CaliforniaRaisin

He has a third choice: Play two more years in Japan and become one of the top FA prizes of the 2008 off season. He'll be 28 if he takes that path. The big loser would be Seibu if that happens, not Daiske. And possibly the Red Sox after he signs with the Yankees. Of course he's taking a risk himself in that third choice - injury or something else limiting the amount of money he gets in 2008.

2 negative rushes and a pick in the endzone. :? Need to give the ball to Mo Drew.

Giants up 10-0 now.

You're just jealous that you don't get to play Florida State in a bowl game. Actually, a Spurrier/Bowden matchup would have been fun. I was just messing around about these bowl games. My team plays Houston, so I don't have a lot to talk about. I know, and I'm actually pretty ecstatic taht we got a bowl game...it didn't look likely a month ago. We already won our equialent of a bowl game (you're welcome, Florida fans), but this would be a great springboard into next season (and also big for recruiting).

Why would anyone willingly listen to Buck and Aikman? I'm just jealous that you're getting the Jacksonville game. MoJo Drew > Reggie Bush. :)

Talking about the Bulls not being tall and struggling inside, it wasn't fun seeing Deng guard KG. :|

Hey ndistops, I have the Carolina game on. :)

You're just jealous that you don't get to play Florida State in a bowl game.

Exactly. It's not their fault. That would imply that this was a mistake or accidental. This was their plan all along. They'd sign him if by some off-chance he took a very reasonable deal, but in reality their intent was just to keep the Yanks from getting him. I disagree. The Red Sox desperately need pitching and could use an ace. I don't think their intent was just to stop the Yankees, but, you know, improve a team that came in third place.

Looked around and didn't find anything about it. They do have quick hooks in Venezuela and the Dominican and Angel had given up two XBHs.

Wow, that sucks for Houston. Wonder if the Commisioner's Office is sniffing around Wrigley because of the Soriano deal - if they were, the Trib/Hendry are obviously not going the same route as McLane.

Well, the Cardinals didn't offer Marquis arbitration so they won't get a supplemental pick for him. If the Cubs signed Suppan, they'd have had to give up their third round pick and the Cardinals would have gotten a supplemental pick. Yay?

This might come as a shock to most of you, but as of now, Miguel Negrón leads the Puerto Rico Winter League in batting average and slugging. He's also tied for second in runs (16, first place: 21) and tied for second in stolen bases (6, first place: 11). Geovany Soto is tied for second in doubles (7, first place: 9) and Negrón is in third place (6).

Is Negron still in the Cubs organization? I thought I read he was released or signed elsewhere as a FA. Maybe I was thinking of someone else... He was taken off the 40-man roster and designated for assignment late last month. Haven't seen anything about him signing elsewhere.

Geovany Soto (Arecibo): 12/58, .207/.254/.328/.582, 4 BB, 13 K, 7 2B Miguel Negrón (Caguas): 27/61, .443/.500/.639/1.139, 7 BB, 9 K, 6 2B, 2 HR, 6/7 SB Federico Báez (Manati): 10 IP, 6 R, 5 ER, 9 H, 3 K/2 BB, 1 HR, 4.50 ERA, 1.10 WHIP, .237 BAA, 2 S

Caribes lost game one of a doubleheader 6-1 (7 innings), box: RP T. Atlee 1.2 IP, 3 ER, 2 H, 1 K/1 BB, 1 WP, 1 HR Leones lose 9-1, box: C H. Blanco 0/2, K (21) Navegantes win 8-7, box: SP A. Guzman 1+ IP, 3 ER, 3 H, 1 K/0 BB, 1 HR, 0 GO-2 FO - faced 2 batters in the 2nd inning, both scored Overall: Thomas Atlee (Caribes): 21 IP, 12 R, 11 ER, 22 H, 13 K/12 BB, 4.71 ERA, 1.62 WHIP Henry Blanco (Leones): 31/138, .225/.305/.326/.631, 1 HBP, 15 BB, 21 K, 3 HR, 5 2B, 2/3 SB Angel Guzman (Navegantes): 9 IP, 3 ER, 6 H, 9 K/0 BB, 1 HR, 3.00 ERA, 0.67 WHIP, 7 GO-10 FO

Culiacan wins 3-2, box: 3B C. McGehee 1/4, 2B (9), 2 K (23) Overall: 58/191, .304/.373/.445/.818, 6 HR, 9 2B, 21 BB, 23 K, 1/2 SB, 10 E Former Cub Steve Smyth now has a 2.41 ERA in 33.2 IP. Also, the second pick in the Rule 5 Draft (drafted by KC), Joakim Soria, threw a perfect game with 9 strikeouts for Obregon.

jjg is trying to politely argue the merits of the young pitchers vs. Marquis with the Jon and Raisin (tough job just to keep up with those two!) The majority of people feel it was an awful deal and have expressed themselves to that effect in various manners. Much hyperbole has been used to describe how bad Marquis is. Some people have come out in support of the signing as being something the Cubs didn't have much choice about and there really weren't that many other dependable (from a health perspective) starters on the market. I think that's mostly it. sorry Tim, I can't let this pass. I was in no way defending the virtues of Marquis or his abilities in comparison to the young pitchers in the system. that's not what that was about. I just want to make it clear that I am actually undecided on what to think in that regard. it was a 'method of debate' discussion that didn't belong here and should probably be moved to rants by some enterprising mod. Okay. Seems like it got pretty heated if all you were disagreeing about was semantics and method of debate. Then again, sometimes debates about what you're debating about are the most heated. It was pretty semantical.

Come on, finish the comeback. And I take it you can't call travel on KG?

weren't you gone until next year? j/k I'm suspending judgement until the contract details become official. But if they're confirmed at 3/$28M, then I've already said my goodbyes :D I edited the thread title so you can at least stay for a few more hours. I tend to think it's 3/$21 M with incentives that can make it 3/$ 28 M.

Jjgman21, you've said I've been dishonest 3 times now. Care to tell me what I've done that's dishonest, or are you just going to say negative things about me?

The discussion went like this: Why give this much money to marquis when we have cheap guys who could pitch as well as him? I need proof that they will pitch as well as him! Marshall has already done it. YOU CANT USE LAST YEARS STATS TO PROVE MARSHALL WILL PITCH BETTER THAN MARQUIS NEXT YEAR! the problem is that nobody said marshall will pitch better than marquis last year. Somebody said that he could and somebody else responded by saying that they needed to show evidence that suggests that he will. The only problem is why does the original poster need to show evidence to proove something that he never said? The proof that the original poster needed to show was that marshall could indeed pitch better than marquis and that proof is in the 2006 statistics. that's my point about using selective stats. I could say that Soriano is going to put up .350/.560 next year. will you buy that Jon? you Raisen? he did it just last year. But nobody was making any predictions in this discussion. let's go back. the poster said now to me that says make a case, not throw out a selective stat to show it is possible. so you are right, noone did make a prediction, but one poster requested a critic of the signing and advocate of a youngster over the signed player give a prediction. that is not what he got. he got a stat line from a single season as a proxy for the argument. that's as lame as it gets. Seems like you've altered what really happened. The stat line was used to point out that Marshall outperformed Marquis last season so it's possible he CAN do it again. I think just the opposite. that you are trying to change it into what you say here, when it's pretty clear that is not the case. edit - what makes it so clear is his use of the word "will" instead of "might, can, possibly," etc. which is necessary for the the discussion to have said what you claim it said. I am trying to change nothing, this is what happened. Note that Disgrunlted used the word CAN. I don't know how you can think it's the opposite of what's actually on there. It seems really strange that you're the only one who doesn't seem to get what I said or meant. My post was meant to show the stats behind coolhandluke84 saying Marshall outperformed Marquis last season. Unfortunately, something this place has had very little of this offseason! It's been hard at points to read this board when you have to wade through pages and pages of arguements that lack reason, an objective view, and have some really skewed logic. The negativity (and I can understand it a bit) on this board has been SO bad this offseason it's crazy! Despite that, this is still head and shoulders above any other forum, I just wish more people would heed jjgman21's advise above. And posts like this one ^^^^ What do they accomplish? This isn't a thread on debate tactics, its a thread on the signing of Jason Marquis. I don't like it. There is a good chance that he will not get better and you will be on the hook for 21+ over 7 years. The following young pitchers can outperform Marquis. Sean Marhsall Carlos Marmol Juan Mateo There was really no point to this signing. Just trying to remind people about what made this board great and how it seems as though it has gotten completely out of hand this year (96 loss season do tend to do stuff like this though). There are a lot of stubborn people on here and I doubt that much will change, hopefully people realize how they have been acting and try to tone it down. Now what does your post accomplish? You tell me that 3 of our young guys can outperform Marquis, fair enough, but where is your logic behind it? Tell me why they will outpitch him, otherwise your post is just as pointless as you think mine was. I can say player A will outpeform player B all I want, give me something of substance to prove that point. BTW, personally I dont really like the signing much either. Sean Marshall outperformed Jason Marquis last year. Is that not the kind of evidence you are looking for. Exactly. Marshall: 5.59 ERA, 1.52 WHIP, .270 BAA, 77 K/59 BB, 20 HR Marquis: 6.02 ERA, 1.52 WHIP, .289 BAA, 96 K/75 BB, 35 HR

I agree that Marquis will outperform Marshall and it's pointless to compare players based on one season (though I think Guzman has a good chance of outproducing Marquis). I have to see Guzman go thru that inital phase in the majors, it's hard to say he did last year b/c was that him getting healthy again as to why he performed poorly (espec. control) or was it the inital adjustment to the majors? I think it was him getting back into the flow. Personally, I don't think he's made that adjustment yet to the majors. When he does and he can stay healthy (if), his ceiling is higher than Marshall and what should be expected from Marquis. I think last year was a good step because it should limit the number of adjustments he's going to have to make to the major leagues once he's healthy again. He certainly hasn't made the complete adjustment, but even a half season in the big leagues where he's also getting acclimated to pitching healthy again has to help him down the road.

The discussion went like this: Why give this much money to marquis when we have cheap guys who could pitch as well as him? I need proof that they will pitch as well as him! Marshall has already done it. YOU CANT USE LAST YEARS STATS TO PROVE MARSHALL WILL PITCH BETTER THAN MARQUIS NEXT YEAR! the problem is that nobody said marshall will pitch better than marquis last year. Somebody said that he could and somebody else responded by saying that they needed to show evidence that suggests that he will. The only problem is why does the original poster need to show evidence to proove something that he never said? The proof that the original poster needed to show was that marshall could indeed pitch better than marquis and that proof is in the 2006 statistics. that's my point about using selective stats. I could say that Soriano is going to put up .350/.560 next year. will you buy that Jon? you Raisen? he did it just last year. But nobody was making any predictions in this discussion. let's go back. the poster said now to me that says make a case, not throw out a selective stat to show it is possible. so you are right, noone did make a prediction, but one poster requested a critic of the signing and advocate of a youngster over the signed player give a prediction. that is not what he got. he got a stat line from a single season as a proxy for the argument. that's as lame as it gets. Seems like you've altered what really happened. The stat line was used to point out that Marshall outperformed Marquis last season so it's possible he CAN do it again.

I agree that Marquis will outperform Marshall and it's pointless to compare players based on one season (though I think Guzman has a good chance of outproducing Marquis).