Every one of them involves bringing in some washed-up guy playing within spitting distance of replacement level and paying his whole contract plus most of the remainder of Bradley’s. The worst of these involve washed-up guys with lots of time left on their contracts. The best merely would involve guys that the Cubs would have to keep on the 25-man roster and would likely feel obligated to run out in the outfield every day all year. Which makes the Burrell idea somewhat better than the Vernon Wells one.

We’d probably be better off trading Bradley and cash to a willing team for a 30-year old minor-league relief pitcher that will never see the bigs. Then we’ll get replacement-level right-field production, but at least it will be cheap and flexible. Maybe we could pull a Tony LaRussa move and rotate a bunch of guys in and out of the spot as they compete for a starting job.

There really are no great options. That’s sort of what happens when you very publicly kick a guy with two years on his contract off your team.

Hendry will have to be very creative to make the Cubs better in getting rid of Bradley. I’d rather eat the money in the end than take on a bad player with an equally bad contract.

Who will turn out to be harder to trade for Hendry?

Let’s just hope this doesn’t drag out until Feb.