neely crenshaw

I guess it's just my worry. Some of that stems from the Shark situation. I think he will be traded, and not for any pitching that is near ready to be an ace. So looking at that, if do not try to draft one here, I don't see how we can buy or trade for 1. Which leaves us with a huge hole to fill and no one even close to being there. Now we have done a nice job of finding arms, but we have also had the luxury of already having Shark, Garza, Dempster and now Wood, so we only had to patch together the back end. If we deal Hammel and Samardzija, We are looking at Arrieta as potentially our best, and then Wood who has slipped a bit, then Jackson, Mcdonald, Hendricks or Villanueva. Not exactly awe inspiring. It's probably just my Cubs fan negativity showing up, but I don't like the idea of HS position player being added at #4. No matter the comparisons Jackson is not Harper. Harper already left HS early, played a year at a top Juco, and hit like 30 bombs using a wood bat there. Not saying he won't be as good, I'm just saying he is not coming to Wrigley anywhere near as soon as Harper made it to Washington.

Read were if Aiken doesn't go #1 he could fall to 4, which would be nice. I am dreading the draft quite a bit. I think this pick will send strong messages about how soon we are looking to be competitive. If we draft a HS position player, I don't see us looking to add big talent for at least another year. If we add someone, particularly a pitcher that is near ready, we might be close to making those moves. Obviously even Aiken wouldn't be ready real soon, but he has the makings of a true ace, and right now we absolutely need to develop our own because it will be tough to buy or trade for one. If we are talking Jackson or Gordon, it could 4 to 5 seasons until they are even on the radar to come up. I really wish Hoffman did not get hurt, then their would be 4 pitchers in the mix at the top.

I don't think that sounds to crazy or out of line. I could see them paying more possibly. Soriano had less time left on his deal but also was producing. We got a good class A pitcher and paid 75% of the deal. Black was rated 25th best prospect in the Yankee organization, Vogelbach is our 9th rated. Obviously a lot more cash to cover for his deal, but the Dodgers don't seem shy about spending. he's not producing like 21mil player but even in his terrible years he's not bad(.725 ops), and most of that is in Dodger stadium, Wrigley in summer and playing full-time would have to help

You're basically looking at last season as a starter and the first quarter of this season. It's what he has done as a starter, which obviously has been solid BUT most of that is last season, and until he shows it's his "norm" there should be concerns about what he will produce especially with his defensive flaws. Good point on change, unless you have someone special like a Posey or Molina, change over every few years is probably a good idea. Can't say there's a stat for it but I have to believe catching almost everyday in the daytime heat has got to take a toll on production. let's just hope he warms up like last year and gets back to that production

That's great but most of that is from last year. He is producing .4 thru 25% of the games this year, which puts him at 1.6 war for this year. What he did last year does not help us much now. Geovanny Soto had 2 nice season for us, where he put up 3.6 and 3.7 war, but he has never done that again. If Castillo rebounds, great but it's not a sure thing. War is very much a reflective stat. It can tell you who had a good year, but it is not very good as a predictive stat.

Tipping pitches or stealing signs? Easy fix for sign stealing. Shark's 98 mph heater in Braun's backside, with the verbal message-stop stealing signs. Then let 'em know it'll happen every time they think it's happening. Sooner or later Braun will tell them to quit.

If Bryant ends up in the OF, he can platoon with Valbuena...but strict platoon, zero AB's against righties. He still has a .956 OPS against lefties. If Olt is out and Bryant goes to OF doesn't that make 3b the obvious landing spot for Baez? Lot easier to find a 2b, and especially with Watkins (and others) near ready as 2b.

We mentioned Kemp during the Stanton rant. What about looking at him? Obviously he has been injured, unhappy and not exactly himself stat-wise. All which could be could for lowering trade value. He has a big deal 5 years-107 mil left after this year. He seems to be in a similar situation to Soriano-probably even worse because of length of deal, and he isn't producing-which at Soriano was. We certainly haven't been shy about spending money to get rid of players, paying players to play for others, so paying 20 mil for a guy who actually plays for you isn't any worse than paying almost 20 for Z and Soriano to play elsewhere. Kemp could bounce back at least offensively in a much friendly home park, and playing full-time. Beyond that I have to believe if the dodgers want anything in return, they are going to have to pay a lot of his salary, maybe all of it. They do not need him, they have 3 other OF's playing better, and possibly there best is tearing up triple A. So maybe for a low level prospect or 2, we could land a potentially free or low cost all star bat. Because of his problems I wouldn't want to pay him anything near full salary or give up much, but it might be a low enough gamble on cost and assets to look at. The Dodgers need to deal him, and I'm sure they want to deal him. I also know they probably don't want to deal him to anyone that could compete with them now or in the near future-which doesn't leave many options. I'm sure they would love to get some value but I don't see many takers on his salary or for good prospects. I know they don't want to DFA him, then he could go anywhere and I'm sure he'd love to find a place to go against them. Maybe Vogelbach or similar would get it done. It sure looks like his value to this organization is to be a trade chip.

Evidently you didn't hear the sports minute, had nothing to do with winning championships. I would guess if it had, he would have mentioned Williams in the piece, and how he didn't win one.

I thought the same with Wood last year. Kept waiting for the other shoe to drop but it didn't. Arrieta certainly has the stuff to be a very solid starter.

I have to agree. It would be nice to say that Ricketts will throw everything at him to keep him but it doesn't mean he'll take our offer. At 26 Stanton will be the next one that is talked about getting to the 300 mil level. If we offer 320 for 10 years and the Yankees offer 300 for 10, do you think he'll stay for an extra 2 mil a year at that point? If we do have an extension in hand, then it makes perfect sense to go for it. Like Tim said we are hoping that Baez or Bryant become what Stanton is, So if you want to throw in the caveat that we trade for him and sign him long term, it ends the argument. My argument simply was that it doesn't make sense because we probably can't sign him long term. So we are trading for 2 years of improved play, not a long term part. Unfortunately, I think that is probably the case in reality.

No one is saying they wouldn't want to extend him, I'm saying there is no guarantee that they could, and track record right now says they probably won't be able to. I clearly said that if they could extend him it would make more sense to trade the prospects but we have no idea if they could. Right now the history shows we have targeted Sanchez and Tanaka, and were outbid on both. The words I believe they said were "we will not be outbid for Tanaka". Which of course, they were outbid by 50 million. I also worry that even with the highest bid, until we have our upgrades in place at Wrigley and in talent, the top guys won't be interested no matter what our offer. I also think that if we have the ability to sign him long term, why not wait until he's a FA and not lose any prospects. I have no problem paying him a monster, long term deal to get him at 26 compared to giving away prospects and risk losing him and the prospects in 2 seasons. At least if we don't sign him at that point, we aren't out anything. With the serious chance of losing Shark, trading for Stanton, with no other large moves doesn't even get us to .500. That's just taking for granted that they will again be able to re-stock the pitching staff and role players after they lose at least Hammel and Bonifacio.

yes, you can draft prospects but in most cases you would be many years away from getting them to the bigs to help. looking at who's close for us, we have Baez, Bryant and Hendricks. Watkins and Alcantara possibly but without the impact of the others. Realistically to get Stanton, it takes 2 of the top 3, and maybe Alcantara or Almora-if not more lower prospects. If we add Stanton, and only have Baez and Watkins ready to come up, we are then waiting for guys in A ball to develop, and I don't see that happening in 2 years. Stanton would be ideal for what we need but I think we are better off trying to sign him later, rather than trade for him, in what would likely be a bidding war, for 2 guaranteed years and then hope to re-sign him.

You can only talk about this team so much. Yes, I would say he's missing Ted Williams.. .316 .451 .645 1.096 with 29 hrs at the age of 41 .344 .482 .634 1.116 for his career over 19 seasons not to mention his missed 3 years in his prime for WWII right after near back to back triple crowns in 41 and 42 Career War of 126.6, average of 6.6 per season- Ortiz's best season ever 6.4 For almost 10,000 plate appearances he was on base almost 50% of the time Big Papi's best season ever doesn't compare to his career averages You can then bring up Larry Bird, Red Auerbach, Bill Belichick, Roger Clemens…

If you can extend him, you can sign him and not lose prospects. You could make the case that having him already would help, but in our case it could be as much a hinderance. "IF" we knew we had him long term, it would make much more sense but it would be an absolute toss up as to whether we could extend him. So we would have to look at mortgaging our future, for two years on a team that isn't ready to seriously compete. Now if they make numerous moves to improve the ML team, it also makes more sense but outside of our fantasies they have shown no hint of looking to do that. I just don't see the FO doing everything to build the system, and then ransack it before we are actually ready. It sucks for the fans, but it sure seems short-sighted to sell out our prospects to try to win 80 games for a couple seasons. I don't think they tried to build the system just to then have to "buy" players anyway in 2017. Losing Shark for prospects, also only minimizes the impact getting Stanton would bring.

During John Feinstein's CBS Sports minute, he proclaimed that Ortiz had now earned his way onto Boston's Mt. Rushmore of sports, along side Bill Russell, Bobby Orr and Tom Brady. Anyone see something wrong there?

That's pretty tough to do, especially starting at only .275…which in itself is a problem.

Stanton is basically the dream of what we hope one of those guys turns into. Exactly but in this scenario we get Stanton for 2 seasons. Is that worth selling out a lot of what has been built? It would be nice to add a bat like that, but it would be for a limited, short time improvement. If the Astros added Stanton would they be playoff contenders? of course not. Right now we are the worst team in baseball, its time some people stop thinking we are that close to winning. As far as Stanton goes, if we want him long term, it makes more sense to bring our guys along, and then try to get him as a free agent after 2016. He is the type of bat that could put us over the top, but we aren't close enough to the top yet.

but he's gone after 2 seasons. Isn't it possible that Bryant is near that type of bat in the very near future? I don't think you get this done without Baez or Bryant being part of it. So you are selling out many years of 2 probable studs, for 2 years with 1 definite one. Unfortunately it sure look alike during those 2 years the rest of the team would not be ready to be a serious playoff team, so without other moves, we sell out the high end of our system for two years of being OK.

We'd be better but not ready to compete. Add Stanton to the middle=very nice. Stanton isn't a salary dump, so he is not coming cheap. Project Stanton to win 10 games, and Baez 5. Our current squad is on pace to win 60, so that gets us to 75 wins- and that's with everyone else staying status quo. The deal would guarantee us Stanton for only 2 years. Then he's gone, and we are without Bryant, Hendricks and others for two seasons of winning 75-80 games. Now if we can make a deal to keep both Bryant and Baez, and get him signed for a long haul, that would change everything. I just don't see that we are ready to make the playoffs in the next 2 seasons, and it isn't worth selling the farm. Better off hoping for those revenue streams come, and we knock his socks off with a huge offer after 2016. Then you would have Bryant, Baez, and Alcantara on board. Hendricks and hopefully the pitcher from the Shark deal ready, with Edwards, Soler, and Almora all close. That would then make sense to find that huge bat(or arm) to put us all the way over.

That was well written. We have a nice farm system, but not terribly deep at the top. If we drain all the near ready talent to get one big bat or arm, are we any closer to competing?

I don't see how there is any way we can trade for a top tier player without dismantling a lot of the work that has been done to re-build the system. For someone like Stanton to Price, it'll more MLB ready talent than we can give up. I don't see how we could get either without Baez or Bryant involved, and that with possibly Shark. If you look at what Tampa got for Shields(with Davis added as a throw-in) KC's player prospect, last years ROTY myers, a MLB ready big arm in Odorizzi, a super talented young lefty in montgomery and a top young prospect in Leonard. Now I wouldn't put Kemp in that category. Because he does have issues, he could probably be had for much less. Add in that they have many options, and he could be expendable. That would obviously come with risks.

I think Hammel (4.97), Feldman(5.09), Arrieta (7.23) and even Strop (7.25) qualify as being fixed. They were all given up on by their former team, and posted ERA's 5.00 or over. We have also seem Wood and Samardzija reach or start to reach their potential. He's older, but if he came cheap, he could be a decent chip. They say he is healthy, if he is, and he rebounds, he could get interest like Maholm did. Veteran lefty starter could gather some interest at the deadline. On the other hand, I don't know how the Yankees, Angels and even White Sox don't take a look at him now.

DFA'd today. He has been bad this year but if the Cubs have done one thing well it's fix broken starting pitchers. Until this year he has been very consistent posting between a 3.02 and 3.79 every season since 2008. With other potential starter deals certainly coming at some time this summer, might be insurance or if we fix him, another chip.

Right now there is now way we could come away disappointed in what we would get in a deal. We have all the leverage. We still have control, don't have to trade him and can still play the "we are trying to re-sign" him card. I just hope he continues to be great, and sooner or later a contender will come looking for a big arm to put him over the top. If you look at what they have gotten for arms like Maholm, Dempster, Garza and Feldman. I don't see how they won't find a very nice haul from a willing participant.. I could see why writers and fans may doubt them signing big name players but with what they have pulled off for 2nd tier or lower starting pitchers, I don't know how you can doubt they'll get great value for Samardzija