Derrek Lee, Chicago Cubs Poised to Part Ways After 2010

Derrek Lee enters 2010 as the Cubs' starting first baseman, the seventh season in which he has done so since being acquired from the Florida Marlins in November 2003. 

During his impressive Cubs tenure, Lee boasts one batting title, a .304/.384/.539 batting line, and a pair of Gold Glove awards.

He also has made two All-Star teams, won one Silver Slugger, and clubbed 163 home runs.

Lee will turn 35 in September, however, and when his current contract expires after the season, the Cubs have a difficult decision to make: Should they hang on to their most consistent leader and contributor of the past half-decade or allow free agency to sweep him away?

Before revealing the manner in which the team has already answered that question for itself, let us dispel the absurd notion that has crept into the consciousness of the general sports populace that would have GM Jim Hendry extend Lee's contract before it even runs out.

That idea is plainly foolish: Like every other aging player who has hit the market in the past three offseasons, Lee will find demand for his services seriously curbed by the realities of baseball's new economy, as well as teams' increasing reticence to spend big money on any player whose prime years are so clearly behind them.

There is no reason Chicago should compensate him right now as though he were still the commodity that earned him his five-year, $65-million deal prior to 2006.

Assuming, then, that Lee will in fact become a free agent after the season, there is one simple reason why the Cubs will not and should not re-sign him: their outfield.

After inking center fielder Marlon Byrd to a three-year deal this winter, the Cubs have three outfielders with contracts that run through 2011 or longer. Yet first-round draft picks Tyler Colvin (2006) and Brett Jackson (2009) are beating a rapid path to the Major Leagues themselves.

Colvin, with his doubles power only and relatively little plate discipline, need not bump anyone from his current position. He played fairly well in very limited time last year, but his future is the same as his present: fourth outfielder duties and the on-the-fringe life of a Quadruple-A batter.

Jackson, though, poses another question. At the tender age of 21, Jackson climbed through both Cubs rookie squads last season en route to a 26-game stint with Class-A Peoria. He hit .295/.383/.545 there, stole 11 bases, and popped seven home runs in only 112 at-bats.

Though this merited an unexpected non-roster invitation to big-league camp this spring, Jackson is still a year away. He may well not be more, though, and if that turns out to be the case, the Cubs will have a logjam on their hands in the outfield.

The only sensible solution to that overabundance would be for Byrd to slid to left in accommodation of Jackson, with defensively challenged left fielder Alfonso Soriano headed for the only spot on the diamond less demanding of glove men than his current post: first base.

Re-enter Lee, suddenly an excess piece. With all the money Chicago has committed to Soriano, there is no way they can unload him before 2013. That means that, unless Hendry is willing to obstruct the progress of his organization's brightest prospect, Soriano will need to shift, and Lee will have to go.

All of that is conjecture, of course. More tangibly, though, Hendry spent the winter loading up on players eerily similar to Lee. Veterans Chad Tracy and Kevin Millar join youngster Bryan LaHair and incumbent Micah Hoffpauir in the battle to back up Lee at first, and each also provides power off the bench.

Perhaps this only suggests that Hendry, wary of Lee's recurring neck problems over the past two seasons, fears that serious missed time could again be in the offing for Lee and wants to assure himself of sufficient depth behind him.

Whatever the reason, though, the Cubs and Lee seem to grow further apart all the time, and 2010 is nearly certainly the respected leader's swan song in Cubs blue.