Blame MacPhail

[Sports Guy]

How happy are the Cubs that they signed "premium" FA, Alfonso Soriano?

[OsnRavensallday]

How can you blame MacPhail , are you kidding me ????. I mean look at all the talent this guy has got in here Matusz, Jones, Tillman, Bell, Pie, and signed Wieters , plus there is more big prospects ready to come up in the next year or so. We also have big time pitchers in Arrieta, Britton and Erbe that aren't here yet . The future is definately looking way better now than it was before Andy came aboard. The only thing i question is why they have kept Trembley for the last couple year's , i mean he's a good guy and everything but we gave him his shot and he just don't cut it as major league manager. I would like to see Bobby V or Larry Bowa as our coach , somebody that can light a fire under these young guy's. I wish we could bring Davey Johnson back , that guy used to be awsome (the good ol day's).lol

[Mad Mark]

JTrea's flaw--aside from his tendency to have vendettas against everyone who rises to a position of prominence in the Orioles organization--is to believe that it's 2005 and that the Orioles are somehow magically capable of spending like the Yankee$.

It isn't and they aren't. 98% of what he posts being based on either the vendettas or the misunderstandings that dominate his thinking make him readable only as humor.

Now to the main point: it's hard...really, really hard to deliberately put together a baseball team that wins less than 10% of it's games. So many things have to go wrong at the same time that its ridiculous. As I said in the 1-9 thread I started, if this was a mid-season, injury-riddled slump, we'd be bummed, but few of us outside of JTrea and MSK would be looking for a ledge to push MacPhail and Trembley off of. Sadly for the rest of us, it isn't a mid-season slump...and this is what we have to endure.

[MikeAD]

How happy are the Cubs that they signed "premium" FA, Alfonso Soriano?

Oh I like this, how to the Dodgers like Juan Pierre and Andruw Jones?

[Fla_O'sfan]

How happy are the Cubs that they signed "premium" FA, Alfonso Soriano?

Picking out one "premium" FA and using that as an argument that it is unwise to sign FA's is a pretty weak one. Every successful team signs FA's. It's part of baseball. Trying to build a team from the bottom up is damn near impossible.

[JTrea81]

How happy are the Cubs that they signed "premium" FA, Alfonso Soriano?

Soriano was rumored to be older than his listed age, had a poor OBP, and his game was based on a combination of speed and power.

His natural position was also 2B and he didn't want to play the OF.

It's not a shock what happened.

Nobody is saying the Orioles should make a similar signing. Holliday is a Boras client, as is Mark Teixeira, and Boras position players are known for being the better talent in the league. Who is to say they would have had the same fate?

Albert Belle had a degenerative hip condition - who saw that coming?

You do take a risk when signing a premium FA, but you can't rule them all out because certain signings didn't work out.

Just as you can't say Adrian Gonzalez is going to turn into Glenn Davis because of what happened to Davis.

[MikeAD]

Picking out one "premium" FA and using that as an argument that it is unwise to sign FA's is a pretty weak one. Every successful team signs FA's. It's part of baseball. Trying to build a team from the bottom up is damn near impossible.

I think what he was doing (to use his words) was showing an example of when a "solid" player was paid like a "premium" player and it burned the team.

[Sports Guy]

Picking out one "premium" FA and using that as an argument that it is unwise to sign FA's is a pretty weak one. Every successful team signs FA's. It's part of baseball. Trying to build a team from the bottom up is damn near impossible.

LOL...How about this...Tell me how many huge contracts haven't been a long term issue?

[Sports Guy]

Soriano was rumored to be older than his listed age, had a poor OBP, and his game was based on a combination of speed and power.

His natural position was also 2B and he didn't want to play the OF.

It's not a shock what happened.

Nobody is saying the Orioles should make a similar signing. Holliday is a Boras client, as is Mark Teixeira, and Boras position players are known for being the better talent in the league. Who is to say they would have had the same fate?

Albert Belle had a degenerative hip condition - who saw that coming?

You do take a risk when signing a premium FA, but you can't rule them all out because certain signings didn't work out.

Just as you can't say Adrian Gonzalez is going to turn into Glenn Davis because of what happened to Davis.

Nothing...but you are still asking for Holliday to buck historical trends...and YET AGAIN, you said you wouldn't have signed him for the contract it would have taken to get him.

[Can_of_corn]

Holliday is a Boras client, as is Mark Teixeira, and Boras position players are known for being the better talent in the league.

Does this mean that Josh Bell is a better player now then he was last week? I guess it would explain why Guts struggled last season, he had fired Boras.

[MikeAD]

LOL...How about this...Tell me how many huge contracts haven't been a long term issue?

This is what I was talking with a friend about the other day. Very few long term, big money contracts are worth it for the whole stretch, and very very many aren't worth it past a year or two (if you're lucky). The Yankees might have a case in ARod, and perhaps Tex, but they also have Pavano as a bust.

[JTrea81]

LOL...How about this...Tell me how many huge contracts haven't been a long term issue?

Manny Ramirez, Carlos Beltran, Alex Rodriguez, Albert Pujols, Miguel Cabrera, Barry Bonds

[Nigel Tufnel]

Soriano was rumored to be older than his listed age, had a poor OBP, and his game was based on a combination of speed and power.

His natural position was also 2B and he didn't want to play the OF.

It's not a shock what happened.

Nobody is saying the Orioles should make a similar signing.

Here's a post from 2006 where you seemed to think that signing Soriano would be a good idea.

[Crazysilver03]

Manny Ramirez, Carlos Beltran, Alex Rodriguez, Albert Pujols, Miguel Cabrera, Barry Bonds

Beltran? You mean the same Beltran who is sitting on the DL while Gary Matthews Jr patrols CF for the Mets.

And Miguel Cabrera, who is only 2 years into a 7 year contract.

[JTrea81]

Here's a post from 2006 where you seemed to think that signing Soriano would be a good idea.

I've learned a lot since then. I don't see the same warning signs with a guy like Holliday.

Heck a few posts above that SG said Lee or Soriano in LF was a good idea even though he thought they'd get too much money.

We've all changed our views...