Chicago Cubs Ticket Blog

The past three season shortstop has been one of the reliable Chicago Cubs in the field and at the plate, but it seems the two parties will be undergoing arbitration proceedings in the coming weeks. The Cubs offered Theriot $2.6 million, but the ball player has demanded that General Manager Jim Hendry meets his demands of $3.4 million. Now Theriot’s salary will be decided by a third party arbitrator as both sides present their case. The Cubs have not gone to arbitration since 1993 when Mark Grace lose his case for $4.1 million. Theriot was one of the only bright spots all year on the Cubs lineup in 2009 batting .285 playing in 154 games. He’s a popular guy in the clubhouse, in the media, and with the fans so keeping him happy should be a priority with the Cubs though they certainly don’t want to overpay for any one player. You can’t blame Theriot for demanding more money as the 30-year-old was one of the most underpaid players on the roster last season only making $500,000.

The Cubs have announced Friday that they have signed outfielder Xavier Nady to a one-year deal worth $3.3 million. The deal was held up for a few days as Nady had to pass a physical with the Cubs. The 31-year-old has good career numbers (.280, 87 HR’s, 325 RBI’s), but his career has been plagued by injury. The journeyman ball player has played for the Padres, Mets, Pirates, and Yankees. In 2008 Nady hit .305 with 25 HR’s and 97 RBI’s playing for the Pirates and then Yankees. Nady spent the majority of 2009 out after undergoing Tommy John surgery for the second time in his career. Bringing in a player with such a history of injury problems is a risk the Cubs are willing to take, but looking back at the Cubs’ 2009 season the move looks safer than signing a troublemaker like Milton Bradley.

Adding another run producer to the lineup could make a huge difference who had to rely to much on Derek Lee and Aramis Ramirez for RBI’s. Nady joins Marlon Byrd as new outfield signing for the Cubs. Byrd career power numbers aren’t as high Nady’s, but the former Texas Rangers center fielder has played the majority of his last three season. No matter who starts in the outfield come opening day the addition of Nady does add some needed depth to the Cubs roster. I’m just glad the Cubs are doing something. It’s never too early to get excited for opening day at Wrigley Field. All this snow and cold makes me miss baseball season. I can’t wait for the days of sunshine, hot dogs, ivy, and Cubbie blue. Who knows maybe Xavier Nady will turn out to be a master stroke by GM Jim Hendry? It could happen!

The Chicago Cubs seem to be taking themselves out of the hunt for former Milwaukee Brewers ace Ben Sheets because of the pitchers’ salary demands are too high. Team officials have cited the high payroll (which could be over $140 million in 2010) as the reason a move for Sheets is unlikely. The right-handed pitcher is demanding a two year deal between $10-12 million making it difficult for the Cubs to add the four-time All Star to their roster.

With the news of pitcher Ted Lilly’s injury troubles the Cubs have been looking to add another starter to the roster, but with the high salary the new ownership inherited signing a ace might be out of the question. Cubs fans will have to be hopeful that Carlos Zambrano and Ryan Dempster return to the form they showed in 2008 when opening day rolls around. Though the team is not completely ruling out a bid for Sheets expect the Cubs to go after more economical free agents or make a few trades before the 2010 season.

A guy in Utah tried to pass himself off as a member of the Chicago Cubs, signing the papers for a new pickup truck, using the ID and signing the name of a player who is a prospect of the Chicago Cubs. Tyler Colvin is the name of that player and you probably haven’t seen him on the field, since he’s only been in 6 games last season. He’s working his way up. He’s in no legal jeopardy about that, but we have to question whether that really gets you special treatment. Maybe he just happened to choose a baseball player by accident, but it seems unlikely. But the guy who did that is going to be in trouble, since he essentially stole a car from the guy on false pretenses. Anyway, it’s a Friday and  we need some fun stories sometimes too. If you want real baseball, don’t worry, spring training is on the way!

Greg Maddux appears to have returned to the Cubs. He’s going to be the “special assistant” to general manager Jim Hendry. This means that he’ll be part talent scout, part evaluator of the team and then do some other kinds of needs for the team. It will be interesting to see how they end up using him and whether that will help the team improve their situation. Maddux retired awhile back after a stellar pitching career. He pitched for the Cubs twice and left twice. He could be one of the best viewers of baseball players in the world and hopefully he will bring that expert eye to this team as the time goes forwards. It will be nice to have him back at Wrigley and he will be able to let the team know what kinds of changes might get this team back into real contention for championships.

Andre Dawson, who made his reputation in a Cubs uniform, has been elected to the Hall of Fame, it was announced yesterday. It appears that he really earned it too, with good strong performances throughout his career. He was able to get a great on base percentage, great hitting, and especially fantastic fielding. His seasons were often cut short due to his weak knees. He had 12 knee surguries throughout his career and that limited his playing time considerably. I don’t know if he could have helped the Cubs to arrive at the pennant or the World Series, but it would have been interesting to find out. Meanwhile, there is a small battle brewing about whether Dawson will wear a Cubs hat or a Montreal Expos hat during the ceremony. We are all sitting on pins and needles about this today, but we probably won’t remember it by the time the actual event comes around.

Are you a Rudy Jaramillo fan? The Cubs are hoping that by the end of the year, you will be. He’s one of the biggest names in batting coaching and we’re expecting that the team will bump up their batting ability this year to stop the continuing problems that they’ve been having. There are some great potential bats in the lineup and having someone who really gets it working with the players is expected to be a very effective way for the team to regain the divisional title that they lost so sadly last year. When Jaramillo is there, his bats are usually booming. He’s the one that got great production out of Milton Bradley a couple years ago and he has worked with a couple other players on the team. Hopefully his addition will make everything good again!

This week, we welcome the addition of Marlon Byrd to the Chicago Cubs. He’s an outfielder and has trained with the new hitting coach for a long time. This is going to be a good year for them, because we hopefully have found the guy that will be able to fill up the center field that has been so tough for the last few years. Really, since Sosa went a little crazy awhile back, the center field position hasn’t been filled properly in awhile. Byrd was good with the Rangers in recent years, so the next few years with the Cubs should be better. The Cubs don’t seem to be trying to make a big splash this year and it will be interesting to see whether the end result of the trade will be better production than some of the bigger-name transactions over the last few years.

Which team would you rather play for? The Cubs or the Nationals? There is a lot of talk right now about the future of Matt Capps. It seemed possible that Capps was going to come in as a great set-up man for the Cubs this year. But the announcement of the signing was much too early to work out the right way. So now it appears that this fellow is either heading to the Cubs or to the Nationals. Either way is probably better than if he had stayed with the Pirates. But the question for him is whether he wants to continue as a closer or if he wants to be a reliever or set-up person for his next team. Maybe Cubs will get a nice Christmas present of a strong relieving pitcher coming in!

Although he has a no-trade clause in his contract, there are reports that Carlos Zambrano was the subject of a discussion between the Cubs and the Yankees last week. Let’s be clear, his agent and Cubs representatives say that this isn’t the case. This would lead us to wonder what the source of the rumor is. Maybe it’s just a test balloon that doesn’t mean much of anything at this point. Or perhaps it means that the possibility is open. Either way, the fact that people are talking about it suggests that the Cubs might be continuing their quest to get the bad attitude players out of town and get the locker room chemistry back in shape. But for now, the Zambrano trade that was talked about probably isn’t happening at this point.