MattyJLCC

My thoughts exactly...The first head rolls for a failed season which seemed promising. I look for a few others to also drop before the end of this season. I am guessing that the Dodgers and Jim Tracy could part ways soon. Felipe Alou may take the heat for a failed season in San Fran, although without Bonds in the lineup, this season is probably just scrapped all around. And of course, I believe that if the Cubs continue to play heartless ball and slide much in the standings that Dusty will be de-throned here in Chi-Town. Here's hoping atleast!

I'd be really dissapointed if Hairston Jr. was let go. I dont feel there's any legit reason to release a utility guy like Jerry who functions well in the role of being a super sub. He may not be a starter quality outside of 2B, but he's functioned decently at CF filling in for a inept Patterson. Granted, he's not done great, but he's done better than Patterson who he replaced. I don't understand why Patterson may possibly be brought up when he still seems to be struggling in AAA (I know about the flu stuff, but still think he's not seemed to turn the corner). Hairston still has a decent amount of value for our team and for other teams. I think many teams would love to have a guy like Jerry on their team and I highly doubt he'd clear waivers. If we're going to get rid of him, he better bring us something of value, even if it's prospects. Losing him and gaining nothing would be a really stupid, stupid move on the part of cub management.

hey Bruce, any chance at all the HoopsCubs may be correct in the idea of Macias being DFA'ed? We're all keeping our fingers crossed that it will be one of the upcoming moves this friday.

hmm...I never thought about the Chi Sox being in contention for Manny, but that makes sense...with the Big hurt seemingly eternally hurt, they are in need of a big bat to power their offense and push them into the playoffs. Manny could be a good fit on the South Side... Granted, that would really sting cubs fans, but if the Chi Sox could put together some prospects I could see them being a great dark horse team to land Manny from the BoSox.

I am in agreement....whatever happens, I would put Murton on a list of prospects that we must keep. He's shown too much talent and giftedness in his stint this year to be trade fodder, even if it is for someone like Manny R or Soriano...

Our goal is to trade pitching surplus or guys like Patterson, Holly, Walker(?), etc...not giving up a cornerstone of our team. There's no way that Jim moves A-Ram...he was in love with the guy when he got him from Pitt and Rammy's only secured his place with the past few seasons. In my opinion, A-ram, D-Lee, Prior, and big Z are all un-moveable on this team. Those are the 4 guys that I see Hendry holding on to regardless of all possibilities. Probably Pie and mabye Hill as well from the minors system, but Im not as confident about those 2.

I think this will more than likely be the case if we do land Soriano. He's a 2B by trait, not an OF, and I would look for walker to be spun for a relief pitcher if the Soriano deal goes through. Perhaps Jim feels that if we can load our infield with big bats as mentioned before (A-Ram, Nomah, Soriano and D-Lee) then we could get by with a guy like Murton in LF who are great hitters but not a lot of pop. Now if only Murty could get some regular PT that'd be great...

I posted this in another Soriano thread, but I thought it also fitting here. I for one would love to see Soriano put into the 2B hole next year with a really young outfield with great OBP top of the order guys filling our outfield.

I think that Mitre would be a similar player to the likes of Heilman - they both have a limited amount of ML experience over the past 3 years (Heilman with a little more starting experience as the Cubs have used Mitre out of the pen quite a bit), both show promise, but to this point have consistantly high ERA's and have not put it all together. Im not completely sure what kind of pitcher Petit projects to be, although I cant think that we don't have someone of equivelance in our plethora of pitching in the minors. Possibly send them Rusch and Mitre even? As for Dellucci, I dont think he's anything near a long term help for this team. As a 31 yr old journeyman who has put together 1 decent season, I dont see him as anything this team would want or need. He'd be another Holly, Grieve, Neifi, etc... a decent player off the bench but not someone who's going to make an impact in a starting role for years to come. We do not need anymore good bench players clogging our starting lineup.

From an article @ the Jersey Star Ledger refering to the Mets and Rangers working out a deal for Soriano. If the Rangers are wanting 1 ML ready pitcher and 1 good Prospect, we could easily assemble something along those lines to make a deal happen. I like the idea of plugging Soriano into 2nd Base and using walker in LF or even as a ph off the bench and knocking Neifi down on the depth chart a little bit. I have a hard time seeing the Cubs make a major move for an OF bat that will be helpful for the future unless it's a player that could shift to RF after Burnitz leaves. It seems as though the Cubs may be content with Murton in LF for the future, and Pie seems to be the CF answer of the future, leaving only RF open for any kind of trade that would be for an impact player for the following few years. In addition, I'm still hopeful that C-Pat turns it around at some point. If this is the case, we could possibly be looking at a 2006 OF of Murton (LF), Pie (CF), and Patterson (RF). I think that a future OF of that makes the addition of a guy like Soriano at 2B a huge addition. 2B seems to be one of the only positions on this team that we do not have any major pieces fitting for the future few years. Soriano could fill that space well. How 'bout a lineup like this for 2006? Pie Murton Lee Aram Soriano Cedeno/Nomar? Patterson Barrett Pitcher

http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/3745186 Has anyone else read the idiotic verbal outpouring of Rob Dibble on the msn.foxsports.com web site? Its a cover story complaining about how great Jeter is and how the upcoming all star game is a fluke without the games "greatest" players involved. In one of his many rants of Jeter's greatness, he actually compares Jeter to Michael Jordan... What is this guy smoking? Jeter is no perenial All-Star, let alone a player who's dominated his sport for a century. What he is, however, is one of the most overrated, overhyped, and annoying players in the MLB today. Jeter is no Jordan, he's more like the Robert Horry of baseball. People call him "clutch" because of all the supposed big hits he has, but no one seems to remember all the crap plays at SS with his shoddy defense or his many strikeouts with runners in scoring position. Clutch is the result of a short memory of only good events and the ability of the human mind to forget about the bad times.

I dunno how accurate this thing is, but on ESPN there's a "gameday statpack" that you can download. It doesnt show a specefic lineup, but it has Dubois starting in LF and Hairston starting at 2B. Is this accurate or is this just some prediction by ESPN people rather than the actual lineup? http://sportsmed.starwave.com/AdobePDF/mlb250705115.pdf

While I understand the attempt at humor, don't forget - we try to keep things on a G to PG level here. (That, and the imagery is a bit much. I never was a big Sammy fan, but eww!) a little graphic, but it got a true LOL from me when I read it...

Thanks for the answers Tim. Could you explain a little more what happened to Nic Johnson, and if there seems to be any hope of him making a ML impact at any time? Nic Jackson has had several different injuries plague him the past few years. The big one was when he splintered his shin bone when he fouled a ball off of it just a bit into the 2003 AA season. Then he missed most of last year with shoulder problems stemming from a head first slide into third base in the first game of the AAA season. Nick Johnson is a first baseman for Washington, btw. yeah, I was asking about Jackson...sorry for the name mixup. I do like Nick Johnson too though now that you mention him.

Thanks for the answers Tim. Could you explain a little more what happened to Nic Johnson, and if there seems to be any hope of him making a ML impact at any time?

As I was looking at the rankings, I agreed with most of them from what I've heard or read myself about some of our young tallent. A few ?'s... -Nic Johnson - whats the story? I expected to see him atleast among the top 30...whats the latest on him? is he just developing slowly, not reaching the potential that was assumed? -With the eval of Dopi, how soon could we expect to see him crack the ML roster? -I've been a big fan of Guz for a while now and am excited to hopefully see him put together a full season this year. That being said, does he have a valid shot at making the ML roster this season? -Sergio Mitre? Where's he fit into all of this? He didnt make the roster cuts so he's still in the system...

Congrats Hoops. Thanks for all the great stuff you bring to this board - great ideas, researched information, tons of articles that you dig up, and great insight about baseball. Thanks also to Tim and Mark. This site is awesome. Its the first place I go every time I get online. I cant wait to see what the newest topic is or any "breaking news" that really happened concerning the cubbies. Its a great board, with real class and real great information.