loukycub

barry bonds thinks you should be his new agent. it seems clear to me you take a corporatist like view of your favorite teams. you don't care how they act, just as long as they bring you wins. i take a community(?) like view where i want my team to win but i also don't want my team to act like jerks to embarrass the organization with their behavior. bradley would have been just fine if he had been a soulless, emotionless, cliche spouting automaton baseball player this season and i think the most the fans would have been saying about him is that we overpaid for a player in a power hitting position touted as the great left hand bat sought after.

*sigh* university of louisville football. our coach sucks. he cannot coach at this level. he needs to go for the future of this program. but do you honestly think i am actively hoping for my team to lose every game? you must be crazy. it is possible for some fans to not root for or cheer for people on their team and still root for the team. i don't like bradley as a person or as a player because from my eye he hasn't done much of anything to help his teams win anything significant. but i didn't root AGAINST him. that's stupid. while he's wearing the uniform of my favorite team, my reaction to him is neutral until he does something stupid (like not knowing how many outs there are) or until he does something actually productive (like getting an extra base hit or driving in runs) then my reaction will change in that direction until the next game where it returns to neutral. i didn't cheer for him until he did something but i never cheered against him. i wanted him to do well because it helps my favorite baseball team win baseball games. i'll bet you rooted and cheered for aaron miles and neal cotts as well, just because they were wearing cub uniforms. what is extremely dishonest is just looking at stats as a reason to justify a person being on the team. stats help but stats should not be the determining factor. anyone else want to guess why barry bonds has not been on an active major league roster the last couple of seasons?

Did you really think there was any hope of Bradley returning? Nobody is saying Bradley "ruined" the atmosphere to the point of losing the division, just that he disrupted the team chemistry. I agree with Theriot, it is pretty obvious that Bradley was disruptive inside and outside of the clubhouse. i want to address the two quotes here: @dan if bradley was really this great teammate that you are claiming that he is, then why has he been on so many teams in almost the same amount of years? don't you think that if he was that great of a teammate he would have stuck around for longer than two full seasons in one place? you can say his teammates said he was a great presence, i'll say that he was so moody in the clubhouse that teammates are saying he was a great teammate to not get on his bad side. this is not on the media or management. this is on bradley. he is not in the soft media markets where the reporters would ask him hard questions. this is also not a management organization that won't tolerate any of his act as some organizations tolerated some before letting him go. if he went to new york or philly, i would expect the same kind of blowup he had here. @b2b & rob i really don't think it was any coincidence that they played as well as they did at the end of the season when bradley was not there as they did all of last season. is it far fetched to say that his attitude made it that we didn't get to the postseason. yes. is it far fetched to say that his attitude made it so that we didn't get to the postseason in the middle of the year when we had all of those injuries? that may have been possible. i think that chemistry is most visible in close games. and just to clarify- i am not saying bradley's attitude caused us to miss the playoffs. that was a total team effort. i am positing that while aramis was out and soto was benched and and out and sori was gimping around in the outfield and at the plate, bradley's attitude caused us to not win those close games which in turn caused us to miss the playoffs. i have never said that we had a bad season because of bradley. bad closers, bad luck and injuries was the main cause for this season.

I have not read this entire thread but I wonder if anyone has brought up that waiver claim on harden yet, because I think that's key. if we were not going to offer him arbitration, why did we keep him? why not get the best we could for him from the twins or draft picks and let him go? this whole situation reminds me of the Colorado avalanche and trade day last year, not trading Ian laperriere in the last year of his deal when teams wanted him and then didn't offer him a fair deal in the offseason and he went and signed with Philly. later the gm got fired. sign of things to come here? if harden doesn't resign with us I certainly hope so.

it certainly helped them on their deep playoff run to the world series. oh wait... how many $10 million talent, $.10 head guys help teams win on average? i'll bet that number isn't very high.

Something tells me you don't understand the logic if you are trying to extend it to those guys. actually i understand it perfectly. the logic is good. the argument is poor. i don't think you understand how vacuous the argument is. it doesn't make sense to say that player x was brought in to help win this year. by that definition EVERY player who is brought in by teams are brought in to help win this year. the argument should be to help make us better. and by that definition, he's failed. he's played enough games to have a fairly good sample size to look at. with the exception of hits, runs, base on balls, and on base percentages, according to yahoo sports as of today before the game, mike fontenot is the same player as milton bradley statistically with 30 less at bats. their slugging pecentages differ by 7 hundreths of a point. bradley has 3 more home runs. fontenot hits better from the left side than bradley. we are paying $10 for slightly better than mike fontenot numbers this year. and yahoo doesn't list other stats like average with runners on or in scoring position where we know what that number is for bradley. i see people on this message board talk about possibly shipping off fontenot in trade opportunities. when talking strictly what he has done on the field, by this logic talks about trading bradley are equally as valid. i have pretty much stated as much in this thread. i don't want bradley around because he doesn't help any to the offense. these numbers don't lie. and with no one really hitting other than lee and ramirez this year bradley adds as much to the offense as mike fontenot. getting on base means nothing if no one brings you in. You know, normally I'd just launch headlong into this and point out exactly what's wrong with the way you tried to evaluate Bradley. But just this once, before I go to the trouble let me ask you this. Do you want to learn how to properly evaluate a player statistically? We wouldn't even have to apply it to Bradley... we could just teach you some of the basics. Because you are obviously very confused. oh sure. but see i don't think that would accomplish much. you can make stats say anything you want. you could make those same stats say that milton bradley is a much needed piece to make the team go while i could make those same stats say that milton is very easily replaceable with a much cheaper option. by the way i am being serious when i said yes. i'm not a stat-head. the only stat i find reasonably reliable and one i trust implicitly is the win-loss stat for the team. i go mainly by what i see and that hasn't been much for bradley.

Something tells me you don't understand the logic if you are trying to extend it to those guys. actually i understand it perfectly. the logic is good. the argument is poor. i don't think you understand how vacuous the argument is. it doesn't make sense to say that player x was brought in to help win this year. by that definition EVERY player who is brought in by teams are brought in to help win this year. the argument should be to help make us better. and by that definition, he's failed. he's played enough games to have a fairly good sample size to look at. with the exception of hits, runs, base on balls, and on base percentages, according to yahoo sports as of today before the game, mike fontenot is the same player as milton bradley statistically with 30 less at bats. their slugging pecentages differ by 7 hundreths of a point. bradley has 3 more home runs. fontenot hits better from the left side than bradley. we are paying $10 for slightly better than mike fontenot numbers this year. and yahoo doesn't list other stats like average with runners on or in scoring position where we know what that number is for bradley. i see people on this message board talk about possibly shipping off fontenot in trade opportunities. when talking strictly what he has done on the field, by this logic talks about trading bradley are equally as valid. i have pretty much stated as much in this thread. i don't want bradley around because he doesn't help any to the offense. these numbers don't lie. and with no one really hitting other than lee and ramirez this year bradley adds as much to the offense as mike fontenot. getting on base means nothing if no one brings you in.

forgive me for not accepting the popular groupthink that milton Bradley could have helped us win this year and next year. by that logic Aaron miles and joey gathright and neal cotts could have helped us win this year too. there is more to being a professional athlete these days than just helping your team win like community relations. he got pissy (dunno if that word is kosher here, if not i'll change it) when he overheard a couple of waiters badmouthing him. so let's say that jim does bring milton back next year. how is he going to react when he slumps next year like most players will and the fans get on his case and start booing him again? past history suggests a repeat of this year's behavior. are y'all suggesting that the players, who pretty clearly stated they were tired of his act through 140 games, are going to put up with his act next year knowing what they know this year? hendry is right when he says when he starts making decisions based on fans desires he's not doing his job. but when it is so glaringly obvious that a blind man could see a player needs to be moved, a gm is doing a disservice to his team not to move him.

He's suspended from the team, how is he supposed to get the apology to his teammates in Milwaukee before the Cubs release it to the media? doesn't everyone have a cell phone these days? didn't derrek say that instead of calling milton after this incedent he would wait for milton to reach out to him? and in any case milton could have released the statement to the front office to pass to his teammates BEFORE they released it to the public. and parsing the statement, what exactly is he apologizing for?

1. When did Bradley do this? 2. Who [expletive] cares? Your skin seems to be as thin as Bradley's. He said the fans were involved in creating a completely negative environment and that he doesn't like playing in Chicago. He's also brought up racism, which rightly or wrongly people tend to take as directed towards a large part of the fanbase. As the head of an organization who survives based on how many people come to a game to see your product, you don't want one of your supposed main attractions saying those types of things to the fans you're trying to get to spend money, especially during times like this. thank you. this was better said than if i responded. really, if you couldn't see my point when i laid it out and i think i did that fairly clearly, you simply didn't want to see it. btw, my skin is pretty thick. milton needs to grow up plain and simple. even if i weren't a cubs fan i'd still say he needs to leave town because of all the stuff he was saying about the fans. you can't expect to call your home fans racist and stating you don't want to be out on your home field for more than 9 innings so you're out on the field the least amount of time and expect to be embraced by the fanbase. i would have done something about him when he said that earlier this season. players should not alienate their fanbase and expect to recieve the benefit of the doubt for anything really. and i think that's teh difference between zambrano and bradley. i haven't heard z badmouth the fans as badly or as much as bradley has, but then again i have only visited chicago for 3 non-consecutive days in my life so i may have missed anything z said locally.

when carlos zambrano claims that he hopes games only last 9 innings so he is out on the field for the shortest amount of time possible, when he throws the entire fanbase under the bus, even though they show up and pack wrigley for an averagely mediocre baseball team and have taken over entire visiting stadiums to make them seem like wrigley, maybe you would have a point. i am not scapegoating bradley for this lost season. that distinction goes to jim hendry for his boneheaded offseason moves as well as the unfortunate injuries to aramis ramierez and soriano's hurt knee. if i wanted to scapegoat a player, it would be aaron miles. but whose fault is that? hendry. he traded away derosa (which at first i had no real problem with) and signed this guy to play with fontenot to take dero's place which made the end result of the trade something to be desired to say the least. and perhaps i should have been clear earlier- he traded away/let go proven clubhouse leaders and veterans and replaced them with severe headcases and players who shouldn't be on a major league 40 man roster, ala gathright, bako, miles, or released players i recieved in a trade 2 weeks in the season for no reason whatsoever. but none of them has disparaged the fanbase like bradley has. as far as i'm concerned, he's going because he called out the fans like hundley did and it cannot work anymore and the situation cannot be resolved. it just also so happens that he is an overpaid average right fielder who can't drive in runs who was signed to drive in runs, and not just get on base. and whether he is at the top of the order or the middle of the order he has not gotten runs in. i hate that i was right in my first thoughts on his signing because that meant that my team had gotten worse not better. i wanted him gone because he was not living up to his contract and did not appear that he was going to as well. i wonder what the reaction of all the bradley defenders would be if a guy named roster player who signed the same contract for the same purpose and had put up the exact same numbers as bradley did. for the record, i'd say that player's signing showed how horrible a job the general manager and his scouts had done to sign a guy like that to that contract.

oh come on now. don't you know all great gms will take the team with the most wins in either league who had a real bad matchup in the playoffs and got swept, dismantle the key parts, sign unnecessary, useless and volatile parts to expensive contracts and kick back and watch the results?

if jim has manned up enough to suspend bradley (albeit way too late to do either bradley or the cubs any good), he's publicly admitting to making a mistake. hopefully he will man up to dfa miles who i am probably more qualified to be a member of the team than he is.

looks like the ip address was it. i hadn't gone through the front page on this computer since you moved the site and i was already logged in when i clicked the message board link, but i'll give it a few hours and see what happens then.

this idea is unoriginal and uninspiring, but i would rather eat bradley's salary and start the season with someone already in the organization and see if we can grab someone off the scrap heap in spring training. it worked with reed, why not here. i would be willing to write off the next few years to get a long term option.

i won't speak for him or the other fans who didn't like him because he's a dick, but in my opinion, it matters because i find it a whole heck of a lot easier to root for a good human being who plays for my team than a dick who plays for my team. for example: i can root for a good story like bobby scales very easily this season even though he has a fraction of the talent that milton bradley has. i would like for my team to be a bunch of good guys who can play ball. if we had a bunch of players who had world class elite level talent but acted like (synonym for donkeys) who made up the entirety of the cubs roster for the year, i would openly be an indians fan until the roster turned over to get those bad attitudes out. i won't trade a championship for a bunch of 5 cent attitudes. And you know what? That's fine. If you decide that his personality is so bad that it makes it hard for you to root for the Cubs, that's your call. What I have a problem with are the people who are pretending this is somehow good for the Cubs, instead of just admitting that they want him gone purely for selfish reasons. well, i'm in the group that did not want him here, but did not root for him to fail and if he would have been traded i would have been happy. bradley didn't need to go. bradley didn't need to have been signed. not only did his off and on field antics concern me but 7 teams in 10 years was a glaring red light. players who move around that much are either glorified super aaaa players or are so big of a clubhouse distraction teams his act overrides any perception of "value" he brings to a team. him being gone for the rest of the season accomplishes nothing because there isn't anything left to play for in the season. and if it was really this bad of a problem before, you should have sit him down earlier this season. its very bad form for them to do this now in my opinion when nothing is on the line anymore. it's not good for us short term. long term is yet to be determined. this was a cluster all around on both parties. bradley brought this on himself by not shutting up, growing a thicker skin and accepting the responsibility of the media attention that comes with being the big offseason aquisition and $10 million man and management should have put a 600 ft wall between media and bradley to make sure this never would have gotten out.

and an update: this only happened again after the site moved. currently i'm accessing the site by ip address (not northsidebaseball.com) if it matters. i do notice that there is an sid string (i interpret to stand for session id) on all addresses and this has not appeared before except when i first posted this. if i delete the sid string and try to re-log in, the string reappears.

i won't speak for him or the other fans who didn't like him because he's a dick, but in my opinion, it matters because i find it a whole heck of a lot easier to root for a good human being who plays for my team than a dick who plays for my team. for example: i can root for a good story like bobby scales very easily this season even though he has a fraction of the talent that milton bradley has. i would like for my team to be a bunch of good guys who can play ball. if we had a bunch of players who had world class elite level talent but acted like (synonym for donkeys) who made up the entirety of the cubs roster for the year, i would openly be an indians fan until the roster turned over to get those bad attitudes out. i won't trade a championship for a bunch of 5 cent attitudes.

Making contact is a real good way to drive in runs. For some. Not for Milton Bradley. he likes to get his RBI by walks and HBP because they increase the OBP, which is one of two stats that imply the greatness of a baseball player, (RBI being the other one) without damaging his batting average which is clearly a worthless and meaningless stat.

that depends on if there were better hitters than him behind him in the lineup. if yes, it's a good at bat. if no, it's a bad at bat. knowing our hitters this year in the 6-8 slots the majority of the time it would be a bad at bat. last year it would have been a good at bat.

this team's major problem has been scoring runs. Bradley could have had an obp of 1.000, but if the players behind him not named lee or ramirez aren't driving in runs, his presence doesn't help the stat line any other than increase the number of men LOB in a game. his salary and position in the lineup implies he should be driving in runs. after all, he was the big left hand bat we needed to fix a lineup that led or was pretty close to the top in all of baseball in runs and team average.

i would think that hoffpaiur is more likely to be on the trade block than fox will be. i know that neither has a natural position in the outfield, but simply from the games i have seen (admittedly right around, to less than half played so far) i have seen more out of fox than i had from hoffpaiur in two seasons. plus in a pinch, fox can play more positions than hoffpaiur can. he would be a decent dh (being lefthanded also helps) and may fetch some mid-level prospects should an al team be interested.

1. soriano has stated that he knows he's not playing well and hasn't gone blaming the fans for booing him for any other reason than he wasn't playing well. alfonso gets it. bradley on the other hand seems to want to be as antagonistic to the media as he can get. if he didn't want all this media attention, he never should have signed with a team in the third largest media market in the country on a team that is either the first, second, or third most popular in the country that is broadcast nationally almost every day to that high a deal. sure at the beginning he has said that he never starts out that slowly, but lately going around saying that waiters were talking bad about him behind his back in restaurants or that he hopes the game only goes 9 to be out there the least amount of time because of the fans is getting dangerously close to todd hundley territory imo. the difference being at least milton is hitting, which is why i don't think the fans are all over him. you were the $10 million man in the offseason, and guess what, the media is going to come to you more often than not. you can't just show up, do your job, and go home, not in that town on that team. if he didn't expect that kind of attention, he's the idiot for not doing his research, or he should have signed a deal for less. i can guarantee that if he hit more home runs or had knocked in more runs (like twice as many in both categories) he wouldn't be getting all that negative attention. like i said, it may not be fair, but my disapointment is based on the contract he signed against what he has done this year. and i'm not one of those fans blaming him on this horrible season, it's been a collective FAIL all around except from the starters. we are leading the majors in quality starts this year but are hanging around .500. starting pitching has not been the problem, but the offense and pen have been atrocious. if both were better and we were 10 games up i'd still be on his case for being massively overpaid for what he is doing on the field. 2. i know, that's why i was against the offseason moves. good pitching beats good hitting and trying to get more left handed was a horrible cya excuse.

i expected more power numbers from him because he is in a power offensive position and he signed a $10 million contract, like at this point in the year 20 hr, 80 rbi. i know it may be a bad thing to do, but i'm basing those numbers only on the size of his contract. had bradley signed a deal for half the money, my expectations would not be as high, say right around what he is doing right now. he was the big offseason aquisition we made, and i expect him to produce at least a high rbi number. and that's not just piling on bradley, it's what i expect from anyone who signs the big contract. both bradley and soriano have been big busts in this case, but at least soriano has owned it this season, something milton has not. in my opinion, bradley is being highly overpaid to be a 2 hitter where he hits right handed better than he does left handed and he was supposed to be that left hand big bat we desperately needed.

truth. i would rather the tampa devil rays win the world series than st. louis. do not ask me to root for the school 80 miles down the road (who hired a coach who had 2 final fours vacated for using an illegal player) in march, or february, january, december, november, october, september, or august for that matter either. you know how you always hear, you want your opponents to do well because it improves your strength of schedule? screw that. i take great pleasure seeing the mildcats in futility. there are some things i cannot do. rooting for the dead wings, st. louis, or kentucky are three of them. personally, i respect people who would never root for my team if we are rivals. you know where you stand with them.