Koyie Hill

The Cubs dealt right-handed reliever Aaron Heilman to the Arizona Diamondbacks on Thursday for two Minor League prospects. Heilman, 31, was 4-4 with a 4.11 ERA in 70 games in his only season in Chicago. He was one of a large number of arbitration-eligible players, which include Carlos Marmol, Mike Fontenot, Jeff Baker, Sean Marshall, Ryan Theriot, Koyie Hill, and Angel Guzman.  

Starting in 2007, Cubs general manager Jim Hendry invested heavily in free agents, adding such players as Alfonso Soriano, Ted Lilly and Mark DeRosa. Before the 2008 season, the big addition was Kosuke Fukudome. Milton Bradley was plucked from the free-agent pool for 2009.

A lot of people have had worse exits at the end of the year than [Bradley did] and they return   -Jim Hendry

 

Center field options, Mike Fontenot, Aramis Ramirez's shoulder and Spring Training are among the topics in this week's Inbox.  

The Chicago Cubs support the community through a wide range of activities and financial contributions.  

The fact that Bradley has such a bad year - and it wasn't even that bad - can be placed solely on a huge drop in ISO from his previously established norms. His plate discipline and contact skills were just as good as they were in 08 and the year before that, and there is no evidence that the drop in ISO is anything "real". Despite the personality problems, teams are apparently lining up to try and steal Bradley away from Jim Hendry because he is still a very good player.

I think the team should be owned by somebody who is local, somebody who is really passionate about baseball   -Sam Zell

 

The Cubs have four free agents going into the winter but they will likely try to bring back only two of them (Reed Johnson, John Grabow) while likely letting Rich Harden and Kevin Gregg leave.  

It was one pitch, one out of 27 that Neal Cotts threw on June 24 in a relief outing for Triple-A Iowa. He felt a sharp pain that he hadn't felt before.  

Ryne Sandberg, Jake Fox, Aaron Heilman and an update on the movie, "We Believe" are the topics in this week's Inbox.  

The 50th anniversary of the production of the last Edsel arrives in November, just in time for the beginning of the Milton Bradley sell-off. Bradley turned out to be the Chicago Cubs' version of the Edsel, a concept that may have looked OK on paper but ultimately turned into a critical and commercial flop. Now general manager Jim Hendry has to find a taker for Bradley and the $21 million remaining on his deal before turning to more mundane matters, like finding another run producer to protect Derrek L