If Lou has no ideas, I think I do....

If the Cubs can’t afford to take on DeRosa’s contract (which is supposedly one of the reasons they have, for now anyway, decided not to deal for him), Tejada makes more. If you want to move money off the current roster to make room for a hitter, Rich Harden is dealable. Seriously — the Cubs did fine pitching-wise while he was out, and I doubt he will be retained as a free agent. Why not get something for him?

I agree that something has to be done.

And as Al says, SOMETHING has to be done to shake these guys up. They’ve grown comfortable with (or perhaps accepting of) losing (despite the lip service to the contrary).

I’m now referring to Milton Bradley as “The Mistake By The Lake” (since Cleveland is no longer using it…). This deal was a bad one Cubs fans, and his offense doesn’t outweigh his downside and negative impact on the team. Sorry, but this one will haunt the team for a while to come.

Sad to see what has befallen the Cubs in just a few months.

Much like in the early 1970s, I think we’ll see this team broken up. The Cub nucleus of the late 60s and early 70s had their shots and couldn’t get it done. Deals were struck to try and fix the problems in 1970 and 1971, but they only made matters worse and ultimately that chemistry created a riff between the players and the manager (Leo the Lip). He seemed lost and unmotivated too back then (sounds familiar) and it cost him his job.

Eventually all the players who we Cub fans had grown to love and root for with all our heart were traded away in the early and mid-1970s and the team was gutted.

I know times are different now but I’m afraid the same thing is happening again. And it will not be pretty when it does.

Then Soto is worthless and has no intestinal fortitude. I’m not implying Blanco didn’t help Soto last year, but at some point they were going to be separated one way or another.

Is Blanco supposed to caddy for Soto for 15 years?

I’ve heard nothing to suggest that that move was motivated by money, other than fans speculating. My understanding is, the Cubs weren’t happy with Blanco’s defensive effort in the second half of last year.

I’ve been vocal about Hendy and Piniella making this mess with a lot of their moves, but Soto’s failure is on Soto. To think Blanco’s absence accounts for 100% of the difference in Soto’s game is naive.

I would take Milton Bradley in the argument of “The worst possible club house guy” against anyone in the MLB

But the people who have played with him wouldn’t. How, exactly does your experience from the other side of the TV screen trump theirs?

Hoffpauir deserves Ab’s and he can’t be worse than Sori defensively.

If I’d had liquid in my mouth, I’d have spit it all over the screen.

This isn’t fantasy ball. That being said, if Sori is hurt, he SHOULD sit. But Johnson should go in for him, not Hoffpauir.

And start another round of “rebuilding.” Because it’s always the manager’s fault.

is Derrek Lee. Not Jake Fox.

Can we please end this at besf goofy idea that is a cancer in Chicago sports that because a manager or head coach doesn’t have a hissy fit he lacks fire?

I have to admit though that little press conference aired at the start of the broadcast was really truly bizarre.

Who would you honestly take over him BLOU? The only hitter going into today’s game i would have taken at the plate is Dlee. If you don’t think he should be getting Ab’s now then your crazy. It’s almost unthinkable that his bat is in Iowa while Aaron Miles is in the lineup everyday as he is still trying to hit a ball 250 ft in the air for the first time this year.

I continue to be completely mystified why SO many historically good Cubs hitters (especially Soriano and Bradley) have continued to have awful years at the same time. If defies all probability, as the chances of multiple players on a team hitting so far below their career averages – even below their career worst years – cannot be explained, unless…

Unless you consider that there is some other factor that is impacting everyone. Was ARAM that important to the rest of this lineup? Did we have a bad hitting coach? Is Lou losing it? Has the team lost it’s heart? Somethings up, right?

I’m still willing to wait until the all star break to make any assessments about the team, and give these guys a chance to rediscover the offiense they have no reasonable excure to have lost. After that, I’ll start with my conspiracy theories..

Okay, I know that this is the tired old argument. But with offense struggling like it has been and Soriano struggling to hit how long can we continue with him as our leadoff hitter. Lou dropped him in the order during the st. louis series earlier this year, and he struggled, but two days isn’t long enough to determine the result. Heck, we have seen him hit leadoff for two and half years with up and down results. Also, why do we continue to hear the argument that this team doesn’t have anyone to leadoff from Lou. Theriot would be a great leadoff hitter.

But the timing is not yet ripe for a big deal or a big change. So changes of personnel are likely to be from within and some managers may not believe in AAA guys to the point where they get burried even when brought up. But apparently big changes are in order soon and I take that to mean Lou will soon make a major decision about who sits and who plays.

All of the off season stuff isn’t relevant now. The new owners will evaluate Hendry when the time comes.

But I will say this for Hendry, getting rid of Derosa wasn’t a bad idea per se, it makes sense. But they could have replaced from within instead of taking a chance on Miles. Signing Bradley wasn’t bad per se, he’s a helluva of an offensive talent (maybe in more ways than one LOL), but it’s risky because of the extremely high injury risk and the intangibles risk. Okay, so you gotta have a quality backup when you sign a guy ike Bradley. Also, consider Dome, still not sure what you have there and so another reason for that same quality backup. In fact, it might have made more sense to keep Deros and add Bradley just so you’d have a veteran backup for the OF slot that’s going to get a lot of ABs. The peripheral players were very poor choices.

I am a Wood fan, but I totally see a valid reason for letting him walk. This kind of “deal” does make sense if you want to be smarter managing the roster but I wish they would have chosen another guy. The guys counted on to step up and contribute have been inconsistent.

If w were getting decent production from Soto it would soften the problems but until recently he’s been pretty bad. I don’t think anyone can be faulted there, it happens (well, maybe Soto if he’s not in playing shape).

Soriano is a streaky player, you take the good with the bad and given his bad recently he could be injured.

There are some moves that can be made internally to tweak the roster and the manager can make some changes as to who plays more and who sits, but one of the things that ha bugged me is that we keep playing this damn season short-handed because the Manager won’t use the roster that is there or he and/or the GM have a preference to keep 1-2 too many pitcher around. The latter is not worth 15 wins, but it’s aggravating that we take this approach and it could be worth a win. This season, one or two wins could be the difference in making the playoffs, so you have to use your roster better.