Who is to Blame?

What would you do with 91.5 million dollars? Buy a mansion? A yacht? A couple new cars? Or you could just buy all of that and have 80 million left over.
Would you sign a MLB pitcher to a five year contract? No. Ok, that's understandable. What if he was 26? And already a two time All-Star. With a career record of 78-51 while still approaching the prime of his career. Plus he was the best hitting pitcher in baseball, an added bonus for a run starved NL squad.
Did I mention this pitcher may be prone to mental lapses? One missed call, bad pitch, or defensive gaff could potentially ruin six innings of well-pitched baseball.
Those were all the factors the Cubs took into consideration when signing Carlos Zambrano to a five year 91.5 million dollar deal at the end of the 2007 season. Should Zambrano finish first or second in the Cy Young voting, or in the top four in 2012, he would be eligible for a sixth year worth 19.25 million. You did the math right, that would come out to 110.65 million in six years. Good thing that's not happening. Zambrano has never finished higher than fifth in Cy Young voting, and would need to actually be on the roster in order to pitch.
On Tuesday, the Cubs placed Zambrano on the restricted list, which basically means he's still on the team but not the roster. It's a way of allowing the Cubs to expand their roster back to the normal 25 men.
So let's all bash Zambrano, then we can bash Hendry for making the deal happen. But here's the sad thing. The signing wasn't ridiculous at the time, and Zambrano would have actually gotten more money if he chose to bolt for another club. It's turned out to be a bad signing, along wit the Soriano contract, and Hendry got lucky with the Bradley for Silva trade.
But at what point does personal accountability factor in? Yeah, Hendry knew what he was getting into when signing Zambrano. Look back at any of the articles detailing Zambrano's contract and his name is always preceded by feisty, fiery, temperamental, emotional, or a number of other similar adjectives. And how exactly is it Hendry's responsibility to curtail Zambrano's emotional outbursts?
You would think a man who is getting paid 90 million dollars to play a game would have the decency to respect his teammates, manager, and organization. You would think he would have the decency not to question the defensive effort of a three time Gold Glove winner who in fact, approached the Juan Pierre liner with just as much effort as he's displayed over the course of his career.
Maybe I'm missing something, but since when is a player a nut case that does not have the ability to control his emotions? You hear this all the time about Zambrano, Milton Bradley, and the same is being said about the Nationals's most recent number one pick Bryce Harper. It's as if a bad attitude is inherently with them and can't be corrected.
Bad attitudes should not simply be an accepted trait of a professional athlete. Rather than blame the GM for signing a guy with a perceived attitude problem, blame the athlete for not being able to conduct themselves in a professional manner. I must bet getting old, but it's becoming harder and harder to defend the ridiculous behavior of Zambrano and others like him.