A Good Weekend
Almost as if on cue, Bobby Hill got his first hit of the Spring on Friday and followed that up with two more hits yesterday. It was a uniformly good weekend for the Cubs, with a 9th inning victory on saturday over the White Sox and a split squad sweep of the Padres and As yesterday.
The story of the Saturday game, with apologies to Phil Rogers and his fanciful dreams of Joe Borchard, was Angel Guzman. His line:
A Guzman 3 1 0 0 0 2
I didn't get to see it on TV, but word was that his breaking ball was definitely still there and he was very effective moving his fastball in and out.
Hey even the shooter got into the game and struck somebody out! I still don't know where he fits on the team, since Borowski is having a good Spring and, well, did it to the tune of an ERA under 3.00 last year.
An
article today speculates that the Cubs might have to make a trade to alleviate some of the competition in the bullpen. I've discussed this before, but there are only a few guys that can be traded after the kid in a candy store spending spree that Jim Hendry went on with the bullpen. Remlinger, Veres and Guthrie cannot be traded in the Spring as newly signed free agents. Alfonseca, 30 pounds lighter or not, has no trade value at 4 million a year. Beck won't be traded since he signed a minor league deal and teams would hope that he'd elect to become a free agent and sign with them after the Spring is over. That leaves Cruz, Borowski and Farnsworth. Cruz is starting this Spring and can be optioned to Iowa to continue to start. Farnsworth is cooking with gas again this year and Hendry really shows no desire to dump him while his value is at its lowest. That leaves my man Joe Bo. As much as I like the guy and admire him for the job that he did last year, if he were to be traded, it might be the first time the Cubs ever realized: (1) the value of trading someone while his value is high; (2) that bullpen arms are easily replaceable commodities.
Personally, I hope he's not traded. But I have to think he's the leading candidate, if not the only candidate.
Mr. Rogers
I know that it's sort of in vogue these days to be "too cool" to bash Rogers, but I simply can't resist this line from a column he wrote last week:
"If the Cubs were interested (and there is no knowledge the teams have talked), he could cost them a package of Corey Patterson, Carlos Zambrano, David Kelton and one or two highly rated young pitching prospects, such as Angel Guzman and 6-9 lefty Andy Sisco. That's a price you pay only if you believe Beltran can get you to a championship series—and even then you know one or two guys in the deal will haunt you for more than a decade, like Rafael Palmeiro after the Mitch Williams deal."
My reaction: hey why don't we throw in Mark Prior and Hee Seop Choi just to close the deal? I mean, he's already suggested our starting CF, our #4 starter, our #9 prospect (BA, #4 by me), our #2 prospect and our #3 prospect. Why not? That would only be about three times as much value as Cleveland got in its trade of Bartolo Colon to Montreal last year, and Cleveland GM Mark Shapiro was widely lauded as getting exceptional value in that deal. So Rogers evidently thinks that Beltran should fetch three times as much value as Bartolo Colon.
I'll have some of whatever stuff he's on, because it must be very, very good.
Also, as an aside, after writing
an odd column yesterday about how the White Sox have a better system and have better prospects,
today's Rogers column almost seems like an apology.
Bellhorn
Evidently
Mark Bellhorn isn't swinging as much as Dusty would like since he was already "programmed" by the As before he became a Cub. This can be taken one of two ways:
#1 - Baker knows the value of walks and doesn't want to change Bellhorn's overall approach, just his aggressiveness early in the count. Since Bellhorn has good pop, a few more homers and doubles would be of more value than a few more walks.
#2 - Baker doesn't know the value of walks and wants to get Bellhorn out of his brainwashed ways.
I'm really torn on this one. My cynical side says that #2 is the obvious answer, but I have enough respect of Baker to at least consider #1. Because it is possible that he wants Bellhorn a little bit more aggressive early in the count. After all, it is still possible to be selective in general but aggressive early in counts. Mark Grace was always a patient hitter, but sometimes he'd walk right up and slam the first pitch he saw for a base hit.
Reader Jason Steffens feels otherwise
in this article, and he may be right. But in the end, it's unlikely that Baker can actually change much about Bellhorn as a hitter. Bellhorn has been doing his thing for awhile now -- not just last year. His record is pretty clear and he's always drawn a good deal of walks. I, for one, want to see how this thing plays out.
Fantasy Draft Time
Well, it's that time of year. Fantasy drafts are all over the place, and I'm asking the readers of this site to email me with their best picks and biggest sleepers. Did anybody get Manny Ramirez in the 3rd round? Did anybody get a great player much later than they thought they would? I'll post the best ones in a few days.
Sears Update
Todd Sears hit his 5th homer of the Spring yesterday. It's still unlikely that he'll make the team, but there was a quote in the Minneapolis paper that said he had a shot. I don't believe it and think that Gardenhire was just posturing, but it's good to see the kid can still rake.
