Cubs rumors

A whole lot of noting happening still so let's look at the Hall of Fame ballot.

The newbies for this year are:

2010: Roberto Alomar, Kevin Appier, Andy Ashby, Dave Burba, Ellis Burks, Andres Galarraga, Pat Hentgen, Mike Jackson, Eric Karros, Ray Lankford, Barry Larkin, Edgar Martinez, Fred McGriff, Mark McLemore, Shane Reynolds, David Segui, Robin Ventura, Fernando Vina, Todd Zeile

Let's couple that with the returning candidates and here would be my ballot. As I did earlier in the year, I've broken it down in two ways.

- Muskat blogged that the Blue Jays contacted the Cubs about Roy Halladay.

A little under the weather and mourning the end of the Bears season, so some brief notes to hold you over for the weekend.

-  To add fuel to my "they better offer Rich Harden arbitration" fire, the Seattle Times suggest the Mariners have some interest in Rich Harden as I imagine a few teams will.

Let's try to filter through all the rumor reports from the GM meetings...

Milton Bradley

We know Hendry has talked to the Rays, Rangers, Blue Jays, Mets and Angels and really only the Rays and Rangers seem to be showing any real interest and both want the Cubs to pay a hefty portion of Bradley's remaining contract. The two most discussed names coming back were Pat Burrell or Kevin Millwood. For those that thought Aaron Rowand or Barry Zito's contract could get it done, Brian Sabean said he has absolutely no interest in acquiring Bradley.

Robothal's latest said the Rays and Cubs were talking again yesterday and were just $2-$3M apart, but then stirred up some quotes describing the discussions as "worse than Chinese water torture." and "I wish cattle prods were legal." And if the Cubs do get Burrell, they'll probably just have to pay some more to ship to another team as he'll unlikely be a Cub next year considering no one thinks he belongs in the outfield anymore.

One of our most trusted readers heard on the radio from Bruce Levine that a deal for Bradley should go down in the next 3-4 days.

All Milton, all the time...

- Foxsports's rumor mongering robot Robothal is hearing talks about a 3-way trade of Milton Bradley to the Blue Jays, Lyle Overbay to the Mets and Luis Castillo to the Cubs. 

- Buried in this Stltoday.com article is this nugget:

DeRosa, coming off wrist surgery, figures to field an offer from the Chicago Cubs, at the least. 

Seems like idle speculation than anything legit, but at least the Wrigley-ites would be cheering for the right team if it did happen. (Hat tip to Bleacher Nation for the find)

I'm not sure I'll get an offseason potential target up tomorrow, but with the World Series almost wrapping up and the Cubs organizational meetings next week, the rumor mill is beginning to warm up for the offseason. Let's blast through these real quick.

UPDATE: MLB Trade Rumors and Eddie Bajek updated their reverse-engineered rankings from two days ago and don't ask me how they changed but they did. Gregg and Grabow as Type A, Harden and Johnson as Type B. For what it's worth, Chone Figgins has been dropped to Type B status by their rankings. Muskat says Gorzelanny and Fontenot will qualify as Super Two status and the Cubs have 10 arb-eligible players total (Arizona Phil also has So Taguchi in his list on the right sidebar). The official Elias Rankings will be out soon enough.

From Bruce Levine's latest:

 The Cubs will not offer arbitration to Harden, who was their top strikeout pitcher in 2009.

I had mentioned earlier in the week that it looks like Harden will be a Type B free agent meaning it wouldn't cost the signing team any of their own draft picks, but the Cubs would get a supplemental pick between the first and second rounds. If Levine's statement turns true, the Cubs are betting that no team would offer more in a multi-year deal to Harden than he could get in a one-year arbitration case coming off an ERA above 4.

This is basically a one-line blog entry, but I'm so over all this Bradley drama.

I had brought up the name Chone Figgins earlier in the season as the one free agent name I thought the Cubs would try and pursue. That is if they can figure out how to squeeze him into their already bloated payroll for next year.