Rob

I am not a fan of the new mlb.com Gameday. They took all the information off the screen and made it so you can only look at one thing at a time... the improved graphics don't make up for that.

Got back not too long ago. A few random notes: 1.) It was miserable weather. low-mid 40s and raining through most of the game. Just enough wind to rub it in too. 2.) Neil Walker freaking destroyed that baseball. 3.) Kinda mad at Quade for leaving Demp out there for ~115 pitches in bad weather when he obviously didn't have his best stuff. It's opening day, no need to stress arms this early. 4.) Soriano caught the boo-birds LOUDLY at the end of his last at bat. 5.) Castro looks like he's done some work on his fielding. I wasn't happy with his attempt to throw out Tabata though... He still needs to work on his decision making some. 6.) Fukudome's definitely lost a step in the last few years, even accounting for the field conditions. 7.) The fans started ducking out of the game really early. I know conditions were nasty, but we weren't down by that much. It makes those of us who care look bad. 8.) Marlon Byrd can't catch up to a good fastball. 9.) I'm officially (finally) ready to give up on Jeff Samardzija. I don't know how you can look that nasty and fool nobody, but he does it. 10.) The Pirates have some actual offensive talent for once. Tabata, Walker, McCutchen, and Alvarez are all quality players... at least on offense anyways.

Well, the rest of the defense can fractionally help. If Ramirez, Casto, and Pena all had excellent range and Dewitt's main problem was a lack of range they could make that up with positioning. If Castro and Pena were both excellent at catching throws and DeWitt had issues with that then they could help in that regard. But I don't think either of those is particularly true so I don't think the rest of the Cubs defense would help DeWitt much. Yeah, defense can be impacted by the other guys on the team. It's one of the reasons I like the Carlos Pena signing... a tall 1B that can pick em out pretty well stands to benefit the left side of our infield quite a bit, as they are both facing some accuracy issues. One moreso than the other.

I saw what the weather looked like and decided against buying myself a ticket. Fate however saw fit to hand me a free one (all the way up in Section 119). And I can't pass that up, can I? So if you're watching the game tomorrow, I'll be the really cold guy in jeans and a sweatshirt. I may even have a poncho if it's raining hard enough.

Did I say all-time?

It's always great to watch two of your greatest rivals get crushed in exciting fashion. Kinda sucks the Reds had to win a great one, but I don't see a way around that... short of double forfeit on account of the biggest damn brawl ever.

I'm sure that you would concede that if we knew our projections about everybody were spot on 100% accurate and that somehow, in some freak coincidence, we needed to squeeze an extra two runs out of lineup to be guaranteed a playoff spot, it'd probably make sense to move Castro down. And since I'm only arguing the technical point of it (even going so far as to say I'm glad Castro is batting 2nd in my initial post), I really don't see the need to argue exactly at what point the picture becomes blurry enough that player development concerns (if they exist) override it.

You're speaking from the perspective of a typical lineup. I'm talking purely about lineup optimization. If you want to make arguments about player development being more important than scoring more runs in the short term, have at it. I'm not barking up that tree. At a glance, I'd guess the optimized lineup looks something like this... Fukudome Soto Aramis Pena Soriano Castro Byrd Pitcher Barney If the org is too scared to use an optimized lineup and has to go with a typical one as not to confuse the fans, I don't care if Castro bats #2. He's better than the other crap we'd toss in that spot normally.

Prepare to be one-upped. This name popped up in my brother's game of Baseball Mogul. No kidding, no editing at all. Spoilered for language (seriously) That is the best thing I have ever seen.

Castro should be hitting lower in the order NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. He should. Sorry. Best hitters 1, 2, 4. Lean more towards OBP than SLG from front to back. Then next best at 3 and 5. Then 6 & 7, pitcher 8, worst 9.

Castro should be hitting lower in the order, but times like these I'm just happy it's him batting #2 and not a guy like Barney, or Cesar Izturis, or Neifi Perez, or all the other guys we put there to "handle the bat a bit." blech.

I don't think anybody here will disagree that Baker deserves to be facing all the lefties, so I wont adress that half of the platoon. As far as who is facing righties, I really don't see it as making any difference. DeWitt is probably the best hitter, but is pretty awful on defense. Baker has had awful numbers hitting righties in his career, but nobody has a platoon split that bad. He's probably the 2nd best hitter, as well as about an average defender... maybe a tick above. Barney is the worst hitter of the three, but his skillset probably isn't the type we have to worry about the sort of implosion we might see from Ronny Cedeno. Barney should be pretty much a carbon copy of Ryan Theriot last year (at least on offense) and if the reports are to be believed, he's a plus defender in the field. None of the three options are good. But they aren't far apart, either. Any way you want to cut it, we'll probably need to make a move for a 2B if we want to stay in the race all season.

Yesterday, that wouldn't have been a problem. As of today, Blake DeWitt would have to clear waivers to be sent down.

Meh. They're all pretty similar value. We will look to make a trade later if we are still in it.

It really seems like people are having a hard time letting go of his injury riddled 2009. Yes, he looked awful in the field and at the plate. It was horrifying. He was fine last year. He wont be worth anywhere near what we paid him, but that's a sunk cost. His play on the field isn't one of the glaring issues with this team.

Where did you get 2.9?? It was 1.4 according to baseball-reference. http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/s/soriaal01.shtml Also, he was never quite a superstar. Fangraphs. UZR > TZ

This is like Ryan Harvey redux... if Ryan Harvey hadn't waited so long that he didn't have a realistic shot anymore.

Soriano isn't done. Maybe as a superstar, but 2.9 WAR is nothing to scoff at. Only Soto and Byrd were better amongst position players last year.

Well the problem here is that you feel his ceiling is no higher than a fringe backup catcher. It's more like good backup/bad 2nd division starter. Think of a cross between Chris Snyder and John Buck. Ramirez tore the cover off the ball his entire minor league career until the last 10 games of 2008. Yeah, his offense has taken a step backwards the last couple years but that seems to happen with young catchers from time to time... they hit the upper level of the minors and turn their focus to improving their defense and gamecalling at the expense of their offense. Not exactly shocking for a guy who just transitioned to the position in 05 that he might not have everything figured out in 4 years. Why not see if we've got something with him? He can't be worse than Hill. He could certainly be better. I'm skeptical of a defensive liability, who has to prove he can hit above AA. Its great that he's been compared to Victor Martinez but those days have come and gone. I'm glad he's at AAA. Although since I project Castillo as a backup C with the ceiling of D. Miller, I think hed be best backing up Soto and Ramirez could be at Iowa trying to improve behind the plate and hit at AAA. I don't blame you for being skeptical. But when the situation has repeated itself often enough that it gets a name like "Young Offensive Catcher Stagnation Syndrome" that has search results going back more than 10 years... well, I wait just a bit before declaring a catcher as having washed out at AAA. I wouldn't blame you for jumping to conclusions though. You'd be right more often than not. I don't see Castillo as much different from Miller either, honestly. But that's another one of those good backup/bad 2nd division starter types. Hell, when they're cheap enough they're not even bad for contenders, provided your GM is smart enough to spend the cash saved wisely.

Well the problem here is that you feel his ceiling is no higher than a fringe backup catcher. It's more like good backup/bad 2nd division starter. Think of a cross between Chris Snyder and John Buck. Ramirez tore the cover off the ball his entire minor league career until the last 10 games of 2008. Yeah, his offense has taken a step backwards the last couple years but that seems to happen with young catchers from time to time... they hit the upper level of the minors and turn their focus to improving their defense and gamecalling at the expense of their offense. Not exactly shocking for a guy who just transitioned to the position in 05 that he might not have everything figured out in 4 years. Why not see if we've got something with him? He can't be worse than Hill. He could certainly be better. The fact that the Cubs kept Hill and placed Ramirez at the same level as Castillo would seem to me to suggest that they don't like Ramirez' catching prospects all that much. Of course it could just simply be a numbers crunch, but they certainly don't seem to be too intent on promoting Ramirez' development behind the plate. Maybe he'll get a lot of action at Iowa and prove me wrong, but it doesn't appear things are going that direction. I don't doubt for a moment the Cubs are thinking of him as a Jake Fox type right now. If they weren't, we'd have cut Koyie Hill three weeks ago. That doesn't mean they aren't making a mistake.

I would be stunned if he was a Cub. We have 3 second baseman on the roster already, and all have more upside than whatever Castillo could give us offensively and defensively. The only reason he would become a Cub is if Jim Hendry's fetish for collecting broken down second basemen returned. We have three underwhelming young guys who don't offer anything we might be able to call consistent. Just knowing what you're gonna get is something Hendry seems to place a premium on. Hendry will send DeWitt down to AAA, platoon Castillo and Baker, and let Barney play backup MI. He'll then look to upgrade the position with an Aaron Hill or Kelly Johnson (maybe even a Jose Reyes) around the deadline if we're still in it. proclamation>

Well the problem here is that you feel his ceiling is no higher than a fringe backup catcher. It's more like good backup/bad 2nd division starter. Think of a cross between Chris Snyder and John Buck. Ramirez tore the cover off the ball his entire minor league career until the last 10 games of 2008. Yeah, his offense has taken a step backwards the last couple years but that seems to happen with young catchers from time to time... they hit the upper level of the minors and turn their focus to improving their defense and gamecalling at the expense of their offense. Not exactly shocking for a guy who just transitioned to the position in 05 that he might not have everything figured out in 4 years. Why not see if we've got something with him? He can't be worse than Hill. He could certainly be better.

The Phils just released him too. Kinda surprising. I'd be kinda surprised if he doesn't latch on here.

Well this is certainly interesting.