Tim

If I'm trading Prior for another player, it's going to be for one of two guys: 1) Miguel Cabrera 2) David Wright I don't think the Fish would take on a very soon to be expensive Prior or they would have just kept Josh Beckett. The Mets would be a very interesting team to talk to. Are they still wanting a second baseman? Prior + Walker for Wright + Matsui + Milledge would do it for me.

Just curious, did Miguel Cabrera come up as a shortstop and was then moved to 3B/OF at the major league level? Because I don't think he's ever actually played SS in a major league uniform aside from 3 innings at the position during the 2003 NLCS. He came up thru the minors as a SS, when we at AA before getting called up, he played SS. Florida has always had Alex Gonzalez at SS until this year. I think he'd be able ro get thru growing pains of not having played the position in quite some time and be adequate. It would definitely be worth a shot. He didn't stop playing SS b/c he couldn't handle it. I could swear I remember Miggy playing 3B in the Southern League.

I've been pondering this, and I think I have finally come to a decision. As much as I would love to pick Big Z, the quote from above is the reason why. Boras is his agent. So, it pains me to pick someone else from the NL, but I will go with Miguel Cabrera. I haven't seen him play 3B yet, but my good God, that kid can flat-out mash a ball. To put up these numbers at Pro Player at the age of 22 absolutely blows my mind: 302/379/488/867 (341/391/625/1.016 on the road :shock: ) David Wright is a year older, but had even more impressive numbers in his second year as a pro than Cabrera. He plays at Shea, which is an equally bad offensive environment. He has the added benefit of being faster, so that his higher walk total means he doesn't clog the bases as much. ;)

Oops. Fell asleep at the wheel. I'll try again later.

If the Orioles valued Prior as much as the people on this board, they would have accepted the trade as soon as Hendry offered it. Assuming that Hendry actually offered it.

The idea here is to debate who you would pick as the cornerstone for a franchise for the future. You should consider talent, contract situation, finances, age, positional scarcity, etc. Let's assume that you're running an expansion franchise and can pick any player off any roster. However, being an expansion franchise, you also have a limited amount of finances to work with -- so that's a major consideration. You also have to consider the marketing possiblities for the player involved and being able to build up a "face" for the franchise. To me, this leads to some obvious criteria. The guy should be young, pre-prime or just beginning his prime. He's obviously got to be very talented. I'd give a very big edge to guys with plenty of service time remaining before free agency (I'd want at least three more years of control). I'd want his cost to be very low (so players not yet even arby eligible would have a big advantage). There's a bunch of players that meet some of these criteria, including many of the best players in the game. Pujols + ARod head up a group of players that are the most dependable forces in the game and some (like those two) are under team control for a good period of time. But they're getting pretty pricey. Johan Santana, Prior + Zambrano head up a list of elite pitchers in the second half of their arbitration years, but they are all going to start getting very expensive pretty soon. For me, this would come down to two players, one whom most everyone will pick and one who tends to slide under the radar a bit - Miguel Cabrera and David Wright. Given the extra year Wright has before he hits arbitration and free agency, I'd actually pick him first. (thinking about this a bit more -- Chase Utley has to fit in the discussion somewhere...) Given the Yankees budget, I'd go a different direction. But on a performance per dollar basis over the next several seasons, I think it would be very hard to beat Wright. It turns my stomach that the two players I'd pick given a limited or an unlimited budget play for the two teams I hate the most - NYM and StL.

Or it could be saying that he's his favorite player. You may not agree with the statement, but I believe your response was more over the top than what he said. If you dial back to 2003, I'd be willing to guess that you'd find more than one GM who would have picked Prior over any other player in baseball to build a team around. His injuries the past couple years have tarnished that image a bit, but it is still not a completely indefensible position. I'd go with Pujols, Cabrera and probably a few other guys first. But Santana is probably the only pitcher I'd take before Prior when considering ceiling, years under control, age, etc.

Barring any completed deal that needs to be discussed, I'll be taking the board down tonight at 1am to prune old threads. I have saved off a copy of the database and will be opening up a search-only (no posting) database on this or another domain. I'm thinking about putting the archives on a separate server so that those searches do not interfere with the posting on the active site. Search will be re-enabled upon completion of the pruning. I will be attempting to retain people's post counts as I perform the pruning, but I can't guarantee that will happen. Thanks!

I have to ask... Likely, greater difference in production going from Cedeno to Tejada or Burnitz (now Jones) to Abreu/Dunn? Just trying to gauge, how much the fact that Tejada plays SS is factoring into the equation? For '06, I think it is very likely to be a bigger boost to production to go to Abreu than the other two. However, I can see the argument against him because he's older. I can't see the Cubs valuing Dunn correctly because of the K's and I think they would be very uncomfortable shipping Prior within the division. Ship him to Boston for Manny. Same age concerns, much bigger attitude questions and defensive liability issues, as well.

I have to ask... Likely, greater difference in production going from Cedeno to Tejada or Burnitz (now Jones) to Abreu/Dunn? Just trying to gauge, how much the fact that Tejada plays SS is factoring into the equation? For '06, I think it is very likely to be a bigger boost to production to go to Abreu than the other two. However, I can see the argument against him because he's older. I can't see the Cubs valuing Dunn correctly because of the K's and I think they would be very uncomfortable shipping Prior within the division.

I would like to mention one more time that Tejada usually walks fewer times each season than Corey did in '04.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/sports/sns-ap-bbn-marlins-coaches,0,6174532.story?coll=sfla-sports-front I'm glad to see Harkey get some love. The Cubs will have to replace Kranitz.

You're mod here, you can do so. :D

Can I please be the GM of the Cubs? Does anyone think I'd do a worse job?

Can I pick Rafael Soriano, instead?

Just to let everyone know what is going on... I have taken a backup of the entire database and I'm planning on creating an archive that cannot be updated. Then I was going to prune older threads from here. Only I ran into a problem...there are so many records here that the prune function timed out on my 10 entry test forum (the prune function searches all 750K+ records). In the meantime, it's been pretty stable lately so I'll search for a better pruning mechanism and then try again next weekend when the load is lower. Given that it will be Christmas weekend, though, no promises on how much time I'll have to spend. :D

Agreed Agreed Agreed Agreed Wah Wah Wah Wah Seriously, what makes his era any more valid than the current "live ball" era? The run scoring environment was much higher in the '27 - '35 era than it has been through the "juiced" era. Wasn't that one of the "golden ages" of the sport? Has the game changed since Goose played? Absolutely. Is it worse? Matter of preference.

I think a big part of this is that we value Huff differently. 1) I don't think his defensive skills are even close to average. 2) I think there are very legitimate concerns with him about the nature of his decline the past two years. I like Huff and I'd give up many of the guys in the system to get him. But I'd be reluctant to part with Guzman, Hill, Pie or Pawelek (though he's not yet eligible to be dealt) to get him. If we could target Gomes instead or if the deal could be expanded to include Lugo, then I'd be more comfortable with losing Angel. That said, the upside I can see with Huff that nobody has mentioned is that if Aramis goes down again, Huff could slide in at third and it would be easier to replace an OF with reasonable production than 3B. Umm... Nobody mentioned it? :oops: :oops: :oops: :oops:

I think a big part of this is that we value Huff differently. 1) I don't think his defensive skills are even close to average. 2) I think there are very legitimate concerns with him about the nature of his decline the past two years. I like Huff and I'd give up many of the guys in the system to get him. But I'd be reluctant to part with Guzman, Hill, Pie or Pawelek (though he's not yet eligible to be dealt) to get him. If we could target Gomes instead or if the deal could be expanded to include Lugo, then I'd be more comfortable with losing Angel. That said, the upside I can see with Huff that nobody has mentioned is that if Aramis goes down again, Huff could slide in at third and it would be easier to replace an OF with reasonable production than 3B.

I think you are misinterpreting the position of at least some of us. It isn't that we think he can bring that much more in a trade. It is that we think he has that much more potential value to the Cubs. People do recover from injuries. Guzman's recovery time from shoulder surgery really isn't that unusual. I can understand the argument to ship him out. I just don't agree with it for a player like Huff, who is in the last year of his deal and has major questions of his own.

Pie and Dope being the other two? Pie and Pawelek. Dope and Harvey would reach that level if they improve their plate discipline.

I'll start of by seconding all the points that Diffusion made. I'd say no to Guzman + XXXX for Huff. I'd say yes to Guzman + XXXX for Gomes. I'd build a package of guys that included Guzman to get Huff + Lugo. But Huff has too many question marks for me to let go of Guzman for one year of him (even if there are draft picks coming as compensation for him afterwards). Based on my ranking, I'm obviously still a big believer in Angel. I think that the extra year back from surgery will prove to be enough and that he'll have a breakout year. I recognize the injury concerns given the shoulder issues for Angel. My philosophy here is simple. It is always hard to trade for a young star or sign one in his prime. If you've got a guy in your system that has that potential, you hang onto him and trade others. Even if there are concerns about health with the prospect, I still hang onto him. Guzman is one of three or four guys in the system right now that I would place that tag on (with Hill in or out depending on the day).

Without looking it up, I believe Tampa had a better offense than we did last year.

Free premium for a year for anyone that provides one. But it has to work!

You can't change it on your own anymore, but if you want a change, PM Tim about it(maybe 1908 too, not sure). 1908 can do it and usually has superior response time.