Brett Jackson is demolishing AAA

Applying it to the real world is different. In the case of the Cubs, this happened in week one. During that period Wellemeyer/Looper went down/retired/…Jay Jackson was hurt…so that’s already 8 SP into the preseason depth. Not many, if any teams, are going to be trotting out quality. Hell, the Yankee FO couldnt even fill out their rotation going into the season with 5 guys they truly counted on. They’re still amazed at what they’ve gotten out of Garcia/Colon.

Russell was at least number 9, and I’d rather see him take his beating than retreads like the three that were pushed. Russell was done as soon as David was ready, and he didn’t not improve while he was SP. He held his own in both LA and Boston for a while…just didn’t have the endurance and arm strength built up after a whole couple weeks into the season.

But, again, at the moment, the Cubs have developed two position players since Hendry became GM on July 5, 2002, who are even in the discussion as All-Stars.

even with one of those years in the negatives. That’s darn close to a 2 WAR a year player for a stretch, and 2 WAR is almost universally considered solid starter.

Even Choi had his productive seasons….though not quite as good as Patterson. His ’04 with Florida was pretty solid.

Pie and Hill, but that’s probably why they got traded.

I didn’t accuse of it, I just like doing it because it fits a board theme.

Those two players have both come in the last 4 years.

Now, SG’s going to chime in about how two of those guys brought Aramis and Lee. That, again, shows Hendry can fleece small market teams sometimes — not that he can develop star position players.

Not only were 3 of those guys guys able to deliver productive (even very productive) individual seasons (‘07 for Hill, ’04 for Choi, ’03-’06 for Patterson minus ‘05), but IIRC three of them are still the big leagues…Or it might be two…Hill’s in the minors I think.

However, if Brett Jackson does not pan out, then the Cubs will have to overspend on another CF.

Neither player is really showing anything in AAA that warrants a call-up this year. LeMahieu is OBPing under .300 and OPSing .612, while Flaherty is OBPing under .250 and OPSing .535.

Flaherty will be on the 40-man this November, but he’s not showing much to suggest he should be up in September. LeMahieu is now already on the 40-man, but has struggled in AAA and didn’t show much in his very brief stint in the majors (.514 OPS).

Both are guys that will hopefully respond next year and earn call-ups.

He clearly had some (ahem) supplemental help. But, strangely, Sosa became a smarter baseball player around the same time. He became less of a hacker and even started to hit the ball the other way. There was once a really strong Phil Rogers column (broken clock) that talked about how Sosa threw a lot of that away after 2001 (his best season) and started swinging for the fences again. Rogers’ theory was that Sosa was trying to compete with Bonds, and that his decline was accelerated by the Bellhorn collision in late 2003 and the HBP by Salomon Torres in early 2003.

Whether was right about the cause of the decline — Sosa might have just been aging — his OPS did decline from above 1.000 from 1998-2001 to .849 in 2004.