Tim

Because Sheets isn't coming off surgery, maybe? Because Sheets' injury history relates to his back and an ear infection, and nothing to do with his shoulder or elbow? Because Sheets is less likely to run into the ground by his manager? Because Sheets has actually been healthy and at his best within the last 21 months? You were saying? ;)

Think of the pitching staffs that have played at Boise in the past five years. Heck, just the one with Guzman and Willis is a great advertisement for the quality of SS-A ball. Last year's college draftees will certainly be in A ball, but guys coming up from rookie league might stop at SS-A. Also a lot of the latin players will go to SS-A ball. And many of this year's college draftees will start off in SS-A ball, as well.

Witch!! Ban him!! Only if he weighs as much as a duck Ooohh - gotta love python references.

Hmm...contraction after this season? It would be a good year to suck, in that case. Let's just assume the two florida teams get nailed. You'd have: Miggy Willis Hermida Young Upton as top of the line talent available at very cheap prices. Both systems are also stocked with next tier young talent, too. Miggy's an easy #1 pick for a team that has enough cash to pay him over the next several years. But any of the top five picks (especially the top 4) would be very nice to have. Pairing a guy like Miggy up with Bay, as an example, would improve the Pirates in a huge hurry. (yes, I left Crawford off the top-tier talent on purpose)

On a team with Varitek & Barrett, how does Schneider get the first start?!?

Wow, if you take the best two hitters out of our lineup, we suck. Of course, it is hard to come straight from looking at the lineups for the national teams, then looking at this.

What has the team done for him? They are employing him and paying him an exhorbitant contract. What else could they do? Foot massages?

Yep. There must have really been some backouts of RF. I'm PUMPED for this game!!!!! GO USA! The list of American right fielders drops off pretty quickly after these two guys: Sheffield Giles After them, it's pretty much into the Jenkins, Dye, Gibbons & Lane crowd.

If the scouting of him earlier in the thread is accurate, I have to agree with Goony here. Soriano as a below average fielding second baseman is valuable. Soriano as a below average fielding left fielder is, well, pretty much Jacque Jones without the defense.

Pitching is: 1) subject to more injury (don't we know it!) 2) more inconsistent even when healthy 3) still reliant upon a good defense Of the three things listed, hitting alone makes up 50% of the game. The other two combined make up the other 50%. That makes it an easy choice for me.

I think you guys missed CIE's point. There are the rare examples of a guy learning a new pitch during the offseason and implementing it to great effect. The most recent example I can think of is Esteban Loaiza, who credited a new pitch with his breakout season a couple years back.

Most pitchers who haven't pitched yet are doing so because of some physical issue, like Pedro and his toe. The Cubs on the other hand are going with the cryptic, there is no schedule routine, and literally taking it day-by-day. You don't do that with 100% healthy pitchers. Why is that Maddux hasn't pitched yet? He's old. Listen, I'm not here saying I think Prior needs Tommy John surgery. I'm just saying it's perfectly reasonable to question the Cubs handling of him and absolutely ridiculous to blast people for bringing it up. Perfectly reasonable to question things? Sure. Perfectly reasonable to ask whether the sky is falling everytime a cloud passes overhead? Not really, but if it floats the boat... Basically, you are claiming a conspiracy theory and calling the Cubs liars about Prior based on evidence that they had him throw a full-speed 50 pitch bullpen session instead of starting him in a game. Meanwhile, you simply write off their doing something similar with Maddux because, "he's old." I guess I just don't see the basis of evidence to blast the Cubs at this point. I'm going to take them at their word that they are merely trying something different to see if they can get Prior ready for the season in a different way. It doesn't bother me in the slightest, nor do I feel it necessarily means that he's injured and that something is being hidden. There are so many other options that to put that as an either/or decision is highly spurious.

Most pitchers who haven't pitched yet are doing so because of some physical issue, like Pedro and his toe. The Cubs on the other hand are going with the cryptic, there is no schedule routine, and literally taking it day-by-day. You don't do that with 100% healthy pitchers. Why is that Maddux hasn't pitched yet?

I think the Cubs have been about as accurate as any team in their return estimates as players have come back earlier, on time and later than expected. I think your opinion is biased because the Cubs are the team you follow the most and there have been a couple of high-profile misses on their part. But they haven't been recent and I think that those experiences have colored people's perceptions on the issue. Were the Giants lying last year about Bonds when they kept pushing back the date but being generally optimisitic to the public about things early in the year?example>

I heard he's working on a 3rd pitch as well, I think Rothschild said it was a splitter or a changeup, can't remember. I didn't see him throw one yesterday, just that big hook and a fastball up. i think a change and a cutter to go along with his 1 and 2. Well, I caught two pitches that were either curve balls that spun and did nothing or were changeups. They were both well out of the zone, though.

There are quite a few pitchers around MLB (many premiere guys) who haven't made their spring debut yet. We're through four games here. It's not like we've gone two weeks at this point and he's yet to see action. It's not like he isn't throwing. We all want the Cubs to do a better job keeping these guys healthy. Yet when they try something different in an effort to do just that, we have people crucifying them for "hiding something". Let me be different and applaud them for their efforts to get Prior to April 3rd healthy.

Oh heck, just do Walker, Pie, Guzman and Hill for Cabrera and get it over with! :thumleft:

Define "give away". Vidro + half salary for Brownlie + Wellemeyer. Then we'd have potentially 4 2B on the roster, unless you consider Hairston a CF and Neifi the backup SS. I don't know. 4 years ago Jose Vidro would have been a really great aquisition, a great 2 hole hitter. Now, I don't know. Do we really need another potential injury risk on a club already filled with question marks? Maybe if the Nats picked up all but the equivalent of Walker's salary, and then we flip Walker somewhere...but I just have this feeling that we should sit any bidding on Washington's 2B out. This is kind of assuming that Walker is gone, anyway. In which case, I'd rather take the risk that Vidro stays healthy and returns to his high OBP, medium power days with Montreal than go with Hairston or Neifi at 2B. Given the risks involved, I just wouldn't want to pay heavily in acquisition costs.

Define "give away". Vidro + half salary for Brownlie + Wellemeyer.

Oh no! Maddus hasn't pitched in a game yet! The Cubs must be hiding a serious injury! I undertand the skepticism, but let's all take a deep breath and see what happens before believing the worst. Unless it floats your boat to expect the worst and then be pleasantly surprised when something better happens. In which case, knock yourself out but realize you're going to annoy people who don't have this habit.

To ruin Shakespeare, I think this is much ado about practically nothing. Without knowing details of the procedure, what it was for, what the damage was, what other structures got involved and so forth, it is impossible to say what the recovery is going to look like. It could be a few days and it could be much longer. However, since the Cubs seem to have learned their lesson about overly agressive statements of recovery, I'd guess that they're pretty sure he'll be back up and running in the timeframe that they say. (BTW - since sources and knowledge are being questioned here, I get this from my wife who is a physical therapist with about 15 years experience helping people recover from this kind of injury, including olympic athletes). What I CAN guarantee is that nobody here, with the information that we have available, is going to know more about what the recovery time is going to look like than the Cubs and the doctor who performs the surgery.

If Vidro shows he's healthy, I'd think Bowden would look to save face and trade him instead of Soriano. And if he's going to be willing to give Vidro away, I'll take him.

Best GM trader in baseball? I highly doubt it. My money would be on Shapiro in Cleveland. A strong case could be made for Jocketty with his history of getting guys below market value and then keeping them for a below market price. Schuerholtz has a strong track record of knowing who to keep and who to trade away.

On any given day, who is playing whom? Unless you are committing to interleague play throughout the season, there's always an offday. I still say we should expand by two more teams, ditch interleague, ditch the wildcard and go to four divisions of four teams. I guess I'm not completely opposed to interleague play, but I would ditch the "rivalry" series as it makes for an uneven playing field. The scheduling becomes cake and you actually have to win something to make the playoffs. Before anyone starts with the "watered-down pitching" talk, let me issue a preemptive strike -- there's more talent in the game per team than there ever has been before. You have (4) 3 game series and (2) 4 game series vs. each divisional opponent, that'll get you to 20 each. Interleague can be kept as 3 games series at 5 different points (MLB will keep the "rival" series at 6 of those 15 games). For Intraleague and non-division opponents, you have (1) 4 game series and (1) 3 game series vs. 7 of the league opponents and (2) 3 game series vs. the other 3 division opponents. I understand how to comprise for each team, the question related to how to schedule each individual day (which has been covered by goony since I typed up the question). I don't think MLB would be willing to spead out interleague so that there is always an interleague series happening through every week of the year. I think they prefer the media blitz and attention it gets when it all happens at once. and unless there's at least one interleague series going on at all times during the season, 15 and 15 simply doesn't work.

On any given day, who is playing whom? Unless you are committing to interleague play throughout the season, there's always an offday. I still say we should expand by two more teams, ditch interleague, ditch the wildcard and go to four divisions of four teams. I guess I'm not completely opposed to interleague play, but I would ditch the "rivalry" series as it makes for an uneven playing field. The scheduling becomes cake and you actually have to win something to make the playoffs. Before anyone starts with the "watered-down pitching" talk, let me issue a preemptive strike -- there's more talent in the game per team than there ever has been before.