Yes, I tend to assume that 35 year old pitchers are not likely to pitch better when they are 36 years old (unless they are knuckleballers). Am I 100% positive? No, but I'd say with 95% confidence that Dempster's performance will never look better than it does today. Sure, clubs don't look at things like FIP etc, but his ERA indicates he's better than he really is.

Dempster obviously would like to stay in Chicago which is why he utilized his 10-5 rights. Thus, I think the chances of him accepting a qualifying offer, even if it's below his market value, are quite high. So, fast forward a year and the Cubs again want to trade him at the deadline. If he's lucky enough to be unhurt, he definitely won't have a nice-looking 2.25 ERA, his perceived value would go down and he'd be less likely to warrant the kind of return the Cubs got for them. In addition, he'd be even more likely to accept the Cubs 2014 qualifying offer, which means the Cubs would have to let him walk without any kind of compensation.


As far as sandwich picks go versus Villanueva, he's already had some minor league success and he projects as a major league average third baseman, if not a tick better. That's more value than a lot of second round picks.