frostwyrm

Team America, f*** yeah! I was watching that movie and decided to create a North Korea themed profile. I may put some panthers in soon.

I fully do not understand some posters in this thread. How can anyone not see that Hendry has influenced the market for relievers? It's so incredibly obvious. Eyre had all 30 teams interested and he never even bothered negotiating. Howry had lots of suitors too, but he accepted Hendry's offer immediately. I also don't get this "big names set the market" crap. If 30-something mediocrities like Eyre and Howry get huge contracts how can that possibly not drive up the prices of everyone else too?

Really? Perez .681 OPS compared to Podsednik's .700 last year seems pretty comparable to me? Pods .671 in 2004 is below Neifi's career .681. Neifi is probably slightly more valuable defensively (certainly if Pods is playing left). Basically, Podsednik has had one good season. I don't see any reason to think his contributions are any more than Neifi's. Oh, and I am quite certain quite a few GMs consider VORP when making transactions. They also use PECOTA. And Beane does listen to scouts - case in point how long TLong hung around Oakland. Neifi has gotten 57% of his career at bats with the Rockies. Podsednik has gotten 0% of his career at bats with the Rockies.

Oooh, good question. The scuttle-butt on this bd. has often been "why are we paying so much money to a middle reliever?" Darn good question. Wish I had an answer. That's one way to look at it, I was thinking that a lot of people love to ride wood for his injuries limiting his pitching time, yet would be fine paying a closer similar money (on an IP basis). I wouldn't dream of paying any closer what Kerrey is making.

This is more proof that closers are grossly overvalued. It's insane to pay $9.4M for 5 seasons for a guy who will pitch maybe 70 innings, many of them against the bottom of the opposing order with a multi-run lead and nobody on base.

Maybe Grudz is thinking "if Scott Eyre gets 3yrs/$11M I have to be worth at LEAST that much".

Um, sure, other teams were just beating down our door to get their hands on the likes of Roberto Novoa, Todd Wellemeyer, Sergio Mitre and crew. The excitement is/was just palpable!! Sometimes, it might be helpful to take off ones's Cub hat and for once, try and think as if you belonged to any other team. It is endemic to fandom I suppose, but you're not going to trade Wellemeyer and Cliff Bartosh for Bobby Abreu, OK? Or even a warm bucket of spit as far as that goes. "Lack of faith in our homegrown guys?" You better believe it, baby. And no other GM in baseball has any faith in these zeroes, either. Pffft. I think these guys had SOME value before the Eyre/Howry signings, but at this point, I doubt they have any. There's no way Hendry can fool another GM into thinking the Cubs were high on these guys for 2006.

I really wish Hendry had tried trading some of our other relievers before hastily signing Eyre/Howry. Now Hendry's total lack of faith in our homegrown guys has been exposed before they could be dealt.

I don't think our bench can be Dusty proofed other than undeniable success. Murton needs to deliver right out of the gate if he wants to be the everyday starter in LF. I agree, we can't completely Dusty-proof the bench, but not having a veteran LH-batting 4th OF is still a worthy goal.

I'd be a lot happier to get Mabry if he didn't bat lefty. If RH-batting Murton starts slowly, it's dangerous to have a veteran LH-batting OF option waiting in the wings. It could be another Holla/Dubois situation.

That Thome contract was awful. I remember the dorks on cubs.com demanding that the Cubs match Philly's offer.

You seem to think Howry has turned a corner in his career at age 32. No one here disputes that Howry had a career year, but do you actually believe that one year represents what he is likely to do in the future?

What's funny is Kerry will probably land in the bullpen sometime next year. If we also have Howry, Eyre, and Dempster, that will be the most expensive Cubs bullpen we are likely to see this decade.

Oops, sorry! :oops:

Market forces never had a chance to assert themselves. Eyre's agent has stated that negotiating started and ended with the Chicago Cubs.

From Tom Verducci's column in Sports Illustrated: That quote by the agent is informative. Considering that Eyre immediately took Hendry's offer and never even negotiated with other teams, Hendry may not only have outbid himself, he may possibly have single-handedly moved the entire FA market upwards. Way to go, Jim! http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2005/writers/tom_verducci/11/22/verducci/index.html?cnn=yes

The market decided the price? How so? Despite all 30 teams being interested in Eyre, the Cubs were the only team to actually put a concrete bid on the table, said bid being very high, and Eyre jumped on it before anyone else even had a chance to negotiate with him. That's practically a dictionary-perfect example of outbidding oneself. The market never even got a chance to have a say in the matter.

Didn't need proof. As recently as two weeks ago, Eyre's agent said they had at least been casually contacted by every team in baseball. There is a premium for effective setup men nowadays, Hendry realizes this, took the bull by the horns, and made sure he got his men (if indeed Howry is signed). For once, I am impressed with Hendry's effort, even if some here are impatient for action at the field positions. From the Tribune: Scott Eyre was so intent on becoming a Cub he accepted their three-year, $11 million offer without trying to find out if he could get more elsewhere. "We never negotiated with the other teams," agent Tommy Tanzer said I bet Eyre's agent told his client to take the deal before Hendry could put down the crack pipe. Seriously, I really have to suspect Hendry outbid himself. http://chicagosports.chicagotribune.com/sports/baseball/cubs/cs-051118cubseyre,1,6706818.story?coll=cs-cubs-headlines

I'm not neccessarily saying signing these relievers is a good thing. And I do view an impact RF as a necessity. But if you are gonna take away the importance of each bullpen by spreading his worth over the other 5-6 guys in the pen, you should do the same for RF. hitting is 1/2, one player contributes 1/8 of that 1/2 or 1/16 to the team total. BP on the same type of rating would come out to about 1/36, depending on how much importance you place on the value of defense vs. pitching and starters vs. relievers. Technically a RF also adds to run prevention, but lets be honest we aren't looking for that. If you really wanna add in defense their importance is maybe 1/12. So a guy who contributes 1/12 to the team contributes 3times as much as the guy who contributes 1/36. So their salary should be 3 times as much. 3mil reliever x 3= 9mil RF. Now actually using such a system to actually evaluate how much to give players is ridiculous. I think you would agree. Plus it would be much more complicated. Another way of looking at it: preventing runs is 50% of the game, and is comprised of roughly 85% pitching and 15% defense, so pitching is 42.5% of the game. In 2005 Cubs relievers pitched 31% of the total innings, so their contibution to the overall team effort was 31% of 42.5%, which is 13.175%, and this is spread over a bullpen of 6-7 guys. A marginal improvement of the bullpen's 13-odd percentage contribution to the overall team effort is not worth the $7.7M that Eyre/Howry will make in 2006. They are not difference-makers except in terms of the salary they waste.

Oh I'm gonna go out on a limb and say he'll be terrible. Again. :lol: :cry: Yeah, but in 2005 he actually got within sniffing distance of a .700 OPS in a neutral park. Put him on the list of Cubs who are several years into their 30's, coming off a career year, with brand new big fat multi-year contracts from Jim Hendry. Let's see how long the list gets.

Hendry already had a habit of selling low, now he's also buying high. I don't see anything in Eyre's and Howry's numbers to make me believe they'll duplicate their 2005 performances, especially not at their ages. I could say the same about Neifi too.

Cedeno would have a better chance with the Cubs if he weren't a RH batter. I can't see Dusty trusting him to start against RH pitching when Neifi is an option. Also, has anyone considered that Cedeno might be playing SS in winter ball because shorstops are much more valuable trade bait than second basemen?

Rowand would be OK by me. We don't need a star, just a serviceable CF to fill the time before Pie is ready.

But why is that? Is that because Texas needs to shed payroll in order to take on Lowell? Maybe Florida feels entitled to a top prospect because they are picking up some of Lowell's contract. I'm advocating the Cubs pick up Lowell's entire deal for Beckett, and as such, not give anything back. I'm not saying you're wrong. I just want to know. If the Cubs come in and pick up 2 years and $18M, I would think Florida would say thank you very much. Hoops They have to get something tangible in return for both, unless they are ready to completely wash their hands of South Florida (which they very well might be). I just think they'd want a pitcher better than Rusch at minimum. I agree, and if the Marlins are cutting payroll why would they want Rusch at 2yrs/$6M?. He's hardly a bargain at that price. I also doubt the Marlins would willingly let a fantastic talent like Beckett get away for zero talent in return. There must be some way for them to move Lowell without it coming to that.

Would you be willing to take Beckett if there was a chance Lowell became a very expensive backup 1B/3B bench player? I don't see a whole lot of teams that are going to want him on their own. Beckett is too good of a talent to pass on lightly. Minnesota is interested in Lowell. Yankees want Torii Hunter. If I'm Hendry, I work out a 4-team deal a la the Nomar deal from 2004. Marlins trade Beckett and Lowell to the Cubs for Glendon Rusch, Adam Greenberg and a marginal pitching prospect, but with the Cubs picking up Lowell's entire contract. The Cubs turn around and deal Lowell, Walker, Patterson, a young pitching prospect and some cash (maybe $2M for Lowell) to Minnesota for Torii Hunter, and JC Romero. The Cubs then trade Hunter to the Yankees for Gary Sheffield. Net: Cubs get Beckett and Sheffield We get Beckett and Sheffield for some spare parts and $2M cash? Sounds way too good to be true.