frostwyrm

Dusty and Sammy don't like each other. If the Cubs fall out of contention it would be really cool to bring Sammy back so he could hit his last homer at Wrigley but Hendry won't do that while Dusty is here.

Just looking at Sammy's numbers it's amazing nobody would give him a chance at the league minimum. The GMs must know something we don't.

If he bam, bam, bam, let him play at the end of last season, maybe the breaking in period is mostly over. Dusty let Hollandsworth, Dubois, Hairston, Gerut, and Lawton all have a chance before bam, bam, bam, giving LF to Murton. That makes Murton 6th in line, or 'Plan F' in Dusty's scheme. Only a giant ego like Dusty Baker would pat himself on the back when his Plan F succeeds in the dying moments of a failed campaign.

Not enough. He'll get a Burnett type contract, and likely even a little more than that.

I agree with everything you wrote. When Yanks/Bosox are in the equation any discussion of average payrolls is silly. Disregarding Sosa's money is silly too. Somebody paid out that money, and it wasn't the Orioles. Also, keeping Sosa certainly wouldn't have indicated an increased committment to winning.

Absurd. Anyway, like Vance, I've predicted Walker will play 2B as the primary if he is retained. I think he'll be somewhere between a regular and a platoon. If healthy maybe 110-120 games. That's certainly a possibility with Baker at the helm, but I think the only way Neifi sees that much playing time is if Walker is traded and no other 2B is brought in or there are major injuries again at SS and 2B. Injuries are the only reason why he has seen as much playing time as he has thus far, and I don't see any reasons why that should change. I was talking about Walker, not Neifi. I think Neifi will get anywhere from 50-100 starts at SS, depending Ronny's progress, and then another 10-20 starts at 2B (if Walker stays). I also think Neifi will see plenty of action at SS, even if Cedeno is playing well. I just can't see Dusty letting a righty rookie hit against all the good RHPs.

It's still not too late for Walker to be dealt. If a team has a 2B injury in spring training you can bet Walker will be avaliable.

its like saved by the bell, when zack and slater were friends, but then they fought, but then they were friends again. yup, these are my readers "Friends Forever".

I doubt it. I think he'll know when to quit. I don't think he'll willingly quit unless he starts to suck very very badly. Moderate suckage won't faze him.

Maddux is one of those athletes who will have to have the ball pried out of his hands and a security guard kick him out of the locker room before he quits.

I'd rather have K-Gonz @ 1yr/$700K than Neifi @ 2yrs/$5M.

Goatees have been pretty much mandatory for dumb lower class meatheads for a long time, although some decent people have them too. Personally I think goatees should have become passé about the same time the mullet did. They don't intimidate anyone anymore, they just make people look like a sleazy stereotype, same as mullets do.

His contract/salary are prohibitive if the rest of MLB concludes he's not good enough to be an everyday player, which is exactly what will happen if he continues on his current path.

I thought they were going to try and lock-up Pierre long term. This doesn't mean they can't. They've done this lots of times _ avoid arbitration and then sign a guy to a multiyear deal in spring training. they did it last season with Aramis, and nearly gave me a heart attack when they waited til opening day to sign him long term to that goofy contract. BTW, Bruce, has there been any indication of Aramis wanting to exercise that opt out clause? Ramirez repeatedly has said he wants to stay with the Cubs. There's been no talk of him opting out, but if he hits 40 HR and drives in a ton of runs with an OBP of .356, all bets might be off. I'm sorry Mr. Miles. I understand that you write for an established newspaper. How do you know what OBP is? Nicely played. Stick with the Daily Herald, the only paper in town that routinely gives OBP figures in stories and dares to dip in to the dangerous waters of sabermetrics. No way. You should be more like the guys on ESPN 1000 and talk a lot about pitchers' W-L records.

Wasn't it 1 year $3m? That's less than Neifi's 2 year $5m contract. The 2006 salary may be more, but the 1 year vs 2 year committment makes a big difference. I'd much rather have Gonzalez than Neifi at their current prices. The extra 500K Gonzalez makes this year would be a very small penalty compared to an extra year of Neifi at 2.5M.

We joke about base-clogging but it's true that an exceptionally slow runner such as McGriff or a hobbled Aram actually does clog the bases. IMO as long as you keep the true slugs off the team then speed is not a big factor is determining how much you score. A roster full of good hitters with mostly average speed and a few slightly below average is fine by me.

I don't mean to nitpick, Soul, but in 2004 Aramis didn't really miss any extended time beyond 5-6 games straight games due to injury, and in 2003 he was pretty healthy for both Pittsburgh and us. 2001-158 games 2002-142 games 2003-159 games 2004-145 games 2005-123 games It's not like he's a china doll. If he's worked on his flexibility and lower body this winter, you shouldn't see any nagging injuries this year. No, I totally agree. And he's still young, too. Alot of times a young ballplayer will pick up the offseason discipline as his career progresses. There's definitely alot to look forward to with ARam as long as he plays his cards right. I remember 2004, and he did play. But I remember many of those games he was in pretty bad shape. He tried to tough it out which is a good sign as well. I just want to see the kid take the next step and become the perennial superstar he has the talent to be. I think it's time for him to make that move. He's too young to be this slow, too-----men in their late 20's need not become slow pokes no matter what they do for a living. Im 2005 he ran slower than Fred McGriff in a lot of games. In the really bad ones he didn't even run, he just jogged, and his defense was lame too.

Not completely, though I don't think it would be fair to say it's completely the fault of Baker or the people he chose to hit in front of Lee, either. Here's a table that focuses on Lee's time hitting 3rd or 4th in 2005. It shows the number of PA he had with each base state, the percentage of his total PA with each base state, the league average for 3rd and 4th hitters, and the difference between Lee's actual totals and the number of PA he'd have gotten if he'd had the same ratio of PA's in each base-state as other middle-of-the-order hitters: State Lee PA Lee PA% (L) PA% PA Diff. ---------------------------------------------- 0 359 57.1% 51.5% 35 1 116 18.4% 19.8% -9 12 30 4.8% 7.4% -16 123 6 1.0% 2.1% -7 13 19 3.0% 3.6% -3 2 63 10.0% 10.0% 0 23 10 1.6% 2.0% -3 3 26 4.1% 3.6% 3 ---------------------------------------------- Totals 629 100.0% 100.0% 0 In short, Lee came up to bat with the bases empty 35 more times than the typical #3 or #4 hitter and had 23 fewer opportunities with runners in scoring position. Clearly his RBI production was hurt by the players hitting in front of him -- he had 73 fewer runners on base in his PA than average -- but exactly how much did his RBI total suffer? Let's look at how often Lee and other 3rd/4th hitters converted the various base-states to RBI in 2005: State RBI RBI/PA (L) RBI/PA PA Diff. RBI Diff. 0 31 0.086 0.040 35 3.1 1 12 0.103 0.100 -9 -0.9 12 11 0.367 0.302 -16 -6.0 123 5 0.833 0.744 -7 -6.2 13 13 0.684 0.467 -3 -2.3 2 13 0.206 0.191 0 0.0 23 7 0.700 0.501 -3 -2.0 3 15 0.577 0.373 3 1.9 Totals 107 ----- ----- 0 -12.5 Had Lee gotten a base-state breakdown like a typical #3 or #4 hitter he probably would have had 10-15 more RBI. Of course the operative phrase there is "typical" #3 or #4 hitter on an average offense. The Cubs' offense was slightly below average for an NL team last year (703 runs vs. the league average of 721), so that explains some of the difference. The rest can probably be attributed to having extra-poor hitters in front of him, which in turn can mostly be blamed on Baker. Still, it's unlikely that Perez and Patterson hitting 1st or 2nd cost Lee more than 10 RBI compared to having average top of the order hitters. Considering the average line of players batting 1st or 2nd was .276/.333/.405 the Cubs didn't have a lot of options better than average. Walker certainly qualifies, but he usually was used up top when he was in the lineup. (About 70% of his PA came out of the #2 slot.) Murton wouldn't have been a bad option, but he was only with the team for a couple months. That only leaves Barrett, unless you want to stick Aramis in the two hole. Most of the blame for Lee's relatively low RBI totals pretty much rests on the fact that the Cubs were a poor offensive team last year. Hitting Perez and/or Patterson in front of Lee did cost him some RBI -- probably about 10 or 15 or so -- but I can't blame Baker for any more than that. I would agree with your analysis if Lee had put up average numbers for a #3 or #4 hitter, but he didn't. He put up MVP calibre numbers, so I think you're underestimating his lost RBIs if you compare him to all 3-4 hitters as a group. Diffusion has already shown that hitters who produced as many XBHs(99) as Lee did in 2005 have historically produced 133 RBI, and I'm sure that some of those players weren't on great teams, just as Lee wasn't.

Using those numbers, average team scored 93 runs in the first inning. Cubs scored 58, allowed 91. It gets worse. The Cubs were tied for 7th in MLB with 24 HR in the 1st inning. Way to set the table, Cubbies!

Amazing facts there, Diffusion. I had been under the impression that Dusty Baker probably screwed Derrek Lee out of an MVP award, now I don't think there's any question about it. Someone should really show this stuff to Lee. Getting the team's stars angry at Dusty would be the fastest way to get rid of him.

If the above projections prove correct Hendry deserves to be fired.

I have no clue when Ramirez took his place in the "Cub Whipping Boy 2005-6" line, but I just don't get it. He got hurt. So what? It happens. He's on a conditioning routine, and he's been the team's most consistently good player the past 2 seasons. BA aside, he was having as good of a season as Lee was having before he got hurt, but people don't remember this. People rag on him for "not running out ground balls". With a hurt quad and a sore hamstring. So, he ran hard down the line to beat out a DP and completely pulled his quad. And gets ripped for getting hurt. I've seen this pattern of "Can do no right" before, and it's crap. He's the best offensive player the Cubs have (Lee needs to do it more than once for me to think last season was anything but an aberration), and thusly, should be cut some slack. If he comes into camp out of shape (which I really doubt given the offseason training he's done), then rag on him if he gets hurt. But injuries happen. Let's not lose sight of that in a mad rush to have a highly paid scapegoat. Look at Aram's legs. They are obviously lacking in both size and muscle definition compared to a typical power hitter. I see no evidence of a real committment to fitness in those legs. I bet I could walk down the street and point out random pedestrians with more impressive legs than Aram's. That has to change. http://chicago.comcastsportsnet.com/images/content/cubs/cubs-041605.jpg I'm not sure how you can glean all that out of a picture, through his pants. And I wonder how you can't glean any of that. I think it's pretty obvious from that picture that Aram's legs are underdeveloped.

Looks to me like the Cubs outscored the opponents by 47 runs from the 6th inning and on (not counting extras). What's wrong with that? What was it you said a while back, IIRC it was "relief pitching is one third of 35% of the game"?

I only have this breakdown for the CUBS, so I can't really compare it to other teams for you. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 Total CUBS 58 79 75 101 63 121 72 72 52 7 2 1 0 0 0 0 703 Opponents 91 88 61 71 115 65 74 85 53 0 7 4 0 0 0 0 714 That first inning was a killer many a game last year. Check it out, the Cubs were DEAD LAST in the majors in runs scored in the 1st inning with 58. There were only 2 other teams with less than 73. It's also worth noting that this milestone was achieved with Derrek Lee batting in the 1st inning of all but 18 games. Just underscores what an absolute sack of crap Neifi Perez is.

I have no clue when Ramirez took his place in the "Cub Whipping Boy 2005-6" line, but I just don't get it. He got hurt. So what? It happens. He's on a conditioning routine, and he's been the team's most consistently good player the past 2 seasons. BA aside, he was having as good of a season as Lee was having before he got hurt, but people don't remember this. People rag on him for "not running out ground balls". With a hurt quad and a sore hamstring. So, he ran hard down the line to beat out a DP and completely pulled his quad. And gets ripped for getting hurt. I've seen this pattern of "Can do no right" before, and it's crap. He's the best offensive player the Cubs have (Lee needs to do it more than once for me to think last season was anything but an aberration), and thusly, should be cut some slack. If he comes into camp out of shape (which I really doubt given the offseason training he's done), then rag on him if he gets hurt. But injuries happen. Let's not lose sight of that in a mad rush to have a highly paid scapegoat. Look at Aram's legs. They are obviously lacking in both size and muscle definition compared to a typical power hitter. I see no evidence of a real committment to fitness in those legs. I bet I could walk down the street and point out random pedestrians with more impressive legs than Aram's. That has to change. http://chicago.comcastsportsnet.com/images/content/cubs/cubs-041605.jpg