First off, headlines often shape our opinion. To be honest, I read the headlines and tweets. I didn’t go full in depth of the allegations, which shame on me. Well maybe not shame of me, frankly I don’t have time to read into everything on every player. In case you’ve been under a rock, athletes get in trouble quite often. Let’s check out the headlines from December.

• Yahoo Sports: Police report: Aroldis Chapman allegedly fired gunshots, ‘choked’ girlfriend in domestic incident
• USA Today: Police report: Reds’ Aroldis Chapman involved in domestic incident
• TMZ: AROLDIS CHAPMAN’S GF POLICE PHOTOS Of Alleged Choking Aftermath
• Bob Nightengale: Aroldis Chapman now a toxic asset to many MLB clubs

That sounds pretty bad. Choked. Domestic violence. Gunshots. Toxic.

Arguably the best time to get facts are at the time of the incident. Stories can change. To summarize the incident based on Chapman, the victim, and eyewitness comments. The victim took Chapman’s phone into a private bathroom. The victim found a text from a woman. The victim confronted Chapman about it. Verbal confrontation led to Chapman putting his hands on the victim’s throat (not strangling) and pushed her away. The victim fell. The victim’s brother tackled Chapman. Chapman still angry, went to his detached garage away from the guests and family at his house and fired 8 rounds.

Domestic violence is a serious issue. Nobody should make light of it. Chapman grabbed and pushed his girl friend and discharged a firearm near her. It’s threatening and intimidating. However, everything needs context. Chapman’s girlfriend wasn’t bruised or bloodied (check out the TMZ link above). No one was injured. No one was arrested. No one went to the hospital. No criminal or civil charges were filed. Because of Chapman’s profession and how good he is at his profession, this was brought to the limelight. The police were only forced to do a criminal investigation when the news broke in December, over a month after the incident. If this happened to a normal couple, it wouldn’t make the news.

I’m not trying to defend Aroldis Chapman here. He’s wrong, he admitted as such.

Sports are for entertainment. We marvel in the athletic feats human beings can do. I don’t feel shame rooting for him to succeed. I don’t recall those around here getting this upset when Starlin Castro was being investigated for sexual assault. Aroldis Chapman is good at sports. He will help the Chicago Cubs win baseball games. It’s reasonable to be on either side of this debate. It’s OK to have this inhibit your ability to enjoy Chicago Cubs games. It’s OK for you to root for him to strike out ever batter he faces in 2016. He might be a bad person, but we don’t have to buy his jersey.

First, a fun look at the top ten position players in fWAR according to Steamer:

That's three Cubs position players that are projected to be in the top 10 in 2016 fWAR. Quite impressive. Jake Arrieta also comes in at #5 for pitcher WAR projections.

Now let's take a look at the projections for the all the Cubs currently rostered.

The projected "true talent level" of the 2016 Chicago Cubs is 49.9 wins above replacement. A replacement level team is 47.7 wins. Put those numbers together and Steamer projects the currently-as-built Cubs to win 97.6 games.

They will be a popular pick by most baseball pundits to win the NL Central and 2016 World Series. A lot can still go wrong, but it looks like 2016 will be a very competitive year on the North Side. By pretty much all our reactions to the Jason Heyward signing, it was a huge get for the Cubs not only by addition, but subtraction from the Cardinals. I'm sure many of your agree with me, but on paper the 2016 Cubs will be the best Cubs team of my lifetime. I'm just glad that we finally have an owner and leadership that didn't cave into the pressure (and poorly written essays) of fans and instead followed their process. Get excited ladies and gentlemen. 

What happened since the last update?

Zack Grienke signed with the Arizona Diamondbacks for 6 years $206 million.

David Price signed with the Boston Red Sox for 7 years $217 million with a opt out clause.

The Cubs signed John Lackey for 2 years $32 million (and lost their first round draft pick).

Jeff Samardzija signed with the San Francisco Giants for 5 years $90 million.

The Cubs claimed another reliever off waivers by the name of Edgar Olmos.

Japanese pitcher Kenta Maeda was posted by his team and will be available to sign with an MLB team for the 2016 season.

Hot Stove

The Cubs are apparently shopping Javier Baez and trying him out in Center Field at the same time.

The Cubs are apparently looking to acquire a "top closer" because, apparently, the bullpen is the biggest weakness on this team.

With just Johnny Cueto left of the top free agent arms, the Cubs free agent talk seems to have died down with the exception of being linked to Wei-Yin Chen. 

What to expect this week

Here's a link to all the transactions made during the Winter Meetings 2014. Expect tons of rumors featuring Mystery Team and a few significant trades (Cubs or otherwise). The Rule 5 draft will be on Thursday 12/10. I believe the Cubs will lose at least 2 players to the draft this year, including pitcher Corey Black.

Once the Cubs stop claiming every reliever, I'd look for some player profiles on the newly acquired in the form of Better Know a Cub. Remember those? That was a good time.

Other shyt

The Leftovers just concluded their second season on HBO. The show apparently is in danger of not getting renewed. If you are bored in the coming weeks, you can binge watch both seasons on HBO GO. While the first season was decent, this season was one of the great seasons in television drama. The show is written and directed by Lost creator Damon Lindelof. I'm not a Lost fan, but apparently that was a popular show people recently enjoyed. I'll say that The Leftovers is my favorite drama since Breaking Bad.

Go watch it. Or don't. I can't tell you what to do.

"There's going to be an apology coming up, but first I want to tell you a couple of stories. Please note! This post is going to be quite long. Pull up a chair, if you aren't in one, and settle in for a while. (And please. Please, please. Be respectful and kind in your comments.)"

I hope the apology is for how self-important you think you are. When I write, I try to be pretty careful blending what I hope is objective information about the Cubs and my own biases. People (I'd imagine) don't come to Obstructed View to hear about me…they want to hear about the Cubs. If I speak through my own filter, hopefully I can add something to that discussion and readers can come away feeling like they spent their time wisely – and if every once in awhile, I indulge myself by sharing something more intimate, it comes away that much more impactful. This is a perfect example – I'm not afraid to say I teared up reading this. I tear up when reading your shit too, Al, but for a different reason. 

Also, I imagine that 99.5% of your readership is in a chair when reading your slurry. 

"Some of you might know who Carmella Hartigan was. If you don't… here's her story.

Carmella was an everyday regular in the left-center field bleachers for decades — this was before the bleacher reconstruction; you could find her sitting in the last row wearing her pink Cubs cap for nearly every game. She was born Carmella Tamburino in a small village in Italy, February 14, 1902, and arrived in the United States in 1916. Eventually, she became a Cubs fan and started coming to the bleachers regularly in 1965, after her husband died. She lived on the North Side near Horner Park; until she was well into her 90s she rode two buses to Wrigley Field and back every day. In her later years, disappointed with the Cubs' failures as all the rest of us have been, her mantra on hoping they'd eventually win it all was: "How long do they think I can wait?"

Mike Bojanowski told me that, upon saying his usual season-end farewell to her in September 2002, Carmella told him she didn't expect to return, saying, "If it's your fortune to live as long as I have, you'll understand."

She was right. Carmella died December 21, 2002, aged 100 years, 10 months. I attended her wake at a North Side funeral home, where her family was astounded at the number of her bleacher friends who showed up. We did so because, in that sense, she was family. She's buried with that pink Cubs cap.

Even though Carmella was alive when the Cubs won their last World Series, as a small girl in Italy, she likely knew nothing of them at the time, so she never saw her favorite team win it all, despite living more than a century."

Ok. I can live with this story. It's pretty sweet, and it's a nice little tug at the heartstrings. Statistically, most Cubs fans have died without seeing their team win a World Series (but that's not even unique to the Cubs – ask an Astros fan about the last time they won it all.)

"Here's another story, told by Sun-Times sportswriter Rick Telander. Now, I'm pretty sure Telander isn't one of your favorites; neither is he one of mine, as I wrote this post only a few weeks ago blasting him on a topic unrelated to this. But two years ago, Telander wrote this, with which I identify very, very strongly:

I was asked by a radio host the other day whether I stood by my long-repeated statement that the Cubs won’t win a World Series in my lifetime. I immediately said yes.  

I said it was all actuarial. I’m 62, and I first thought the Cubs were going to win it all 42 years ago, in 1969, when I was a college sophomore and before Santo, Banks, Williams and pals expired in the August heat. But say I’ve got two good decades ahead of me, maybe even three. In fact, let’s say I’m an outlier and make it to 102. Forty more years.  

That’s nothing! That’s less than 40 percent of the time the Cubs already have gone without winning a championship.

(Note that you can now add two more years to what Telander said, since that column was posted July 30, 2011.)"

Umm… that's not how "actuarial" works, Al/Rick. First off, correlation does not prove causation. What happened in 1924 doesn't have any noticeable effect on 1986, or 2014, or any other year when none of those players/management were on the team. 

Let's think of it this way. Each team has a roughly equal shot at winning the WS. There are 30 teams, so the probability you DON'T win the WS is, say, 29/30. The probability that you don't win the WS in the next n years is (29/30)^n. When does is become more likely than not that the Cubs will have won a WS? 21 years. After 40 years, it's roughly a 1/4 chance (25.8% against). This only holds, of course, if you believe the Cubs are positioned to be just an average franchise in the future (and we can't look back, because past trials hold no bearing on future ones); I'd argue that's pretty obviously false, as the Cubs play in the 4th biggest media market, and have a better than average payroll as a result, and have better than average management, etc.

"And that's where I stand, and now let me explain why I feel the way I do. This week, I become the parent of two college students."

Congrats! I'm glad they've escaped.

"That's a milestone in anyone's life, and at nearly 57, I have begun to contemplate my own mortality. I've done pretty well in the genetic lottery; my maternal grandmother lived to be 100, and my dad is still around and will be 92 later this year (and he reads this site, so be nice). Another personal milestone: there is now someone who is in the major leagues who is younger than one of my kids (Jurickson Profar, born in 1993).

If I live as long as my dad has, that'd be 35 more years, which is a good long time. That makes me think back to 35 years ago — 1978. That's the year I graduated from college. The time since then has gone by in the blink of an eye. In considering that, think about this: the Cubs' drought for not even getting to the World Series was 33 years in 1978. That drought — not even the World Series-winning drought, just the drought of even getting there — is now more than twice that length."

This is a stat of which we are all aware. Totally sucks. Remind me again how the failures or the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, and early 00s have an effect on our chances going forward?

"Time goes by so fast. Years pile upon years with a blur. You'll please forgive me, then, if I at times seem a little impatient with everything that's going on with the current state of our favorite team."

I will not, and you can't make me.

"Patience thins, and here's where I apologize. Simply living longer and having experienced more Cubs failures doesn't make me better or make my opinion more important than anyone else's. We've all suffered disappointments and soul-crushing defeats. It does give me a longer perspective than many of you; that's all I was trying to say. Some who are my age or older are willing to be more patient; that's cool. Some aren't. I'm having a hard time with it right now, partly because of changes in my own life. I apologize for being over-the-top with this following Friday's loss, and I hope you will forgive me for letting it get to me. But there are times I do begin to wonder if I will die without ever seeing the Cubs win the World Series. Seriously, and that's a sobering thought. Carmella Hartigan lived a century and never saw it. Quite a number of friends, met in the bleachers, some younger than me, died without ever seeing it."

On a level, I sympathize with you. You'd think, though, that with your many years of sitting in the worst seats at Wrigley and watching Mel Rojas blow another save, you'd gain a little more perspective, especially concerning a loss by a club that has no playoff aspirations whatsoever. The loss more-or-less helps the club, and if you've been to games for the last 40 or so years, you've probably seen around 1800 losses in person anyway.

I love the Cubs more than I probably should. I spend most of my day at work (and part of my day at home) refreshing this site, and Brett's. It would bum me out pretty hard if the Cubs never won the World Series in my lifetime…but it wouldn't be close to the top of bad things that would happen to me, over the course of my life. The Cubs are entertainment; they don't give my life it's meaning.

"Now, on to the analysis part of this epic. Many of you have said, in connection with what current Cubs front-office management is doing, "This kind of thing hasn't been done in the entire century of failure." I respectfully submit that statement is incorrect. A build like this has been tried before, and more than once.

Dallas Green began doing it when he took over — and the Cubs organization was in much worse shape in late 1981 than it was in late 2011. The cupboard was empty; there was almost no talent on the major-league team (save Bill Buckner) and almost nothing in the system, except for the recently-promoted Lee Smith, two guys who were selected in the last years of the Wrigley regime (Mel Hall and Joe Carter) and Jody Davis, probably the best Rule 5 pick the Cubs have ever made.

Green's drafts produced quite a number of quality major-league players: Mark Grace, Greg Maddux, Shawon Dunston, Rafael Palmeiro, Joe Girardi and Jamie Moyer, and some others of lesser talent. Green, unfortunately, wasn't allowed to complete his mission. It was one of Tribune Company's biggest mistakes to let Green go. But you can't say this exact thing — building a strong organization — wasn't tried. Green supplemented it with key free agents (Ron Cey, for example) and trades, bringing over several major-league players from his old team, the Phillies, and of course, making the deal that got Ryne Sandberg to the North Side. Green got upset when the Cubs lost 13 in a row in spring training in 1984 and pulled the trigger on the deal that got Gary Matthews and Bob Dernier to the Cubs just before Opening Day. The Cubs don't win the National League East in 1984 without that trade."

Do you realize the irony in what you just posted? I don't think you do. You are saying that building a strong organization has been tried before, and that it was a mistake to fire Green, especially after his crafty trades and signings led directly to the Cubs biggest success in the past 40 years. Man, it sure would be irresponsible to judge this organization that quickly, especially because in your scenario, it took 3 whole years to go from worst-to-first!

"I'd like to see Theo Epstein get that upset with losing."

What. The. Fuck? This is an unnecessary potshot at a guy who, for all we know, is very upset with losing. What makes you think that Theo Epstein isn't upset with losing? Does he get bonuses for finish with 100 losses? No. He realizes the value of thinking with your head instead of your heart, and he's had LESS time to work than Dallas did before he fielded a team capable of winning the division. 

"It was tried again when Andy MacPhail was hired away from the Twins. You can bash MacPhail all you want, and yes, many of his methods failed, as did those of his successor, Jim Hendry."

Now THIS is how you set up a point for success!

"But the Cubs under MacPhail produced Kerry Wood, Mark Prior and Carlos Zambrano. Had those three pitchers remained healthy (both mentally and physically), they could have been the core of a playoff-caliber starting rotation for more than a decade. The draft under MacPhail also produced Jon Garland, Ricky Nolasco and Dontrelle Willis, sent away in ill-advised trades (though the Willis trade did bring back three decent years of Matt Clement), as well as Scott Downs, a serviceable big-league reliever for more than a decade."

When "serviceable reliever" is in your list of successes under the Andy MacPhail era, it's not that successful an era. 

"The MacPhail years didn't produce any significant position players other than Ryan Theriot and Geovany Soto; neither had the long-term impact you'd like to see from the draft. Its later years and the Jim Hendry years produced poor first-round picks: Bobby Brownlie, Ryan Harvey, Grant Johnson and Mark Pawelek. (Ugh. That's four straight years of failed No. 1 picks from 2002-2005.)"

I'm not even sure what point you're trying to make here. A poor GM made poor draft choices? Cool!

"So you can't say an organizational build hasn't been tried. It has. Both of those general managers presided over eras that did produce quite a number of good major-league players. The organization, for reasons we now know all too well, never had the depth it needed, and it's not my point to recount those failures here."

What is your point? We are like a thousand words into this article, and over half of the readers have either left BCB or fallen asleep at their monitors. All you've told us is that build a strong organization was tried once or twice before, and that it was working until people gave up on it too early (curse those media types like Al Yellon, who always quit too soon) or when they had bad drafts (which, ok, lets wait and see because this regime has had 2 drafts so far)

"The current regime has invested a tremendous amount of money in young players, both through the draft and international signings, and has opened an academy in the Dominican Republic that we all hope will bring success in the future. These are, without question, good things, though you'll forgive me if I don't share all the excitement that was posted here and elsewhere about the millions spent this July on 16-year-old kids, who, ifeverything goes right, might be at Wrigley Field in 2019 or 2020. It's the same reason I don't really care if someone's "arb clock" is started one year early so the Cubs could, presumably, save a few million dollars eight years from now. That could be eight more years without winning a damn thing."

So we agree that spending money on good, young players is a good thing, right? We're on the same page here? You're definitely overreaching on the arb clock thing, by the way. What player, or combination of players, would have helped the Cubs win the World Series any earlier if we had just said "arb clocks be damned!"

Money is a finite resource, and I'd argue it's a GOOD thing that our FO is not spending it frivolously. Does starting Javier Baez's arb clock a year early do us any good in ANY of the next 6 years, if winning the WS is the only goal (and I'd argue that the goal of any F.O. shouldn't be to win the W.S, but to make the playoffs, but that's a whole other argument)? Of course not. ALL it does is make Javier more expensive later down the road, and/or retard his development. At best, Chicago wins 2-3 more games this year, and have a slightly worse draft pick. 

"Here's how I see the current crop of young players: Javier Baez looks like a potential superstar. Maybe Kris Bryant will be, too, but it's pretty early to tell. The rest? Maybe a solid regular or two (Albert Almora, a good example), but most of them will be washouts. In the Kane County game I saw two weeks ago, I saw two players I think will become major-league players: Jeimer Candelario and Willson Contreras. Both project as major-league backups. Most of the rest, including Dan Vogelbach, will likely never play a game for the big-league Cubs."

These are the same players you were just complaining weren't called up aggresively enough for your tastes. 

And you're right, in the sense that a small percentage of our prospects are going to work out; that misses the point. Each and every time the Cubs grow a regular player through the draft, or minors, we can afford to spend that much more on free agents. The Cubs aren't the Dodgers or Yankees and their funds aren't limitless; the only way Chicago AFFORDS those big ticket free agents are when they can supplement them with players the minors develop.

"The team has to supplement this, as both Green and MacPhail did, with key signings or trades. And here's where I'll get a little controversial: you can't just wait until 2015 or 2016 to do this, because maybe the guy you need won't be available then. Some Cubs fans thought the Cubs should sign Carlos Beltran in 2005, when he became a free agent. But management didn't do that, because, well, the Cubs were a contender in 2004. Some thought Rafael Furcal should have been signed — and he nearly was — in 2006 (instead, we got stuck with Juan Pierre as a booby prize, Jim Hendry's worst trade). That's when those players came on the market; you can't time the player you want to acquire with some artificial timetable."

*paging Edwin Jackson to the front desk, paging Edwin Jackson to the front desk*

"You know what I think the Cubs should do?

They should go after Robinson Cano. Yes, you heard me. With all the money being stripped off the payroll now (and more after the final payment to Alfonso Soriano is made next year), there should be plenty of room to sign a Cano, even to a megadeal. At 30, he's worth it; he's exactly the age that Soriano was when he signed with the Cubs in 2006. The problem wasn't signing Soriano; the problem was the two extra contract years and the fact that he got hurt, which could not have been predicted. Five or six years for Cano? I think the Cubs could handle that."

I'd like to bet you a very large sum of money that Robinson Cano does not sign a "5 or 6 years" deal. There is just so, so much wrong with this paragraph that it makes me hurt a little bit. There is room to sign Cano to a megadeal, but not because he's worth it (because he will not be worth whatever contract he signs; that's the nature of long-term superdeals); there's room because the Cubs (wisely, and against your presumed wishes) didn't spend foolishly for the last few years, and can afford some deadweight because of it. The rest is just violently wrong; it's pretty EASY to predict that players are likely going to be hurt at some point during a contract that takes a player through his AGE-38 SEASON ARE YOU KIDDING ME. In any case, you are paying for a few years of peak, and more than a few years of decline with any 30 year old. I'm not saying it's a terrible idea, but you are giving terrible reasons. 

"Cano would fill the black hole in the middle of the Cubs' offense, and give the Cubs the possibility of trading Starlin Castro or Darwin Barney, or both, for help elsewhere, presuming Baez might be ready by next year sometime. Buster Olney, though, dismisses the Cubs as a possibility:

The Cubs may not have as much money as casual fans expect, because they have renovation projects to pay for, including their own farm system. Cano would help Chicago improve in 2014 and 2015, but the team really isn't in a position to compete in the next couple of years because of other roster issues.

I'm not sure I buy that, because Cubs starting pitching has been very good this year; with some better bullpen work, maybe they could have been at least a .500 team this year, with the hope of building on that for 2014."

I'm actually glad that you agree with me here, but it makes your article all the more pointless; you yourself concede that the Cubs are moving in the right direction. 

"And here's another factor. Signing Robinson Cano would do another thing: just as with the Soriano signing in 2006, it would show the fanbase that the Cubs are ready and willing to compete, perhaps a little earlier than some artificial "timetable" that's been set by the front office. If you are going to simply wait for all the "waves and waves" of talent to be placed in the lineup and asked to produce, they're not going to magically lift the team to the postseason in 2015. They could struggle at first. It could be 2017 or 2018 before they're All-Stars."

YOU DO NOT KNOW THE TIMETABLE. Quit pretending like you know the timetable. Theo/Jed and the front office clearly made some moves to get better this year. We had a fringe-fringe chance of being competitive, and when that didn't work out, they got real bad real fast. This is the right way to go, even if it's painful right now for Cubs fan. All a signing "pre-timetable" does is waste a year of that player's talent. The better argument is that you can only sign players when they are available (which, presumably, is why the Cubs were linked to Anibal Sanchez and Miguel Gonzalez, and actually signed Edwin Jackson). Slow your roll on this one, Albert. The Cubs' FO has had 2 offseasons to work on this, and they were very clearly bad both of those years. 

"In my view, putting teams full of DFA guys and waiver-wire pickups and never-were minor-leaguers who have a couple of hot weeks in the major leagues on the field at Wrigley is disrespectful to the paying customer."

Is it more or less disrespectful than wasting time and money chasing the dragon of a WS with ill-timed FA signings?

"To that, you'll likely say, "Just stop buying season tickets, then.""

Yeah, Alcindor! Stop buying season tickets, then!

"Beyond the fact that this is not an option for me, for many reasons that I have explained here on multiple occasions, you aren't saying that just to me."

Wait a minute. This post is already longer than the King James' version of the Bible, and THIS is the one thing you just don't have time to explain?

"You're essentially telling everyone who wants to see a major-league product on the field to stay away until the young players magically become superstars. You've seen, in the cases of Wood and Prior in particular, how difficult this is to actually accomplish. Even Jeff Samardzija opined, after the Matt Garza deal, that maybe the Cubs were dumping too much:

"I definitely don't want to see all my boys traded, that's for sure," he said that day. "That wouldn't be the coolest thing in the world, especially when we feel we're not too far away from being a pretty darn good team."

But before Monday's game against the Diamondbacks, Samardzija said he understood the decision.

"Garza was going to be a free agent," he said. "Obviously if a deal didn't get done (he'd be gone). I think any team in that situation would do the same thing. You have to understand reality. We're (16 games) back, and to trade a guy you don't have protection over anymore kind of makes sense."

This is obviously not what we're saying. If you don't enjoy the Cubs, then don't go to the games. If you enjoy the Cubs, then go to the games. It is that easy. I don't particularly enjoy how shitty the Cubs are right now, but I still like them, and I still went to a game this year (it's harder, being a new dad and 3 hours away as opposed to 1). The fact that you have season tickets, and can afford them, makes you in the minority of Cubs fans, and to speak from your "position of authority" and tell us how we are offending your delicate sensibilities just seems disingenous. 

"I understand both sides of Shark's position here. I hope you do too.

I want the Cubs to build a strong organization. I certainly don't have a problem with drafting well and getting as much talent in the minor leagues as possible, even knowing that some (or even many) of those guys will never make it. If anyone here claims my position denies this, you are simply wrong."

Nah, I'm not denying this (though a good way to appear guilty is to make the statement that you did, in italics). 

"All I am saying is that the "parallel tracks" Theo Epstein once spoke of, can and should be done; it shouldn't be just lip service. I believe you can do both — put together a good organization, and try to win at the big-league level every year. This doesn't mean wasting money on someone like Josh Hamilton — the Angels will be paying for that and the Albert Pujols deal for many, many years. Of course I don't want to do that, and if you think that's what I believe, you're still wrong."

Hold up there, Alvin. First, the Cubs did try that this year. It didn't work, they saw it didn't work, and then they did the best thing for the future of the organization. You also told us, in this very article, that you want the Cubs to sign Robinson Cano. He isn't signing for 5 or 6 years, so by signing him, we are going to be paying him necessarily for "many, many years." You DO wan't to do that, and I'm not wrong. You may not think that's what you want to do, but that IS what you want to do.

"Maybe Robinson Cano isn't the right answer, right now, either, although I submit that he's at least worth thinking about. If you think I'm saying "Go back to the Jim Hendry junk-food highs," you're wrong, yet again."

This is probably where your ignorance is brightest. OF COURSE the Cubs' F.O. is thinking about Robinson Cano. That is their job, and they are some of the best people at their jobs in the entire world. They were in on Edwin Jackson, Anibal Sanchez, and most every other big-ticket FA on the market last year. Let me take a page out of the Yellon's Treatise on Bad Faith Arguments and say that if you think the Cubs aren't doing their homework on free agents, you're wrong, yet again.

"There's one further reason the Cubs should make an effort to put a better team on the field in 2014. The WGN-TV deal, as you know, is up at the end of the year and the team has already stated publicly that it will likely be up for open bids. I've written before on how it would benefit both the team and WGN-TV to re-up. Obviously, the Cubs will want more than the (approximately) $400,000 per game they are getting from this deal.

If you have a mediocre team on the field, who's going to pay a bigger rights fee? The Dodgers got their huge local TV deal because they let it be known they were going to be a major force going forward. So did the Rangers when they got theirs.

With another 90-plus loss season in the books this year, ratings are bottoming. Ad rates are going to be down next year as a result. Unless there's a clear sign of movement upward in the future, who's going to pay what the Cubs want for this portion of the TV contract?"

There is no way on earth that whoever is vying for Cubs' rights are going to look at just one year of data to determine the worth of the contract. The Cubs are a very desirable commodity and they will be paid like one. Thank goodness you aren't involved in the conversations:

Al: "I say we offer the Ricketts $50 a year for the next 20 years. They DID lose yesterday."

"We can have both. We should have both. Dallas Green would have done both. Don't consign this team to several more 90-plus loss years, because no one knows when these young players are going to produce winning seasons. Give us some hope at Wrigley Field. Yes, in 2014. Because … how much longer do they think I can wait?"

You are not the sun. The Cubs' plans do not revolve around you. 

Note: I can't ask about the Cubs, specifically (there are NDAs about that sort of thing).

Obstructed View: Where do you want to be 10 years from now? Do you aspire to be a GM?

Tom: More of the same, I think. I have no desire to be a GM.

Obstructed View: How did you end up meeting MGL?

Tom: We both posted at an old baseball forum called BaseballBoards.com, which later became Fanhome. Voros, Patriot, David Smyth were also some of the posters there. (Note: How incredible would it have been to be in that environment?)

Obstructed View: I worry sometimes that my father might misunderstand sabermetrics because the barrier to entry is too high. Are you ever afraid that advanced statistics are off-putting to people who might just be getting into baseball, or are already overmuch familiar with low-quality stats like RBI and Wins? Do you have recommendations on ways to introduce advanced stats to those who may not be comfortable with all of the math, or is it just not for them?

Tom: I'm not worried about it being off-putting. Everyone should be comfortable with wherever they are.

I think the reliance on RBI and Pitcher Wins is a barrier, but as we saw with Felix and others, pitcher wins is starting to erode.

I think picking up an old Bill James Baseball Abstract through inter-library loan is the best way.

Obstructed View: The Book came out in 2006, almost 7 years ago. What part of it do you think has held up the best and what part do you think has held up the worst?

Tom: Sales every year has been pretty constant, which means it's getting pretty good word-of-mouth. Looking back, I don't think there's any one part that is better or worse in terms of timelessness. We wrote the book on the idea that it would be timeless.

Obstructed View: What aspect of baseball do you think is least understood, from a statistics standpoint? What is holding the sabermetric community back as far as exploring that subject?

Tom: Least understood by who? The only thing holding back the community is access to the relevant data. Without data, we have no way to test the hypothesis.

Obstructed View: Whose work in baseball do you most respect from a statistics standpoint? Whose work in baseball do you most respect from an “old-school” standpoint?

Tom: There are plenty of people. Bill James, Pete Palmer, MGL, Andy Dolphin, Tom Tippett, Dan Fox. Really, it's a very long list, and I can spit out another dozen names or three if you give me a few minutes. I'm just really happy to be part of such a community.

Obstructed View: What statistic do you like the most that you DIDN’T invent? Any moments where you were surprised someone “got there” before you did?

Tom: Well, Voros invented DIPS, which is about the most important finding in the last 15 years. Pete Palmer introduced us to Linear Weights. I'm never surprised, since everyone has their own creative input. We're all building on the work of others.

Your question seems to suggest some single-lane race, when really, it's about all of us on some scavenger hunt, coming from all over the world, picking up items on our journey, and agreeing to meet at Times Square, and see what we can all share with each other by the time we get there. It's cooperation, not competition.

Obstructed View: Many managers have started to embrace the new thinking as far as sabermetrics are concerned. In your opinion, will people with a purely statistical background ever be on-field coaches, giving strategic advice? How far away might we be from having, say, Dave Cameron advising Eric Wedge on when to use his bullpen?

Tom: I don't even know what "purely statistical background" means. Are you suggesting someone who only has a vocation in some various mathematical disciplines, but has no baseball experience at all? That would be the worst person to put on the field. You need a subject matter expert, and that means someone who lives and breathes baseball as the first requirement. 

Obstructed View: I'm afraid I may of framed the question incorrectly. I meant to say someone who perhaps never played baseball at a high level, but has a masterful grasp of the percentages and that sort of thing. With Billy Beane, Theo Epstein, Andrew Friedman, etc. changing the way front offices operate, I was curious if you thought that a similar thing might happen in the dugout (if it hasn't happened already). I think some managers are becoming much more receptive to the idea of using more and more specialized stats already.

Tom: Ah, I see. Well, I'm not really qualified to answer that question.

Obstructed View: How important do you think FIELD f/x will be as far as clearing up defensive metrics? Will we ever get to a place where fielding is as well understood as hitting? Should FIELD f/x ever be made public?

Tom: Tracking player movements and ball movement is critical. We do it all the time with our eyes. So, now we need to have a systematic, precise way to do all that on a large scale. A system that does that will remove all the uncertainty we currently have.

Obstructed View: From previous interviews, I know that you aren't a fan of the current system of the Hall of Fame. Do you think there is a place in the hall for sabermetricians and internet writers to have a say in who gets in? Do you think we'll live to see the day where someone like Bill James gets inducted for his contributions to baseball?

Tom: There's some really passionate fans out there, who devote their time and energy on baseball and its history and they don't get paid for it. Any time I run my many polls, I'm quite happy with the results I get. The IBA shows how you can have a good system with good fans produce good results.

Obstructed View: Anyone who has heard you speak about Rock Raines knows you believe he’s a no-doubt Hall-of-Famer. In my mind, Edgar Martinez is in the same boat – his numbers look to me like he’s better than maybe half of the Hall (not to mention that 3B are SORELY underrepresented in the Hall), and he hasn’t really received any support (languishing in the
mid-30’s). With the growing backlog of worthy players that will “take votes away” from Gar, he most likely won’t make it in until the Veteran’s Committee, if at all. Do you think Edgar should make the Hall? Do you think he will?

Tom: If you think a Hall of Fame should have about 20-25 new members every ten years, then Edgar would likely be part of that group. If you think it should be 10-15, he's probably outside that group.  If you think it should be 30-35 members, he's easily inside that group. So, you have to first decide the size of your hall of fame. The readers on my site have suggested that we should have 20-25 new members every ten years.

Obstructed View: Are there any players in particular that you think are “better than their numbers?”

Tom: It's a given that some players are better than they've performed so far, and others are worse. It's just a sampling issue.

Obstructed View: What topic would you most like to research, but haven’t been able to?

Tom: There's a long list of things, and I'm really happy that we've got a broad community that someone somewhere is addressing each one and will eventually publish it.

Obstructed View: How good are these Blackhawks? Are they for real?

Tom: I've only been following the Canadiens and Devils so far, but eventually, I'll pick up on a few more teams. I still they think have the best uniform in all of pro sports in USA/Canada.

Thanks again to Tom Tango for answering the questions.

Those of us who follow the Cubs a little too closely know by and large what to expect from the 2012 version: mediocrity will hold sway. Bountiful and unabated mediocrity. The question that has kept us on the edge of our seats over the past roughly five months is: “how will the new front office put its stamp on this team?” The answer is still unclear, but seems to involve terms like “incrementally” and “deliberately.” Since we’ve been talking about playing time around here lately (there’s still time to enter the OVBlog over/under challenge), I decided to poke around the pasts of our front office heroes and see if anything could be learned about what to expect on the field.

Playing Time Distribution

My first instinct in confronting questions like these is always to put my nose in a spreadsheet and take in the sweet numerical aroma. While Theo’s Red Sox never looked like anything resembling this year’s Cubs, Jed’s Padres are a fair comparison. They, like the Cubs, have been short on impact talent (on the offensive side, at least), and have experimented with a variety of players in trying to fill that void.

Hoyer took over the Pads following the 2009 season and kept a low profile. Despite a surprising run at the playoffs in 2010 and the splashy Anthony Rizzo trade the following offseason, his name was rarely mentioned in national circles right up until rumors of his imminent hiring with the Cubs started to swirl.

One of the nice things about Hoyer’s time with the Padres, for those of us trying to tease out his influence in the product on the field, is that longtime manager Bud Black was retained by the new GM. Any changes in playing time following Hoyer's arrival are likely to have been influenced (directly or indirectly) by Hoyer’s guidance than by the whims of a newly-arrived manager. As an initial look at the Hoyer-era Padres, I focused only on the offense, and compared the distribution of plate appearances for the two years pre-Hoyer to his two years with the club. The results are not altogether unexpected.

Lots of Experimentation, Few Iron Men.

Hoyer’s Padres weren’t shy about mixing it up on the field. In 2011, only Jason Bartlett managed 600 plate appearances; in 2010, that mark was reached by two players, Adrian Gonzalez and Chase Headley. There was thus lots of room for experimentation. In 2010 and 2011, the Padres averaged 12.5 players with between 150 and 550 PAs, as compared to 10.5 (slightly above league average) in the two years prior.

The distribution of these plate appearances ran the gamut of the player universe. Veteran “contributors” Ryan Ludwick and Miguel Tejada were acquired for the 2010 stretch run. Fringy younger players like Jesus Guzman, Kyle Blanks, and Tony Gwynn Jr. were given extended looks. Retreads like Jerry Hairston, Chris Denorfia, Jorge Cantu, and Alberto Gonzalez filled out the bench, and found their way on the field more often then one might hope. The Pads even managed a seemingly successful reclamation project in stealing underachieving Cameron Maybin from the Marlins.

One of the side effects of this mix and match strategy is that very few players ended up in the 1-49 PA bucket. In fact, the Padres had the fewest number of “1-49ers” in the league in ‘10 and ‘11, after being among the league leaders in ‘08 and ‘09. I’m not sure there’s a whole lot to make of this, and it may be due in part to limiting the at-bats of relief pitchers (always a good thing).

Implications for the Cubs

We have already seen the Cubs experiment in a variety of ways. Sabermetric darling David DeJesus looks to be the regular right fielder for the next two years. Ian Stewart is currently playing the role of reclamation project, and will most likely get a full season’s worth of at bats on the chance that he turns things around. The first baseman’s job, on the other hand, is currently PCL-oldster Bryan LaHair’s, and don’t be surprised if he only gets 200 PA to prove himself. Even then, someone not named Rizzo could very well be given a shot, especially if the young first basemen starts out cold in the PCL. If the Padres are any guide, I expect to see lots of turnover, time-shares, and chances taken in the years to come.

By way of reassuring readers regarding my temperament, none of these moves have put me into a full Ted Lilly-, Carlos Zambrano-, or H.L. Mencken-type fury. And objectively, these moves range probably range from “practically meaningless” to “that definitely only bothers you.” Nonetheless, annoying.

10. The bunting contest. How about a home run derby? When did that become out of the question?

9. Moving Samardzija to the rotation. Not likely to end well (and I needed ten of these).

8. The rise of the Regulartron. Yes, there is undoubtedly some money to be made here. But color me completely unconvinced that it outweighs the brand value of that time machine on the North Side. And nothing drives me crazier than the constant blather of these things.

7. Leaving WGN. Hasn’t happened yet, obviously. I am among those out-of-staters dreading paying for MLB Extra Innings because the Cubs left the sole remaining national affiliate in favor of a glorified SportsChannel/FoxsportsChicago/CSN. If they can work out a deal with the new NBC network or find another way around the regional restrictions, I will promptly redact, but there is a lot of downside here among casual fans in particular.

6. Trading Zambrano. Yeah, I know, the veterans were tired of him and that was the last straw and all the rest. But couldn’t we turn the page on The Hendry Era by getting rid of someone like oh, say:

5. Reed Johnson. No? OK, fine.

4. Caving on Theo’s compensation. I’m sure that some folks are completely enamored with Kurcz and Carpenter, but I’m not one of them. However, Bud was obviously reticent to step in here, due to the future consequences of his decision. Why not call his bluff? We know that Theo put on his lawyer pants and drew up a pretty good case, complete with the glaring absence of any precedent. What’s the worst that could happen? Losing “uberprospect” Josh Vitters? It would have been worth it on the off-chance that Bud decided to tell Lucchino and Co.: “You will take Michael Brenly and like it.”

3. Ryan Flaherty. There’s no space on the 40-man for a 25 year-old lefty-hitting middle infielder with some pop? Did all of Koyie Hill’s detached appendages require their own spot?

2. Sitting out free agency. A wise man once said, “The bottom line is you can’t go out and buy young players, there is no opportunity to do that anymore.” So, what exactly is the plan? It’s nice to say that the organization needs to rebuild from the ground up, but what does that really mean in practice? Developing homegrown talent takes years, especially if your current minor leaguers more or less stink, and your only hypothetical advantage is scouting and developing marginally better than everyone else. Sure, free agents are expensive. Thing is, they are likely to get more expensive as their supply dwindles due to teams increasingly coercing young talent to sign long-term deals. It’s not like the Cubs were reluctant to spend money this offseason, as they seem to have offered in the neighborhood of $100 million dollars for three Cubans (allegedly), a McDonalds, and a vocational high school in the Dominican Republic. It would have been nice to sign a few vets likely to still be contributors if and when the young talent starts coming up, instead of the Maholms and DeJesuses of the world.

1. Failure to put a specialized strategist on the bench. As far as I can tell, “smart” front offices around the majors swooned over Dale Sveum for his tendency to pore over spray charts. That’s all well and good, but is it so out of the question to put someone on the bench who is actually numerate? It’s not like no one has ever considered the effects of various individual strategies on seasonal basis. There would still be plenty of room for leader-of-men types that inspire confidence by instigating bean-ball wars. Theo and Co. had the capital to really take a chance here, and instead they went traditional with Sveum et al.; the bench remains sacrosanct and decidedly quant-free. What we did get was a voluminous manual full of corporate speak, to be read and digested by a group of functional illiterates. The Cubs Way indeed.

If you were in last year, you should have already auto-enrolled into this year's league. If you want in this year for any spots that open up, post that in the comments of this thread. Spots will be given on a first-come first-served basis as they become available.

Plus if you win, you get this:

Indy Theo Parody

The article stresses Scott’s relationship with his teammates, particularly the Latinos and African Americans. I searched the article for the phrase”I’m not racist. I have a black friend. See?” but I surprisingly could not find them. Felix Pie spoke highly of Scott, pointing out that Scott helped resurrect his career after he was traded from the Cubs. Scott apparently told him “…he was running out of time in his career and that he lacked the qualities of a person with good character.” That comes off as pretty insulting and self righteous, but maybe Pie needed some tough love. Scott’s exact words were a bit harder to excuse:

“I tell him about some of the ways he’s acted: ‘Look, you’re acting like an animal, you’re acting like a savage. So I throw (plantains) in his helmet. Here are my banana chips to remind him that whenever he acts like an animal, ‘Hey, that’s what other people are thinking. They’re just not telling you, but that’s what they’re thinking about. And I’m telling you so that you’re aware of that so you can make a cognitive decision to not behave like that.’ I would want someone to tell me that instead of letting you making a jerk of yourself.”

Ummmm…insert awkward silence here. An animal and a savage; why didn’t he just call him a monkey? Everyone in the Orioles clubhouse defended Scott and said that he ribs people and they rib him right back, and that may be so. But doesn’t it seem odd for a man who has a race-related image problem to say those things to a journalist?

h/t to Mercurial Outfielder

WSD contest for April 2012

It's a bit early, but figured we'd get a head start.  If you guess "zero" and Tony Campana gets injured in spring training, then you're pretty much automatically in the random drawing to win (dying laughing)

Paterno contends that ignorance was the context with which he heard McQueary’s disturbing story in 2002. McQueary, sitting at Paterno’s kitchen table, told him that he had been at the football building late the evening before when he heard noises coming from the shower. “He was very upset and I said why, and he was very reluctant to get into it,” Paterno said. “He told me what he saw, and I said, what? He said it, well, looked like inappropriate, or fondling, I’m not quite sure exactly how he put it. I said you did what you had to do. It’s my job now to figure out what we want to do. So I sat around. It was a Saturday. Waited till Sunday because I wanted to make sure I knew what I was doing. And then I called my superiors and I said, ‘Hey, we got a problem, I think. Would you guys look into it?’ Cause I didn’t know, you know. We never had, until that point, 58 years I think, I had never had to deal with something like that. And I didn’t feel adequate.”

At that point, Paterno set up a meeting for McQueary and Curley, the athletic director, and Schultz, who oversaw university police. McQueary has testified that he gave both men a far more graphic description of what he witnessed, which he believed to be Sandusky sodomizing a boy of about 10, who had his hands against the shower wall. At the preliminary hearing for Curley and Schultz on Dec. 16, McQueary said he had been reluctant to go into similar “great detail about sexual acts” with Paterno, out of respect for the coach, who was 78 at the time.

Schultz and Curley have maintained that McQueary failed to impart the seriousness of what he saw to them as well. They never told police about the allegation, instead informing Sandusky he could no longer bring children to university facilities. Prosecutors say Sandusky continued to abuse boys for six more years.

Paterno has said, “In hindsight, I wish I had done more.” — Washington Post

When it's now your job to figure out what to do, I strongly suggest you don't sit around for 10 fucking years and do nothing.

Updated with some Day 2 stuff.

Updated with our wrap-up.  It was fun but I’m not sure it’s worth full price.

Last update: the opening ceremony.

Hoyer’s lasting impact on the Padres organization will be the infusion of talent at the minor league level. Along with the trades that sent prospects to the Padres, Hoyer, McLeod and company also added plenty of talent in the draft. So far, it looks like the 2011 draft might be the better of the two, adding players like second baseman Cory Spangenberg, right-hander Joe Ross and catcher Austin Hedges, who have already established themselves as bona fide prospects among scouts. In 2010, the Padres drafted right-hander Karsten Whitson in the first round (ninth overall) but failed to sign him. They did add promising prospects like third baseman Jedd Gyorko and right-hander John Barbato later on.

If you look at Baseball America’s or Goldstein’s top Padres prospects, a remarkable eight out of 10 were acquired under Hoyer, who transformed a system that had depth but few established prospects into one of the best systems in the game. Now guys like outfielders Jaff Decker and Donavan Tate and right-hander Simon Castro, formerly very highly touted in the Padres system, are almost forgotten amid the influx in talent.

It’s an extensive look at the two years, but it’s a very good read.

Hoyer’s lasting impact on the Padres organization will be the infusion of talent at the minor league level. Along with the trades that sent prospects to the Padres, Hoyer, McLeod and company also added plenty of talent in the draft. So far, it looks like the 2011 draft might be the better of the two, adding players like second baseman Cory Spangenberg, right-hander Joe Ross and catcher Austin Hedges, who have already established themselves as bona fide prospects among scouts. In 2010, the Padres drafted right-hander Karsten Whitson in the first round (ninth overall) but failed to sign him. They did add promising prospects like third baseman Jedd Gyorko and right-hander John Barbato later on.

If you look at Baseball America’s or Goldstein’s top Padres prospects, a remarkable eight out of 10 were acquired under Hoyer, who transformed a system that had depth but few established prospects into one of the best systems in the game. Now guys like outfielders Jaff Decker and Donavan Tate and right-hander Simon Castro, formerly very highly touted in the Padres system, are almost forgotten amid the influx in talent.

It’s an extensive look at the two years, but it’s a very good read.

The Cubs have also signed Andy Sonnanstine.

Jaramillo’s contract is a minor league one and I’m assuming the same is true for Sonnanstine. Both players will look to have strong performances in spring training and earn their way onto the roster. Sonnanstine has the much clearer path. They already have Welington Castillo and Steve Clevenger on the roster. Castillo will likely become the back-up and Jaramillo is probably nothing more than spring training roster filler.

Sonnanstine never reached the potential that many thought he could and after several years of not being any good the Rays finally cut him loose.