Transmogrified Tiger

Ronny Cedeno should be the backup middle infielder.

There's a reason five organizations rid themselves of Milton Bradley, and it's not because of his baseball ability. Dumb move. Five organizations? Montreal traded him because they were getting Zach Day, both were good prospects at that point. Cleveland traded him because they had Sizemore coming and he was arbitration eligible, in addition to his off field problems. Bradley's only been with 3 organizations, and this would be the only one to get rid of him for solely behavioral issues.

Well, some good has come of this. I've never seen Jon so upset before. :P Seriously though, the only way you can ensure Neifi being a backup is by not starting Cedeno, which makes Neifi redundant unless you trade Cedeno. There's no logic to having Neifi on the team with Dusty around.

From today's ATM Report: 1) According to the Chicago Tribune, the Cubs have agreed to a 2 year contract for all time great run coster Neifi Perez. YEAR AGE RCAA OBA SLG OPS OWP RC/G AVG HR RBI SB G TEAM 2003 30 -20 .285 .348 .632 .279 3.05 .256 1 31 3 120 Giants 2004 31 -23 .296 .336 .632 .299 3.42 .255 4 39 1 126 Giants/Cubs 2005 32 -27 .298 .383 .681 .332 3.49 .274 9 54 8 154 Cubs CAR -329 .301 .380 .681 .289 3.86 .270 61 454 56 1262 LG AVG 0 .342 .433 .775 .500 5.23 .270 157 654 91 POS AVG -127 .324 .385 .709 .409 4.33 .263 89 500 108 The only question for Perez is whether he gets enough playing time in 2006 to set the record for worst career RCAA or whether he has to wait until early 2007. 1 Ski Melillo -355 2 Tommy Thevenow -351 3 Neifi Perez -329 4 Bill Bergen -312 5 Tim Foli -309 6 Larry Bowa -307 7 Alfredo Griffin -306 T8 Don Kessinger -305 T8 Ozzie Guillen -305 10 Ed Brinkman -300 In 2005, Perez set the major league record for most consecutive years with -20 or worse RCAA-- 1 Neifi Perez 1998-05 8 2 Doug Flynn 1977-83 7 T3 Bill Bergen 1901-06 6 T3 George McBride 1911-16 6 T3 Wally Gerber 1919-24 6 T3 Rabbit Warstler 1932-37 6 T3 Hal Lanier 1965-70 6 T8 Tommy Corcoran 1902-06 5 T8 Everett Scott 1920-24 5 T8 Frank O'Rourke 1926-30 5 T8 Rabbit Maranville 1929-33 5 T8 Ski Melillo 1932-36 5 T8 Ed Brinkman 1963-67 5 T8 Alfredo Griffin 1980-84 5 T8 Andres Thomas 1986-90 5

Trading Cedeno is the only way this move can be half-justified. Otherwise you're either overloading an already short bench(hooray 12 pitchers!) with strictly middle infielders, or you're setting up a Neifi/Cedeno for one spot. If the latter is the case, they'll start in a platoon to break Cedeno in, and Ronny will outproduce Neifi. Dusty will say that this is part of the plan, and wait until Neifi completely breaks down to play Cedeno everyday. At the slightest sign of struggle, Dusty will put Neifi back in, and Cedeno will be lucky to see the platoon role. We saw it with Choi/Karros, we saw it with Hollandsworth/Dubois, and we saw it last year with Cedeno/Neifi. Why would this be any different?

Since birth.

Murton whom JH did trade for. Oh never mind! Sorry, boys! I didn't mean to ruin the pessimist party. Wow, get over yourself dude.

I came to a horrifying realization this morning that Hendry is like Bowden-lite. Both make pretty good trades. Hendry's(Barrett, Lee, Ramirez, Nomar) bring in better talent, but Bowden(Guillen, Lawrence, Wilson, Byrd, Nomar?) gets talent for next to nothing as well. Both have been terrible with Free Agent contracts, Bowden's(Castilla, Guzman) being worse than Hendry's(Maddux, Remlinger, Neifi).

Again, Neifi is either on the bench with Cedeno, which is stupid since they both play the same position(s), or competing with Cedeno for a starting spot, which is a dangerous dangerous thing. Cedeno shouldn't be starting unless we have big upgrades elsewhere, and Neifi shouldn't be starting at all. This is a waste, plain and simple.

Let's take a look at the situations here: Sign Furcal, keep Walker Neifi is redundant with Cedeno already around, bad move. Sign Nomar, keep Walker Same thing, you don't need two players for the same job, and you don't need to be signing one to a two year deal when the other is much younger, cheaper, and in all likelihood better. Sign Furcal/Nomar, trade Walker Now we have Cedeno and Neifi both vying for 2B. Uh-oh. Bad move. Sign no one, keep Walker Same thing, except at SS. Can't have those tailing throws messing things up. Sign Furcal/Nomar, keep Walker, trade Cedeno This is the only situation where Neifi isn't excessive, or at high-risk to be the everyday starter. How likely is this situation, and what are the odds keeping Neifi and trading Cedeno improves the team? This is a terrible, terrible move.

This sucks. I was willing to give Hendry the benefit of the doubt last season because of the Sosa debacle, but he's started this offseason out criminally bad.

I'll say Texas 24-0. kU has a great D, but their offense is terrible, and Texas has proven that it can put up some points on strong defenses(see O$U).

Or his 2001 season where he pitched nearly 200 innings with a 12-6 record that should have been more like 16-4 with any run support. Or his 2002 season where he pitched over 200 innings and should have been a 15 game winner with any run support. Or his 2003 season where he pitched over 200 innings and should have been a 15 game winner with any run support. Or the 2003 NLDS where he owned Atlanta. As for the 2003 NLCS, Dusty riding him the whole year (as he did prior) two of the highest pc/game may have had an effect on the burnout - but he certainly didn't pitch his best there i'll give you that. OR the fact that he has some of the filthiest stuff in the majors. But I guess we can go on saying he worthless other than 20 K's in 1998. It makes more sense. Blah, blah, blah blah blah. Kerry Wood has DONE nothing in the majors but tantalize baseball with his enormious gift. But like Todd Van Poppel, Brien Taylor, Adam Johnson, etc....Kerry is a million dollar arm, .10 cent brain. I don't know how to nicely say this, but what you're saying is completely and unequivically incorrect. Wood has done plenty, his problem has been staying healthy. That problem has nothing to do with some mental deficiency(million dollar arm, 10 cent head is one of my most hated cliches), and there's really no evidence to support Wood being a "stupid" pitcher.

I'd say put it from the upper part of the shin/lowest part of the knee to just below the waist. Make it the width of the plate or maybe an inch or two wider.

As discussed in the Walker thread, Sizemore isn't going anywhere. He's about as available as David Wright. Crisp on the other hand, has been involved in past trade rumors, and would be an attractive candidate to play CF.

My personal fave is getting both Giles brothers and Bradley. Giles Bradley Lee Giles Ramirez Barrett Murton Nomar/Cedeno/trade target

What?! He spent less than a season in the minors. All he did was go through the paces. He was MLB ready out of college. I guess those 9 games in the minors "developed" him. Murton spent little over 1 season in our system to get to the major league club. So the Cubs get no credit for targeting players that need less development? no, they get credit. the scouts get a nice pat on the back. good job. but they didn't "develop" that talent. they just took what was already there. Identifying and developing talent are part of the system. In evaluating the system as a whole, like was being done in the original post, why wouldn't you include Murton and Prior?

Sure that's one way you could go about it, and I'm not saying that's bad at all. Hoops was talking about shying away from Bradley because of player cost, and I pointed out that it might not be necessary if he's non-tendered. I'd rather make sure I got him and give the Dodgers some of our bulk arms. Yeah, I'd probably rather do that too, I was just responding to the mindset that Hoops laid out.

Sure that's one way you could go about it, and I'm not saying that's bad at all. Hoops was talking about shying away from Bradley because of player cost, and I pointed out that it might not be necessary if he's non-tendered.

I think his point with Prior is he was the most major league ready SP prospect to come out of college in the last 50 yrs if not ever. Yeah, but you can't just take away from the system because they were smart enough to draft him, or smart enough to trade for Murton. If Murton doesn't count, then we should be allowed to count Brendan Harris, Dontrelle Willis, etc. well lets just count everyone that ever played 1 game in our system as "being developed by our system." No, but Willis spent more time in our system than Florida's before he was ready. I think if someone spends the majority of their development in the Cubs system, then they should be considered a Cubs product.

What?! He spent less than a season in the minors. All he did was go through the paces. He was MLB ready out of college. I guess those 9 games in the minors "developed" him. Murton spent little over 1 season in our system to get to the major league club. So the Cubs get no credit for targeting players that need less development?

I think his point with Prior is he was the most major league ready SP prospect to come out of college in the last 50 yrs if not ever. Yeah, but you can't just take away from the system because they were smart enough to draft him, or smart enough to trade for Murton. If Murton doesn't count, then we should be allowed to count Brendan Harris, Dontrelle Willis, etc.

Prior most certainly is. Murton spent about the same time in each of the two systems(including his MLB time), and he had his greatest success in our system too.

:?:

You think it's unrealistic to want an OPS over .840 and a IsoP of .200 out of a 5 hole guy?