Magnetic Curses

So you expect a guy with a mediocre career minor league OBP to improve upon that OBP in his rookie season? Yes, Edmonds is going to keep declining. Do you not understand the idea of aging ballplayers? Do you think all these injuries have been faked? do you understand that aging ballplayers are capable of good seasons? do you understand the concept of the 1 year deal? goodness gracious, goony, i'm not talking about signing this guy long term. relax.

first off, i don't know why you wouldn't want wood back at a reasonable, incentive-laden deal. it's a virtual no risk/high reward situation. i'm all for those. i agree with adding zito, but there were two train wrecks on this team last season, pitching and offense. pitching is much more important than offense, so an appropriate amount more should be spent on it.

I can't comprehend your inclusion of Mussina. He's an old inconsistent pitcher. He could easily be a mediocre 100 ERA+ guy next year, going on his recent track record. He could also easily fail to reach 200 IP again. How in the world can you justify putting him over highly productive lock offensive players. You are blinded by the need for pitching. inconsistent picther? first of all, he's fourth on my list. any of those first 3 i would take over him. no, he's a consistent innings eater that has had 2 below 100 era+ years in his entire career (99 and 98). no, history doesn't show he's due for a terrible year. his ERA+ was 125 this year, but i guess we can just assume he's bound for imminent disaster because he's 38.

That's some awful sneaky use of stats. What's the point of giving DLee's 2005? He'll never repeat that. Theriot's 2006 is meaningless. Barrett's career year? Beat up catchers decline quickly. Moore's AA OBP? His career OBP is .343. Edmonds didn't just have a fluke down year. He's in decline because he's an old cripple. You are filling a lot of full-time slots with part time players. There's no way that lineup gets 7 players over .350 OBP. And there's significant downside risk to many of those players. Not to mention a severe lack of SLG. ugh, so moore isn't going to improve yet edmonds is going to decline? THAT'S stupid. edmonds is an old cripple? before this season, when's the last time he played less than 142 games? barrett took a ball off the nads, not exactly a symptom of being injury plagued. Dlee had a major collision and had not been injured at all before that, plus is in the prime of his career. theriot and murton were both rookies and showed an ability to be productive-murton in a full time capacity and theriot in a situation in which he had to produce at any cost or risk demotion by his idiot manager. Clark has not had a major injury as far as i know.

the thing is, we can afford to throw enough money at them to get them. why not do that? Because it's stupid to put all your eggs in the pitching basket and ignore offense when offense has been your biggest problem for several years. You can cite the fluke teams that look good only because of pitching, but year in year out the real contenders are the teams that are good at pitching and hitting. It's asinine to purposefully make yourself a one dimensional team. i think it's more asinine to make yourself mediocre at both, which is all that would happen. might as well make yourslef excellent at pitching, when many teams have been successfull doing just that.

1. Zito 2. Schmidt 3. Matsuzak 4. Mussina

It might win a championship if the five starters average 22 wins and .05 ERA because that lineup is pitiful. okay, let's look at OBP, shall we? OBP's in last full year of baseball. Brady Clark-.348 (down year, it was over .380 at one point, .372 in 2005) Theriot-.412 (limited duty, but his IsoD is good) DLee-.418 (2005) Edmonds-.350 (down year) Barrett-.368 Moore- .360 (at west tenn) Murton-.365 Izturis-.282 it's lineup capable of having 7 players over the .350 mark. regardless of what you may have heard or might have believed in the past, that's a lineup capable of quietly putting up a lot of runs. pitiful? i doubt it. cost efficient and effective, yes.

the thing is, we can afford to throw enough money at them to get them. why not do that? it doesn't matter where people believe they will or will not go, the cubs have the money. and hendry's best quality is that he understands the place of pitching in the baseball dynamic. he misunderstands everything else, but he's got that going for him. if we get schmidt and zito (and we have the money) and make a few other more minor moves, we're instantly in the playoffs next year, assuming health (and poth pitchers have been healthy). there is not one other combination of players out there that can do that for us. not one.

Your mention of the hit and run just severely soured me on Girardi. The hit and run may very well be the worst call a manager can make, outside of choosing who plays. If the Cubs never again called for the hit and run as long as I lived, I'd feel much more confident in our ability to win a World Series before I die. No problem, there. It's just a form of baseball that I like to watch. I like the bunt too. The trick is, the players have to execute for that form of baseball to be effective. They did it in 89, and that is the year I fell in love with the Cubs. It's good baseball, and that is just my opinion. players are more effective when they're failing to execute bunts than when they're successful. whatever you've seen, it's wrong.

i wonder how many other hitters in the league that we could have acquired last season would have done much more with all of those plate appearances that pierre had.

We have enough money to improve both offensively and defensively, and to your point there aren't the pitchers out there to become an elite staff only. The best course of action would be to become better in both areas, and make sure you are balanced. Resigning Ramirez, signing Soriano and exploring a trade for a better CF or RF isone way to make your offense better. Pitchingwise, Zito and Schmidt aren't the end all, be all, but you can still get one of them, and combined with the above offense moves improve dramatically without busting the budget. Who said elite? The Cubs should be a top 5 run scoring team and top 5 run preventing team in the NL every year. It's not smart to try and just build around pitching. If your pitching falters, you are screwed. Pitching is less reliable anyway. Great pitchers go down or disappoint with far more regularity than great hitters. Improve the offense, improve the pitching. Try to avoid pathetic defenders, but don't focus on improving the defense. improve the pitching, how? how else are we going to improve the pitching significantly? by adding lilly? padilla? some other pitcher with a perpetual + 4.50 era? in order to significantly upgrade the pitching, and i mean to championship level, not just (and you'll love this one, goony) "competing within the division" level, we need to add TWO top of the rotation pitchers, TWO. there are 4 FA pitchers that i'd be okay with, i've posted the list. Zito Schmidt Matsuzaka Mussina get two of them and the cubs have a chance to win the world series NEXT year, with or without a top 5 offense.

That's a terrible idea. Neglecting the offense is exactly why this team has struggled so much. We don't have the money to put together an elite offense. OBP and SLG have become expensive. There are other ways to win...e.g. the 2006 Oakland A's. Pitching and defense really do matter. PITCHING matters, defense to a lesser extent. if the pitching is there, a bunch of below average fielders can get the job done. and it's not just the oakland a's who have had success with building a team around pitching. like i said, pretty much any world series contender has pitching. imo, USSoccer, simply adding vicente padilla is not going to do it for this staff.

That's a terrible idea. Neglecting the offense is exactly why this team has struggled so much. no, this team has struggled because of a lack of pitching. management's conventional view of offense has only added to the team's problems. a team can excel with a lack of offense, that much has been proven. it cannot excel with a lack of pitching. aram is a valuable part of the offense, no doubt, but if his departure means the pitching will be improved, i'm all for it. i'd give moore a chance. Well, the worst part is your obsession with Edmonds. he'd come cheaper than ramirez and likely put up a similar OPS. that's simple. i don't know how much money they have, but with a significant raise due for zambrano this offseason, there won't be the money you think is available, and who knows what effect the loss of macphail will have on payroll, it could go up or down. personally, i also don't know how much the addition of soriano AND CLee would improve this team without adding a significant amount of pitching as well. and the astros made the world series last season with almost no hitting to speak of. the white sox won the series without one .300 hitter.

he seems to be patient at the plate and he's cheap. that's all that matters. "making contact", "terrific speed", "excellent defense"--that stuff is just music--pretty, but near meaningless without the first two.

That's a terrible idea. Neglecting the offense is exactly why this team has struggled so much. no, this team has struggled because of a lack of pitching. management's conventional view of offense has only added to the team's problems. a team can excel with a lack of offense, that much has been proven. it cannot excel with a lack of pitching. aram is a valuable part of the offense, no doubt, but if his departure means the pitching will be improved, i'm all for it. i'd give moore a chance.

i disliked the article. "fundamentals", "making things happen", playing the game the "right" way. what does any of that really mean? anyway, field manager is a pointless job. at worst, he screws things up even worse than how hendry set it up. at best, he interjects reason into the crap that hendry put together with a conventional philosophy (not really conventional, as hendry's philosphy appears to be "put the ball in play at any cost", which isn't totally conventional-but for the sake of argument we'll call it that) and encourages his players to wait for the right pitch instead of the controlled flailing that has gone on the past couple of years. either way, the cubs won't be in the playoffs until hendry is fired and someone who understands how to achieve a semblance of efficiency in baseball is given his job. this man can then hire a "yes man" to operate the field product, someone who does not get in the way of an effective management ideaology. the house needed to be completely cleared, now, with a lame duck GM, things are even more disorganized than ever.

ideally? well, it's possible that: RF- Brady Clark 2b- Ryan Theriot 1b- Derrek Lee CF- Jim Edmonds C- Michael Barrett 3b- Scott Moore LF- Matt Murton SS- Cesar Izturis Bench: Restovich Pagan Graffanino Branyan Cedeno Blanco Rotation 1. Zambrano 2. Zito 3. Schmidt 4. Hill 5. Prior Relief Wood Howry Eyre Wuertz Novoa Ohman I think it's a championship team

i like the idea of obtaining drew, but his deal would cripple our ability to get pitching, which is what we really need. i also think that jones is desperate to be out of chicago, he hates the fans, pure and simple. i can't say that i blame him, but to repeatedly rail publicly against the people that help pay his check is bush league. hey jacque, maybe twins fans would be a little higher strung if they hadn't had a title in almost 100 years, ya think? but anyway, back to pitching. if we have to neglect the offense in order to field a good staff, i say do it. bring me two of zito, schmidt, matsuzaka, and mussina. let aram walk, play moore at third, sign edmonds. maybe jacque for brady clark and tony graffanino would do the job. it imroves our OBP and gives us a pretty decent utility infielder. the contracts work out, at least for next year, i think. if edmonds gets hurt, or has to miss some games, clark can play center, restovich/pagan can play right. our obp is improved without having to spend all of our available cash on high priced position players, plus our pitching is dominant. we're in the playoffs next season.

What does that mean? Most every team has a more or less fixed budget in any given year. Hendry often failed to use up the entire budget in the offseason, planning on taking on salary mid year. I say build the best team you can from Day 1, then play the midseason trades however you can. Don't handicap yourself from the start just to make room for theoretical future moves. I mean exactly what you later go on to say - build the best team can when you can, and don't handicap yourself. Hendry shouldn't have to bypass a better player just to stay under budget, whether it's offseason or for a theoretical midsummer move. Every year we see the same thing develop with the Cubs. They start with a fixed budget, attempt to fix last years most glaring weakness, then have very little left to fix other problems. I still say start with a good baseball plan and get the best players available that conform to that plan with no fixed budgetary constraints. Winning will take care of revenue and profits. Every successful enterprise makes up front investments that end up being dwarfed by later success. echoing goony, what does this mean?

no to stone and no to piniella.

how has ramirez's lack of hustle ACTUALLY hurt this team?

I did. Honestly. Been pimping Rex since before the 2003 draft. I was ticked at the Bears that draft day. I remember Jauron or someone saying the draft was 12 players deep as far as top talent then trading their pick for the 13th and 22nd pick. I was mad that they did what the Cubs do and get ok players to fill two needs instead of a franchise player to fill one need. I was all hot and bothered for Byron Leftwhich. But now I've seen the error of my ways and know that when it comes to Sexy, there is only one Rexy. edited: because I'm so used to complaining about my NBA team's drafts, that I dropped their name in. okay. that's disturbing. anyway, i'm just glad that boller didn't fall to us at 19.

Just because the money's available doesn't mean we'd be able to outbid anyone for either. I have severe doubts about Zito and Schmidt being anything other than overpaid, fairly good pitchers (Schmidt especially). None of their numbers jump out at me and scream #1 starter. They just happen to be the biggest names on the market this winter. schmidt's posted a sub-4 era in 4 of the last 5 seasons (once eclipsing the sub-3 area), while throwing at least 175 innings each year. zito's posted a sub-4 era in 6 of his 7 major league seasons, which would likely come down in a move to the nl--and, since his rookie season, he's never thrown less than 213 innings or made less than 34 starts in a single season. those facts jump out at me. can hill be just as good as zito? i hope so, and if he can, wouldn't it be nice to have another pitcher in the rotation pitching at that level. it's not an either/or question here. i'll take both. hill being as good as zito is not the point. prior being himself next season is not a risk we can afford to make again. slot him in the #5 position ad replace him with mateo or guzman if he can't go. i don't care about having balance. i'd rather have a great staff and have an offense with a good IsoD than field a rotation with vicente (barf) padilla in it.

Sully, that's a really bad idea. Realize that Aramis is the best offensive 3B in the NL right now. You don't just let him go and let Scott Moore try and replace him. Additionally, the chances of signing both Zito and Schmidt are next to zero. That's a last place lineup in support of a merly above average pitching staff. Aramis is easily worth as much as Hendry gave Lee, if not more by virtue of his age. The safest avenue to go would be to sign Aramis before he opts out, sign Soriano, play Pie in CF, resign Wade Miller and sign Vicente Padilla. Lee Soriano Izturis Ramirez Murton Pie Jones Barrett Zambrano Padilla Prior Hill Mateo/Marshall/Miller/Guzman/Insert arm here. It costs about the same as your roster, but it's much, much more balanced. Instead of an anemic offense and an above average, very expensive pitching staff, you have a fairly potent offense (albeit short on OBP) with an above average pitching staff. realize that i'm saying that if it means we have the money to sign both schmidt and zito, we let aram walk. pitching is much more important than offense. and i just don't like the staff of the team you've assembled. that's terrible. zito and schmidt would make this staff more than merely above average.

as i've said before, Piniella would be ten times worse than dusty.