NEWSLETTER
Following today’s abysmal trade of Milton Bradley to the Seattle Mariners for Carlos Silva and cash, Chicago Cubs General Manager Jim Hendry offered a statement about the trade, about Bradley, and about the state of the team. For your consideration:
“Obviously, it was a trade we’ve been working on for quite some time. There wasn’t any easy solution to it, by any means. Many of the names that were bantered were obviously deals that would have never been considered ideal. But we also knew that we had to move the player.
“In hindsight, obviously, it was an acquisition that I’m responsible for that obviously didn’t work out. The intent, obviously, was to get a quality offensive player from the left side or a switch hitter that had been outstanding for a few years before we got him in our quest to improve on a 97-win team. Obviously, it didn’t work out. I bear the responsibility for that not working out.
“That being said, we have a tremendous amount of really good players that may not have played as well as they would have liked last year. But they certainly are guys that play hard, obviously good teammates, respectful of the great opportunity that they have here to play in front of our great fans. Obviously, in this case, it did not work out like we planned. In this case, this was also responsible for the reason that I sent Milton home, as I mentioned in September, not going to be tolerated, to treat our fans, teammates and members of the media the way he did. It’s just time to put it behind us and go forward. I think this deal helps us in a lot of ways. Hopefully, Mr. Silva will get back to where he was a few years ago. Obviously, he has struggled since (signing) his contract, but he was a quality free agent when he left the Twins. We have been monitoring him a little bit on the side and in games in Venezuela. We’ve done a lot of work on him. Hopefully, he’ll be able to get back and at least have a successful spot on our club in some way, and then we’ll go about our business of trying to add a few more pieces to make the club better before spring training.”
h/t Bruce Miles
