Tim

I was sitting in the bleachers with Serena & BK the next day and AJB was back out near the outfield wall during BP. So I shouted out, "AJ, sign with the Cubs this offseason!" He shouted back, "No way! I'm signing with the Cards!" At which point he was roundly booed and harrassed by the whole section of the bleachers.

Or Walker...

congrats again to Eric! Thanks for the great year.

I've been clicking every day, Tim. I plan to be a premium member before the playoffs are over.... hopefully. Muchas Gracias!

Bad call on the sacrifice by Greenberg. One of the toughest outs in the lineup, I would have liked to have him hitting with EP on second base. I would have sent Eric on the straight steal instead of sacrificing. But I hate bunts in general.

You're welcome! Just a shameless plug here... If you really enjoy the site, please either join Premium or click on one of the google ads every day. Yesterday, there were only seven clicks. Today, there have been only seven clicks. In those two days, there have been over 41,000 page loads on the index page alone from non-premium users.

You're doing great, Chris! Keep up the good work. :thumleft:

That would be Jon. :thumleft: You tell him, Tim. Jon, getting shout outs from the booth. :D

Myself or 1908 can do it. In other words, Tim is really busy, so pester 1908 as much as you can with such petty issues. :lol: Or just pester whichever of us you see online. BTW - if you're brave enough...Modzilla can do it, too. :evil:

That's a nice looking image, kudos to whomever created that. That would be Jon. :thumleft:

Eric Patterson has been selected as the 2005 Chicago Cubs Minor League Player of the Year by North Side Baseball. Eric had a fantastic first professional season as he put up a post-season all-star year at Peoria. He displayed all the tools on the field. On defense, he lead the Midwest league in defensive fielding percentage among all second basemen and showed very strong range. He stole 40 bases in Peoria and has two more since his promotion to West Tennessee. At the plate, he showed the ability to hit for average with a .333 rate. He slugged 50 extra base hits in 432 AB's. And his plate discipline was strong with a walk rate of better than 1 in every 10 plate appearances. Overall, as impressive as his line of .333/.405/.535 is, it still does not reflect the amount of contributions he had to his team. As mentioned above, he also contributed great defense and was a great sparkplug on the bases. Nathan Boliva, announcer for the Peoria Chiefs, had this to say, "Eric is a very deserving choice as the NSBB Minor League Player of Year. His on-field achievements spreak for themselves and he was clearly the Chiefs MVP of the season. The Chiefs were happy and fortunate to get to watch Eric play all season. In addition to his on-field achievements, Eric also carried himself as a great example off the field with his teammates and in the Peoria Community." Eric has chosen to donate the $100 award to the Hurricane Relief fund. Strong consideration was given to Matt Murton, who edged out Patterson in the user vote. However, the NSBB minor league writers for the site were unanimous in nominating Patterson for their 50% of the vote, giving him the overall edge in the award. Others receiving support included Brandon Sing, Sean Gallagher, Ronny Cedeno, Ricky Nolasco and others. Thanks to all who participated in this process and congrats to Eric Patterson!

Congrats to Ricky Nolasco for winning the Most Outstanding Pitcher award in the Southern League!

Hooray! Go Chris! :D

i agree This will become a less family-friendly website if that's the case...

Even worse, now they can't use Harris because Bowden/Robinson are criminally stupid by sending out Castilla and Carroll(while Vidro was hurt). He's 25 now, he really deserves a shot. He's about to be passed on their 3B depth chart by Zimmerman. The worst thing that ever happened to Brendan was getting shifted to 3B.

Choi is over 1000 PA's.

The NSBB Minor League Player of the Year has been determined and will be announced this weekend. I want to take the time to thank everyone who participated in the inagrual process. It was a last-minute decision to do this and next year we'll improve the process. But I think that this still turned out pretty well and I can't wait to share the full results with everyone!

Myself or 1908 can do it.

Brian Anderson plz Isn't Anderson on their 40 man already? I'm hoping for Gio Gonzalez, myself.

But how would Dusty be able to have a "veteran presence" at each OF position if they traded Burnitz? You can't play all rookies, all the time. That's disrespecting the game, man. After all, it's absolutely un-possible that any rookie could replace Burnitz' .269/.331/.463/.794. It's possible that the Cubs could be thinking of either: 1) picking up his option 2) declining the option, but offering arbitration

Thanks for the rundown, UK. Assuming that Gooz holds up this fall, I think he's going to be an important part of the 2006 pitching staff for the Cubs.

Jones is up there because for a long time he was the only productive veteran on Atlanta -- and they pulled away with a lead in the East. Now, everyone knows that rookies can't be the reason that they did well, so it must be Andruw's home runs that propelled Atl to that lead.

So does superman :) Unfortunately, superman doesn't play in the Cubs' system.

Batman has pretty good power, too.

Sizemore please. Seriously though, some combo of Riske, Betancourt, Crisp, etc. might work, although trading Walker because someone is willing to trade for him isn't the wisest of choices. The players coming from Cleveland would have to either: 1) be guys that could pass through waivers themselves or 2) not be on the 40 man roster.