TruffleShuffle

an ops of .900 or better? that seems pretty ambitious for a 21 year old in the high minors whose best single-season ops is .852 and who's been at .770 and .717 the last two years.

Only if you don't count last year's contract year where had his worst season since he was 19. and he got hit in the balls with a sharp grounder, making it his worst season ever

oh i would do ted lilly for delmon young in a minute. k rate is way down, power is up, and he's only 24 years old. i guess it depends what else you could get for lilly, but i'd take the chance that this year is not a fluke from young.

you cheated

if you make him available around the league, he may be less inclined to exercise his option. plus he has a full no-trade clause. i wouldn't go down that road.

pop quiz: what are the only two franchises in baseball to never have a pitcher throw a no hitter?

Yeah, I didn't see a big market team like the BEARS going with a first time head coach in Mike Ditka. What were they thinking ??? Ditka was an assistant coach for 10 years before getting hired as a Bears coach. Sandberg has spent exactly zero years doing any kind of major league coaching. I honestly don't know the answer to this, but who was the last major league manager that was hired without ever having been an assistant coach of some kind in the majors? probably a.j. hinch. i guess trey hillman counts too, although he was a manager in japan.

are we talking about the same junior lake who had a line of .248/.277/.365/.642 with 18 bb and 138 k in peoria last year?

speaking of the DSL, i really want to know what happened to carlos henry. the cubs gave him a reported 110k bonus and then he played like someone who had never been on a baseball field before.

wait do you mean floyd, danks AND beckham? because there is zero chance of the white sox considering that. i guess they might give up floyd.

derrek lee for mike trout and they have a deal

yeah lemahieu seemed like kind of a pointless pick given the presence of ryan flaherty in the system.

i wonder where he would've been ranked on prospect lists after this season if he stayed in AA/AAA and then came up in september and raked. probably top 5?

also, it was nice to see colin richardson get the win with a 3 perfect innings yesterday (along with 3 k's). it was his 5th pro outing and he'd given up at least a run in each of his other appearances. seems like he was running into babip problems, though, as his numbers aren't that bad (7 ip, 10 h, 6 er, 1 hr, 0 bb, 9 k)

decided to wade through some DSL cubs info. DSL cubs 1 beat their opponents 19-2 today; the other team made 9 errors in the game, which is just fantastic. some of the guys who look interesting on that team (based on age/production): kelvin encarnacion, cf: .216/.354/.275/.629, 21 bb, 17 k, 11 sb (18 years old, 7 months... young and good eye, obviously no pop yet) jesus rodriguez, 2b: .284/.442/.313/.755, 16 bb, 13 k, 7 sb (18 years, 11 months old) marco hernandez, ss: .282/.335/.359/.694, 12 bb, 13 k, 13 sb (17 years, 11 months old) delbis arcila, of: .268/.400/.346/.746, 27 bb, 30 k, 2 sb (17 years, 3 months old) carlos montero, 3b: .288/.362/.340/.701, 17 bb, 25 k, 7 sb (20 years, 0 months) oliver zapata, of: .260/.339/.385/.723, 20 bb, 28 k, 10 sb (17 years, 10 months) gioskar amaya, ss: .267/.376/.363, 21 bb, 22 k, 13 sb (17 years, 7 months) starling peralta: 47.0 ip, 38 h, 15 bb, 48 k, 2.68 era (19 years, 8 months - third year in the DSL though) amaury paulino: 45.0 ip, 33 h, 13 bb, 41 k, 2.00 era (18 years, 11 months - big improvement in control from last year) ramon garcia: 6-0, 40.1 ip, 26 h, 5 bb, 28 k, 0.89 era (about to turn 19 - third year in the DSL) willengton cruz: 32.1 ip, 15 h, 17 bb, 40 k, 2.23 era (about to turn 20, second year in the DSL) luis villalba: 30.1 ip, 29 h, 14 bb, 19 k, 2.97 era (17 years, 9 months) pretty much the whole DSL Cubs 1 pitching staff has been really good this year... there are a handful of other 18-19 year old relievers who also have good numbers. what stood out to me about the hitters is that many of them have good walk rates, which is nice to see (rather than the nelson perez types)

jackson needs to stop striking out so much. pierre lepage may not be much of a prospect, but he sure can hit.

that's not nearly as huge as you think.

that doesn't really surprise me (garza's no-no). he seems like a guy who is really tough to hit when he's on (and when he's missing his spots, not so tough) the twins beat zach greinke and the royals 19-1. mauer was 5-5 with 3 runs and 7 rbi, and some guy named danny valencia was 4-4 with 4 runs and 4 rbis. that's just a fun line.

wes darvill is looking like a terrible 5th round pick so far

i know everyone likes dumping on theriot, but can we wait to do it when he's having a bad game? he's 2-4 with a home run. i almost want him traded so that we don't need three posts after every ground out about how much he sucks and shouldn't play.

samardzija hit a 2-run homer... maybe he can try his hand as a position player since he sucks at pitching. great control by the pitchers in the tenn game - the opposing pitcher had 4 walks in the first inning and then dolis had 2 walks and a hbp in the bottom of the frame. btw, this is what MiLB.com lists in dolis' bio: i'm thinking that note about the orioles is wrong since he was 13 in 2001.

matt garza has a no hitter through 7. scherzer also had a no-no through 5 2/3 but gave up a grand slam to end it (walk, catcher's interference, walk before that)

houston is pitching for houston?

who is chris johnson and why can't we get him out