The Deal Jim Hendry Should Make

As the Chicago Cubs move into an offseason of their fans' discontent, Jim Hendry has already said there are numerous issues he wants to address while moving towards 2009. With the unfortunate ability to move their organizational meetings up to the middle of November, some of these questions will likely be answered sooner rather than later.

The first couple of issues the organization will look at are whether to keep a significant member of their starting rotation and their closer from this past season: Ryan Dempster and Kerry Wood. Wood has consistently shown that he wants to stay in Chicago, and he had enough pull on the heartstrings of the Cubs fan base that he will likely stay.

Dempster, however, had a career year and will likely receive attention from numerous suitors that are turned on by his 17 wins. Keeping Dempster could be tricky.

The starting rotation has some holes to explore as well. Manager Lou Piniella has openly longed for two left-handed starting pitchers, and had that until Rich Hill left the strike zone in 2007. The Cubs have a solid internal candidate in Sean Marshall to step into the rotation to couple with Ted Lilly to give Piniella what he wants. This would also make Jason Marquis expendable.

The issues surrounding the mound are, shockingly, almost identical to those of last winter. The Cubs are still in search of an everyday center fielder and still want to add left-handed bats to an almost exclusively right-handed regular order.

In 2008, Jim Edmonds was a wonderful shock, but probably will not be back. Felix Pie has looked like he is still wandering through puberty every time he steps onto the Wrigley Field grass, and having Alfonso Soriano as a mentor will certainly not help his grasp of the strike zone.

Kosuke Fukudome disappeared, both literally and figuratively, after the All Star break in 2008, and might warrant a trip to Iowa or an imported hitting coach.

So what do the Cubs do?

There is a player in baseball who hits left-handed, gets on base, has a wonderful throwing arm, and is the prototypical leadoff man that Soriano has been incapable of being since his arrival in Chicago. He has been an every-day player for almost a decade in the majors, but late this season fell far enough out of favor in his own clubhouse that the only story from that team down the stretch was the relationships on the roster.

His name: Ichiro.

What would Ichiro mean to the Cubs? He would allow the Cubs to move Alfonso Soriano down out of the leadoff spot and place a career .331 hitter into the leadoff spot. He has also won numerous gold gloves in the outfield, steals nearly 40 bases annually, and is regularly among the major-league leaders in hits. Throw into the mix the fact that he came to the U.S., and Seattle specifically, because of their manager at the time: Lou Piniella.

Not only that, he has a career .451 average in October. Imagine the possibilities for the Cubs if they had someone who could his after September!

Now for the negatives to acquiring Ichiro. He turns 35 on Oct. 22. He's signed through 2012 at an even $17 million per season. And he is the face of a franchise that has marketed itself in enormous proportion to their counterparts in Asia because of the stature Ichiro carries. He would not come easily.

You're currently logged into Facebook

Do you want to share your Bleacher Report activity on Facebook?