Phil Watch: Double Dose...Again

This Phil offering is not only classic Phil, it's classic Off-Season Phil.

It's why we exist here at Phil Watch.

Before we get started, I like to say that I'm dubious over whether Phil is actually in Indianapolis. For a national baseball writer to not have one reference to anybody else in the league while everybody else in the league is so conveniently in one area is spectacular.

He's in a hotel room in Hammond. That way, he can get a Skyway receipt to expense the whole thing.

Let's get started.

INDIANAPOLIS -- Take heart, Cubs fans. There's no taking the easy way out under Crane Kenney.

The man accountable for everything from overseeing the baseball staff to raising ticket prices insisted Wednesday the Cubs won't "run away from our problems" on his watch. The determination is nice, of course, but wouldn't it be better if they stopped creating so many of them?

Fine! I'll bite. What problems? The Cubs have many but what does Phil think the problems are?

In the second month of the Tom Ricketts era, there's an odd sense of disconnect between the Cubs and the business of winning baseball. They continue to reel and stumble trying to regain footing lost with the Milton Bradley signing and Mark DeRosa trade a year ago. And, guess what? The situation doesn't seem likely to clear up any time soon.

Oh, Sweet Fancy Moses! DeRosa? This again?

First, what's the hurry? We're only at the dawn of the free agency period right now.

Second, and most importantly, this free agent class isn't really that good.

It's akin to the NBA right now. The 2011 free agent class is infinitely more talented than this one. Here's an example. Randy Wolf was considered to be the fifth-best free agent (not just pitcher) on the market this year before he signed with the Brewers. Randy. Wolf.

John Lackey is far and away the best pitcher in this class. If he were a free agent in 2011, he'd be, at best, the fifth-best pitcher behind Halladay, Lee, Beckett and Webb with Javier Vazquez also in the mix.

Holliday and Bay are shiny, pretty toys to swoon over. Yes. They're good players. But if they were to be free agents in 2011, they'd have to compete with Joe Mauer, Carl Crawford, Victor Martinez, Carlos Peña, Adam Dunn and Jayson Werth to name a few. That doesn't bring into account a number of players with upside like Derrek Lee, Konerko, Lilly, Kuroda and Street while having oodles of players with options that may not be picked up like Jose Reyes, Jimmy Rollins and Aramis Ramirez.

In short, they have no competition this year. Some teams are going to sit on their hands, clear some payroll and wait for the infinitely better class just around the pike.

The Cubs, having just changed ownership and already have $120 million committed, had better be one of those teams if they're smart business people.

Look at the Cubs payroll commitments for the future. Where is their any wiggle room?

We would like to report Tribune Co. hadn't gotten so much of Ricketts' money that there was enough left over for the new owners to authorize general manager Jim Hendry to ring in the new regime with a signature acquisition.

Name a 'signature acquisition.'

But the Cubs haven't entered the bidding for Roy Halladay and seemed happy to let Curtis Granderson go to the Yankees.

Oh, holy hell! How many columns has Phil wrote extolling the virtues of Starlin Castro and Andrew Cashner. They are their only trade chips.

Both the Blue Jays and Tigers rightly have said they wanted major league-ready talent in return. Both those guys aren't CLOSE to being ready.

Phil is living in Score caller world. Other baseball teams should just give the Cubs what they want for crap in a bag.

They instead have allowed themselves to become laughingstocks of the winter meetings with tireless attempts to trade the unwanted Bradley and appear on the verge of making another decision just as baffling to their fans as the DeRosa trade -- becoming the first team in 20 years to move their spring training base from Arizona to Florida.

I suppose I have to discuss DeRosa.

There's no position where he fielded adequately. He was coming off a career year and the Indians offered something the Cubs didn't have: Organizational pitching depth.

Here's what the Cubs got back:

Chris Archer: 6-4, 2.81 ERA in A ball, giving up 78 hits in 109 innings, striking out 119

John Gaub: 2-2, 2.25 ERA seeing relief time in AA and AAA, allowing 17 hits in 31 innings while striking out 40.

Jeff Stevens: 1-3, 2.03 ERA in AAA, giving up 35 hits in 57 innings while striking out 61.

Pretty nice little haul.

DeRosa had a $7.6 million Win Value this year while being paid $5.5 million. Meh.

More importantly, he put up a .250/.319/.433 line for a .752 OPS, his worst mark since 2004.

Most importantly, he saw his walk rate dramatically decrease (from 12% to 8.4%) and had a strikeout rate nearly equal to his career-high (23.5% with 121 Ks, the most of his career). Wrist injury. Sure. But his numbers in Cleveland before the injury weren't much better.

We here at Phil Watch liked DeRosa, especially as it seemed he was paying more attention to getting on base. But he's 35 now and can't field.

Let's stop talking about Mark DeRosa, shall we?

Nothing's official, and Mesa, Ariz., did agree Wednesday to spend $750,000 to improve the existing facilities, but all signs point to the Cubs soon announcing they have turned down the proposed new complex there to jump to one in Naples, Fla.

People have been bitching about the shittiness of that complex for years and they did nothing.

I talked to Kenney, the president who represents one-stop shopping for Ricketts in his role as adviser on all matters, about the situation Wednesday.

Here's what he said about Mesa building the two 5,000-square foot buildings to house batting cages: Nothing. Nada. Zip. Not a word.

Oooooohhh, now we have the impetus of such vitriol. Kenney was a little short with Phil and Phil didn't like it.

The Cubs will deny this, and I can't say it with 100 percent certainty, but I believe the decision already has been made to abandon the 45-year relationship with Mesa. Carlos Zambrano, Alfonso Soriano and a generation or two of Starlin Castros...

I'm getting queasy. JHC. Castro has one good year in A ball and we're talking about him like he's Derek Jeter (Oh, we'll be getting to terms like Jeteresque...)

...are about to find their rear ends on buses headed across Alligator Alley and in heavy traffic on Interstate Highway 75 headed to Tampa or quaint places like Lakeland and Kissimmee.

The 30 worst traffic cities in America. Phoenix is #14. Tampa isn't on the list. Just saying.

Kenney insisted it is Ricketts' intention to do what is best for his team.

But no matter how many justifications you hear about the Florida move -- heavier air for pitchers, a short hop to the Dominican Republic and elsewhere in Latin America, etc. -- the reason will be that Ricketts wanted his base of operations in Florida, not Arizona.

So?

Oh, and the developers driving the Naples deal, the Chicago-based Esmark Inc. and the Florida-based Fifth Avenue Advisors, will be sure to add plenty of sweeteners to their offer, including some specifically targeted for the owners. I understand this isn't criminal activity; it's business.

SO?

But, please. Don't sell a sweetheart land deal as progress for the Lovable Losers.

Who has said it's progress? Nobody! Just that they might be moving.

Personally, I wouldn't mind the move. I have Marco Island connections. But I'm not a 28-year-old free agent with a .295 career batting average and six teams interested in signing me. If I was that guy, I'd be far more likely to have attachments to the Phoenix area than the southwest tip of Florida. Those things matter when you are recruiting players.

Who's he talking about?

The only guy that would fit the mold that I can find is Carl Crawford, a 28 year-old guy and a free agent in 2011 with a .295 career average and he just spent the last eight years of his life IN TAMPA!

Really? Who's he talking about? Is it hypothetical?

When I asked Hendry for his Arizona-Florida preference Wednesday, he gave as noncommittal answer as possible -- no doubt the wise one when your owner is leaning to the remote location that fits his needs, if not those of the fans who flock to see games in the Cactus League.

So Cubs fans will now see them in the Grapefruit League and in a better facility to boot.

What's the real problem here? It's a month and a half of fake baseball. A glorified stretching session. Who cares?

What's with the pissy attitude?

"There are a lot of intangibles that as a general manager I don't have a right to weigh in on," Hendry said. "There's going to be a huge commitment of dollars, land. Those things are way out of my area of expertise, and they should be. Tom has to do what's best for the organization."

Based on the 83-78 record in 2009, a little better roster might be "best for the organization." But Ricketts didn't bring fresh payroll capital to give Hendry back the flexibility he sacrificed signing Soriano, Kosuke Fukudome and Bradley for $214 million over 15 seasons in his first three off-seasons under manager Lou Piniella's spell.

Holy Crap! He's all over the map! First it was Bradley and DeRosa and now it's Soriano, Fukudome and Bradley.

What a freaking stream of consciousness with absolutely no direction!

After allowing Rich Harden, Reed Johnson and Kevin Gregg to leave as free agents, Hendry has added only reliever Jeff Gray thus far. It's early, sure, but the lukewarm pursuit of Granderson and free-agent starting pitchers speaks volumes about the internal expectations for a big move.

Reed Johnson? Kevin Gregg! Did Phil watch Cub games last year?

Again, please tell me, Phil. What did the Cubs have to offer up for Granderson?

Kenney stressed the Ricketts ownership is looking at the long haul, not the 2010 season. He insisted it's too early to draw conclusions.

"Jim hasn't stopped working," he said. "Put it that way."

Too much of Hendry's time has been spent trying to get a 25-cent return on the dollar for Bradley. The Cubs simply should have released him last August, after he said he "prayed" games would go nine innings so he could go home.

Or they could try to get something for him. If they can't, THEN dump him.

"And eat $21 million?" asked Kenney. "I have 21 million reasons why we're not releasing him. If there's any prospect we can get back, players who can help us, or save some of the money (to do other things with), why wouldn't we explore that? ... We don't have an unlimited budget."

So the Bradley watch goes on.

Now that's a limp response to a legitimate question.

"We don't run away from our problems," Kenney said. "The fact it's painful doesn't change anything."

Sort of has to a ring to it, doesn't it?

Maybe Soriano will have his 40-40 season in 2010. Maybe Zambrano will win 20 games. But somebody ought to start printing the T-shirts:

Cubs in 2010 -- the fact it's painful doesn't change anything.

What just happened? I'm confused. What was Phil's point?

Personally, I like counting how many questions were posited without once giving an answer to any of them.

Classic Phil. Just classic.