Bleacher Bums Forum

Pretty much, Baker has a lot more potential to bring in a Maholm type return than Feldman, IMHO.

Maholm looks a lot more like Feldman prior to coming to the Cubs than he looks like Baker.  What was the board reaction when the Cubs signed Maholm?

Pretty positive reaction actually . . .

1 year, $4.25 million for Maholm with a $6.5 million club option for 2013.  Not bad at all.

I'd definitely agree with that.  I'm a little surprised he couldn't do better.

Happy we got him...I watched him pitch in HS, in college, and now he's a Cub...nice!

Wow, that's a club friendly deal.  I'm surprised he couldn't get a better deal. 

Maholm's contract will look even better come July.

If his ERA is as glossy as it was last year, at worst, they could get a mid-level prospect for him.

I'm all for Wells becoming a situational righty once the rotation takes shape.

I haven't looked at the FA market as far as relievers but I assume there is some value on the board as far as a setup guy.

That Maholm deal is a steal.

Actually the Maholm deal was a better deal for the Cubs than Feldman.  $4.25M for Maholm last year with a club option compared to 1 year, $6M without an option for Feldman.

Really Maholm probably should look for a new agent.  He should have done a lot better.

It's silly to say people are complaining because Theo is doing what he said to do, because the guys he's bringing in - while they may nominally fit the model - aren't good baseball players by and large.  They're space fillers so we can field a team for the next 100-loss season.

Interesting to wonder how that will play for the draft.  With teenagers, obviously there is a lot of scouting projection involved, both for whether the guy will end up throwing hard, and for whether he'll have control.  But this draft was interesting in that we took Blackburn in the first and then Underwood shortly thereafter in the second.  Blackburn came with and has since been reported as a very polished control-type pitcher, but with very fringy stuff.  Underwood seemed to come with more stuff and much less control.  My guess is there was probably a healthy balance of projection and scouting in both picks.  They projected that Underwood could throw harder more consistently, and that Underwood might someday be able to pitch with control.  They knew that Blackburn showed good control, but projected that he'd be able to throw with good velocity and good stuff.  There were reports that Blackburn had been throwing a lot of 90's in the late spring, and was flashing 92-93 maybe even 94 in some tryout camps.  Perhaps the Cubs scouted/projected that that was real, and that he'd be able to sustain that and perhaps become more consistent with that, or get even faster, in due time.  The summer and fall reports suggested otherwise, of course, suggesting that he consistently lived in the upper/mid 80's instead.  Perhaps that's all exactly what they expected, but my guess is they were probably disappointed by what they saw.  Probably just a scouting mistake there.  Or, perhaps that's just a brief sample for a teenager, and in a year or two or three he will be maturing physically and working regularly in the 90-93 range, and occasionally touching 95 or 96?  If so, maybe he'll end up being all that they hoped for when they drafted him after all.  But an interesting case, I think, where the stuff that Blackburn was flashing in Mesa was certainly less stuff-wise than what Hendry would have spent a sandwich pick on  back when he was draft boss. 

Casey Coleman has been designated for assignment to make room for Feldman.

But is our 6th guy currently Belken/Raley/Coleman/Rusin/Germano? 

Germano is gone.  Don't know if any of the others are as well.