Wheelimus

I am, however, shocked that the Yankees did not claim him just to screw with Boston.

Wonder what Jones would cost if we ate the contract.

Since the 3 million buyout counts towards this year payroll, don't even think about it. If you could bring Kerry Wood in for 3 million with incentives, you'd be crazy not to do it. He was nasty last year in relief when he came back and I think he'll be nasty again. And I think we can afford it, you're basically paying him a little more than Scott Williamson. And if you're having trouble affording him, you could always try DFA'ing Neifi and Rusch and see if anyone is dumb enough to claim them. Or if not, see if they get sick of Iowa and want to negotiate a release.

I'm betting that they just tack on another year or two to ARam's deal and he stays...

Wow, I can't see Dukes giving up on baseball because of this. Anyone else think it's a ploy to get released so he can sign someplace less stupid? I realize he's a basket case, but I'd take him on our team any day of the week at this point.

C'mon! You would be comfortable with Neifi Perez at SS instead of Itzurtis going into next year? Abso-frickin-loutely. Defense: Wash (both former GG winners, both actually very good on defense) Offense: Perez has superior numbers, but probably a wash. Cost: Perez Looks simple to me. Don't you think that Iz is a bit more upside to his career then Neifi? I mean you can't be serious? Because, of course, our coaching staff has had such success coaxing out a players upside. Nevermind you don't pay someone four million dollars in hopes they live up to their "upside", by that point they're already a known quantity, or someone you're looking to dump.

If you gave me the following option 1) Cesar Itzurtis, who will cost you four million dollars, eating up half of what you save by getting Maddux off the books or 2) let Neifi Perez toil as your eigth hitter and put the full eight million from Maddux towards an upgrade at another position. It's a no brainer. Same gold glove defense, Neifi is actually the better hitter. I sure hope I'm wrong, though.

It isn't that a team cannot win with Cesar Izturis as their starting shortstop. If this were our team 1B - Derrek Lee 2B - Chase Utley SS - Cesar Itzuris 3B - Aramis Ramirez RF - Manny Ramirez CF - Carlos Beltran LF - Adam Dunn C - Michael Barrett Then, sure, we would be perfectly fine with our gold glove shortstop. The problem is, with our team as it is currently constructed and likely to be constructed next season based on the free agent market, we just can't afford the dead bat in the lineup. I mean, if we redo the team next year to the point that Cesar Itzuris is batting 8th and everyone ahead of him is a threat, then we'll be fine. Does anyone expect that to happen? In fact, I'd put this as our best case scenario next season. 1B - Derrek Lee 2B - Alfonso Soriano (IF he agrees to go back to second, he may think he has more value as an outfielder. Anyway, he'll be expensive as hell 3B - Aramis Ramirez SS - Cesar Itzuris LF - Carlos Lee CF - Juan Pierre RF - Jacque Jones C - Michael Barrett Which, I'll admit, would probably get things done though I'm not sure who you put in the 2 hole (though I know who Dusty would :roll: ) and I think the odds of affording both Soriano and Carlos Lee would be pretty low.

Really, the question is. If Cesar was DFA'd, would any team in baseball other than the Cubs have picked him up his contract as is? If the answer is no, then we just PAID for a privilage no other team in baseball would have wanted. Brilliant...

Wow. Well, first, the positives. The good news is, basically, there are two Cesar's. There's the one from 2004 and half of 2005 who wasn't too bad offesively for a shortstop. .288/.330/.381/.711. in '04, .275/.322/.338/.660 Pre-All star '05. So the talent is there, though that drop in power is troubling. And remember that LA is a pitcher friendly park, he was much better on the road in '04. .306/.351/.418/.769. I could live with that from a shortstop. Now, with that out of the way... Terrible move. Yes, Cesar had a good year and a half run where he was probably one of the better offensive shortstops in the NL. But then arthritis hit. Whenever you have "degenerative" before an injury, it isn't good. Tommy John surgery? I could live with him if he made the minimum. Because that's what he is at this point in his career, a minimum salary spring training invite type of player. He just might pay off, you never know. There's always Omar Vizquel. But you shouldn't be paying four million dollars on a roll of the dice. You gave up the best mentor a young staff could ever hope for in exchange for a guy who you should have picked up off the scrap heap for a mid-level prospect, with the Dodgers eating a bunch of cash. Totally pathetic.

And really, how would you ever know if there is or is not a "tampering" deal in place? Unless you have mics in every GMs office, you're never going to know. Aramis Ramirez could easily say to Hendry "trade me, I'll opt out, and resign" and so long as everyone says the right things to the media nobody would ever be the wiser. Now, of course, that would bring up character issues with both of them for doing something like that, but the point is that you just can't ever know and there really isn't any way to catch them unless one of them pipes up. I'd almost guarantee in the last twenty years there's been a couple of deals like this.

Great move by Detroit that makes them that much tougher. Unless another team really steps it up, it looks more and more like Detroits only question is "who do we kill from the NL this yaer".

Damn, two? They're shooting higher than I would. If I was offered Kemp for Maddux plus all the cash he's still owed this year, i'd take it.

Has there ever been a player/coach Pitching Coach? Would be kind of cool to have Mike Maddux as the Manager and Greg Maddux as the pitching coach, but Greg still pitch in relief when it makes sense. Say, after your fire baller goes six solid, Maddux comes out and their swinging before the ball is halfway there, then Kerry Wood comes out and they don't know what the hell is going on. :lol: Man can dream...

And plus, it's all in how it's presented. If he's traded to a solid contender and makes some sort of nice statement in the Tribune on his way out, it'll be fine. Hendry's company line can just be that Mad Dog deserved to play on a winner at this stage of his career, and it improved the Cubs going forward. Maybe even mix in a complimentary "we'll be one of the first clubs calling him in the offseason if he wants to pitch again", knowing of course you're only bringing him back at a greatly reduced rate if at all.

After this years pitching woes, even if Mad Dog goes in a deadline deal, I wouldn't be opposed to bringing him back next year with a greatly reduced salary, if he's willing to deal. And since he won't be our free agent we can negotiate much later in the year with him and focus on other things first. If someone wants Maddux so much as to grab him up, hey, that's life.

Hell, being able to say he has a 4.60 ERA might make him more tradeable, heh.

I only advocate trading Jones because he's one of our few tradeable chips which we would be dealing from a position of strength. I like Jacque and had a feeling that signing was going to work out better than some thought, but come on, if you're trading for Jones and hoping to get .300/.329/.517/.843 out of him...you're probably overpayin for Jacque Jones. If we could net Scott Baker and perhaps a positional prospect {looking at their AAA affiliate, Jason Tyner looks like someone I'd like to see, potential for decent OBP there} for Jones, maybe eating a little cash to make him fit into Minnesota's budget, you have to do it.

Trading Jones to Minnesota does not mean Hendry is conceding anything. It just means a team had a need and was {hopefully} willing to overpay to get it. We're in a situation where we can offer to pay a little bit of Jock's money to make him someone Minnesota can afford, and take back a few choice guys who can help us. If you guys think Minnesota has the talent to spare {no real familiar with their farm system} it's a no brainer. They're 6.5 out of the wild card. Close enough to make a run. Hell, can we expand on this deal? Minnesota could really use a 5th starter too, think Mad Dog would take up the challenge of kicking these kids butts into the playoffs? What else could we fleece from these guys if we ate all of his '06 salary?

While in division trades are not always a good idea, it's less of a concern now that 2006 is hopeless. If you could trade the Astro components who help them in 2006 but likely don't help them in 2007, why not go for it? So, here would be my proposal. Lets take Jason Lane off of their hands. They just demoted him to make room for Aubrey Huff, and speculation is that he may be moved. Now, I realize he is having a terrible 2006, but we're looking towards 2007. And there is reason to hope that his struggles are a fluke. His splits are reversed from his career averages, he's hitting lefties better than righties this year. So it's not completely stupid to hope that he's having a fluke down year but is learning to handle lefties and that might carry over to the future. My big positive on him is he has already walked more than he did last season, in half the at bats. He's still striking out as much as always, but the walks are encouraging. If (and I realize it's a big if) he could find his power back and hit for average again, he'd almost be a poor mans Dunn. While I realize it's a gamble, it's doing something incredibly un-Cub like, and that's buying low. Now, as for what to give them...think they could be made to be interested in Greg Maddux? The allure of having another Hall of Fame bound pitcher in the rotation might be inticing. Can anyone think of any other potential deals which might push The Astros into the 2006 playoffs but not screw up over come 2007?

I never said he was, I simply meant that if you don't deal for Burrell, you hope you trade for someone better, decide Lee is good enough instead via free agency and pay the price, or are worse off. Burrell is obviously the better player. Who cares if his contract is 2/27, I'd rather deal with that than Carlos Lee at 5/50. And who knows is 5/50 would even get it done for him...

If you could get Burrell for little talent but having to take on a bulk of that contract, do it. There is no good reason that this ballclub can't up payroll if it makes sense to do so. If you don't, you're banking on either gutting the system for someone better, hoping you can get Carlos Lee, or potentially (i can barely say it) being WORSE in the outfield next season.

There's no way any team gives Kerry major money next season after barely pitching in the last two seasons. He's given no indication that I've ever seen that he was hoping to leave after this season or was even thinking about it. I understand people are mad about how little we got for his last contract, but it's maddening to let him go just because you're mad about that. We know we're going to have to pay him 3 million (which, as Hendry has stated before, buyouts are calculated into the previous years budget, so that isn't even on the books for next seasons payroll), why not pay him another 2 or 3 to see if he can stay healthy as a reliever? It's pretty good logic, this last time around it seemed like he was fine up to 50 pitches. What if his arm can handle 30 an outing and stay healthy? Are we going to be petty and let another team have Kerry Wood, lights out closer, because we're mad he didn't pan out as a starter? If so, I hope he goes to the freaking Cardinals because we'd damn sure deserve it.

Is it honestly worth an extra 2 mil next season to let Kerry go and turn into a lights out reliever somewhere else? Do you trust this organization to spend that money better? It's a no brainer, if he will come back for a low money deal to be a reliever next year, you bring him back.

Surprised you guys think Wood is done here. It sounds like Kerry is willing to take what the club will give him to stay. If he's already going to cost us 3 million, no matter what, and would instead be willing to take 4 with incentives if he actually is able to pitch {tailored to assuming he's a reliever}, then I want them to do it. We've invested too much into Kerry Wood to not be the ones to get him if he can put it back together as a reliever. I'm intrigued to see what a fresh Kerry Wood can do against a team with 20 or 30 pitches.