Both teams spent heavily on a core group of players to carry them to a pennant and it didn't work.

I have no love for Hendry, but when I look at his spending.

1. Soriano - signed him off a 40 HR year, was an ALL STAR twice as a Cub and hit 40 HRs as a Cub twice. Everyone knew the back end of this deal would be an issue. Plus, some say the 7 year deal was not his call. McDonough?
2. Zambrano- The guy was 26 years old, pitched 200+ innings, was 18-13, 177K, which could have been a down year for him. But age 26, ready to go free agent. OK fine. Yankees would have come calling.
3. Fukudome - This one pissed me off, that the guy was nothing as reported, and this for a team that has a scout watching him everyday? (Steve Wilson) Not well spent but relied on a Scout.

Versus Kenny's

1. Adam Dunn - Always high K's, second half season terrible, current team made no effort to keep him. No way do you predict him to do as poor as he did, but maybe you question that is he going to keep hitting 40 HR?
2. Rios - Another case of a guy not doing it when you got him and you hoped/expected him to be better for no other reason than you think so? (Sorry Edwin Jackson mistake not an excuse)
3. Peavy - aches, pains...everything now tracked back to a sprained ankle. read every roto magazine the year they got him, most anticipated guy to blow out something! Maybe the first 2 times a guy says he doesnt want to come to your team, you deal with that instead of trying to prove him wrong.

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"That's what the internet is for. Slandering others anonymously." Banky
“Been that way since one monkey looked at the sun and told the other monkey ‘He said for you to give me your fuckin’ share.’”

I agree with part of what you are saying BF. Hendry's big signings are overly criticized in hindsight because the players ended up not performing. But at the time they were signed, not a lot of people bitched about the signings. In fact, lots of people initially thought the Cubs may have gotten a deal on the Zambrano contract in some ways.

But that being said, I'd take the bad signings and not complain a bit if Hendry would have gotten us a (lucky) ring like the father of that SOB wide receiver from the 49ers did.

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It will always piss of Kenny that people dont give him credit for that team. They give Ozzie credit.

So I ask? why is that?

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"That's what the internet is for. Slandering others anonymously." Banky
“Been that way since one monkey looked at the sun and told the other monkey ‘He said for you to give me your fuckin’ share.’”

I hated the Soriano signing at the time. But I was Ok with the other two when they were signed.

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its not that you hate the signing of the player, you hate the terms o the deal. IF it was a 5 year deal like Hendry wanted, you would have got 3 good years of 5, the other 2 are 20+ HR years, bats.245 and cant field. The worst is he could run in years 1 and 2 of the deal.

By all accounts, Hendry had a 5 year deal on the table and McDonough called the agent to ask what it will take to get it done tonight. Agent said 7 years, McDonough said ok, fly to Chicago tomorrow to sign it. Or this deal would be done by now as well.

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"That's what the internet is for. Slandering others anonymously." Banky
“Been that way since one monkey looked at the sun and told the other monkey ‘He said for you to give me your fuckin’ share.’”

i did not hate it at the time so much because i hated seeing matt murton in left..but i knew the last 3 years were going to be brutal..big z surprised me..i thought z would be 18-20 win a year guy with 200 plus innings yearly. and i never wanted fukudome here.. i am not a believer in the asian players..ever since ichiro it has been all down hill

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Where you kill Hendry is the $$$ and signings on average to bad players, plus the lack of drafting. Hayden Simpson, still kills me right now.

All GM's will fail with some picks, but when you draft a kid in the first round that NOBODY had going in the first or 2nd?????

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"That's what the internet is for. Slandering others anonymously." Banky
“Been that way since one monkey looked at the sun and told the other monkey ‘He said for you to give me your fuckin’ share.’”

Williams and Guillen should have both been terminated after the 2010 season.
End of Story.
Reinsdorf runs a strange operation.

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There goes one over the fence..Tru Link Fence..Beauty, Privacy Security....Call Tru Link.
Murph's Union 76 Truck Stop....A great Thanksgiving Tradition!!!!

WOO LIFE!!!!

I don't blame Hendry all that much for the Soriano/Zambrano signings. The Cubs were in the win now mode and they were proven major league ballplayers.

The Fukodome signing bothered me because the Cubs missed badly, paying a lot of money for what turned out to be average major league talent. Sort of indicative of the Cubs scouting, or lack of it.

But Hendry did put together the best team in the NL in 2008, best record in the league, in the toughest division in the league, best run differential. I can't blame Hendry for the Cubs playoff collapse, those players pissed down their collective legs. That team should have been in the World Series.

But I blame Hendry for post '08. Letting Derosa go and signing Bradley (in fairness I didn't think it was a bad signing but I don't have scouts working for me). Thinking Gregg was a legitimate closer. Letting the farm system go to waste. Never finding a left handed power hitter.

That to me was the downfall of Hendry, not the Soriano signing.

Bradley is his Rios, but worse!

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"That's what the internet is for. Slandering others anonymously." Banky
“Been that way since one monkey looked at the sun and told the other monkey ‘He said for you to give me your fuckin’ share.’”

I guess someone needs a refresher

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

I'm sure baseball thinkers recognize the genius of sitting on your ass and letting starting pitchers on a tear finish the games they started.

Williams had much more to do with that WS than Ozzie.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

quote]
Soriano's high HR total on the Cubs is 33 in 2001

33
29
20
24
26



And its an EIGHT year deal