CubinNY

Obviously you were not alive in the 70's Oh, for the days of Steve Swisher, Jerry Morales, and Ivan DeJesus. Now that was some baseball. Steve Swisher fathered Nick Swisher. http://files.myopera.com/Eddie_Lopez/blog/The_More_You_Know.jpg[/img] Steve Onteverios was on some of those teams with Dick Tidrow. http://files.myopera.com/Eddie_Lopez/blog/The_More_You_Know.jpg

Also says he fits in the 2-hole nicely. That didn't come out quite right.

Whomever sings it, iit is 100x better than God Bless America.

What a whacky game.

That's rationalizing his decision, not defending it. Just because there is traditionalist logic behind his moves doesn't mean they are justified. I agree. I was just responding to the criticism of Lou at this point. I hope Lou can overcome his history and begin to see what the problems are and where the solutions lie.

Sorry if this is not topical, I'm going to defend Lou a little here. I think he's tried and is still trying to make this team better, but like I wrote yesterday, he is a chess player who was given too many bishops and not enough castles. He can move these guys around all he wants but at the end of the game he still can't get them in a positon to win, becuase he never had the right pieces to begin with. I think Lou wants SLG out of the outfiled. That is traditionally where a teams gets it. That's why Murton is sitting. I don't think he recognizes that the Cubs need to get guys on base. He's a traditionalist, just like Hendry. Similarly, "you gotta' be strong up the middle". Izturis has a repuation as a golve man. That's why he's playing. A tradionalist through and through. But I think Lou can be swayed by results. Let's just hope it is soon enough.

I'm with you, and they do play baseball the right way. I dream of a day when we play ball like that. Is this a joke? Do you guys know how many HRs the Sox hit last year and in 2005? Do you know their OBP for the 1-2 hitters? Stop it. It's grit and intestinal fortitude that wins games for the Sox.

Not to mention, hitting into an inning ending double play with the bases loaded. He can't even strike out. He always "puts the ball in play" . Utterly craptacular.

I'll give them credit...yesterday they did get an awful lot of hits...its hard to get that many hits and have so little to show for it. Not really. They only had two walks. This team's problem is walks, they walk too many and don't walk enough.

I wonder how many people go to an 11:30 am AA game? Do they still serve beer at that hour? Enquiring minds want to know.

Anyone who has studied this team over the last several years should have seriously questioned how good they could be. It's a long season and strange things can happen. I could see the Cubs going crazy and winning the division with a .500 record.

Prior will have to learn to be "crafty". A tough accomplishment for a righthander (I'm joking). Perhaps the Cubs should contact Doyle Alexander and have a sit down with Prior. Alexander started off his career much like Prior but he became a pretty good pitcher even after arm/shoulder injuries took away his fastball. http://www.baseball-reference.com/a/alexado01.shtml

Frank Chance and his liquer bottle.

There is no way in hell that is going to happen.

I think you're over-estimating Murton's trade value. There simply aren't all that many teams that can afford his lack of power at a corner OF spot, and especially if he is going to play LF. I'm not sure of too many teams who would give up a decent return for him at all. Now, the sad thing is that Murton definitely does have quite a bit of value to a team, and the way the Cubs are constructed with power at scarce spots they don't really need a huge power bat in LF. So Murton with his high OBP would have quite a bit of value to a team like the Cubs (and any team built like them) but apparently not right now with this team. Cosign. Corner outfielders that post .800 OPSes aren't exactly in short supply. If you believe he reached his ceiling in his first full year. I think he'll be much closer to 875 in the coming years. PECOTA disagrees. 875 is not out of the question but it would be in the upper ranges. Onlty CHONE projects Murton to be below 800 (.792) ops for this year. Bill James has him at 864 (high mark). http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=6307&position=OF

I think you're over-estimating Murton's trade value. There simply aren't all that many teams that can afford his lack of power at a corner OF spot, and especially if he is going to play LF. I'm not sure of too many teams who would give up a decent return for him at all. Now, the sad thing is that Murton definitely does have quite a bit of value to a team, and the way the Cubs are constructed with power at scarce spots they don't really need a huge power bat in LF. So Murton with his high OBP would have quite a bit of value to a team like the Cubs (and any team built like them) but apparently not right now with this team. Cosign. Corner outfielders that post .800 OPSes aren't exactly in short supply. Really? Right now, there are 22 ML corner OF's with an OBP higher than Murton's career OBP. And there are currently 24 ML corner OFs with an OPS of .800 or higher. Last year 14 corner OFs had an OBP higher than Murton's and 21 corner OFs had an OPS higher than Murton's. Since there are 60 corner OFs in MLB, that leaves a lot of guys who would be worse than Murton's career numbers (and he's just entering his prime, so it wouldn't surprise anyone if those numbers got better). Come to think of it, the Cubs could use an OF with a .370 OBP and .800 OPS. Currently, we don't have any of those. Murton would have value to any organization that had a competent management system in place. The question is what would he fetch in a trade? The Cubs are currently killing whatever trade value he might potentially have.

I predicted this a long time ago and took lots of heat. The worst thing for me is that Murton has the ability to at least get on base. LIke I said in another thread, he doesn't hit for enough power for traditionalists like Lou and Hendry.

It's Cubs or bust for me. I hate AL baseball.

In what world is 50% good? When you add that to their other losses it makes for a bad team.

The only people talking about their 1-run record are the people who keep blaming their struggle on luck and blindly expecting things to just even out. Pythagorean record doesn't mean things will even out. You have proof that it won't? Teams underpreform their pythagorean record all the time. The measure is used to determine if teams underperform or overperform based on their RS and RA. It has no basis in reality, it's simply a nominal measure.

That's the point. And there have been quite a few more examples of dumb play that cost the Cubs this year. Luck probably plays a role, but so does poor decision making and poor execution. I conceded this point before I even argued anything else. What I'm arguing against is your contention that that run cost us the game, when there is absolutely no way you can say that the run would have scored had things gone differently. D-Lee as a runner on base when Aramis hit that HR is your own hypothetical. You're accusing me of (and ridiculing me for) coming up with hypotheticals when the situation you're trying to present is just as much of a hypothetical. Him getting thrown out and then the following pitch being thrown and hit out of the park is what actually happened. Him being on base for that pitch, that's entirely hypothetical. Neither you nor I know what would have happend had Lee been standing on second base. I'm going by what actually happend. Lee got CS. Aramis hits a HR. Maybe things would have been different, maybe they wouldn't. It's not luck or fate that is hurting the Cubs, it is stupid plays and lack of execution. "Bad" teams lose close games, "good" teams win close games. That's how they get the label.

That's the point. And there have been quite a few more examples of dumb play that cost the Cubs this year. Luck probably plays a role, but so does poor decision making and poor execution.

Yes, and we all know that pitching from the stretch is so much more effective than pitching from the windup. While, I bet you he would have just blown it past Aramis had he been in the stretch. Or better yet, if Lee is safe a butterfly would have landed on a dandelion and distracted Jenkins just enough that Aramis would have been able to hit an inside the park HR on liner.

That's asinine. Aramis hit a freaking HR. That HR was the difference in the ball game if Lee doesn't try to steal. For the life of me, I cannot understand Cub fans. ITS NOT BAD LUCK THAT IS KEEPING THE CUBS FROM WINNING Tell me, what exactly is asinine about what I said? Asinine:" You cannot really Aramis would've hit that HR if Lee had been called safe or hadn't tried to steal at all." Aramis did hit a HR and Lee did get called out. This isn't chaos theory nor is it the butterfly effect. All we have to go on is exactly what happened. And what happend was a dumb play followed by a HR that should have been the difference in the ball game. So you are trying to argue that the catcher would've called the exact same pitch, the pitcher would've made the exact same pitch in the exact same location, and Aramis would've made the exact same swing had the attempted steal never happened? The play may have been dumb, but you can't just say that it cost us a run because Aramis hit a HR on the next pitch. It just doesn't work that way. You're the one making asinine statements. No. You are trying to argue that there would have been a different outcome in some hypothetical universe where Lee's stupid play went the other way. I'm going on what actually happened. The problem is, it very likely wouldn't have actually happened had Lee still been on base. How in the wide, wide world of sports can you possibly say that?

That's asinine. Aramis hit a freaking HR. That HR was the difference in the ball game if Lee doesn't try to steal. For the life of me, I cannot understand Cub fans. ITS NOT BAD LUCK THAT IS KEEPING THE CUBS FROM WINNING Tell me, what exactly is asinine about what I said? Asinine:" You cannot really Aramis would've hit that HR if Lee had been called safe or hadn't tried to steal at all." Aramis did hit a HR and Lee did get called out. This isn't chaos theory nor is it the butterfly effect. All we have to go on is exactly what happened. And what happend was a dumb play followed by a HR that should have been the difference in the ball game. So you are trying to argue that the catcher would've called the exact same pitch, the pitcher would've made the exact same pitch in the exact same location, and Aramis would've made the exact same swing had the attempted steal never happened? The play may have been dumb, but you can't just say that it cost us a run because Aramis hit a HR on the next pitch. It just doesn't work that way. You're the one making asinine statements. No. You are trying to argue that there would have been a different outcome in some hypothetical universe where Lee's stupid play went the other way. I'm going on what actually happened.