LBJackal wrote:The Cubs have done great IMO. They got rid of Sosa who is bad, overpaid, and hated. They got rid of Farny who is their 4th arm out of the pen and not as good as everybody thinks he is, and got 3 prospects in return (don't know much about them, but I've heard of Novoa so maybe he's good ???). They didn't overpay Alou just because he had a career year, I don't know how that's viewed as a bad thing. Same with Clement, why overspend on an SP in this ridiculous market when you have a comparable one already in Glendon Rusch?
Hairston and Burnitz aren't great, but they're better than the rest of the Cubbies' OF's (which is pretty much just a bunch of rookies along with Corey Patterson who couldn't reach first base with one of Denny Neagle's clients).
So is their team better by losing Sosa, Alou, and Clement? No. But they saved $25M in 2005 salary alone by getting rid of those guys (More if you factor in Alou and Clement's multi-year deals). The added value of having those 3 isn't very big at all... I don't know how anyone could criticize the Cubs. Maybe if they had a shaky team because of the losses, but I'd be surprised if they don't better last season's W/L record. And they still have most of that extra $25M to play with (Burnitz iss $4.5M, Hairston is $1.5M which leaves about $19M left).
I don't know how you can say the Cubs did great when they just lost 74 homeruns, 186 rbi, and 175 runs between two players; one of whom had an off year. Lee, Ramirez, and Garciaparra's values are all significantly less without those bats to drive them in, regardless of Sosa's inept timely hitting and propensity to strikeout.
Clement's 3.68 era and 9.5k/9innings made him one of the best fourth starters in the majors and gave the Cubs an advantage every fifth day. If he'd had decent run support, he would have won 12-15.
The Cubs got worse this offseason. Burnitz and Hairston are marginal players, despite what Burnitz did in Colorado last year.
Sure the Cubs still have a chance, but if, and only if, Prior, Wood, and Zambrano are all healthy and at their top level.
Trading Farnsworth was bad. All someone had to do was tell him his breaking ball sucked and to keep throwing heat. I remember a game two years ago where he hit 102 on the meter. How can you trade that, especially when he had an offyear last year.