The Cubs have found a way to reduce to their 40-man roster to 40 players. They traded Jae-kuk Ryu on Tuesday to Tampa Bay for outfielder Andrew Lopez and right-handed pitcher Gregory Reinhard.

Ryu had an 8.40 ERA in 15 innings for the Cubs last year. That high ERA was largely attributable to his one disastrous start on May 28. At triple-A Iowa, Ryu had a 3.23 ERA 139.1 innings, which followed a 3.34 ERA in 169.2 innings campaign in double-A in 2005. PECOTA's projection for him is nothing to write home about, but consistent: between a 4.70 and a 4.90 ERA over the next five seasons. Ryu is going to get a chance to make the Rays' big league club this spring, something he would not have had a chance to do in Chicago, barring injuries.

Lopez just turned 20 and has spent the past two seasons with Tampa Bay's rookie ball team in Princeton, West Virginia. He had a 945 OPS in 2005 and regressed to a 758 OPS in 2006.

Reinhard turned 23 in August. He had a 4.50 ERA in 142 innings for Tampa Bay's low-A team last year, with a 2.5 K/BB ratio.

As Chicago Cubs Online notes, "Neither prospect was listed on John Sickels' Devil Rays Top Prospects of 2007."

In my mind, it would have made more sense to drop Buck Coats from the 40-man roster.

David Pinto at Baseball Musings is more optimistic about Lopez and Reinhard than I am, unless, as one of his commenters suggests, he was being sarcastic (though it doesn't appear so). As Dan Szymborski writes at Baseball Think Factory, "Andy Lopez is interesting, but a long way off and nobody really expects either Reinhard or Lopez to do anything other than sniff the bottom of a Top 20 prospect list for a time."

Some Ryu trivia: On September 26, 2006, Ryu entered the 9th inning of a 14-6 win over the Milwaukee Brewers and became the Cubs' 522nd pitching change of the season, a new all-time record, according to Elias.