Illini Iceman

I hope they didn't use up their one run they needed for Saturday's 1-0 victory.

Don't you have somewhere you can go where people actually want to hear what you have to say? First of all trolling in a Cubs thread as a Brewers fan and secondly enlightening us with your compelling fantasy baseball draft strategy. Tell me more, tell me more!

I'm thinking right now, would I rather have a series go down like this and get swept or lose in 4 games or would I rather the Cubs had won the first two and then lost three in a row like they did in '84 (and similarly in '03)? As a Cub fan, these are the types of options you are forced to consider.

Actually it got them the right to have a potential game 5 at home and unless they lose 2 out of the next 3 they will still get that privledge. If the Cubs are going to go deep they need to have Z pitching well. If Z is as unreliable as he somehow has suddenly become depicted as then the Cubs really had no chance to win it all anyway. Hopefully he pitches well and the Cubs get game 2 and then take game 3 with the better match up. Game 4 becomes a coin flip and if they wind up coming up on the wrong end of that game they still have a better matchup in game 5 with Demp against Billingsley than they had tonight against Lowe. I don't believe in there being different regular season and postseason teams. I think the Cubs are just better and like their chances in any game they play against the Dodgers. The fact they came out flat and got outplayed in what happened to be game 1 of the NLDS like they probably did 30 times during the regular season does not suddenly make me think they are doomed to fail.

If you were a truly dedicated fan you would get it tatooed on there.

and in 24 of his 32 starts, he's given up 3 or less ER. Which one is more likely to happen? Tell me what teams the 24 starts were against and if they were on home or on the road and then the same for the 8 other starts and then maybe it will be possible to make a judgement. I think his point was that with all the hand wringing about which Z will show up it seems to be assumed that Billingsley is going to be lights out. Seems like I am hearing a lot about how lights out Lowe was tonight or how badly the Cubs struggled offensively. Yes, they only had 2 runs, but they had 7 hits against Lowe in 6 innings so they were putting themselves in good positions. Some games you just can't seem to get the big hits when you need them. Hopefully the Cubs can have a big offensive outburst tomorrow and it will relax them a bit. I know it is hard to win 3 of 4 when you put it that way, but in '03 the Cubs won three in a row against the Marlins then rumor has it the Marlins may have done the same right back to the Cubs. In '07 the DBacks beat the Cubs three in a row. In '98 the Braves beat the Cubs three straight. In '89 the Giants split the first two then won 3 in a row against the Cubs. In '84 we all know the Padres won 3 games in a row. So maybe in the big history of the playoffs it doesn't happen much, but in Cubs history it has happened just about every year they have been in the playoffs. Yeah, you can do the the whole "but it is the Cubs and that is why other teams do it to them" but if you are going to be logical the '08 team certainly has nothing to do with '84, '89, '98 or '03 so this '08 team has just as good a chance to do it to the Dodgers than any of those teams above had to do it to the Cubs teams they were playing.

According to the link from THT Live posted earlier in the day, the Cubs odds of winning the WS drop 67% if they lose game 1, so the odds of them winning the first series must drop by the same amount. The odds were 52% before the loss, so they now drop to about 17%. Odds of one of your posts being worth reading - 0%

Odds of winning tomorrow: Maybe 50/50 if we take an optimistic view of homefield advantage. We are down 0-1 and facing a bad pitching matchup. Seriously dude, do you take some joy in coming to this board and being a complete killjoy? We get if from your previous 3900 posts, the Cubs suck, they will never win and anyone that expects them to is delusional. Why don't you go hang out at WSI where people will appreciate your negativity toward this team and not here where everyone groans whenever they see you posting before they even read whatever downer comment you are going to make next. I really don't get why people are fans of things they really don't like. Some of us actually find it more enjoyable to be optimistic and actually root for our team.

On Baseball Tonight you would think that the Dodgers just had a 100 win season and that the Cubs barely snuck in to the playoffs. I love it. I hope every expert picks against the Cubs. Biggest kiss of death is all these [expletive] head experts picking the Cubs to win - see last year again the Diamondbacks.

I would rather the Cubs face any Dodgers starter than Johan Santana and since the Cubs may have had to face him twice against the Mets that makes the Dodgers a better match up IMO. Also, while Manny is scary he is really the only major offensive threat while the Mets had Delgado, Wright and Beltran so I think they were the better offensive team. The Dodgers also played an easier schedule being in the NL West and had a worse record so that also supports the Mets being the better overall team. The Cubs could get beat in this series, but I don't think it is any tougher than the Mets would have been. Plus LA fans are not as obnoxious so that is a plus.

Really? You do know he is scheduled to pitch in Game 2, in 4 days, right? But as of this afternoon, he was named the starter tomorrow. Yea, Bruce said the plan was for him to pitch an inning or two, which would make sense But as long as he's not hurt, who cares I guess I didn't know he was going to pitch a couple innings. But I think that would have been a stupid idea since he was named game 2 starter already. Had he been going in game 3, that would be different. I know...like I said, its the same thing that they did with Lilly last year. He started the Sunday game, threw 2 innings, and then pitched 4 days later in game 2 It was Z's decision not to pitch in the game: http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=3612971

Why pitch Sabathia again on short rest in game 2? You can only get one start out of him in the NLDS anyway so it doesn't really make any sense to not let him get rested up for a potentially more effective start in game 3. It would have been risky, but maybe the Brewers should have held back using Bush today and started him tomorrow and then have Sabathia for the one game playoff against the Mets on Monday if necessary. You figure with the bullpen pitching for the Cubs tomorrow they should have been able to count on getting a win even with Bush pitching (and he looked better against the Cubs last time than Sabathia) and if they had lucked out with a Mets loss Sunday they would have had Sabathia ready to pitch twice in the NLDS. If the goal really was to win it all and not just limp into the playoffs the strategy they are using of riding Sabathia into the ground down the stretch seems a bit odd.

I don't see how it is a forgone conclusion that they are going to win the wildcard. There is a good chance Sheets is not really ready (he goes from feeling "OK" to "the best he has all season".....alllrighty that sounds odd) and Sabathia will be on 3 days rest for like the third time through the rotation so he has got to start losing some of his effectiveness as his arm tires. If the Cubs take one of those and the Mets can win the next two against the Marlins it is tied again and the Brewers go to a one game playoff with Bush as their starter. They manager to win that and then the go to the NLDS against a powerful Philadelphia offense with a most likely rotation of sore elbowed Sheets, Sabathia on 3 day rest again and then Gallardo who can at most go 5 innings and turn it over to a bullpen that has not done well down the stretch. I wouldn't bet on them being able to beat the Phillies 3 out of 5. Even with having their Sabathia, Sheets 1-2 punch pitching on full rest and healthy they had an awful September. Adding a gimpy Gallardo (who probably can't realistically be expected to match that last performance) and with Sabathia and Sheets on fumes I can't see them making a deep run.

Not to beat a horse that has been dead quite some time, but why the hell did they choose to DFA Eyre instead of Howry? Eyre is only sporting a 221 ERA+ since his arrival in Philly. I swear to God, if Eyre ends up screwing us sometime this playoffs... It was very clear from Lou's quotes throughout the season that he respected Howry's work ethic and attitude and did not feel the same way about Eyre. If you remember, one of the reason Eyre came here was that Dusty was the manager and I think he said something along the lines of liking Dusty because he didn't make him run during spring training. If Lou doesn't like a guy, history shows that he will get his way and that guy will be out the door sooner or later. I think it wound up being later since Eyre was so effective the second half of '07 into the start of '08 when he came back from the DL. Once he started pitching like Howry (word editor), starting with the Crawford grand slam in TB, Lou wasted no time in showing him the exit. It is, in other words, a detailed example of why major league managers are really bad at their jobs compared to people in other 7 figure a year positions. I don't know about that. Managers in all industries will give employees with a good attitudes that work hard a bit more leeway than a guy that might be slightly better at his job but is a screw off and doesn't follow the rules. It's not like Eyre was a Marmol level talent and they let him walk. At best he was about equivalent to Cotts and really couldn't be trusted in any important situations. Let's not use revisionist history and act like Eyre was some lights out reliever that everyone here loved and got a raw deal. Depending how he pitched he may have not made the playoff roster anyway over Cotts and Marshall and at least the Cubs got a marginal prospect for him instead of cutting him lose after the season for nothing.

Whatever makes you feel better.

http://chicago.cubs.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20080926&content_id=3554007&vkey=news_chc&fext=.jsp&c_id=chc

Howry also named to bullpen. Howry now that we know howry and marquis are in the playoffs, it seems as though one of gaudin, samardjia, cotts, and marshall will miss the playoffs. Who do you guys think isn't on the roster? Source: cubs.com article that announces playoff rotation Gaudin is out. No way Lou trusts him in any key situation the way he has pitched since coming back from the DL. IMO - they will send him out to AZ to pitch during the NLDS and consider activating him for the NLCS if someone else struggles.

What does this mean? You don't know what you're gonna get on any given day from anybody. Secondly, if you do think Zambrano is iffy, why don't you think Harden and Lilly are iffy? Third, if you think Zambrano is iffy, then wouldn't you rather have him going in game 2 than 3? Where you're faced with a must win down 2-0, or going for the kill up 2-0, or in a pivotal tie breaking game with the series tied at 1. Given Zambrano's last 7-8 starts, its more likely you are going to get a bad start from Z than Harden and Lilly. Harden had a bad start or two, and Lilly has had his clunkers, but neither has been nearly as erratic as Z. And I'd rather him going game 3, on the road (where he pitches better) than game 2, yes. It's easier to come back from down 0-1 than 0-2, and if we're down 0-1, I don't feel as comfortable with Z pitching as someone like Lilly or Harden. Harden has had control issues and hasn't looked as sharp over the same period as Zambrano has looked bad. Lilly has had issues giving up the longball. Zambrano's bad outings recently have come when he was clearly not 100% and/or games that were meaningless. He dominated the playoff game last year, while Lilly crapped the bed. I'm not really saying I disagree with you, but I don't think Zambrano has any more worries than Harden or Lilly. Another thing to consider is that Harden has been quoted as preferring to pitch at night. Since the first two games are almost definitely going to be day games based on the schedule I have seen then Lou may be trying to also get Harden a night game start by sending him in game 3. Don't know if his splits actually support that he pitches better at night.

I wonder how those writers that accused him of being "soft" feel about it now. If you ask me this is a much bigger story of overcoming adversity than Josh Hamilton getting over his drug habit. Geez, the guy has MD and actually worked himself back to the big leagues this year.

Not to beat a horse that has been dead quite some time, but why the hell did they choose to DFA Eyre instead of Howry? Eyre is only sporting a 221 ERA+ since his arrival in Philly. I swear to God, if Eyre ends up screwing us sometime this playoffs... It was very clear from Lou's quotes throughout the season that he respected Howry's work ethic and attitude and did not feel the same way about Eyre. If you remember, one of the reason Eyre came here was that Dusty was the manager and I think he said something along the lines of liking Dusty because he didn't make him run during spring training. If Lou doesn't like a guy, history shows that he will get his way and that guy will be out the door sooner or later. I think it wound up being later since Eyre was so effective the second half of '07 into the start of '08 when he came back from the DL. Once he started pitching like [expletive] (word editor), starting with the Crawford grand slam in TB, Lou wasted no time in showing him the exit.

I wonder how high the Cubs are on Hoff? Do they have enough confidence to give him a shot to take the RF position next year and slide Fukudome over to CF? If Hendry is still in love with Brian Roberts he could make another play for him with the Orioles (might take less this year since he is 1 year closer to free agency and O's may be trying to move payroll to make room for a bid on Tex) and put Hoff in some type of platoon arrangement with DeRosa. The numbers this year were huge. Just hard to say if it was a Soto type situation where he can translate that to the big leagues or a Dubois type situation where he can dominate at AAA but is just a role player at best at the next level.

Considering that Piniella has given Ward no starts since the scrub game against the Cardinals I think he may be trying to get an extended look at Hoff to decide whether he wants to keep him over Ward. You would think if he was 100% sold on Ward making the roster he would be giving him more AB's here to sharpen up his swing. If it is a trial of sorts for Hoff he is certainly passing the test.

Maybe if someone else actually stepped up and could get anyone out it would make Lou's decision a bit harder. Other than Wood and Marmol every guy out there has been pretty much a disaster lately. Wood, Marmol, Marshall, Cotts, Shark, Marquis seem like pretty sure bets for the NLDS. Howry gets left off if they go with an extra bat but I don't see that happening. Assuming they keep the 11th pitcher Howry is up against Guzman and Gaudin and neither really have inspired much confidence.

Still upset at him for getting Champagne in Hendry's eyes on Saturday.

What difference does it make? They can rest them for the rest of the series if they wanted to. Need to let them pitch at least about every other day each just to keep them sharp.