The Cubs’ trade for centerfielder Kenny Lofton and third baseman Aramis Ramirez may help the Cubs in the short term, though it’s hard to tell how much.

While Lofton’s definitely stronger than Tom Goodwin in center, he doesn’t come close to replacing Corey Patterson’s team-leading offensive contributions. He and Ramirez together barely approach Patterson’s statistics before he went down with the torn ACL.

Ramirez is young and may yet develop into a great player. He is signed through 2004 so who knows? Maybe he’ll be The Next Santo everyone keeps praying for.

The trade certainly makes the Cubs better now than they were before, but I highly doubt it’s good enough to get them the division title. The Cubs offense is still anemic and Shawn Estes can’t seem to get past the fourth inning, so that’s an automatic loss every five days.

The final word on this trade will come when we learned who the player to be named later is. If it’s another B-level prospect like pitcher Matt Bruback, then whoopdedoo. If it’s something more, I’ll be sore.

The “win now” focus is just fine, but I just don’t think there’s much to be said for this team. It’s at .500 now and has played worse than .500 for most of the season. I don’t see how it has merited any great investment.

With their nucleus of pitching talent, the Cubs have lots of time to win. Time may be all they have.