Pineapple on pizza = yuck.

A few random thoughts from yours truly:

Junior Lake: Great-looking player but poor plate discipline keeps my enthusiasm in check.

Josh Vitters: I haven’t given up on him but many have. Hope he figures things out defensively because a move to first base or left field would seem to lower his value even further. This upcoming season looms large.

Ronald Torreyes: Many of us are hoping he’s our Dustin Pedroia, but his small size and minimal power keep me from getting my hopes too high. Looking forward to following his progress, though.

Dave Sappelt: Decent fourth outfielder.

Chris Carpenter & Rafael Dolis: I hope/expect both to be decent-to-good MLB relievers.

The Cubs have as much talent as about anyone at low-A and below with a ton of upsid, so a lot of those guys will be shooting up rankings the next couple years.

They’ll let Sori start this year in the hopes of building some value (plus he’s not really blocking anyone – yet). But I’d be surprised if he’s on the roster in 2013, and floored if he’s starting.

As for Theo spending money… this offseason, I think he was prepared to make value buys (and did) and would have considered market buys in the right situation. I suppose I shouldn’t use past tense because the Cubans are still out there. I’d put Cespedes as a value buy, and Soler a market buy.

Next offseason, I think he’ll be prepared to make market buys in SP and will consider overmarket buys in the right situation (Cain, Hamels). After that, most of the pieces will be place and then he can fine tune here and there with a strategic buy at whatever price level is needed.

3B is still the big mystery to me though. I think how they fill that hole will be a key litmus test for Theo & Jed.

They didn’t come here to run Pittsburgh-west.

Most of the Cubs big roadblocks roll off after this season. For ’13, they only have $33.5M committed to Soriano, Marmol, and DeJesus (and the half million buyout for Maholm if the decline his option).

Now that doesn’t include Garza (if he’s kept / extended) or Soto (last year of arbitration… I’m in favor of dealing him) who could add a reasonable chunk. But even if Garza is 15 and Soto 6 and let’s say they pick up Maholm’s option ($6.5M), that’s still only $60.5M.

There would still be plenty of roster space left (19), but most of those could / would be filled by:
Arbitration 3 guy: Sonnastine
Arbitration 2 guys: Wells, Volstad, Stewart, DeWitt, Corpas
Arbitration 1 guys: Shark, Castro, Russell
Pre-arbitration guys: TWood and Barney most notably… but plenty of others

Obviously not all those guys will be around… but for the sake of the example, let’s say they are. That’s 11 of those 19 spots, not including other pre-arb guys… let’s say they fill 4 of those spots with such guys (Carpenter, Dolis, back-up catcher, Gaub, LaHair, Sappelt, etc.) and that total couldn’t possible be more than $20M (probably less).

That leaves 5 other guys to acquire (FA or trade) and you’ve got at least $20M to just get to $100M. If they set a $120M payroll, which seems reasonable, then you’ve got $40M to spend. And, keep in mind that several of those guys probably won’t be around and could be replaced either cheaper or with a pricier replacement (maybe you trade Soto and go with Castillo, try and find a ’12 trade deadline deal for Marmol, Garza could be easily gone, decline Maholm, let one of Wells or Volstad walk, get rid of DeWitt… obviously not all those will happen either, but they would pare a big chunk off the payroll).

One last note… if indeed the Cubs sign one or more of the Cubans, that would impact the totals.

I went to his site and paged through everything he had posted. His oldest post in the “Window” series is only a week ago. My original comment was posted over three weeks ago. The similarities are rather striking. About the only thing he didn’t do was add a black border. Oh, and list Adam Lind and Brian Roberts.

Daver, consider yourself retained. Not looking for a monetary award, just credit where credit’s due.

Release the hounds! Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war! If only SOPA and PIPA had been passed! Jessica, you were right! A pox on Wikipedia and Google’s houses!

If they were on their top 20 lists, I’ve left them out.

Don’t. Know. What. Was. Said.