The Cubs officially signed Xavier Nady to a one-year deal worth $3.3MM today. GM Jim Hendry was also considering Reed Johnson, Jonny Gomes and Jermaine Dye, but he settled on Nady, who could earn an extra $2MM in incentives tied to games played.
Nady is coming off his second Tommy John surgery, which is uncharted territory for an established everyday player. The 31-year-old appeared in just seven games in 2009, but he hit 25 homers the year before that, so you can see why the Cubs were intrigued.
Next up for Nady: proving he's healthy enough to deserve a big contract next winter. Next up for his agent, Scott Boras: find a home for Johnny Damon.
ESPN Chicago's Bruce Levine first reported that the Cubs were close to adding an outfielder. Yahoo's Tim Brown reported that the deal was official and Jon Heyman of SI.com added the terms of the contract.
Ben Nicholson-Smith contributed to this post.
I want Johnson sback o he can rob Fielder of a grand slam again.
Please be Nady or Dye.
theres such a huge upside for nady. i really don’t know if dye could play 130+ games. both are good but i’d rather have nady. i wish the giants were in after him.
Guess what? This signing implies that Damon will be re-joining the yankees, my guess is at a $4 mil, one year deal with a possible team option at $7-8 mil. Mark these words
lol Mark my words…You’re wrong !
Please be Nady or Dye.
Surprise! It’s Jim Edmonds again!
Not really, but hey, he’d be better than Dye.
Reed Mantle
I honestly think that Gomes would be a good signing. He’s not going to cost as much as Dye, and maybe Nady, and he’s got some pop. I don’t think they can go wrong with any of the 4 though.
Agreed on Gomes. Not sure why they’d prefer Nady (coming off serious downtime form injury) or Dye (old and in steep decline) over Gomes (younger, and hitting his prime.)
To me, all signs point to Nady. Whoever Levine’s source is in the article seems to be answering questions about Nady…how he’s throwing, about his asking price going down, the upside of Nady having some power (as a ready response as to why the Cubs didn’t re-sign the popular Johnson.) It seems to me like the PR wheels are already starting to turn.
Personally, I like Nady. I have no illusions about him being much more than an average hitting corner outfielder/first baseman, but average is much better than we have on the bench right now. In fact, it’s pretty much what we have in Byrd and Fukudome as starters. Let’s get this done!
Gomes can crush righties ask the cubs about face him last year when he was playing left for Cin
Gomes is a great fit….he will kill the ball @ Wrigley! Plus he’s cheaper & younger than the rest, although I still love Reed Johnson in the mix.
I also liked that the article said that the Cubs are “unlikely” to sign Park because he is asking for two much money. What’s going on here? The Cubs suddenly think $3-4M is too much for an average reliever? Why didn’t this light bulb go on before they threw that money at Grabow?
Yup we’ve been hearing this for a while now. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was dead silence for another few days before we hear anything. This offseason has seemed to develop so slowly but hopefully it lands us some late offseason bargains.
Man, glad you were wrong.
Hahaha me 2…… Now let’s hope it doesn’t take forever to get our rh setup pitcher
OMG, Edmonds down to two teams and the Cubs are adding “depth”. Nady is not depth. I was just kidding in the other post but PLEASE do not let it be Edmonds.
Wouldn’t it be smarter to go for lefty or switch-hitting OF? Like Randy Winn or Gabe Gross? just my $0.02
In a perfect world, yes a lefty would be ideal, but the Cubs have gotten themselves in a position where they can make a more attractive playing time offer with a righty. Because they can platoon a righty with Fukudome, the Cubs are able to offer a righty twice as many as ABs as a lefty, something that top bench guys will be looking for in addition to money. They also want someone to step in and replace some of the power lost when Soriano gets hurt or Lee needs a rest — that would seem to rule out Winn.
I think you can keep Dye fresh by platooning him with Fukudome. Dye had a great first half. He kills lefthanded pitching. If Nady is healthy he is probably better than Gomes. Last year might have been a career year for Gomes, in that bandbox. Gomes also strikes out every three time at bat.
this has all the suspense of waiting to find out who won the grand prize in the church raffle–a shoe buffer.
LOL, HAHAHAHA!!!
My choice would be 1. Nady, 2. Gomes, 3. Dye………………. In all reality, Dye probably decided he wanted to stay in chicago and significantly dropped his asking price. Which is why this came out of nowhere (signing imminent) without any word as to who it will be………. just my .02
I’ll buy that. Cubs could have come back to Dye’s agent and let him know they’re ready to move. Surely, Dye has seen what is happening to other FA out there. Maybe he ultimately decided staying in Chicago and 300-400 ABs might be the best offer he gets.
i would say gomes is the best option for you guys. A solid bench bat. Isn’t that what you guys need?
If only that was all that we need…………………………….. to bad the GM cant trade himself!!
i think defense is, at least, a little bit of a concern for the cubbies for their fourth outfielder spot. and as much as i hate defensive metrics, i think the consensus is that jonny gomes sucks real bad at defense. this, plus the fact that he’s dealt with the team before, seem to make reed “high socks” johnson a favorite. at least in my mind.
oh, the suspense…
swing and a miss. its nady.
I’d take Nady or Gomes. I think Gomes though is probably the best fit.
Yay! Good for the Cubs grabbing Nadi, I like to hear that the cubs are making a decent choice on a player to improve their club and have a tiny chance against the Cardinals next season.
But seriously they still have no chance. Just trying to be nice.
Like the Cardinals had no chance in 2009?
That’s an awfully sturdy team built out there in St. Louis. No injury prone aces or star 1B with elbow issues to be seen.
this is very smart by the cubs.
sorry, i was going to say something mean, but i erased it. i think the jury is still out on whether or not signing a guy who played in all of 7 games last year is “very smart.” that is all.
i can’t remember a time a high-potential but oft-injured outfielder has hurt the cubs.prediction: the cubs deny nady a contract after the physical. nady then files a grievance against the cubs for damaging his reputation (think torealba), wins, and gets $4MM out of them. by the time the suit goes through next offseason, nady is the only player left on the market, so they sign him anyway to the first multi-year contract of his career (think mets, torealba/ cubs, bradley). about halfway through the year nady’s relationship with the fans completely deteriorates (nady cites “mistreatment”) and he gets traded the following offseason to brewers for the rest of jeff suppan’s contract. or something equally as sucky. count it.
That sounds about right.
Yeah…that’ll happen. But, despite the absurdity of your scenario, it’ll score you points with Cardinal and Sox fans.
LOL, and your end game scenario still wouldnt be the worst that hendry has done to this organization ( think bradley but not so much his bad play, more along the lines of how hendry handled it and erradicated any value the guy had by suspending him).
P.S. I’m ok with this because the rest of the field isnt much better than sam fuld, and the guy could easily do what ibanez did in the first half last year if given/earned a starting role. Especially playing at the wrig
Because Xavier Nady has such a nasty reputation.
thanks for treating this comment with the appropriate level of seriosness.
DAM, but now this means the yanks are going after Damon, or Gomes. I really wanted them to get nady.
Why would you want Nady over Damon, or even Gomes in a platoon?
Not good for Dye – if it is true that he offered a “hometown” discount and the Cubs still passed him over, not sure who will pick him up. I scoffed at the Padres rumors earlier this offseason, but maybe that would work out after all if they minimize his usage in the field.
Two Tommy John surgeries? Eeeeeek… I guess we’ll just have to wait and see if he passes his physical.
Agreed, but we know that the cubs med staff has already taken an extensive look at Nady’s medical file……. hope he does all right……….. And someone needs to tell the man that the next time he has TJ he needs to have Dr. Andrews do it! hopefully their wont be next time
I’m a pretty big fan of this signing. He could legitimately take Fukudome’s starting job if he plays to his potential. I think a straight platoon could see pretty big numbers out of the RF spot for the Cubs, which they desperately need.
Nady or Dye would have fit. Dye’s price tag was too high for the Cubs. Maybe they would have considered Dye, but they still want to fill a bull pen arm as well within budget. Or they wanted someone a little better defensively. Hopefully, Nady gets/stays healthy.
While I would have liked to have seen Dye’s bat on the bench ready to fill in for Soriano, I think Nady is the better fit — provided he’s healthy — when you consider budget concerns and Nady’s greater experience at 1st. Truthfully, I would have been happy with either one for different reasons.
Between the two, I have posted before I would prefer Nady as well. Which means, he will not be healthy very long if I wanted him on the team. 🙂 Let’s hope he gets ready.
We’ll see. He’s been good, hopefully, after the injuries, he can be good again. If he is, this will be pretty good. How much money you guys thinking?
My guess is $4M plus some incentives for games played.
I was thinking in the same range. Hopefully Hendry can control himself to around that figure.
1 yr /4 mil??? man, doubtful. at least i hope hendry didnt pay that. seems high for a guy thats been off an entire season and has had 2 TJ procedures!
wasn’t too far off
yup, you’re correct
$3.3M plus incentives for games played.
I think that is a solid signing (depending on the price, of course). Huge upside potential. I wish the Braves coulda landed him.
If Nady passes his physical, this is a good signing and the most prudent move the Cubs have made this offseason. A 4th outfielder/bench bat was a bigger need than a starter, reliever, 2nd baseman and everything else that’s been thrown out there. This signals the Cubs are looking at the big picture instead of patching holes.
who’s roaster spot would he be taking in your eyes? hoff or fuld or the 12 pitcher? I’m thinking fuld starts at AAA as we all know Lee will need his spells at 1B and hoff is the only guy that can really do that, while also be able to spell the corner OF spots (just not very well). i hate to see fuld miss his shot but nady is just that much better IF healthy
Hoffpauir. With Nady, his role is reduced to lefty pinch-hitter. I think that’s too limited a role to save a roster spot for. Fuld still has value as a defensive replacement, pinch-runner, pinch-hitter and he’s the team’s only CF other than Byrd (I don’t think the Cubs are going to play Fukudome there again, even in limited stints — but I could be wrong.) I think the Cubs will carry 11 pitchers with Hill, Blanco, Fuld, Nady and whoever isn’t playing 2b between Fontenot and Baker as the bench.
I hope you’re right. If so then I have to start leaning towards hoff’s time with this org nearing its end assuming dlee doesnt go down with a serious injury anytime soon.
I agree. I’m afraid Hoffpauir is becoming redundant in the Cubs organization. The Cubs have just picked up that LaHair guy to be the AAA first baseman and they also have Brad Snyder as a lefty power bat who can play the corner OF positions and is a much better athlete than Hoffpauir. If Lee gets hurt, I expect Nady to start at first and that one of those guys will get called up. I think the Cubs will look to trade him but it’s unlikely they’ll find a partner. Teams will just wait for the Cubs to release him and sign him to a minor league contract. I’ll still root for him — I’ve met him and he’s a real nice guy. I just don’t think he’s good enough to be the big bat off the bench on a team that expects to contend.
at 30 years old, its getting near the end of Hoffs time in organized baseball, let alone with the Cubs.
Somehow, there just isnt a big demand for in/past-their-peak 4A hitters with no positional ability. Go figure, huh?
Psssh, who made you the authority on past their prime AAAA DHs?! I’m seeing the HoF in Hoffpauirs future!
/sarcasm
Lol, i like the signing, but the Cubs gotta prove that they aren’t their own worst enemy in the regular season/playoffs. At least Bradley is gone, right? By the way…good luck to Seattle, even with all their moves they will need it with Milton in the mix.
Great move… I’m really excited about this if he can stay healthy. Now add Hudson to play 2b and a cost-effective reliever… I could see a guy like Hudson becoming affordable enough that hendry and the ricketts can’t pass him up!
where would you bat OHUD? Have you seen his numbers as a leadoff guy? he would probably have to bat 2 and theriot would go to the bottom. regardless, his D is undeniable! If hendry was trying to make a 1 year run at the title then this would be the move to make. 1 year deal to OHUD, nothing more though due to castro. i’m not sure that hendry is on the same page though.
“regardless, his D is undeniable!”
Unless, of course, you look at a statistic other than Fielding Percentage. Hudson’s 2009 Gold Glove is ridiculous.
Have hudson bat second theriot leading off. Drop fukudome to 7th. That would split up the lefties a bit and allow soto to try and rebound from the 8 spot. it would put someone that takes walks in the back half of the lineup. Also when nady plays against left handed pitching it wouldn’t change the lineup too much… One year plus an option would be nice in Castro doesn’t progress as fast as predicted. Hudson would be a nice addition to the team
What about Damon? Playing time concerns?
I know this will not happen. Here is my thought. The Cubs have several guys they could throw in the pen on the roster who have good arms. Granted, they are young and not veterans. The Cubs bench is upgraded if Nady is healthy. His average play is an upgrade to the Cub below average bench. He could find himself playing quite a bit if Fukudome skids after May or Soriano gets hurt, plus Lee’s days off. The Cubs will then need another decent bench guy. I think the Cubs should skip the pen arm and get another bench player. They would have to make a trade or cut a roster spot in spring. Also, another decent player coming in would have to accept a limited role, which is unlikely. It’s just the thought or Hoffpauir or Fonteno as the lefties off the bench scares me. Again, I know this would not happen. The Cub bench is likely done.
what about the scrappy sam fuld
Fuld has to stick because he can play center as well as the corners defensively. I know his bat is nothing to write about, but I meant to say I was done with Hoffpauir’s loopy swing and ‘Little Babe’ Fonteno coming off the bench from the left side. Fonteno will stick because he will platoon with Baker. That in itself is a waste of a roster spot by Hendry. Having a part time, second baseman who can’t play any other position (no third base wishing) is not what I would do. Anyway, I know some Cub fans like those two guys. I think Hendry should have upgraded and it would not have costed a lot.
I figure you’re referring to Fontenot when you say, “Having a part time second baseman who can’t play any other position (no third base),” but you do know Baker came up as a 3B and can also play SS, correct?
Fontenot will stick because he is out of options. Same goes for Blanco and Baker. Plus, Blanco is the only true utility fielder, so upgrading the middle infield bench would have meant one of Baker or Fontenot would need to be removed from the organization.
Now, I am not opposed to that as neither are anything special – both are below average bats (well, when Baker is not at Coors) with limited fielding ability/flexibility while trading one of them would save us some cash. But what could Hendry get in their place with our limited payroll at this point? The only realistic upgrade in that area was likely going to be Castillo in a potential Bradley trade. So, I’ve come to grips with our inept middle infield options and instead wanted both Fuld and Hoff upgraded over (Winn and Nady becomes ideal here) as his minor league numbers indicate Fuld will always be a below average hitter with pretty good but not outstanding D. On our current roster configuration, that just isnt good enough.
That would be the ideal situation. I think Fuld is passable as a 5th outfielder but it’d be nice to have someone like Randy Winn if they could get him cheap and he’d be willing to sign as the 5th guy…but that’s a big if considering he isn’t happy about being a 4th guy. Then if Nady has to play full-time (i.e. when Soriano gets hurt), then you still have Winn to platoon with Fukudome and provide excellent corner defense. We have 6-8 good arms that are major league ready for that last spot in the bullpen…you’d have to think that at least one of them will pan out!
personally i like stevens. unfortunately i dont think my vote counts 😀
He did impress at times and he’s got a great arm. Unfortunately, I don’t think Lou ever trusted him completely.
Yes, you would think one of those arms would pan out. Even for Lou! I think Nady has already upgraded the Cub bench with his average playing abilities. Lou will get frustrated with Fukudome after June 1st. Soriano likely goes down at some point. Nady and Fuld should see decent playing time. I guess I am more frustrated knowing Hendry could and should upgrade Hoffpauir and Fonteno. Hopefully, Nady helps.
I can’t believe I’m saying this.
Nice *cringe/twitch* signing Hendry.
LOL! I was thinking the same thing! I’ve been critical of the guy but I can’t argue with this move…he actually sees the bigger picture this time. *facial tic*
let me guess, this was said before we knew the dollar amount?
*shivers and grits teeth*
You would be correct in that assumption! But I’m hoping it means it leaves us no money to waste on and old, average reliever.
Really a shame the Mets couldn’t pick him up. Not only could he platoon first base, but he could play the entire outfield. Think it would’ve been a much wiser pickup then trading for GMJ.
i just feel bad for fuld, colvin, and jackson. they wont be have a spot for awhile now unless they let nady go after the season.
Another fine move by Jim “Full Retail Price” Hendry.
Yeah, he overpaid a bit again. His base salary is fitting for about a 1 WAR player but if he gets his ABs it’s going to surpass 5M. Except for the anomalous 2008 year, he hasn’t shown to be worth that much. But I’m not going to worry about it too much. It fills a huge need and hopefully it used up whatever money we were going to waste on a reliever!
By the way, it makes me wonder what Dye was asking for…
WooHoo! Finally Hendry does something right! That career .255/.397/.426/.822 pinch hit line is like a dream come true when considered agaisnt all the 4A filler we were looking at before.
So
starters – Soto, Lee, Baker, Ramirez, Theriot, Soriano, Byrd, Fukudome
bench – Hill, Fontenot, Blanco, Nady, Fuld
Next order of business; hopefully we have enough money for Winn to replace Fuld! That would give us two real Major League worthy bats with experience and pinch hit success on the bench and plenty of flexibility for Fukudome and Byrd days off and the inevitable Soriano injuries. Go get him JimmyBoy!
But then again, we are talking Hendry here so I guess I will have to settle for one bench upgrade and be thankful we even got that 🙁
Winn would be ideal! Any chance 1) Hendry sees this as a bigger need than a relief pitcher and 2) Winn settles for being a 5th outfielder?If Hendry manages to pull that off, I may need to change my icon thingy.
1) Not at all. As Cubs fans, we know Hendry should never be given that much credit
2) I do think Winn would take the 5th Job for us since Fukudome/Nady will in essence be a platoon, our new CF is a career 4th OF, Soriano has such a hard time staying on the field and knowing how weak the catcher/infield portion of our bench is which will likely result in our 4th OF (Nady) filling in for all of Lee’s days off/injuries. Our 5th OF job will have plenty of playing time.
“If Hendry manages to pull that off, I may need to change my icon thingy.”
If Hendry does something right it doesnt alter his incompetence – every dog has his day, and any moron can stumble upon a smart move once in a while. Shoot, if he did sign Winn, it would still be the first smart move of the offseason considering he greatly overpaid what we thought would be a good signing in Nady!
Well, if it were up to me and the budget was about capped with the Nady signing, I would skip the veteran, middle relief arm. I would still upgrade the bench. That’s just me.
“But then again, we are talking Hendry here so I guess I will have to settle for one bench upgrade and be thankful we even got that”
And yes, we need to be thankful for that. I suppose Hendry could have signed Park instead of Nady.
DISCLAIMER: im not trying to feed into the “fight” between cubs and wsox fans…my question here is what is wrong with hendry? Literally is there something wrong with him? NAdy who has not played a full season in a number of years, coming off his second…count it SECOND tommy john surgery to a potential 5 million dollar deal…Granted Nady WHEN HEALTHY(RARE) is a solid hitter, and can play just about everywhere. The cubs could have gotten pods, coco crisp, and even mike cameron for the same money that went to nady and some of marlon byrds deal…I just dont get it…Hendry has done it again stacking his team with DH’s…soriano, koske, byrd, aram, dLee and now nady Dlee and Aram are the only ones who should be allowed to play the field..you guys will not be happy with marlon(he had a career year in a contract year in his 30’s) and Nady is wayy to injury prone, you know something is up when the yankees dont even tender you a contract
so fukudomes defense is poor and you think he’s a dh type??? i’m sorry but i dont think you know anything about my team and/or its personnel
The cubs are your team? Tom Ricketts posts on mlbtraderumors under the name cubnation…..NO WAY nice to meet you mr ricketts……dude chill out is was a base statement…about koske I retract the fielding this…7 errors in the outfield in 2 years is mediocre at best…but the guys really doesnt hit all that well .259(mediocre) .357obp(again not bad not great…NOT WORTH THE 12 MILL A YEAR HE IS GETTING) and only 38 2b’s and 11 hr’s last season..SO i retract the statement he is not even worth a sport as a DH he is the ideal 4th Outfielder..
Listening to the person who uses Errors as the measurement for good fielding….
LOL, thats why i didnt even reply to his incoherent rambling. glad i’m not the only one that caught that.
I didn’t reply because I don’t spend my entire day on this website. And why exactly Counting Errors not a good way of measuring fielding? Are you saying someone can still be a good fielder with alot of errors and someone can be a bad fielder with little to no errors? And if you read my previous state meant i retracted saying he was a bad fielder I said mediocre. Ill go into the super stat jungle and look at his UZR/150 one of the other super stats used to measure a fielder…koskes is over all in the out field a -3.8..yeah he is a great fielder
In RF, where he’s playing this year, he has an 18.2 UZR. The -3.8 overall OF rating is misleading because it factors in heavily his poor CF defense. As a RF’er, however, he’s well above average…and as far as the Cubs are concerened for 2010, that’s the only rating that matters.
In RF, where he’s playing this year, he has an 18.2 UZR. The -3.8 overall OF rating is misleading because it factors in heavily his poor CF defense. As a RF’er, however, he’s well above average…and as far as the Cubs are concerened for 2010, that’s the only rating that matters.
and considering the whitesox were able to get a guy as the 4th outfielder who has 30 hr power(17 hrs in 82 games) for 500k i dont get this deal
Yikes @ two Tommy John surgeries for an outfielder. Still, in his last full season, the guy hit, especially with the Pirates, where he hit .330 in 90 games. He’s not going to be the Cubs savior, obviously, but I think he can provide a little offense off the bench and face lefties in place of Fukudome. If this is a $3 million deal or less, pretty good job, Hendry, especially considering the other available options on the market.
a minimum $3.3 million for a bench bat? have fun with that.
im still surprised they have yet to try to move fukudome…he is a waste of money and space ona 25 man roster
Who wants a mid-30s corner outfielder with little power who STILL struggles to hit breaking balls making more than $10 mil a year?
the mets would probably take him.
I can’t think of anyone on the Mets 25-man that I want that the Mets would actually be willing to part with. It would have to be a deal involving some mid-level prospects. I can’t stand watching Fuk flail at curveballs like a hs freshman playing his first game on the varsity level.
Fukudome has been a 4.1 WAR player over the past 2 years and has been worth 18.4MM of his 19.5MM contract. He isn’t as good as we had hoped, but now that he is back to a full time RF he will be worth more (very good defensive RF, bad defensive CF).
Another reason might be beacause they want to open up a road for more Japenese players to come and play for them. Fukudome is pretty highly regarded over there so you never know.
the cubs payroll is now at roughly 137 million….they officially have the 3rd highest payroll only behind the 2 NY teams…only to see them knocked out in the 1st round again..hah kidding all chill out
what makes you think we will even get there?
“12:57pm: SI.com’s Jon Heyman tweets that Nady will make $3.3MM in 2010 plus an additional $2MM in incentives tied to games played.”
Holy…
Hendry, why is it that even when you do something right you make it so dang wrong!!!
You sir, are just as big of a fool as I give you credit for! And I cant wait till you’re fired!
Why are you suprised? The combo of agent Boras and GM Hendry.
I know I shouldnt be, but come on – up to 5.3 Million for Nady of two Tommy Johns???
But you’re right. I guess I got caught up in Hendry somehow correctly paying attention to the Bench first. Man he needs to be fired soon.
Yes, good move for Nady, but a lot of money. Fuld will stay because he is cheap and can play all outfield spots with good defense, but so far he can’t hit. I still say Hendry needs another bench guy. Hendry can impress me by skipping the middle relief and getting one more for the bench. We all know he will sign a pen arm, so I might as well get ready to complain though.
Fuld can’t hit??? Did you deduct that from his stats last season?
In his entire professional career, Sam Fuld has hit well exactly once – a measly 119 PA last season for the Cubs.
Yes, Fuld cant hit.
He stepped up big in his short time with the club last year…….. Sorry buddy but I like to keep a positive presence about me and think that the kid has a chance to be a legit 4 of. think what you want.
There is a difference between being optimistic and illogical, and relying on extremely small sample sizes that dont match players ability of track records leads to stupid moves like giving Fontenot the 2B job…
so at what point do you give a guy a shot? I mean he did what you want/need a top of the order guy to do in him limited time last season. Sure, we would all love for him to swipe some more bags and hit gaps a bit harder but he was pretty darn good at the top towards the end last year. The time of signing big names to over paying contracts will come to and end soon. Eventually, in order to be successful we will have to grow our own talent and give guys like fuld, vitters, colvin, castro a chance to prove themselves and sustain production over long periods of time. I dont have a problem with this approach as it seems to have won more championships as opposed to the yankee/cub/met approach over the last 5-10 years. time will tell but it would be interesting to see how fuld would produce with a years worth of playing time. bet he wouldnt be much worse than bradley was last year.
“Eventually, in order to be successful we will have to grow our own talent and give guys like fuld, vitters, colvin, castro a chance to prove themselves and sustain production over long periods of time.”
You seem to be missing the part that Talent needs to be present for the players to be able to show it. Sure, Vitters, Castro and to a much lesser extent Colvin have some talent and will need to start using them when we start our mini-rebuild, but when has Fuld ever shown talent? 119 PA in his initial introduction to the major leagues (and ML pitchers initial introduction to him) last season; and thats its. That is the point.
Look, I would have no problem keeping Fuld on the roster if we didnt have three sub-average hitters making up the 2B/UI positions. But with Baker, Fontenot and Blanco all on board plus weak hitting Hill as the backup Catcher, we have a gigantic hole on the bench that Fuld compounds.
Making the issue even more of a problem is the gigantic question and known injury waiting to happen in Left (Soriano), the 4th OF now given the fulltime CF Job for the next 3 seasons (Byrd) and the fairly Average but cant hit Lefties guy in right (Fukudome) plus our new poor fielding two-time Tommy-john reclamation project in the 4th OF spot who ideally produces something in the league average range.
On top of all that, add the inability of Fuld with the bat and you have issues.
I’m all for giving players with upside a chance to be a part of the club. What I am not all for is using 28 year old weak hitting career 4A players to back up the other major issues we have all over the outfield and bench in one of the last shots we have while our window to win is open. We are in for major overhaul soon, and this year should be about doing everything possible to win (which is likely the only way Hendry keeps his job anyway, and Lou likely wants to go out a winner).
Fuld has had too short of a sample to say last year with the Cubs was what he really is as a hitter. I would like to see him hit because he will likely be with the big club.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but at one point (maybe still) Sam Fuld was the all-time hit leader in NCAA with Stanford, or was it all time Pac-10, or all time at Stanford? Any which way, the guy can hit. He is a productive bench guy, nothing more, nothing less, and no one is asking him to be the second coming of Willy Mays.
and the evidence of his being able to hit comes in his singles total with aluminum bats at Stanford?
Really, at 28 years old, Fuld is starting to come out of his peak years – peak years that still resulted in about average at best hitting in the minor leagues. In an absolutely best case scenario, maybe we get lucky and he is the second coming of Willie Harris. But even that is probably a pretty big longshot.
Tell me if I’m understanding this correctly…I see that CHONE has him at 0.7 WAR which translates to $3.1M…but this is with 450 PAs. If he reaches that much he’ll likely reach those 2M in incentives, which, in effect, makes him overpaid by 2M (assuming he has a typical Nady-like year). Now, If the Cubs would have tied those incentives to his performance, I think it would have made more sense. If he had incentives tied to statistics that would have made him a 1.3-1.4 WAR player, then that extra 2M in incentives would have been worth it. Is this more or less correct?
Okay, I can only assume the comment there was removed for the inclusion of the word “Idiot”.
Question, since when has idiot become a censored word? Especially when it is not even directed to any specific person?
Idiot is in all dictionaries and is in no way censored on TV or Radio. Why in the world would a post be deleted for including something as innocent as “the word of the day – idiot”?
Perhaps they thought it was directed at me? That would make it against Tim’s commenting policy. Reading it again, it just says, “Which would bring us to the word of the day – idiot.” Out of context, I can see how that can be misconstrued as insulting the commenter — namely me. It’s probably a misunderstanding. If you had instead typed, “Hendry is an idiot”, it probably would have been okay.
Yeah, guess youre right, but still pretty weak.
Yeah, guess youre right, but still pretty weak.
Perhaps they thought it was directed at me? That would make it against Tim’s commenting policy. Reading it again, it just says, “Which would bring us to the word of the day – idiot.” Out of context, I can see how that can be misconstrued as insulting the commenter — namely me. It’s probably a misunderstanding. If you had instead typed, “Hendry is an idiot”, it probably would have been okay.
Wow… 1 year? Good job Jim!
nice contract for someone who didn’t play most of last year because of injury, on the wrong side of 30, and is a below avg RF (or slightly above avg LF) fielder. Nady made out like a bandit here.
no, sheets made out like a bandit. Nady made out more like a petty thief
nice. Sounds about right to me.
Sheets is projected somewhere in the 2.5-3 WAR range. At 3.5 MM per win, Sheets projects for about 8.75-10.5 Million. In essence, Sheets is being paid right around his market value (+1.25 MM to -0.5 MM difference)
Nady projects to 0.7 Wins, and as we mentioned above, that is about 2.45 million. Nady is being paid up to 5.3 MM, 2.85 Million more then market value. Nady is making more then double what he should be.
So no, Nady is not the petty thief – that is armed robbery level. Meanwhile, Sheets merely got what the market says he should.
Do these projections take into account injuries both past and present and/or likelihood of remaining healthy all season long?……………… BTW, sheets base is at 10 and with incentives he can be up around 13 i believe. so where does that put them?
Yes, they do account for injury. Sheets is projected to be in the 100-115 range inning wise.
And you would have to think the incentives will be based off Sheets exceeding that innings level, which would be increasing his WAR at the same time his Salary increases. His pay really is in the market value range. I personally would have given him less, but it isnt a horrific one year deal based off what people are paying overall for that type of production.
I just cant fathom it, regarless of WAR projections. Teams should have set a precedent with sheets this year, sending out the message that we arent going to spend blindly anymore, regardless of past production. It’s just senseless. I’m just glad that they picked him up before hendry decided to raise revenue by holding goat sacrifices prior to each home game in order to sign him
Suzysman, I do not understand the numbers you are using? Are you using fangraphs for WAR? I see projected WAR for Sheets to be 2.5 to 3.1 and that’s right on the level you were quoting. However, It shows Nady at a 1.7 WAR not a 0.7 WAR. Am I missing something here? Wouldn’t that mean Nady should get 5.95MM? Please, if I’m wrong help me understand it.
You are looking at the Fan projections, which I generally ignore. If you factor the FIP/Inn of the CHONE and Marcel projections on Sheets you get the 2.5-3.0 range. Nady is 0.7 by CHONE and between 0.5-1 WAR on the others. Its only the fans that are overly optimistic on Xavier and the others all point to a 1.75-3.5 range salary on the current market.
Of the two, is the CHONE WAR projection the 2.5? If so, then that would make Sheets worth 8.75M per CHONE. The A’s would have overpaid his base salary by 1.25M per that projection and the Cubs would have overpaid Nady by 850K. I think if you just take base salary into account, the A’s overpaid on base by a bit more than the Cubs. But to me, it’s the incentives where the A’s did much better. The Cubs based them on playing time that won’t affect his WAR, meaning he’ll get 2M more just for showing up but not playing any better than he’s projected. The A’s on the other hand, will presumably only pay Sheets more if his performance warrants it. We have yet to see what those incentives are but it’s likely that the A’s contract is the better one overall when you take the incentives into account.
Yeah, CHONE is somewhere around to slightly upwards of 2.5.
But the thing is even if you consider the A’s overpaid 1.25 MM, its off a 10 MM salary – that is only a small increase really. Hendry overpaying nearly 1 MM on only a 3.3 base means he overpaid at a much higher percentage. Plus, we know that if Nady plays the 450 PA/116 games of his projection, he will almost certainly be receiving the full 5.3 MM. Meaning the Hendry overpaying is now in the 116% increase over market value range.
For the A’s to overpay Sheets at a similar rate to the one Hendry overpaid Nady, Beane would have had to give Ben a 1/19 MM range contract.
Paying 19M for Sheets is a lot worse, don’t you think? Assuming his true value is 8.75M For that extra 10.25 M you would give Sheets, you can get close to a 3 WAR player. That’s a solid starter. For the extra 3M you blow on Nady, you can’t even get a 1 WAR player…you just lose out on an RP or bench player. When it comes to budgeting and putting the best roster together, money is money…in my opinion, percentages overstate the error.
I disagree the extra 3 MM would have gotten us that little – we learned today it could have gotten us Belliard (how nice would he look at 2B?), Thome (if we had a use for a DH) and still have money to sign a minor league with invite guy.
The 5.3 MM we just promised to a career 1 WAR/Year guy is a ton of money in this weak market. Shoot, its more then what we are paying our new CF on average! We got so royally taken it isnt even funny. For 5.3 (or maybe slightly more) we probably could have had Damon and his 3 WAR a year production. Instead, we get to hope Nady’s arm stays on long enough to provide merely average production.
Paying 19M for Sheets is a lot worse, don’t you think? Assuming his true value is 8.75M For that extra 10.25 M you would give Sheets, you can get close to a 3 WAR player. That’s a solid starter. For the extra 3M you blow on Nady, you can’t even get a 1 WAR player…you just lose out on an RP or bench player. When it comes to budgeting and putting the best roster together, money is money…in my opinion, percentages overstate the error.
I see that the fans’ WAR projection on Fangraphs is for 2.7 for Sheets and 1.7 for Nady. CHONE’s statistical projections are less optimistic than the fans’ on both players. CHONE’s WAR projection for Nady is 0.7 but I’m not finding the CHONE WAR projection for Sheets on Fangraphs, but I imagine it would be less than the 2.7 projection made by the fans. A 2.7 WAR at 3.5M per win would be 9.45M, so Sheets dollar value on CHONE should be less than that. It seems to me that both teams paid too much on base salary.
A big difference is how the incentives were paid out. Nady gets them for playing time, which doesn’t necessarily make him more valuable. Sheets has performance incentives so his salary only goes up if his value goes up as well.
what do you guys think will last longer: wrigley field or the cubs’ world series drought? thats actually a serious question, not just a sarcastic remark.
well, considering that the rickets have plans in the motion for renovations and additions to current facilities I would have to say wrigley will last longer. besides, it cant be much longer, right??? 😀
This deal is so bad. Why would you committ up to $5M+ to a complete question mark for a 4th outfielder when Johnny Damon can’t get an offer above $2M. I know people are down on Damon’s defense and home/road splits, but he is a much better player than Nady.
I like Nady. Hopefully he can stay healthy though.
Why do I feel like most NBA fans waiting for this offseason so my team can pursue LeBron James, Dwayne Wade, or Chris Bosh? I’m content with the Cubs not doing a thing this year, and somehow getting better through free agency after the 2010 season (even though Lee and Lilly will be off the books, which will leave two pretty sizable holes)…
I’m guessing Bosh to be honest. I could deal with Lebron though 😀
You a Bulls fan? I’d LOVE it if they could sign Bosh. Nobody in Toronto cares about basketball, anyway.
Been a bulls fan my entire life. I know there is a reason we are suffering through this season and a reason we didnt ante up for Ben and that is because of the ridiculous FA class coming next season………….. you know LBJ wants/needs to be in one of the big markets Chi/LA/NYC
Dwayne Wade! Miami’s season is tapering off and the Bulls are showing more promise…it’s his hometown…why not?
Then again, I remember how are big FA offseason went the last time we went after all the big names. I’m not holding my breath!
Wade is definitely a possibility, just like Bosh and Stoudemire via trade. Like I said earlier, the Bulls will have a better chance to land a big FA this time around because they’re a much better team than they were 10 years ago. And they have a legitimate superstar in Derrick Rose.
This is a much better Bulls team with much more promise…so I hope you’re right.
Trading Hinrich would be sweet. I’m hearing Morrison and possibly Fischer.. Looks like the Devin Brown acquisition may have given them the roster flexibility to deal Hinrich and open up a lot more room provided we get expiring contracts in return, of course…then if Salmons leaves the Bulls can get a second impact player….Bosh and Wade? Nah…that can’t happen, can it?
If Wade and Bosh want to win and not worry about getting max contracts, they’d be smart to accept a slight discount in exchange for a couple of rings.
Cardinals sign Rich Hill………. sloppy seconds??? 😀
The Cardinals signing Rich Hill makes them unstoppable now. The Cubs shouldn’t even suit up for the 2010 season.
Word. I don’t know why so many Bulls fans were upset that the Bulls didn’t overpay for a one-dimensional, undersized shooting guard in Ben Gordon. There’s no way that not ONE of the big-name FAs will sign with the Bulls. This isn’t like a decade ago, when guys like McGrady, Duncan, and Hill laughed at the Bulls offers. The Bulls are a solid big man away from being a perennial contender in the East. BTW, a Hinrich-to-the-Lakers rumor is starting to heat up…
Good Call!!
Hooray! The first good thing Hendry’s done in 2 off seasons. Including this one.
Cubs bench
2B/INF- Baker/ Fontenot
OF/1B- Xavier Nady
OF- Sam Fuld/ Tyler Colvin
SS/ INF- ANdres Blanco
C- Koyie Hill
i don’t like the deal…unless they try to either get a 2B so fontenot doesn’t have to play everyday (cough: O-dogg) or get a SS (cough: Orlando Cabrera) so theriot can move to second (either way leads to less playing time for fontenot….at least with Lefty’s), and at least if we pay them millions of dollars they will be everyday starters in the field.
Honestly, I hope Starlin Castro blows everyone away in spring training, leaving Piniella no choice but to at least keep him on the Opening Day roster. Then slowly ease Castro into the everyday lineup, and put Theriot’s weak-armed ass at 2B where I believe he’d be better.
I like the Xavier signing. Provides great depth. My money has him over taking Fukudome’s starting job by July when Kosuke hits his inevitable mid season slump.
As far as arms who do we target now? No Sheets….No Garland…..Smoltz?
I like the Xavier signing. Provides great depth. My money has him over taking Fukudome’s starting job by July when Kosuke hits his inevitable mid season slump.
As far as arms who do we target now? No Sheets….No Garland…..Smoltz?
Okay signing…….. I guess. I really hope next offseason Hendry is fired. But right now they should sign O-dog and Kiko Calero. And if hendry ends up signing Edmonds…………….. I actually won`t be mad if its under 1 million.
Tear tear. Cubs get Nady. >;(
Nady joins a Cubs outfield mix that includes Alfonso Soriano, Kosuke Fukudome and Marlon Byrd. Nady is a career .280 hitter with 87 homers in 679 major league games with the Padres, Mets, Pirates and Yankees.
I don’t get it. Is any of this & guaranteed?
meant money guaranteed…
R Winn, healthy and can play OF – $2M. X Nady, uncertain health, didn’t play last year – $3.3M.
Both signed on as spare OF parts. You can complain about NYY financial advantages but they also appear to have superior thought processes.
I can’t believe the Cubs GM is still employed.
It’s kind of an upside signing…… If both were healthy there’s no doubt that Nady is way more valuable and productive than Winn….. And much younger so I’m actually cool with taking a chance on it
In 2008, Nady was coming into his own as a hitter, and I would argue that he was more valuable than Jason Bay when both trades went down. He got nailed with arm injuries, but I have full confidence he will bounce back and be a quality power OF for Chicago. Have patience Cubs fans, this is a move that will pay high yield for the Cubs.