unless he puts up his career numbers. then he'll be like the 4th or 5th best hitter on the team. gtyty Read my post again. I never said I didn't expect him to be good, I just don't think it's a foregone conclusion that he'll be a great hitter. He's been a great hitter for about his last full season's worth of at-bats. Before then he wasn't great for a corner outfielder. His career OPS+ is 118, which would have been tied for 6th best on the Cubs last season.... hence my comment about him probably being like the 4th or 5th best hitter on the Cubs if he performed to his career averages. Like I said, I'm not expecting that. I'm expecting him to put up numbers similar to what Aramis put up last year.... rate-wise. oh okay so you were suggesting that he might perform close to his career averages, which are heavily weighed down by terrible years early in his career, but you're comparing his OPS+ to the OPS+ that current cubs put up just last year. why might he perform close to his career numbers but everyone else would perform close to last year? i guess we could talk about what it will be like if rich harden pitches 200 innings, or derrek lee reverts to his 2005 form, or ted lilly spikes his glove so hard that it bounces back up and hits him in the face and he suffers a detached retina and is out for the year, but doesn't it make more sense to discuss what is likely to happen, and not what could perhaps conceivably happen? also, i will again suggest that you use a statistic other than OPS+ to evaluate a player's worth. if two players have the same OPS+ and same clutch/late stats, but one has an OBP that's 40 points higher, that guy will be the significantly more valuable hitter. Yes, of course it makes more sense to discuss what's likely to happen, and I've already said what I think is likely. My point is that you declared that will hit if he's healthy. You never said he'll probably hit. Everybody just assumes that when he's healthy he's some hitting machine. That's only been true for like his last 650 ABs. Before then he wasn't great. Why are we so positive he's going to rake? It's not a sure thing at all, yet people ace like it is. As for the thing about him performing to his career and that being worse than 4-5 Cubs from last year....obviously that's skewed. My point was that it's not a foregone conclusion that he's going to crush the ball. Oh and the stuff about his career 118 OPS+ being weighed down by numbers early in his career is just flat out not true. He's rakes for his last 623 AB's. In 2006 he had a 114 OPS+. In 2005 is was 118. In 2004 it was 108. Ill say it again. He's been a great hitter for about the last full season's worth of PA. For the rest of his career he's just been okay. Like I said, I'm expecting him to be fine. I just don't know how we can be 100% sure that he's some stud hitter when he hasn't been for the majority of his career. Is it likely he'll be good? Probably, but it's far from a sure thing.