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There's no need to do a whole lot. More power arms would be nice. I suppose Harden will be out of our price range. Ottavino and Boggs to the bullpen sounds good.

Try to re-sign Holliday and Smoltz.

I wouldn't have any problem with the club trading Ludwick and Franklin. Or Lohse, if possible. Nor will I mind if they're back, as I expect them to be. Just sayin' they can be replaced rather easily.

I don't mind if they bring DeRosa back for 1 more year, but no multi-year offer. The rest of the free agents can be let go.

No Figgins. Freese or DeRosa at 3B. Schumaker at 2B again.

thrill wrote: give me Figgins and Abreu.

Like having Polanco back, except 6 years older and now he's playing 3rd instead of second and striking out 3 times as much. Plus, the schizophrenic Figgins (which is fun to say) looks like he's due for his every other year low to mid 80s OPS+. Of course, he has speed but that brings us back to the dilemma, do we want to run in front of Pujols? Abreu, to turn 36 before next season, has lost most of his power. I think I'd prefer Holliday's mid 30 HR and 1.000 OPS potential to Abreu's 15 HRs and low .800. Not to mention Holliday has potentially many more years. Plus, I think you need a Holliday on the team if you're eventually going to convince Albert to stay.

I want no part of Pineiro or DeRosa on muilt-year deals. Neither is likely to be a high-impact player and both will consume too much of the budget for replaceable production. In my eyes, they're like Lohse, the $40 million man who didn't even appear in a playoff game.

I'm with PIR and Jim on Figgins. I've had a man crush on him for several years. I'd love to see him at 3B. I'd only make the effort to sign DeRosa if Holliday walks and we can't sign Figgins. I really think Freese could give us everything DeRosa could in a utility man role for a lot cheaper. I also think Smoltz will hang it up if he's not offered a starting spot somewhere, and I don't see any reason to offer him that here unless he's willing to wait until January to sign. Good bye to Glaus, Ankiel, and Khalil. Offer Pineiro arbitration, but nothing long term. Garcia and Hawk deserve a shot at the rotation. I'd like to see us sign another veteran arm for the bullpen and take a shot at a rehabbing pitcher (read: Ben Sheets). I'd personally love to see this next year:

Schumaker - 2B
Figgins - 3B
Pujols - 1B
Holliday - LF
Ludwick - RF
Rasmus - CF
Molina - C
Ryan - SS

Carpenter
Wainwright
Lohse
Two of Sheets/Garcia/Hawksworth

Franklin
Motte
Miller
McClellan
Reyes
Two of Garcia/Hawksworth/Boggs/FA

Freese - 1B/3B/LF
Craig - 1B/OF
Lugo - MI
LaRue (or not..whoever) - C
LH FA Bat

What length of contract will Figgins be looking for? He will be 32 before the start of the season.

Since it looks like they don't trust Bryan Anderson yet, LaRue would seem to be a no-brainer to bring back.

I'd be thrilled to have Smoltz back on a deal similar to what he had in Boston last year and almost wouldn't mind them guaranteeing him $7M or something since it's a one year deal only.

I hate to be "that guy" but I'm going to be annoyed if Holliday's not back. They gave up their only legit prospect to get him. Some people will say that Bay is a good, and more cost-effective, substitute but it's just not true. Game 2's drop notwithstanding, Holliday is light years ahead of Bay in the field and there's pretty much no difference with the bat.

Given the choice of having DeRosa in '10 or not having him, I'd rather have him. If it means the difference between signing Holliday or not re-signing him, then so long DeRo. While I'd like to see what Freese can provide, I'd rather do it with the security and versatility that DeRosa provides. Even diminished, you're talking about him gobbling up 500 PA's at league average production that would've gone to the Joe Thurston's of the world.

Give the #5 slot to Garcia, let Boggs and Thompson (if he's back) duke it out over the swing-man role... what else is there? It's a really straight-forward offseason. They enter 2010 with more stability than they've had in years. The lineup is locked into place except for 3B and LF, the rotation is 3/5 locked in place, the bullpen is locked in place. If they even get league average production at 3B and LF, they're going to be an 85-ish win talent level team and there's room to grow there.

And unlike last season, where you entered 2009 expecting dropoffs from a ton of guys, it's the opposite in 2010. Ludwick and Lohse should have solid rebounds. Carp and Wainwright are likely due a little decline, as is Ryan. And Piñeiro's production will have to be replaced somehow. The overall gain/loss to be had from players having off years v. players playing over their heads in 2009 favors the Cardinals a ton more for next season than it did this season.

I think the bullpen needs works, but EastonBlues and I were discussing the streaky nature of a bullpen in the flashchat on Saturday. I think they should put some horses there and EB thinks that it's still luck. I could see either side. I say pick up what you can, but don't spend a lot of money. Maybe look at the farm system as someone else already mentioned.

What bothers me most is that fact that we made moves late in the season to build up for the post season, something I can't recall us doing to this extent, and we got blown out.

Resign Holliday, it's not all his fault. How many time did we fail to get RISP home? With that in mind I would like to retool the bottom of our order to get some basehitters installed so we can be more productive in the runs category. Bat Molina 9th for cryin' out loud. He's not a six hole hitter IMHO.

All in all, I was happy with the way the team was structured this year. It just didn't work out for us.

I think the bullpen needs works, but EastonBlues and I were discussing the streaky nature of a bullpen in the flashchat on Saturday. I think they should put some horses there and EB thinks that it's still luck. I could see either side. I say pick up what you can, but don't spend a lot of money. Maybe look at the farm system as someone else already mentioned.

Putting horses in the bullpen is great. A strong, deep pen is a major ingredient in both regular season success and post season success. When you have quality arms in them pen aside from just a closer, a lot of good things happen -- fewer games get out of hand, so you get blown out less often, you win more comebacks, you can manage the workload of your late-inning guys better, etc etc etc etc etc.

Problem is -- the guys who are horses one year are donkeys the next -- and vice versa. The ability to make really good decisions on guys who pitch to three or four batters per appearance is fairly limited. And even the good ones tend to have pretty short shelf lives.

And finally, truth be told, a guy who is a legitimately good pitcher is only going to be a bullpen depth guy on a great team; other teams would need to move a quality arm like that, into a higher-leverage role in the rotation or later innings (or trade him to a team that would do that, in order to fill other needs instead of having the luxury of a quality 6th-inning middle reliever/swing man).

Great comments here, especially the Iron Balls McGinty one. Can we just call him IBM from here on?

I think the Dodger series really exposed the lack of depth in our lineup and on the bench. The Dodgers have a wonderful balance of LH and RH hitters with excellent OF production and good IF production. Their bench consisted of Thome, Loretta, Pierre, etc., while we had Glaus and Lugo.

I think Schumacher, Molina, and Ryan are givens at their respective positions in 2010, which means 3 of 8 lineup slots will feature league average offensive production at best. We need to get a lot production from our OF and 3B if this team is going to compete with the likes of LA, Philly and Colorado.

Resigning IBM seems the obvious thing to do in terms of adding offensive production. If Jason Bay becomes available, he's another possibility. I am hopeful that Rasmus can improve on what I consider a very successful rookie campaign. I would like to see our 4th OF slot go to Coco Crisp (assuming the Royals decline their option). Perhaps Craig or Mather can fill the fifth slot.

I don't know what to make of Ludwig von Crushtoven, but perhaps Abreu is a better option.

For 3B, DeRosa, Beltre, or perhaps Garret Atkins are good possibilities. It would be foolish to count on Freese, though I am hoping he makes the club. I doubt we can afford Figgins.

I would like to thank Joel Pinata for his great season, and wish him luck in the Big Apple. I think we'll need to add a budget 4th starter in FA. I probably prefer Boggs in the bullpen than at 5th starter, but I don't know if we have any better internal options for the 5th slot.

I love the idea of retaining Smoltz and using him as a closer. I think the rest of the pen is largely set with Dennys, Motte, Franklin, Hawksworth, and any holes should be filled with our own pitching prospects. Please no multi-year deals for FA relievers a la Scott Linebrink or Octavio Dotel.

Have a nice offseason.

Hungary, would you agree that Garcia is an infinitely better option than Boggs? Boggs can be the middle relief guy for me, but he's had two years to show what he has as a starter, and it just isn't happening.