"Two years ago, I played, and I was good," Bradley told The Times. "I go to Chicago, not good. I've been good my whole career. So, obviously, it was something with Chicago, not me."

"Just no communication," Bradley told the paper, referring to his Cubs tenure. "I never hit more than 22 homers in my career, and all of a sudden I get to Chicago and they expect me to hit 30. It doesn't make sense. History tells you I'm not going to hit that many. Just a lot of things that try to make me a player I'm not."

"We expected him to bat fifth in our lineup," Piniella said

tripxcore wrote:He makes me regret ever sticking up for him. Fucking douchebag!

richdanna wrote:

tripxcore wrote:He makes me regret ever sticking up for him. Fucking douchebag!

That's how I feel. It's like, how the fuck did we ever get baited
into buying his first bullshit press conference. Yeah, "thanks for believing in me" and showing me you care with a 3-year deal.

I'll promptly cram it right up your ass with a three-foot sword....

MESA, Ariz. -- After spending the last six months biting his tongue about his feelings toward Milton Bradley, Cubs general manager Jim Hendry ripped into his former player Wednesday morning at HoHoKam Park.

Hendry called Bradley's implication to ESPN that he received hate mail from within the organization "absolutely ridiculous," and said Bradley needs to look "in the mirror" and accept responsibility for his poor 2009 numbers.

"We're all brought up in life to accept responsibility when we fail, and to judge people by how they act and how they carry themselves when things don't go well," Hendry said.

Bradley told ESPN some of the hate mail he received had no postage, suggesting it could've been in-house.

"Obviously, that couldn't be further from the truth," Hendry said. "I think maybe it's time Milton looks at himself in the mirror. It is what it is. He just didn't swing the bat. He didn't get the job done. His production, or lack of (production), was the only negative."

Photo: In happier times, Jim Hendry introduces Milton Bradley in January 2009. (Phil Velasquez/Tribune)

Hendry said people drop off mail at the front desk at Wrigley Field, which could explain why there was no postage on the alleged hate mail. He added that Bradley never mentioned the claim to anyone in the organization, and that the Cubs said the organization "couldn't have bent over backward any more than they did for the entire season, before (the suspension) in St. Louis."

Hendry was also upset that Bradley told ESPN that Piniella should've apologized to him in front of the team after their incident during a Cubs-White Sox game at the Cell last June, instead of simply apologizing to him personally and through the media.

Asked about the remark, Piniella said: "I apologized to Milton. Listen, I did the best I could, and I'm human like everybody else. I think I bent over backward to make it as comfortable as I possibly could, and that's all I can do, nothing more, nothing less."

While Hendry played the bad-cop, Piniella was the proverbial good-cop, taking the high road and asking everyone to "move on."

"Look, the thing with Milton is, it's behind us," he said. "I'm concerned about this year's team. We've got good chemistry here, we're getting ready for a championship season and that's all I'm concerned with. Anything else in the past, we've just got to go forward."

Piniella said he didn't know "why we keep re-visiting these things," and declined to get into a war of words with Bradley.

"I guess we can talk about the Los Angeles Lakers, we can talk about the Chicago Bears and the players they got," he said. "I think we let this subject go and concentrate on what we have here, and not re-visit it any more. I don't think there's any need to."

Hendry denied Bradley's claim that African-American players have a difficult time playing in front of Cubs fans at Wrigley Field unless they are Hall of Fame caliber players.

"We have a lot of players from a lot of countries and a lot of nationalities that love playing here," Hendry said. "I think it's the total (cop-out) when you don't perform up to the expectations that are expected of you, (then) blame it on a variety of different excuses."

Hendry said the Cubs have never had problems with players who wanted to stay in Chicago.

"We have a long history of quality people that want to play here, and I don't believe in the last seven or eight years under this regime we've lost a free agent player that we wanted to keep," he said. "And that's still the case. We just heard (in the media) from Aramis (Ramirez) and Derrek Lee the other day how strongly they would like to end their careers here. I do find it ironic, too, that if there was any truth to any of the things that are coming up now about (the difficulties of playing at Wrigley Field),

"I'd like to think that Kevin Millar and Marlon Byrd, who are represented by the same firm, the Levinsons... I don't think they would've been dying to have their clients come here. I think Kevin and Marlon will both tell you we were clearly their first choice. It's really unfortunate you get to that situation (and) deflect the lack of production you did in the year you were here, and t6hen try to use the other areas for excuses."

Hendry again accepted the blame for signing Bradley to a three-year, $30 million deal, repeating that it was his "mistake" and his alone. He thought he helped Bradley by sending him to a situation where he could thrive, only to see Bradley rip the Cubs in separate interviews with ESPN and the New York Times.

"I think we've all done our best to move on," Hendry said. "We've got a great bunch of guys here and a really quality thing going in our clubhouse and our organization. We thought we helped Milton move on too, by putting him in another place. And that's how we approach it.

"It's time to go about our business. Obviously, it was a one-year situation that I brought him in here to try and help us from the left side. Obviously it was a mistake and he didn't get the job done. You move on from your mistakes and you make life better for both sides, and that's what we did."