Andy

Holy [expletive], he didn't even look like he got all of that, either.

They said it was nothing serious last night, I believe. No reason to push it.

I've long felt the best pound-for-pound seats in the park are upper deck box. They're probably pretty cold in the April and September games (I've only ever sat there in the summer), but the sight lines are terrific. And for some reason they're usually pretty cheap on the resell sites. Where you want to sit has nothing to do with how quickly you move through the queue.

Wada, with Hendricks and Arrieta the centerpieces of a Stanton deal.

Well, this escalated quickly.

USC DB Josh Shaw allegedly saved his nephew from drowning at a family function Saturday and sprained his ankles doing so. I say 'allegedly' because Steve Sarkisian has apparently received a contradicting story regarding the injury and now Shaw (a USC captain) is unavailable to the media until the Trojans figure out what happened. Dan Wetzel had the best line on the subject:

He's signed through those six years already, though. The last year of his contract is 2020, which would also be his last pre-FA year if he is indeed beholden to the standard service-time requirement.

out of curiosity what is the long term difference between him coming up now, and him making the opening day roster? I know less than some others here but I believe the service-time impact is essentially nil between those two scenarios.

It's not even unlikely. It's 100% not happening. They don't explicitly say things too often but they pretty much have explicitly said that. And I still don't understand it. ETA: compared to Baez/Soler that is you don't understand why Soler would be called up before Bryant? I don't understand why they're seemingly playing service time games with Bryant but not Baez and Soler. Bryant's a Boras client and won't sign an early extension. Baez isn't a Boras client, and Soler's already on an MLB contract.

I went in '03. Paid $6 for nose bleed seat. the stadium was empty and I secured seats about 15 rows behind 3rd base by the 3rd inning. I went in 03 also. The Estes game...but I remember the stadium being pretty packed. I only live a couple hours away. I went for the division clincher in 07, but we actually clinched when the Brewers lost an hour after the game, so it wasn't all that exciting. I was also at that game (was at Ball State and bought the ticket on a whim). I think the Brewers were losing pretty big by the time the game ended, so most of the Cubs fans there (and that was probably close to half the fans in the park) knew what was up. I remember a pretty large group of them singing "Go Cubs Go" on the way out.

This is going to be excellent

There are like 5 sports owners that aren't a-holes and that might be optimistic. We'll survive.

I don't think the strikeouts are unexpected or alarming at this stage. It's just depressing to watch. the fact that he's been as good as he's been while being bad javy and swinging at everything isn't what i'd call depressing. This is about how I feel. It's a bummer that he's striking out so much but despite that he's been productive. Once he figures it out he should be even better.

I don't really see the issue. According to this article, to stream games online you'd still have to prove you had access to them. This just keeps teams from blacking out fans that have no way to watch them.

Javy takes a terrible swing at the 2nd pitch of the AB. Every single time.

View the fact that we probably wouldn't have gotten Bryant with Anibal pitching as a consolidation prize. the two things wouldn't have been related whatsoever In his defense, it seems like Jaxon has been here 3 years.

I am generally anti-booing in all forms, but I'd even struggle with it in Jackson's case.

Morning football might be in jeopardy because of that oh-so-common cause of sporting event delays, a mother [expletive] volcano: http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/11383726/penn-state-nittany-lions-ireland-opener-threatened-volcano

This could be the title of the book about Jaxon's Cubs career.

this is how i feel as rational as i like to be, looking at those pictures is even worse somehow than what i was visualizing. [expletive] all that. There is nothing irrational about not wanting to see that on the uniforms. It will provide very little, if any, benefit to the team on the field. It will only serve to make the owner more rich. And it looks like [expletive]. Correct, all of this.

STL would be the team to get in over them just to piss me off

He looks frighteningly like Zac Efron in that photo. I'm very uncomfortable with it.

Colon scratched, Carlos Torres starting.

Even in a season where CFB is starting at the earliest possible date, the off-season seems to last forever. But finally, the AP poll is out and the first Saturday is 12 days away. I'll switch to the committee rankings (man, that's weird to say) starting with their first release on Oct. 28. Top 25 games ------------------------ Oklahoma State vs (1) Florida State – in Arlington, TX (8 pm, ABC) West Virginia vs (2) Alabama – in Atlanta (3:30 pm, ABC/ESPN2) South Dakota at (3) Oregon (10:30 pm, Pac-12 Network) Louisiana Tech at (4) Oklahoma (7 pm) (5) Ohio State vs Navy – in Baltimore (12 pm, CBSSN) Arkansas at (6) Auburn (4 pm, SEC Network) (7) UCLA at Virginia (12 pm, ESPN) Jacksonville State at (8) Michigan State (7:30 pm Friday, BTN) (21) Texas A&M at (9) South Carolina (6 pm Thursday, SEC Network) SMU at (10) Baylor (7:30 pm Sunday, FS1) UC Davis at (11) Stanford (4 pm, Pac-12 Network – Regional) (16) Clemson at (12) Georgia (5:30 pm, ESPN) (14) Wisconsin vs (13) LSU – in Houston (9 pm, ESPN) Fresno State at (15) USC (7:30 pm, FOX) Rice at (17) Notre Dame (3:30 pm, NBC) Boise State vs (18) Ole Miss – in Atlanta (8 pm Thursday, ESPN) Weber State at (19) Arizona State (10:30 pm Thursday, Pac-12 Network) Stephen F. Austin at (20) Kansas State (7 pm) Florida Atlantic at (22) Nebraska (3:30 pm, BTN – Regional) Liberty at (23) North Carolina (6 pm, ESPN3) South Dakota State at (24) Missouri (3:30 pm, ESPNU) (25) Washington at Hawaii (10:30 pm, CBSSN) Other nationally available games --------------------------------------- Abilene Christian at Georgia State (7 pm Wednesday, ESPNU) Eastern Illinois at Minnesota (7 pm Thursday, BTN) Wake Forest at UL Monroe (7 pm Thursday, ESPNU) Howard at Akron (7 pm Thursday, ESPN3) Presbyterian at Northern Illinois (7 pm Thursday, ESPN3) Chattanooga at Central Michigan (7 pm Thursday, ESPN3) Idaho State at Utah (7:30 pm Thursday, Pac-12 Network) Tulane at Tulsa (8 pm Thursday, CBSSN) Cal Poly at New Mexico State (8 pm Thursday, ESPN3) Temple at Vanderbilt (9:15 pm Thursday, SEC Network) Rutgers at Washington State (10 pm Thursday, FS1) Villanova at Syracuse (7:30 pm Friday, ESPN3) BYU at UConn (8 pm Friday, ESPN) Bowling Green at Western Kentucky (8 pm Friday, CBSSN) Colorado State vs Colorado – in Denver (9 pm Friday, FS1) UTSA at Houston (9 pm Friday, ESPNU) UNLV at Arizona (10:30 pm Friday, ESPN) Central Florida vs Penn State – in Dublin, Ireland (8:30 am, ESPN2) Appalachian State at Michigan (12 pm, ESPN2) North Dakota State at Iowa State (12 pm, FS1) Western Michigan at Purdue (12 pm, ESPNU) Indiana State at Indiana (12 pm, ESPNEWS) Youngstown State at Illinois (12 pm, BTN – Regional) Northern Iowa at Iowa (12 pm, BTN – Regional) UT Martin at Kentucky (12 pm, SEC Network) Delaware at Pittsburgh (12 pm, ESPN3) Georgia Southern at NC State (12:30 pm, ACC Network/ESPN3) Wofford at Georgia Tech (12:30 pm, FSN South/ESPN3) Colgate at Ball State (2 pm, ESPN3) Nicholls State at Air Force (2 pm, ESPN3) Boston College at UMass (3 pm, ESPN3) California at Northwestern (3:30 pm, ABC/ESPN2) James Madison at Maryland (3:30 pm, BTN – Regional) William & Mary at Virginia Tech (3:30 pm, ESPN3) Duquesne at Buffalo (3:30 pm, ESPN3) Marshall at Miami (OH) (3:30 pm, ESPN3) Portland State at Oregon State (4 pm, Pac-12 Network – Regional) Elon at Duke (6 pm, ESPN3) Morgan State at Eastern Michigan (6 pm, ESPN3) Ohio at Kent State (6 pm, ESPN3) Idaho at Florida (7 pm, ESPNU) Austin Peay at Memphis (7 pm, ESPN3) Western Carolina at South Florida (7 pm, ESPN3) New Hampshire at Toledo (7 pm, ESPN3) Montana State at Arkansas State (7 pm, ESPN3) Southern at UL Lafayette (7 pm, ESPN3) Arkansas-Pine Bluff at Texas State (7 pm, ESPN3) Southern Miss at Mississippi State (7:30 pm, SEC Network) NC Central at East Carolina (8 pm, ESPNEWS) Samford at TCU (8 pm, FSN) North Texas at Texas (8 pm, LHN) Utah State at Tennessee (7 pm Sunday, SEC Network) Miami at Louisville (8 pm Monday, ESPN)

IT'S BEEN LIKE 10 GAMES. In which he tied the Cubs' record for mots HRs in the first 10 games of a career. Exactly. It's not like it's all been terrible. I mean, I think we all knew he'd look bad at times, but he's also looked exactly like a future star at times too. He certainly has, and I look forward to when he stops swinging at 55 foot pitches so he can look like it even more.