Cubs Want Jermaine Dye

Jermaine Dye is undervalued throughout baseball, even on the South Side.

Of course White Sox fan doesn’t want to hear that, but Dye’s never received the acknowledgment of a Konerko, Thome or Buehrle.

If the Cubs are smart, they’ll value Dye this offseason. And if Dye’s smart, he’ll commute to the North Side.

For that to happen Dye must agree to both a significant a pay cut and reduced playing time, neither of which is as bad as it sounds.

Last year Dye made $11M. The Cubs need to cut that in half to roughly $4.5M-to-$5.0M. No question that’s a big cut, but not unreasonable, either.

Jermaine made $4.0M while claiming the 2005 World Series MVP Award. He then made $5.0M the following season as a fifth-place finisher in the league’s MVP voting.

What I’m saying is the Cubs’ offer is a fair one, especially for a soon to be 36-year-old, albeit an under appreciated one.

So, what’s in it for Dye you ask? Plenty.

Alfonso Soriano is likely to land on the DL for a few weeks and Kosuke Fukudome could very well ’spin-o-rama’ himself out of Lou’s favor rather quickly.

Then, there’s Wrigley’s small outfield where Dye could easily hit 15-20 HR while doing his best impression of Cliff Floyd in right field defensively.

And, who’s to say this isn’t the year the Cubs reach the World Series? Certainly, such possibility exists with the Cubs’ talented roster, which only begs the question. “how could Dye not be interested?”

Not surprisingly, however, the mere rumor of Dye heading to the Cubs has drawn little, if any, excitement from around baseball.

But if this deal gets done that feeling changes in a hurry…at least so in this city, North & South Side!