The Farns kicks the Cubbie Bucket....

And I guess that's better than kicking an electric fan and breaking your foot, but only the Farns can tell you that answer. High on potential and low on results, Jim Hendry finally got tired of Farnsworth and dumped him off to Detroit today along with the infamous PTBNL for 3 minor leaguers. The three minor leaguers coming from Detroit are RHP Roberto Novoa, 3B Scott Moore, and OF Claerence (Bo) Flowers. Novoa, 25, sports a hard slider with a fastball that tops out at 97. He can get his pitches over the plate, but he tends to leave things over the middle, which led to him giving up about a hit per inning until his AA season last year. Novoa was promoted to Detroit towards the end of last season pitching in 16 games with a 5.57 ERA, although his ERA at home in 10 games was 2.76. In AA last year Novoa had a 2.96 ERA in 79 innings, striking out 59. He'll be given a chance to make the 'pen in spring training, but most likely will start the season in AAA.

The good news is that Moore and Flowers, both 21, made the Baseball America list as the best power hitter and best athelete respectively for the Tigers Farm system. The bad news is neither is in the Tigers top ten prospect list and that system is very weak right now. Flowers may be more of a reach to jump to the majors in his career but Moore appears to be a legitimate prospect. Moore was the 8th pick in the 2002 draft by Detroit, and was ranked as the 2nd purest hitter in that draft. A lefthanded batter, Moore was drafted originally as a shortstop and has also played some 2B in his career. It will be interesting to see where the Cubs want him to play, but he will most likely start the season in either AA or high A ball, where last year he hit .223 with 14 HR's in 391 AB's. He can take a walk, but his rate of about 1 every 10 AB's needs to lower, as well as his 1 strikeout every 3.13 AB's. Flowers is a native of Westmont and was a 5th round pick of Detroit, also in 2002. He was named the best 'athlete' in the Tiger system in both 2003 and 2004 but spent his first two seasons in low A ball until promoted to regular A for 22 AB last season. Look for him to spend more time there with the Cubs new 'A' affiliate the Peoria Chiefs(I wish we still had the Lugnuts) to see if he can develop into anything this season.

The Kyle Farnsworth era in Chicago is going to be remembered for two things: the untapped/wasted talent of the Farns, and his unfathomable beatdown of Reds pitcher Paul Wilson in 2003. It really is a sad story that a pitcher with his arm is going to be best remember as the guy who flattened then bloodied Paul Wilson, but thats the way it goes sometimes. Once thought to be the future closer is long line of Cubs closing immortals; Bruce Sutter, Goose Gossage, Lee Smith, Mitch Williams, Randy Myers, Mel Rojas, Rod Beck - Farnsworth never lived up to the hype of his 100 mph+ arm (yes Mel Rojas was a joke). At times he had signs of brilliance as a reliever, including an entire seasons worth of it in 2001 and 2003, he was just too inconsistent overall to be effective on a regular basis. There were always tales of his late-night exploits (many ladies will be upset with his departure) as well as some rumors that harder things were ruining his career, but it might just be that he will never 'get it' as an effective MLB pitcher. Maybe this trade will be the pitchfork to his ass to get his baseball career in order.

Personally I believe Hendry made another desperation move here just to get rid of someone because he could. As he did with the Juan Cruz deal before the season last year, it appears that Hendry just dumped a player to the first offer he recieved. Cruz was turned into Tim Hudson for the Braves, and Farnsworth might turn into the effective reliever the Cubs wanted him to be. Some say he might have never turned it around in Chicago, but I would have given him one more chance to prove himself - especially with the 'pen the team is going to throw out next year- that is unless the rumors of Farnsworth doing exactly what Sosa did on the last day of the season is true, then I can see why Hendry dumped him so eagerly. But what i really want to know is, does this mean the value of my Farns Bobblehead will skyrocket sometime soon?