only he's the World Champion now. So what's changed? Not so much Alonso. He was a very good young driver back then, and he's an even better still young driver now. What's really changed are the things that aren't in Alonso's control. This year he had an extremely reliable car, and he's finished in 15 of the 17 races so far this year (and 1 of them he didn't start, the farce in Indianapolis in which just about no-one started). So he's finished 15 of the 16 races he's started so far this year. He's also had a fast car, if not the fastest, and in 13 of the 15 races he's finished, he's placed in the top three. He also placed 4th in another. And he's also enjoyed quite a bit of luck, with a good driver in a far quicker car (Raikkonen) suffering huge reliability problems. But if you want to measure everything in wins and losses, in any sport, then you can only come to the conclusion that Alonso was crap in 2001 and brilliant in 2005, and it's lucky for him that he didn't remain such a terrible driver and actually got better. Let me say a few things, Diffusion. This reply to your post was not a personal attack on you. I don't understand your over the top reaction to what I wrote. It was my opinion. That doesn't make it wrong or right, it makes it my opinion. I don't need to sit and give you my reasons for it being my opinion. I don't need my eyes checked. I don't eat at McDonalds.......ever. Unless you're reading something I'm not, I don't remember saying Kenny Williams is good. I don't remember "drooling over Kenny Williams". I said he did a good job....THIS YEAR. And please also show me where I said that I wanted Williams to be the Cubs GM or where I said "I heart Williams"? So now I'll ask you, using your logic on wins and losses, do you think a GM or manager should ever be fired? I also accidentally deleted the part where you compared me to a little kid doing math with a calculator. That was a nice touch. And mods, a little help here if you could........

Some buffoon writes a web article and that means something somehow? You oughtta know better than that. Who's in the playoffs and who isn't? That's all that matters. Like I said, individual stats: overrated. Team wins: the name of the game. Wow Soul. You're missing the point. What CPatt and the rest have been saying is true, Kenny Williams simply isn't a good GM. The article proves it without discrediting Pods' year. Lee's importance to the Brewers is far more than Pods to the White Sox, as the VORP is stating. He's fortunate that Pods became a sparkplug. Would a good GM make a trade to acquire the SAME OF/DH (Everett) twice in back to back midseasons? Seems like a waste of prospects to me. Let me see what I'm gathering here, your argument is based off of what? Miracles and luck? No doubting the White Sox have been good this year, but come on. Statistically they shouldn't even been close (hence my comment that they will fall hard in the standings next year). You should know better... What that mediot fails to realize as do most others who look at that trade, is that it was also a salary dump, which saved the White Sox 7 million, which they used to sign AJ, El Duque and Iguchi. And there is the winning answer. Now the big question for us Cub fans: How will Hendry spend the freed up Sosa money?

i thought we were supposed to look past the complicated numbers. Sure. Let's. 99 wins. Any questions? No, but one massive complaint. This is just an expansion on what I wrote earlier, but here's how a baseball team works, baseball philosophy 101... Resources > Talent > Performance > Wins Resources By far the biggest variable resource that a GM has is payroll, and that for the most part is determined solely by the money men. It's not unknown for a GM to talk his superiors into giving him more payroll to work with than might otherwise have been the case, but for the most part, the GM is uninvolved in the determination of the payroll that he has to play with. The same applies to other resources: draft picks, waiver claims, all these are bound by baseball-wide regulations that GMs have only a fractional say in determining. Therefore, more often than not, the nature of the resources that a GM is afforded can be disregarded in effective evaluation of his job performance. Resources > Talent This is by far the biggest area of the GM's job: the efficiency with which he takes the determined resources that he's been given and turns them into talent. That means getting the most talent out of every dollar, the most talent out of every trade, the most talent out of every ounce of prospect potential, the most talent out of every draft pick, and as many draft picks as possible too (via exploitation of the compensatory draft pick system), the most talent out of every possible waiver wire claim, the most talent out of every single roster spot, the most talent out of every action he ever takes and every decision he ever makes. However, any talent just isn't good enough: it has to be the type of talent that's the most accessible, the most likely to be turned into performance. Part of a GM's success in this area is ultimately dependent entirely upon his own skills as a trader, negotiator etc. and his own instincts, since the buck stops with him. But a GM can help himself, by surrounding himself with the best and most knowledgeable baseball minds, by appointing the best scouts, statisticians, accessors of talent, and so on, just so that he's never in a position where he doesn't know enough to make the right decision. Talent > Performance Here the GM's job is confined to the appointment of those most likely to facilitiate the conversion of player talent into performance. That means hiring the best manager, the best coaches, the best medics, the best minor league instructors, the best anything that could in any way help a player to make more of his talent. An injured player is no good, an unmotivated player is no good, a player that's never learn to harness his talent is no good. But, at the end of the day, much of this conversion from talent to performance is well beyond a GM's control. Random unforeseeable injuries happen, players slump even when supported as much as possible, players make stupid mistakes they obviously shouldn't. And, on the flip side of things, players that could reasonably be expected to get injured stay healthy, players play above their heads, players can become different better players overnight. The conversion from talent to performance is extremely imperfect. And the GM doesn't have a huge amount to do with it. Performance > Wins The conversion here is just as imperfect and just as important. And here the GM has virtually no say or control at all. In fact, does anyone have any say or control at all? Over the course of a season there are probably billions of situations where one thing could have happened, but didn't. Or one thing could have not happened, but did. There is no guarantee that over the course of the season you'll end up with happened and didn't happen in the proportions that you'd expect given the talent (aka performance). But there's even less guarantee that over the course of the season the timeliness of the happened and didn't happen will all balance out at all. As a result two teams that perform identically, probably despite different levels of overall talent, can end up with hugely different win totals simply because of variation in the timeliness of their performances. And yet there seems to be very little correlation year to year in the timeliness of performance. It just seems so random. It's just not a case of the most talented team wins, or the best performing team wins. It's not as simple as that. There are greater cosmic forces at work. The translation from performance to wins is hugely imperfect, and often decisive. And, like I said, the GM almost certainly has nothing to do with it. So, my point, again, is that while it is often the case that such a GM competent at turning resources into talent partially contributes to his team winning more games, because there are such imperfect translations from talent to performance and performance to wins in which the GM is not involved in the slightest, not to mention the variation in the determined resources that the GM had to start off with, it's simply impossible to say that because a GM's team won 99 games, the GM by default did his job, and did it well. And that, Soul, is the essence of your entire argument: the White Sox won 99 games, therefore Ken Williams did a good job. Sadly, it's not as simple as that, and you can protest as many times as you like, but it won't ever change the fact that winning baseball games is a complex and complicated business. You can't boil it down as you've done, and as numerous other idiots regularly do, in the media, in baseball circles, in bars, in here far too often too, to catchphrases, cliches, throwaway lines, and all other manner of gross oversimplications. Williams, like every single GM, has to be judged much more by the job he's done in terms of turning resources into talent and faciliating talent into performance (via appointment of manager etc.) as opposed to the end results of wins and losses. A similar logic applies to managers: they have to be judged much more by the job they do in turning talent into performance (and perhaps performance into victories) than by the end results of wins and losses. And the money men have to be judged by the resources they make available and their facilitation of resources into talent (via appointment of GM etc.) much more than by wins and losses. Consider all that together, and consider all the things that are beyond control, and only then do wins and losses have any real evaluatory purpose. I look at it like this. 99 wins means the manager did a good job, and the GM who picked the manager and gave him the players also did a good job. Luck also is a huge factor. Good teams have good luck, bad teams usually don't. Neither the manager or GM can control that. Williams and Ozzie did a good job this year, and Hendry and Baker did not. Williams remade a team that could not beat the Twins and now that team is in the ALCS. He picked the players and the manager that carried out the task, so he gets the credit. Scheurholtz and Cox are probably the best, especially after this year. In the end, it is based on wins and losses. That is the bottom line in any sport. If it wasn't that simple, than no GM or head coach or manager would ever get fired.

By the way, just playing with a lineup after a series of moves like this, and the lineup is insane: Giles Giles Lee Helton Ramirez Barrett Murton Cedeno Assuming Helton at $14m (Rox have to pick up some of the deal if they trade him), Giles/Giles at 5.5/10, respectively, a crazy 3/30 deal for Wagner, a bench of Blanco/Theriot/Fontenot/Greenberg/1.1m OF, and I've got a $102.75m juggernaut. Having 2 minimum wage starter helps a lot. And with that lineup, you have to be happy to go with the kids on the bench. Don't you dare say things like that. My hopes for this offseason are already precariously waiting to be dashed against a Preston Wilson signing. Your lineup, while formidable and roughly within budget, is so far out of the realm of Jim Hendry's reality that I don't even want to think about it - because I might cry. Please no Preton Wilson That rattled me so much I couldn't even spell his name correctly......

IIRC, Thome signed for $15/year for 6 years, but was prepared to go as low as $12/year for 6 years with the Cubs. Do you think that would have made for a good contract for the Cubs now? I don't. Thome went to JUCO around here, and he told some buddies that he told the Cubs 5 years at 10 mil per. Second hand info, whatever it's worth.

Soul, I'm right there with you and I've only been rooting for 28 years. About three years ago, I thought to myself " Why am I continuing to give this club my hard earned money?". I quit buying the Trib, any Cub related merchandise and I haven't been to a game since. The whole "legal" ticket scalping really solidified it for me. That was just a case of the Cubs kicking their fans in the crotch. If Dusty gets his extension, I won't be watching next year. I'll just check the scores online, and get my info from here.

It looks like Joe is going to be the next Marlins manager. I think he would have looked pretty nice as the Cubs boss. Oh well........

You'll hardly notice the Red Sox bias from him....... :roll:

Wood and Prior for me, and Nomar if he's back. There are no jinxes.

Yeah, he'll be cheap. You can DH him. Make sure you have a short LF porch. Get your 600 and retire with dignity, Sammy. As soon as you hit it, tip your cap and call it a career. Dignity went flying out the window about the same time time the cork went flying out of Sammy's bat. Come on now, we all know that was just a "batting practice" bat..........

http://www.newsday.com/sports/printedition/ny-spken024452041oct02,0,308277.column?coll=ny-sports-print Sammy sayonara? If Sammy Sosa wants his largest paycheck in 2006, rather than attempting to reach 600 home runs, he could consider playing in Japan. The buzz in the Far East says the Fukuoka Softbank Hawks will make a run at Sosa. It could be a good one-year plan for Sosa, who turns 37 next month, to rehabilitate his swing and his character. Or it could be a last-ditch effort to make some dough.

Absolutely no way do you pick up that option, unless he totally changes his mechanics and goes 25-5 with a 2.50 ERA.

The part of the quote that bugs me is "if they could come to camp and fufill that obligation soon" and "We're not going to hand it to them". I'm not quite sure how much more Murton has to show the brass. Unless a trade is in the works, I would let Murton start in LF next year. This would not be like breaking up some sort of dynasty.....IT'S THE CUBS FOR GOD'S SAKE!!