Top 10 Players I Wish Never Left The Chicago Cubs

People forget the Cubs were the team that selected Hamilton in the Rule-Five Draft before 2007 from Tampa Bay, then moved him to Cincinnati for cash.

The Cubs haven't had a left-handed hitting outfielder put up the kind of numbers Hamilton did last year since Billy Williams left.

If GM Jim Hendry had the foresight to hang on the mega-talent, the mistake of Fukudome and the pending debacle of Milton Bradley might have never happened.

I promised I wouldn't use the word steroids here...oops.

Gonzo spent half of 1995 and all of 1996 in Chicago, hitting 22 home runs and becoming part of the laundry list of empty attempts the team made to find a left-handed hitting corner outfielder.

After leaving Chicago, he had over 20 homers in seven of nine seasons, including a "remarkable" spike to 57 in Arizona in their World Championship season in 2001.

Maybe it's just the left-handed thing that's plagued Chicago.

Not only have the Cubs been searching for a bat from that side, but they hadn't had a real lefty in the rotation for quite some time, until Ted Lilly got to town.

It's too bad the Cubs gave up on soft-tossing Moyer.

He's still pitching effectively in the majors, over 20 years after being sent packing.

Only once in the last seven years has Garland won fewer than 12 games, with two 18-win seasons during that stretch.

Do you think Matt Karchner would have played as big a role in the White Sox winning the World Series?

Someone once claimed that there was a curse on the Cubs AND players that left the team... really?

Seems to me like Girardi did pretty well in New York.

Girardi was considered one of the best clubhouse leaders in the majors during his time in Colorado and in New York.

Plus, he's transitioned nicely into a solid managerial career so far.

So far we've seen Gonzo, Moyer, Garland, and Girardi who have rings from their post-Cub careers...theme?

(NOTE: I HOPE I NEVER HEAR CARTER'S VOICE DURING A BROADCAST AGAIN.)

Carter was one of the centerpieces of the trade for a starting pitcher from Cleveland named Rick Sutcliffe.

Can't blame the Cubs for moving him, but his power and clutch home runs would have been nice.

OK, so the starter thing didn't work out...

But, if memory serves and if you ignore the name Kirk Gibson, I think his career turned out alright.

Those of us that collected baseball cards in the 1980s will note that Moyer and Palmeiro, as well as the No. 1 player on this list, all have rookie cards from 1987.

And all three players left to have big careers.

Palmeiro might be the biggest goat not named Bonds, A-Rod or Clemens of the steroids drama over the last few years, but the numbers back up that he had a solid major league career.

Over 500 homers would have been fun to watch at Wrigley.

We cheered for Sammy, didn't we?

Also, you'll note that I have Raffy listed as both a first baseman and an outfielder.

Palmeiro was forced into the outfield because the No. 2 guy on this list was also ready to come up in 1987 at first.

I'm comfortable saying I had a man-crush on Grace from 1988-2001, and that I may have had eyes fill when he got a ring less than 12 months after leaving for Arizona.

He had more hits and more doubles than any player in the majors during the decade of the 1990s.

The only other player to lead all of baseball in either of those stats and not get into the Hall-of-Fame: Pete Rose.

I won't drag us through the history of arguably the best CLEAN pitcher of the last 30 years.

Maddux won his first Cy Young Award, his 300th game and notched his 3,000th strikeout in a Cubs uniform.

All of his post season winning happened in Atlanta.

Do you think he misses this great mustache, though?