Cubs deal Hill to Orioles, Wuertz to Oakland

If nothing else, the Cubs' front office has turned into a pretty good job-placement service.

With players out of options right and left, general manager Jim Hendry has managed to trade some of them to various clubs (especially the Baltimore Orioles) while getting at least live bodies in return.

On Monday, Hendry sent troubled lefty Rich Hill to the Orioles for a player to be named. The quality of that player will be determined on whether Hill makes Baltimore's big-league club.

A couple of hours later, Hendry traded veteran reliever Michael Wuertz to the Oakland Athletics for a pair of minor-leaguers.

In addition to Wuertz and Hill, Hendry has traded center fielder Felix Pie and infielder Ronny Cedeno, pretty much clearing the decks of tough calls on players out of minor-league options.

"Wuertzy wasn't an issue; he's got three-plus years in the big leagues," Hendry said. "That (options) didn't really factor in as much. We felt Michael wasn't quite as effective last year. With the new acquisitions we've gotten, we felt it might be tough for him to fit in by the end of camp. We felt like some guys were ahead of him."

Hendry added that Oakland GM Billy Beane has shown a lot of interest in Wuertz. Beane sent the Cubs outfielder Richie Robnett and infielder Justin Sellers.

Since the beginning of last year, the Cubs have lost Kerry Wood, Scott Eyre, Bob Howry, Carmen Pignatiello and Wuertz from their pen.

This off-season, they've added Kevin Gregg and Luis Vizcaino to join Carlos Marmol and a mix that figures to include lefty Neal Cotts and righties Chad Gaudin, Jeff Samardzija, Kevin Hart and Angel Guzman and possibly righty Aaron Heilman, if he doesn't start.

Wuertz spent two months in the minor leagues last year after his slider flattened out. Before that, he was a mainstay of the Cubs' bullpen, leading the team in appearances in 2005.

His fall from grace was not nearly as rapid as that of Hill, who opened the 2008 season as the No. 4 starter, only to be demoted to Class AAA Iowa in early May, never to return. After a rough winter-ball season, Hill was on shaky ground for making the club and was out of options.

That means that if the Cubs tried to send him to the minor leagues at the end of spring training, they'd have to expose him to waivers, and another team likely would have claimed him.

Hill's collapse is perplexing. In 2007, he went through spring training without walking a batter and then posted a record of 11-8 with a 3.92 ERA during the regular season. But command problems suddenly befell him last spring, and he went 1-0 with a 4.12 ERA and 18 walks in 192/3 innings.

With Baltimore, Hill will be reunited with pitching coach Rick Kranitz and bullpen coach Alan Dunn, both of whom came from the Cubs and worked with Hill in the minor leagues.

"If it didn't go well in camp, it might be too late for Rich to catch on with somebody," Hendry said. "I did take a lot of consideration the fact that I wanted to land him in a spot where he might be able to succeed early in camp. He's got a comfort zone with Rick Kranitz and Alan Dunn from his Cub days and pitched well in the minor leagues under both of them.

"So I wanted to give Rich a fair shot to make a ballclub."

Hendry was hard-pressed to say what happened to Hill.

"It's hard to put your finger on it when he had such ups and downs and some really strong success mixed in with some failures or some command issues," the GM said. "It's part of the business. It happens a lot to people. It happens pretty much in every organization to a guy or two.

"Hopefully, in his case, because he is such a good kid, he gets it back. After the winter ball, we all felt the last couple weeks, it was going to be hard for him to maybe put it together in a short period of time in Mesa with the new guys we've added, and possibly the best thing for him would be to move him now and not have to deal with an out-of-options situation late in camp."

<div class="infoBox"> <h1>More Coverage</h1> <div class="infoBoxContent"> <div class="infoArea"> <h2>Stories</h2> <ul class="links"> <li><a href="http://blogs.dailyherald.com/node/1350">Blog: First Hill, now Wuertz <span class="date">[02/02/09]</span></a></li> </ul> </div> </div> </div>