When you get around to talking about the Hot Stove for the Cubs, consider a deal for Ichiro leveraging either Soriano or Lee. This move works on the following levels:

- Seattle’s players hate Ichiro.
- Seattle won’t want to lose their marquee player without getting a marquee-level player in return.
- Seattle is in flux and would be interested in making a deal.
- Their contracts are similar: Ichiro’s is 09:$17M, 10:$17M, 11:$17M, 12:$17M and Soriano’s is 09:$16M, 10-14:$18M. This is where the Cubs might have to add value to a deal since Ichiro is cheaper, albeit older by 2 years, than Soriano. Throw in Guzman or Samardzija. Neither projects to more than relief or 4th/5th starter roles.
- Cubs would get their lead-off hitter (career .377 OBP)
- Cubs would break-up the Soriano-Ramirez-Lee righty tri-fecta which has two years of post-season stank on them.
- Hoffpauir could play LF and platoon with DeRosa & Fontenot (cycling DeRosa back and forth from 2B to LF).
- Fukudome would have a countryman to play with in the OF. He seemed overwhelmed and lost in the second half and getting a fellow Japanese player could do wonders for his play in ‘09.

Or…trade Lee instead of Soriano…you still get all the same benefits and Seattle might even like this more as Lee is more of a team guy and costs less than Soriano. Talk this up…I think this is a realistic move that could actually give Cub fans hope in 2009.

Here’s my quick take on what to do with the Cubs roster. There’s not much to do unless we can make a deal or score a high OBP lefty free-agent CF:

Cotts - contract up - re-sign
Fox - contract up - let go
Gaudin - contract up - re-sign
Guzman - contract up - re-sign
Howry - contract up - let go
Lieber - contract up - let go
Marmol - contract up - re-sign
Marshall - no data available - re-sign … take Harden’s spot in rotation
Samardzija - 5y/10m til 2011
Wood - contract up - re-sign
Dempster - contract up - re-sign
Harden - contract up - 2009 option @ 7m - decline
Lilly - 4y/40m til 2010
Marquis - 3y/21m through 2009
Weurtz - contract up
Zambrano - 5y/91.5m til 2012

Blanco - 2009 option @ 3m - accept
K.Hill - contract up - let go
Soto - contract up - re-sign

Cedeno - contract up - re-sign
DeRosa - 3y/13m through 2009
Fontenot - contract up - re-sign
Hoffpauir - contract up - re-sign
Lee - 5y/65m til 2010
Ramirez - 5y/75m til 2011
Theriot - contract up - re-sign

Edmonds - contract up … replace with FA or Pie … keep if can’t find good lefty replacement
Fukudome - 4yr/48m til 2011
Johnson - contract up - re-sign
Pie - contract up - re-sign
Soriano - 8y/136m til 2014
Ward - contract is up … replace with Hoffpauir

Contract data courtesy of Cot’s Contracts.

While Santo’s nickname for Mike Fontenot is a little much, “Little Babe Ruth” is showing some serious pop for a guy listed at 5′8″ and a generous 170 lbs. He’s currently tied for 7th on the team with 7 HR, but when you factor in playing time, you can see he’s mashing with the Ramirez-Soto-Lee group.

I’m not saying he should be starting or that he can duplicate this production over 450-500 ABs. What I have noticed though is that it seems like his short stature and position in the order (generally 8th) afford him lots of fastballs to punish. Also, take notice of when Edmonds does damage. There’s been a several times this year where Edmonds slugs a 2B or HR and a few batters later Fontenot matches him. Whether it’s the pitcher thinking he’s got an easy out in the miniature sized batter or the pitcher being generally weak against lefties, it works well for the Cubs.

Why do the derby contestants have to be All-Stars? The dunk contest in the NBA doesn’t require All-Stars. The reason I ask is that I am dying to see Adam Dunn in this contest. He’s just a beast and hits the farthest home runs I’ve ever seen in games.

Just something to think about…get rid of All-Stars and just get the lumberjacks toting sawed off treelimbs to participate. That’s what I want to see.

Two interesting plays in tonight’s home game against the Reds which occurred after Montoya brutally raced through “Take Me Out To The Ballgame”.

Cubs fans should be encouraged by Carlos’ restraint in not arguing the call at first base in the bottom of the 7th. He was clearly safe after viewing the replay, but he responsibly avoided confronting the umpire and ran back to the dugout. Sweet Lou came out to please his case instead, but there were no real fireworks.

Adam Dunn has been the hot subject lately as Toronto GM J.P. Riccardi made some comments about not being interested in his services (even though he’d be better than anyone on the Blue Jays save Rios). As much as Dunn gets unfairly ripped for his offensive style (patience & slugging over average & aggression), he rightly gets prodded for his lackluster defense. Just after the Cubs were robbed by Jim Joyce’s poor call at first base on Zambrano’s sacrifice, karma prevailed as Dunn awkwardly avoids catching Fukudome’s opposite field drive to the ivy. I believe most average defenders would have caught that, but it landed safely for a double. 4-1 Cubs, 2 out in the bottom of the 7th.

Cubs get Rich Harden RHP and Chad Gaudin RHP in exchange for Matt Murton, Eric Patterson, Sean Gallagher and minor league player.

Looks like a fantastic trade for the Cubs … this is not a usual Billy Beane trade in that he didn’t get any outstanding prospects, only some guys whose ceilings project to average at best. As long as Harden stays healthy, this puts the Cubs in a great position to maintain their lead and be a threat in the post-season.

The unsung piece of this deal is Chad Gaudin, who was solid as a starter last year, and has pitched well out of the bullpen this year.

There’s been a lot of hype and discussion about how the trade of Sabathia from Cleveland to Milwaukee impacts the NL Central. Chicago sports radio seems to imply that the Cubs have to make a counter-move, and that now Milwaukee is better than St. Louis.

To become a better team, the Brewers still need bullpen help and to depend less on the home run to score more consistently. Not to mention that Sabathia will make somewhere between 12 and 14 starts. While he and Sheets make a great combination in a playoff series, they have to get there first…he can only affect 20% of MIL games the rest of the season.

I keep hearing that the Cardinals are more experienced, but this roster only has a couple of ‘old’ Cardinals like Carpenter, Isringhausen, Molina and Pujols. LaRussa and Duncan are the keys, but I’d say Piniella can match LaRussa in X’s and O’s.

I just hope the Cubs don’t knee-jerk themselves into a weak trade for someone like Randy Wolf or AJ Burnett. They aren’t top of the line rotation pitchers. The only guy I’d be interested in right now is Rich Harden from the A’s or someone who has previously not been mentioned in the market that has #1 or #2 quality make-up.

The Cubs just need to get healthy (Soriano / Zambrano), stay healthy, and hope that Gallagher and Marshall continue to make quality starts at the bottom of the rotation.

Of course the day after I post on Edmonds, he has a couple of great games in a row. He’s bought himself a decent length stint and now with Soriano out for roughly six weeks, he’ll need to play even a touch better.

That saying, I was listening to the game this afternoon and DeRosa and Zambrano lead-off the 3rd with singles, which normally brings up Soriano and the offense starts to purr over the prospect of a crooked number of runs. But with Alf out, we have Eric Patterson (yes, Corey’s younger brother) and he grounds into a double play. Not saying Soriano is immune to twin killings, but it’s an example for those who defend him in the lead-off position.

I personally feel in the National League, that if you don’t have a Rickey Henderson type (.250-.300 AVG, .400+ OBP, crazy wheels, crazy stolen base instinct) then it’s a fair decision to make, and there’s little you can do wrong: you either stuff a high OBP guy (regardless of wheels) or a good contact/RBI guy in that position. There’s statistics out there that the lead-off man only leads off 25% of the times he bats, so basically you want a good hitter up there. He’s going to get the most at-bats on your team, he’s going to hit in front off your best slugging hitters, and he’s going to bat when the bottom of your order is clicking.

Edmonds has gone 2-16 with 1 BB and nothing else in four starts and one pinch-hitting appearance over nine games. Over the same span, remarkably also four starts and one pinch-hitting appearance, Reed Johnson is 5-18 with 2 BB, 5 R, 6 RBI, 2 2B, 1 HR. Is this enough sample size to make a determination on whether to keep him? Probably not. But the first two weeks of the Jim Edmonds Experiment have certainly shown the combination of Edmonds’ age and injuries make him look over-matched in the batter’s box, even falling down on one occasion.

It was a no risk signing, as long as you know when to pull the plug. Bottom line is unless he has a nice hot streak at the dish over the next two weeks, I think you’ll see him released/designated for assignment. The question will be will the Cubs let Johnson start everyday until the All-Star break and allow Micah Hoffpauir be the fourth outfielder, and then evaluate both Johnson and Hoffpauir’s offensive performance against the trade market as teams start dumping players. I think that’s the best choice the Cubs have right now.

I was watching the Cubs-Stroh’s game last night and noticed ESPN changed something about their game status bar that they present at the top of the screen. The new item was listing the hitter’s performance after certain counts. For example, after a first pitch strike, Soriano would be a .290 hitter with 2 HR and 10 RBI. After a couple more pitches, say, a 2-1 count, they would show Soriano is now a 7-11 with 6 HR and 18 RBI in 2-1 counts and beyond, for instance.

They listed AVG (or hits per AB under a certain number of ABs), HR and RBI, the old school triumvirate. Hopefully they’ll expand it to something more Saber-esque…say, AVG, OBP, and XBH (excluding RBI because RBI aren’t really interesting when doing count-based analysis…it’s too dependent on runners or RISP).

All in all a very progressive and enjoyable addition to the usually abused telecast game line.