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Getting Ready For the Winter Meetings | Print |  E-mail
Written by Justin Bridgman   
Wednesday, 02 December 2009 11:28

The most fun rumor time of the year is about to be upon us, this years winter meetings happen in Indianapolis (much less fun than last year's Vegas meetings) and begin on Sunday. What this means for the Cubs is a healthy dose of Curtis Granderson rumors, and a whole lot of Milton Bradley talk.

Ideally Jim Hendry will complete his Bradley for Pat Burrell swap before the winter meetings start. That way the rest of the offseason can begin, right now Hendry is handcuffed by his own stupidity. The budget is frozen until Bradley is moved and we see how much money is saved by moving him (I'll bet it's no more than $3 million, and probably is no money saved at all).

Once Milton is gone I think the winter meetings will revolve around two things for the Cubs- trading for Curtis Granderson and negotiating with Rick Ankiel. The unfounded rumor I posted on twitter is not my motivation for speculating an Ankiel-Cubs marriage, I just think that it makes too much sense as a Cubs/Jim Hendry move. Ankiel is about as good a hitter as you could want for a pitcher, but the problem is he plays outfield. He isn't very good in center (Fukudome-like -9.4 UZR in his career) and plays a good left (6.5) and a below average right (-1.4). Do those numbers sound familiar? That's because they look just like Sam Fuld's numbers, who the Cubs already have. The only difference is Fuld is a patient leadoff type hitter, and Ankiel has the ability to hit homers.

Curtis Granderson will be the story though. I'm betting nearly every young Cubs player and top minor league guy is mentioned in various reports next week, there will be at least one fake "trade is completed" story, and in the end nothing will happen. We will have stressed out discussion about how we can't possibly trade Starlin Castro and Carlos Marmol. How the team isn't that good anyway so why blow up the imporoving minor league system. How Granderson might just be a platoon player anyway. Basically every ounce of story involving Granderson to the Cubs will be talked about by the time we reach this time next week. It should be fun.

 



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