Although most Cubs brass and fans alike will spend the offseason debating where Cashner will pitch next year, what about Sean Marshall.?There are compelling arguments to be made both for keeping him in the setup role and to be given another shot in the rotation. I'm writing this as someone who has done a complete one-eighty  both on my view of Marshall as a pitcher and what role he should play, going forward. I'd never thought that I'd say this but I think the young man deserves a shot at 30+ starts and 200+ innings.

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   While attending my first Cubs game of the season on Thur(I used to be good for about 15/yr prior to wife & kid), I tried to ignore the massacre occuring on the field and take a "long" view as to where the team and organization are headed. To help some shed some light, I decided to compare the near-term prospects of the Cubs and their opponent, the Giants. I understand that the Giants aren't a division rival but are a fellow NL team that has also suffered a fairly recent run of mismanagement. The result of my comparison(s) was far from encouraging.

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      As the season comes to an end and we begin to start our annual off-season planning, I have an idea that hasn't been discussed too much: trade Carlos Marmol . When proposing this, I fully understand that our pen has been a major weakness this year and moving Marmol might seem counter-intuitive. There are several reasons why this move would make sense: he could bring  back very good value in a deal given his track record and relative affordability,;he can probably be replaced either internally or cheaply through FA; his heavy workload over the last few years coupled with his reliance on the slider make him a continued injury risk:; and , most importantly, Marmol is likely to be an expensive, overused pitcher by the time the Cubs are legitimately competitive again.

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