After a much-needed All-Star Break (needed by the fans, not sure about the players), baseball finally returns to the North Side today.
How many members of this team will still be in Cubbie blue at this time next month? We don’t know, but the veterans know it’s coming:
The Cubs played well the final two weeks before the All-Star break, going 9-4 against the Mets, Astros and Braves. They begin the second half of the season Friday against the Diamondbacks, and players are expecting a sell-off of veterans between now and Aug. 31.
Ryan Dempster figures to be the first to go, with Matt Garza, Paul Maholm, Carlos Marmol, Geovany Soto, Reed Johnson and Jeff Baker among those on the endangered Cubs list.
“There are needs for every team out there,” Dempster said. “Right now the need for our team is to have me in the rotation. I just want to continue to do my job every time my name is called.”
Dempster seems to have accepted the idea of moving on, and his start Saturday could be his last with the Cubs at Wrigley, making for an emotional day. Most of the other veterans, including Marmol, Baker and Johnson, have said they hope to stay where there are in spite of the team’s short-term prospects.
Franky, after his outing in Atlanta, I’m shocked that Dempster is STILL here. Let’s hope that Theo is holding out for a good deal.
The Cubs will take on the Arizona Diamondbacks today at 1:20 pm CT. This means two things 1) Mark Grace will be back in town and 2) Mark Grace will be back at the Wrigleyville bars this weekend. Enjoy, ladies.
This afternoon, Paul Maholm will take on Ian Kennedy. Nothing gets me more fired up about the second half of the season than Paul Maholm.
So . . yeah. Happy Friday. Lineup to come.
Yaayyy, Grace gettin’ faced!
So we have like 15 days off in a row and we have to start the second half with Maholm pitching?
WTF!
My thought exactly.
We may have even another day off. Aaarrrgghh.
Soto being named so high on the poosible trade bait list is a little frustrating, everytime the “building blocks” players become the “trade to get prospects” player my ability to believe the Cubs will ever turn around diminishes
I don’t understand. Is this because Castillo will be our catcher? Because I’m not sure how much of an upgrade (if any) that is.
Lavarnway or D’Arnaud is my guess. Someone from the AL East is going to overpay for Garza, and my guess is we get the starting catcher of the future in that deal. Castillo and Clevenger get to fight it out for backup over the next few months.
It’s only frustrating because we were oversold on Soto by the Hendry regime. Could Soto have become a .285/25-32HR/80RBI guy we wanted? Perhaps, but we had a “sell the team” management team rather than a “protect the franchise” front office. Soto is a causalty of his own early success. He was expected to replicate his success at the MBL level when he hadn’t even show the abilty to do so in the minors.
The balad of Geo Soto goes something like this – Hot year at AAA, come up and stay hot in a playoff run, earn starting job without showing you can make the adjustments needed to be an everyday MLB position player. Be given repeated chances to be “the one” again while skills and peripheral numbers contine to erode.
We either trade him now or we’re stuck with Todd Hundley 2.0.
The last 3 or 4 days the LA sportsmedia have reported both the Angels & Dodgers are interested in Garza. The LA Times went so far as to guess a Garza for Peter Bourjos trade. I would hope the Cubs would try to get pitching, and not take any AAA castoffs from either the Dodgers or Angels…
That’s a pretty shitty trade.
Since the LA Times is part of TribCo…I would have to assume that Phil Rogers’s dog made that rumor up.
Seriously, Bourjos is a pointless acquisition. He’s the type of player the Cubs would be looking to trade away, not acquire.
My point-Bourjos is now a reserve outfielder because there is no room for him right now with Trout coming up. The Dodger now might try to push Javy Guerra who they brought up a few times,injured him, and now he’s struggling in the minors. I almost feel like any trade right now that doesn’t involve the Cubs getting any type of a quality pitcher is a wasted trade..
I don’t feel a trade of Dempster will require the Cubs to get a pitcher. He’s an aging veteran making a lot of money at the end of his contract. He doesn’t have an astronomical amount of trade value. If the Cubs could get a decent prospect…any decent prospect, it is probably a good trade. I just don’t see Bourjos as a prospect that the Cubs will find very appealing. While he has a ton of talent, he strikes out a lot, walks very little, and doesn’t hit for significant power.
Garza, on the other hand, should bring in at least a top pitching prospect, along with 1 to 2 other good prospects.
As you said, the Garza for Bourjos trade rumor is pretty stupid. I don’t see how that fits with any scenario unless Bourjos is a throw-in.
Aging, yes. But I think Dempster will still be pitching effectively 4 years from now. He knows ‘how’ to pitch.
It’s hard to say. He was pretty horrible last year. Remember, everyone wanted him gone and was upset when he picked up his 2010 option.
Dempster has a tendency to pitch really well when he has something to prove…and then lets things slip when he doesn’t. He worked his ass off in before the 2008 season to prove he could be an effective starter for this team and he had a great season. This year is a contract year, he once again is having a really good year.
He’s going to get some interest because of the good season he is having, but it is very unlikely that any team trading for him is going to look for anything from him beyond 2012, and because of that he’s not going to bring in a significant haul.
And this is something the club has to not forget when wheeling and dealing. Many solid players are playing competently and well in their 30′s. And far, far more ‘promising prospects’ are still ‘promising’ in their late 20′s. So the club needs to keep an even keel in their thinking when rebuilding.
Is it still raining?
this is Theo/Jed braintrust, there will be no this player for these 2 prospects trades, there will be a 5 team trade where nobody is quite sure what happened, but Garza is in the east, Dempster is on the west coast and Soto is catching in Texas and nobody quite knows why
Yep. And the take for each will be-
Garza- catching prospect and some A/AA pitchers with limited upside
Dempster- A pitcher and a AAAA utility player, more if we pick up a bad contract of an MLBer in the process (think overpaid reliever or stopgap 3rd base solution) and throw in Jeff Baker or LaHair.
Soto- AA guys who would hit their ceiling at AAA in Texas.
I choked on my drink.
Well-played.
Soriano with another home run!! Trade value at an all time high
It figures that I benched him today.
*Nelson Muntz laugh and point*
Finish him! Finiiiish hiiiim!
Man, that Zagursky dude is like a human toad.
Holy crap, if Maholm gets the win he’ll be our winningest pitcher??? God help us.
Are some of these comments from like, 2 pm this afternoon? Or are you all watching this game on delay?
Lol Rain delay! Game didn’t start until 5 pm Chicago time.
Oh God! LOL! I’m so out of it today.
Der.
I was in meetings during the “usual” game time. I just assumed I’d missed it.
Hell, if I had nothing better to do today I would have missed it too
Any word on why Marmol isn’t finishing off the ninth (or is it just due to the fact that the Cubs are up by 7 runs)?
Had to double check to make sure that it was the Cubs who were in fact up by 7
Not a big enough run cushion. You want to be up by at least 8 or 10 before you bring Marmol in.
hehehehehehehe
that made me giggle.
Are you drunk?
I wish.
Oh, so you are high.
It’s funny because it’s true.
That is so true…
Forgot to tell you guys:
Aidan’s camp went on a tour of Wrigley on Thursday. Apparently Rizzo was there working out and came out to talk to them when they were going by the batting cages. Aidan told him that I was a “famous Cubs blogger” (hee hee hee), and Rizzo said “you tell your mom I said ‘hi.;”
So suck on that, haters! Anthony Rizzo said “hi” to ME!
Congratulations.
Do you think Rizzo has a picture of you?
Yes. Taped up in his locker.
Is this going to be today’s game thread too?
Give me a break. I’m a single parent this week and I had to go to little league at 8:30 this morning.