Tuesday, January 8, 2008

Cubs looking at Brian Roberts

Here's a bit of news concerning the Chicago Cubs that makes me a little nervous. It's been reported that the Cubs are aggressively pursuing Brian Roberts, even though his name came up in the Mitchell Report.

The Cubs' offer included Sean Gallagher and Matt Murton, as of now. It did not, however, involve Rich Hill or Felix Pie. I would expect the Orioles would want one of these pieces in a trade for an all-star. It has been said that Ronny Cedeno, Sean Marshall, and Donnie Veal could also be in the mix.

Brian Roberts playing 2B for the Cubs? A scary thought...The one thing that I was sure of concerning the Cubs is that the middle of their infield leaves a lot to be desired. If they can land Roberts, that would take a HUGE step towards fixing that problem. Gallagher and Murton? That seems like a measly return for the Orioles. Sean Marshall is terrible too, so let's hope the Cubs have to keep him.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

What scares you about Brian Roberts? He's got a career 101 ERA+ and a career SLG thats just .015 better than Jason Kendall. His career EQA is .279, not terrible but not good. The Cubs making this move wouldn't really scare me too much.

jimmyb1799 said...

Okay, okay..."scary" may be a little hyperbolic, but still...the guy hit .290 with 50 stolen bases last year. He only had 57 RBI, but put him in the Cubs' lineup, and that is bound to increase. His OBP was .377 last year (again not monumental, as Prince had an OBP of .395), but that would also grow in the Cubs' lineup. No matter how you look at it, he would see a lot better pitches to hit in Chicago than in Baltimore, surrounded by much lesser talent. The stats would go up.