hawkeyecub

I definitely would, but I'm not sure what else we would have to give up. Mitre + Nolasco for Dunn Murton + Williams + Ohman/Wuertz + Prospect for Abreu.

Again, I might take that. I'm sure Hendry will first see how much more it would take to land Dunn. That doesn't seem like an outrageous asking price compared to what they were reportedly asking for before.

I'd take it.

Gathright's not going to put up a solid OBP unless he hits for a very high average, which is very difficult and he hasn't proved able to do at the big league level. Also, his lack of power is beyond slap hitting. Juan Pierre, slap hitter extraordinaire, had a minor league IsoP of .062, and a major league IsoP of .070. Gathright's minor league IsoP is .045, and .051 in limited major league time. Yeah I didn't realize how incredibly poor his extra base ability was until looking at his numbers a little more. Still in his minor league career he has a .319 average, .385 OBP. A .066 IsoD isn't too bad. If he maintained that in the majors and his averaged dropped to .279, you're still looking at a .345 OBP. Now in his limited major league time he's hit .271 with a .316 OBP so who knows what his patience would be in the majors.

I guess I didn't have time to look up his walk rates, but his IsoD looked pretty decent to me in each season. Last year he took 29 walks while having 226 AB's in AAA. That would be good for what, about 65 walks in a full season? Not bad. And yes I understand that he's a total slap hitter. But that really doesn't bother me much if we can get a solid OBP out of him and he's hitting leadoff. He's a pretty solid base stealer, so that helps make up for a very small portion of the lack of power.

SCORE! Pierre- Ack Lugo- Leadoff? I guess. Wilkerson- YES Gathright- Ack No Damon- yay Why are people so down on Gathright? I admit that about the only thing I've heard about him is how fast he is and that he has no power. But looking at his minor league numbers, he gets on base at a decent rate. 2003- At age 21 he put up a .324/.406/.359 line in A ball. In 85 AB's in AA he put up a .376/.419/.388 line. 2004- In 32 games in AA he hit .341/.399/.397. In 236 AB's in AAA (age 22) he hit .326/.384/.373. He hit .250/.316/.250 in the bigs. 2005 (age 23)- In 226 AAA AB's he hit .305/.388/.407. In 203 ML AB's he hit .276/.316/.340. Obviously he hasn't done real well at the major league level, but he's had some pretty good success as a leadoff man in the minors. He's 191/247 in career stolen bases, good for a 77% success rate. If he had produced those numbers in the minors in our organization I think people would be a little more excited about him.

Different Alex Gonzalez.

williams + novoa/wuertz probably isn't as good as backe + qualls...but if the cubs throw in both novoa and wuertz (or perhaps ohman, who i think is expendable) + prospects, they could match/beat houston's offer. if the phils are looking for something along the lines of clement + trot, i don't know if the cubs can put together a similar package. That's what I was thinking. We can't match Trot + Clement, but we could probably match Backe + Qualls. What I couldn't figure out was when Stark said that Trot + Clement may not be enough. I still can't figure out why they have Reynolds and Kruk hosting this thing. After Kurkjian said the Marlins are doing a better job of rebuilding with this fire sale than they did after '97, Reynolds said no way. His reasoning was that Lee, Lowell, Looper, Preston Wilson were all franchise type players. None of these guys have proven anything yet besides minor league numbers. Hmmm, Harold, did you forget that most of those guys hadn't proven much at the point the Marlins acquired them also?

Stark was just talking about all of the teams interested in Abreu. He said the Astros are really interested as are the Red Sox, Blue Jays and some others. He said Trot Nixon/Matt Clement has been rumored, but he didn't know if that would be enough. Then he said the Phillies really like Brandon Backe and Chad Qualls. How is Backe and Qualls > Nixon and Clement?

Murph is an idiot. The beat writer hasn't even heard anything about it, but he thinks it might make sense for a Bradley/Patterson deal. Wow, what a scoop.

Coming up after the commercial, so sometime between 1:45-2:00. I'm guessing it will be complete speculation.

I think this is his way of getting revenge for people not praising his photo shop work of Furcal and Pierre in Cubs hats.

I'm sure Melbourne Australia would pick up the story before Chicago. Enough man. Can I get a "He gone!"? HE GAWWWWN! And there it is.

No it's not.

Well this is odd. Perhaps after Furcal decided to accept the Dodgers offer, Neifi came swooping in with a sales pitch that caused some delay.

FWIW, the LA Times is owned by the Tribune Co. True, But I still find it odd that its been close to an hour and NO other media source has reported it except the LA times has reported this. I just noticed that Chicagosports.com took down the article they reported around 8:pm tonight. I wonder what's up with that??? What did that article say?

FWIW, the LA Times is owned by the Tribune Co. True, But I still find it odd that its been close to an hour and NO other media source has reported it except the LA times has reported this. I agree. This has been out for a long time in a major newspaper and yet no other media source has picked up on it.

His source is a guy who went to college with Barry Larkin's cousin (Michael who played WR at Miami of Ohio) who claims that Barry told Michael at Thanksgiving about this deal after being asked by Bowden what he thought of Cedeno's defense. Honestly this site is absurd and I have no idea why people give it even the slightest amount of credibility.

His source is a guy who went to college with Barry Larkin's cousin (Michael who played WR at Miami of Ohio) who claims that Barry told Michael at Thanksgiving about this deal after being asked by Bowden what he thought of Cedeno's defense. Honestly this site is absurd and I have no idea why people give it even the slightest amount of credibility.

Based on what? Right, because who could forget their breaking news story reporting that we acquired Pudge after '03 in that 3-year deal. It's message board people, just like this one. There's absolutely no way they're giving Furcal 6/100 when every leak in the papers has said they're looking at a deal in the 4/38 range.

You're not the first Illini fan I've heard that from. Why didn't Bruce feel the same way? I'm honestly curious. From what I've read/heard he was a bit of a late bloomer in that he really elevated his game during his senior year after already committing to Iowa. He sure looks the part so far and every report on him has been glowing. He's really acted like he's belonged from day one and has fit in wonderfully. No character or grade issues are always a plus with some of the recruiting troubles we've had. Alford says he's the fastest player with the ball he's ever coached. He's been a lockdown defender and seems to have great court vision. There have been some mistakes that are expected of a freshman, but I think his future is really bright.

Heck of a game tonight UK fans. I don't think either team played their best ball, but it had a March atmosphere. I can't believe we were able to beat you guys with Horner/Haluska combining for 3-19 from the field. Bru was an animal inside, and Mike Henderson has really continued his development and improvement he showed down the stretch last year. Tony Freeman has been very impressive for a true freshman, especially in a game like tonight. He's great with the ball, very quick and a lockdown defender. That strip tonight in the closing seconds just isn't the kind of play you expect from a freshman. Alford coached a great game tonight, probably one of his best in-game performances in a big game. Rondo is a great point guard and freak athlete with good instincts, but no shot. If he can develop a solid jumper he'll be dominant. You guys need Morris, but even without him will be very good. Sparks will see better days.

What if he factored Abreu's contract into the equation? Would it still be proof of players gaining momentum? With only 2 years on the deal, it's pretty difficult to justify knocking Abreu down the list of potential candidates. The one thing the Cubs have going in their favor is the money they have to spend. If Abreu was a free agent and was willing to sign for 2/30 right now, I'd be on that deal in a heartbeat, an that club option in 2008 also gives the team a chance to keep him for three years without risking a longterm deal in his late 30's. I started this Abreu talk months ago, and I'm extremely happy that it's picked up some steam this offseason. From a baseball standpoint it doesn't make sense for Philly to trade him, but they are in a "we need to change what we're doing mode" and might just be willing to go in another direction by trading Abreu. There's not one prospect in the system that I'd refuse to deal for Abreu. And if you know my history of prospect love that means a lot. Couldn't agree more. We don't need to save money and go cheap in RF. He isn't cheap, but I also don't think he's overpaid. Like you said if he was a free agent and we were talking about a 2/30 with a club option, it would be a great deal. He'll only be 33 when the two years are up. Obviously the fact that we would have to give up players to acquire him in a trade is a negative, but I don't think we would have to give up a king's ransom for Bobby. Last year he put up a .286/.405/.474 line and it was almost the poorest season of his career. At the age of 31 I don't think the decline was caused by age, he just had a dreadful second half which a lot of people attributed to the home run derby. In 2004 he hit .301/.428/.544 and was 40/45 in stolen bases.

Exactly. He just dove (no flip) and was somewhat in traffic so it was excusable. It should never have been called. But NO ONE gets calls like Michigan.

Leinart is 12-19 for 84 yards? Fresno's defense must really be confusing him.