Willis trade talks take back seat as Fish pursue park

	Dontrelle Willis has won 58 games in four seasons. He has a cumulative ERA of 3.44. AP

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JUPITER, Fla. -- Two executives with interested competing teams said they believe they have no hope of prying Dontrelle Willis away from the Marlins anytime soon, not while the organization is currently involved in the latest spirited and hopeful campaign to get a new baseball stadium built in South Florida.

Yet, Willis himself isn't quite as certain about his chances to stay. "I hear all the trade rumors. I've got friends in New York, and they're telling me stuff,'' said Willis, the whirling-dervish wunderkind who at (just barely) 25 is among the oldest players on the Marlins' roster.

"I like it here,'' Willis said. "This is all I know. This is the team I made it to the big leagues with. This is the team that took a chance on a gangly 21-year-old. I have a great deal of love and respect for the city, and the city has a great deal of love and respect for me. I definitely want to stay. But there's the business aspect of the game. It's up to them. We'll see.

"With all the talented young left-handers we have here, they just might bump me out,'' Willis adds, with a laugh.

Only Willis -- 12-12 with a 3.87 ERA last season -- isn't completely kidding. The Marlins are as deep as the Atlantic when it comes to that most coveted of commodities: young pitchers. Willis is already the oldest man in the Marlins' rotation, all of whom won in double digits in 2006, and there are still more pitching prizes coming; their five first-round and sandwich picks in 2005 were pitchers, as well. Not only that, but the Marlins' organization is about as predictable as hurricane season in South Florida.

Just when you think they're scaling back, they add Ugueth Urbina and Jeff Conine for a stretch run that culminates in a World Series title. Or they sign Carlos Delgado to a megabucks deal. And when you foresee just a little trimming, instead they gut the team, as they did in the winter of 2005-06 (and in the process, manage to improve their overall prospects).

The Marlins' tally over the last decade: two World Series championships (more than anyone except the Yankees) and two fire sales (more than anyone). This year's team is long on youth, pitching and hope. It's typically inexpensive, yet it's oddly top heavy, with Miguel Cabrera making $7.4 million and Willis $6.45 million, nearly what the other 23 players will make combined for an exciting, enthusiastic team that still draws little more than flies to its football stadium.

To the most oft-asked question he hears regarding their chances to keep Willis, Marlins general manager Larry Beinfest, maybe the most unknown great GM in the game, said, "We'll see. I think there's probably some people in the media and maybe some of our fans, based on reports especially in the last year, they're probably surprised Dontrelle is still here ... As long as (Willis and Cabrera) keep performing, they're going to be at or near the top of their respective classes, and they're going to be deserving of big pay raises. We'll see where the payroll lies, then meet it head on from there.''

To the second most-asked question about whether it will take a new stadium to keep those players around, Beinfest said, "I think we definitely would like a new venue. There's no question David Samson, our president, has been out front on that and the effort's been under way a long time. I don't think it's a fair question at this point simply because we'll see where the payroll is set. I don't set the payroll. Our owner sets the payroll.''

There would seem to be little question, though, that without a stadium, it's going to be difficult to keep their two high-priced megastars much beyond this year. Cabrera's career looks like it may mirror that of Albert Pujols, who got a $100 million Cardinals contract long before he got to free agency, while Willis is paralleling his old Cubs buddy Carlos Zambrano, who nearly doubled his pay in a contract agreed to Feb. 20, from $6.65 million to $12.4 million, from his fifth year to his sixth.

"He's my roommate in Cubs instructional League so I'm happy for him. He deserves it,'' Willis says. "I was never good at economics, so I don't get into that. But God bless him, man. I'm happy to see everyone make more money because that means the owners are making more money.''

Though of course, as anyone connected to the Marlins could tell you, some owners make more than others.