Illini Iceman

If he was consistently that good he would be a hall of fame caliber player so clearly it was an outlier season for him. But we are comparing him to Jacque Jones and David Delucci and I will be comfortable with him on my team any day over those two. The point is that none of the 3 have had very good careers yet bradley was talked about as some stud hitter all offseason Maybe that is your point, but it is not the point of this post: That post is irrational.

If he was consistently that good he would be a hall of fame caliber player so clearly it was an outlier season for him. But we are comparing him to Jacque Jones and David Delucci and I will be comfortable with him on my team any day over those two.

Yes, it reminds me of that as well except for the fact it is absolutely nothing like that.

I hate these movies. Quite sure there will be the token: 1) Guy who talks about wanting the Cubs to win before his poor old grandfather dies who has never seen a world series championship. 2) Dufus who is unsure if the wants the Cubs to win because then they would lose their special bond with the fans who have suffered with them through all the years. I guess it is cute for people that don't really follow baseball but to me they always seem to focus on people that I would never want to identify with as fellow Cubs fans.

Vitters also grounded into not one, but two, TWO double plays. I say we hang him. Actually this would seem to indicate he is developing the skills needed to qualify him for the MLB team. If he can master the strikeout and/or pop up on the infield with a man on third and less then two outs he may be in line for a quick promotion.

Except for the slight difference that Jacque Jones also was a crappy baseball player and Milton Bradley isn't.

Hendry obviously is also very bad at putting together a team this year that can win from May 18-20.

Please go with the Counsell / McGehee platoon. (BTW - I love that current McGehee line - .188 / .188 / .188)

If Kerry Wood were still here and performing like he has been with the Indians I think people would be considering him more part of the problem than part of the solution.

We saw basically the same exact performance in 2007 and 2008. Same key problems(dominance of our hitters with RH pitching, errors, weak starting pitching). If the Cubs had put up a fight, maybe taken a game or two in one of the series, you might have a point. But this team didn't show up for even one game in all facets of play. They couldn't pitch, hit or field. So that rules out any possible team wide slump with offense as being the only cause. If you look at the overall performance of the ball club, there is something fundamentally wrong with them in the post season. Until they win a playoff series(or stunningly, even a single game), those are the facts on the table that we can pick apart. I really don't know what else to say. There wasn't a glimmer of hope or promise for two straight NLDS's. None. Aaaah, so now along with Ramirez now becoming a choking dog some time between the end for the 2003 playoffs and the start of the 2007 playoffs you now have focused in on the starting pitching. You do realize, of course, that Z is the only pitcher that made starts in both the 2007 and 2008 postseason and actually he had one very good start in 2007 and then one mediocre one in 2008 that would have been much better if the defense had supported him better. So the Cubs swapped out 2/3 of their playoff starters from the 2007 playoffs to the 2008 playoffs but, darn it, they should have instead gotten some of those gritty pitchers that would do well in the postseason. By your logic they should start grooming Cotts as their closer now in preparation for this year's postseason since he has never given up a run in a playoff appearance. That is the type of mentally strong, clutch players we need more of!!! Marmol? Ha! Look at him crap the bed in the playoffs. DFA him now and save yourself the inevitable failure in October.

I think the guy in danger of getting into the Lou Piniella official Scott Eyre memorial doghouse is Heilman. Guzman already seems to have jumped ahead of him in the pecking order and whichever of Wells or Marshall gets dropped from the rotation when Z comes back also probably will be higher on Lou's list as well.

The KC lineup is not exactly Murderer's Row so the 1.59 WHIP is not overwhelming, but obviously the fact he only had two walks is at least a sign that maybe he has something figured out. The key is going to be when he faces some of the more powerful offensive teams in the AL East and get knocked around a little will he be able to keep it together and not start getting wild again.

I completely agree with this logic. But it leads me to ask, if it's a "hot/cold" thing, why do the Cubs key hitters consistentyly end up on the cold side of the equation? For example, when looking at a simple stat of a lead off man, Soriano has a .125 OBP the last two post seasons for the Chicago Cubs. His job at the top is to get on base. He has failed in a freakishly spectacular fashion, perhaps setting an overall tone of futility from the first pitch of the series. Ramirez, the Cubs most consistent run producer and "clutch" hitter in the regular season goes compeltely ice cold under the pressure. His OBP is .163 with *zero* rbi's and three total bases the past two post seasons. Soriano also has three total bases and zero RBI. There's "going cold", and then there is a very bleak and recognizable pattern from your best hitters when the post season pressure is on. Nice of you to selectively choose the past two post seasons when analyzing Ramirez's performances. Wouldn't want to mention that .956 OPS in the 2003 playoffs, huh? I guess he just forgot how to be "clutch" at some point after 2003. Or maybe 23 combined AB's in the 2007/2008 postseasons is too small a sample size. As for Soriano, he does seem to struggle in the post season. Not sure why that is, it might be because he is a mistake type hitter and since he will generally see more elite level pitchers he doesn't get as many mistakes. However, his value in putting up production that is vital to a team getting a team to the post season probably offsets the fact that his production may drop off once that team reaches the post season.

In Philly, they boo mercilessly, so that's one place that's worse than Chicago. Boston and New York do the same thing. Pretty much any big market fan base that cares (so that elminates the LA Dodgers).

So let me get this straight, the meaning of Wilson's gesture was pretty well-guarded secret until last season. However, it's not showboating, it's just to quick message out to the world and to Christ. But if the meaning was a well-guarded secret then how was anyone in the "world" supposed to understand the message? And I think that a silent prayer to himself would satisfy Christ. It's showboating veiled with good intentions so no one can complain about it. Either stop doing it or drop the outrage when someone decides to shove it back in your face.

That's what it looked like to me. One of his pitches sailed extremely wild, he held his arm in pain, and that was that. Can we find a way to blame Dusty for it again?

Lee, Soto and Bradley have all been pretty much worthless so far this year so if those three can just start putting up offensive numbers closer to what would be expected they can replace a lot of Ramirez's production to date. He had already missed 11 of the 29 games so it was not like he had been carrying the team on his back so far anyway.

And a home run to of all people Ryan Braun! He sucks and never hits home runs! They should just give up now. I can't believe they are in last place and haven't even won a game yet. Unacceptable. Nice worthless post. Are you saying that Heilman hasn't sucked this season? Are you saying that Jim Hendry's offseason moves haven't been terrible so far? I guess your original worthless post deserved another, huh? I am saying an average reliever gave up a home run to an all-star caliber power hitter. Guess what, it happens and it will happen again so if you plan on watching 162 games this year you probably should get used to it or you are going to have a coronary attack. And no, I don't think Felix Pie (worthless) and Ronny Cedeno (worthless) is overpaying to get Heilmann even if I am willing to accept your hypothesis that he is also worthless. The Cubs are over .500 and within striking distance of first place despite a lot of bad luck so far with injuries. Hardly worthy of the "disaster" description. But the bottom line is that you hate Hendry and pretty much criticize every move he makes so every time something goes wrong you get all excited and break out your "the season is over and it is all Hendry's fault" posts.

And a home run to of all people Ryan Braun! He sucks and never hits home runs! They should just give up now. I can't believe they are in last place and haven't even won a game yet. Unacceptable.

Bobby Scales also gets a last minute reprieve.

Hendry worked for the Marlins for three years before joining the Cubs. He has worked for the Cubs since 1995. Explain to me how Chad Fox having pitched for the Marlins in 2003 and 2004 would possibly qualify him as one of Hendry's "pets from Florida".

Whatever...the NL loses every year anyways. I'd rather just see it happen and see the MLB flip out about it. Hopefully it would bring about some sort of change to the systems. I don't get why everyone wants it changed. The players vote in the NFL and they are probably worse at picking the best players than the fans. The sportswriters are so on top of things that, for example, here in Tampa the local writers voted Jason Bartlett the team MVP of the Rays last year. Fans make some dumb picks but overall they do OK and from a standpoint of generating a lot of interest in the game the best way is by letting the customers decide who can play. All the starters are out after 3 innings anyway. The problem with the fans voting is that unlike with other sports' all-star games, the MLB All-Star game counts toward HFA in the World Series. Most fans just vote for players they recognize or players on their team. Fine, that is probably true, but the NFL players have shown that they also pretty much are as bad as the fans when it comes to voting for guys with big names or reputations, probably worse. I have no reason to believe that MLB players would be any better so scratch players voting as an improvement over the fans. The baseball writers have shown from their hall of fame voting that for the most part they also don't really have a clue so I don't think turning it over to them would be much of an improvement either. IMO opinion none of the "mainstream" options are going to consistently provide better results than the fans and there is no way that MLB powers that be would ever turn it over to a statistical type selection process (at least one that uses worthwhile statistics) so they may as well just keep doing it the way they are because it is the best way to ensure interest among the common fan.

What does Chad Fox having pitched for the Marlins have to do with Hendry?

The only way you can criticize this deal is if you would rather have Scales than Freel, because that's what it comes down to. If they don't make this deal Gaithright either accepts the AAA assignment or gets released and there is no point in having him in AAA because if the Cubs really need a CF at some point they could just promote Fuld and get as much production. Overall I think this team with Freel is better than this team with Gaithright so it seems like an OK move. Freel is still on the DL so Scales probably gets to stick around for a little while longer until Freel is ready to go.

You probably have better odds guessing the the lottery numbers than trying to predict what a major league team's bullpen will look like in 3 seasons.