Sammy Sofa

Wait, what? Colvin is a first baseman now? And you talk about him like he's some awesome offensive player, but he can't face lefties and shouldn't be hitting at the top of the order?

Dave Kaplan is a racist who thinks all black people look alike.

A Randy Armenian Matador.

Hi, J.R..

Yeah, this. Hendry is too easily led around by whatever halfassed theory the manager has to fix the team. He did the same thing with Dusty, too.

Usually they don't.

Yeah, but the Knicks REALLY suck.

I figured this team would be frustrating, but more in the "hover right around .500 the whole season" sense as opposed to this. Don't get me wrong, we are probably on the same page. Maybe we just have different definitions. To me..... 140m payroll/unfun to watch/hovering around .500 = SUCK Oh, that would have sucked, too. Nowhere near the "fun bad" thing people are talking about, but at least they would still be able to beat the likes of the Pirates and Astros. Small consolation, I know.

I figured this team would be frustrating, but more in the "hover right around .500 the whole season" sense as opposed to this.

Yeah, this team is just frustrating/depressing bad.

Byrd's really the only one that's stunk over most of June, but then you run into the issue of playing Colvin too much in CF. That's a strange statement to make. Byrd was definitely hotter in the first half of June and has slumped the second half. At the same time, he still has actually improved his season numbers in June. And he's definitely been better than the other two outfielders as Soriano has had a very bad month and Kosuke has had a horrific month albeit in limited playing time. I was just going primarily by their last two weeks. Byrd started off doing well, which is why he's got a kick ass .340 .386 .500 .886 line for the last 28 days. Unfortunately, he's got a .231 .259 .288 .548 line over the last 2 weeks and a .192 .222 .192 .415 over the last week. Soriano's last month has an underwhelming .227 .316 .409 .725 line, but he's basically pulling the opposite of Byrd with a .297 .366 .486 .852 line over the last 2 weeks and a very promising .278 .381 .556 .937 over the last week. That's why it makes more sense for Byrd to get some extra days off for Colvin, and that's why the issue of Colvin playing CF comes up. Colvin's June numbers, FYI, are mostly propped up by hitting home runs at an insane rate, hence why his June looks like this: .281 .303 .563 .866 with 5 home runs. The last 2 weeks he's pulled .243 .263 .514 .777 with 3 home runs. Now he's showing .227 .227 .500 .727 over the last week with 2 home runs.

Byrd's really the only one that's stunk over most of June, but then you run into the issue of playing Colvin too much in CF. I really just hope they play Kosuke and he has a nice bounce back summer like last year and they can move him in a decent deal. Then Colvin can get plenty of starts (not that he'll be lacking for playing time in the meantime).

This whole Africa tangent of J.R.'s is FJM.com-worthy.

Lou is baffling. Taking Byrd out and moving Colvin to center? Batting Nady against Dotel instead of Fotenot when lefties are hitting .333 off of him? Leaving Cashner out there for 2 innings and no sign of Marshall?

b/c what does 3 months with crap team that doesn't care tell you about a manager? All it does is give the Sandberg-lovers some evidence that Trammel won't do any good as manager. I don't think managers are sacred cows by any stretch. But the manager isn't going to improve the team in any way (in chances of making the playoffs, or in player development). And if giving Trammel the reins now would improve his chances of getting the gig full time, I'd support it. I just don't think that's true. Right. Turning the team over to Trammel does nothing except all but ensure that Trammel will have nothing to do with the team next season. I can't stand Lou, but the time when firing him might have made any kind of an impact on the team has passed. If it still happens before the end of the season, hey, I'm not complaining...but if it doesn't, oh well. The only thing I really want to see is Hendry fired after this season limps to a close. I'm hoping that happens sometime in September. Just to get a head start on bringing in the new guy. Oh, we can dream. At the very least I'd love to see him bounced out the door the day after the Cubs' regular season finishes. Or whenever they're mathematically eliminated.

b/c what does 3 months with crap team that doesn't care tell you about a manager? All it does is give the Sandberg-lovers some evidence that Trammel won't do any good as manager. I don't think managers are sacred cows by any stretch. But the manager isn't going to improve the team in any way (in chances of making the playoffs, or in player development). And if giving Trammel the reins now would improve his chances of getting the gig full time, I'd support it. I just don't think that's true. Right. Turning the team over to Trammel does nothing except all but ensure that Trammel will have nothing to do with the team next season. I can't stand Lou, but the time when firing him might have made any kind of an impact on the team has passed. If it still happens before the end of the season, hey, I'm not complaining...but if it doesn't, oh well. The only thing I really want to see is Hendry fired after this season limps to a close.

Around $130 million.

It's also a largely pointless move since the team is so bad and Lou's contract is up at the end of the year. Why saddle someone else with this team in the meantime? The interim manager would likely be Trammel, and unless the team has some kind of miracle turnaround, why scrap the team's ability to keep him on after Lou is gone if they and he want to?

zambrano yells at people in the dugout like three times a year, who cares. i won't try to justify his hr/9, but i don't really care too much about this sort of thing. I don't particularly care about it either, but there's really no defending it in any way. Yeah, he does it a lot...and most of the time he looks like an idiot. I'm not sitting here thinking he's some horrible person that needs to be "dealt with," but the "at least somebody is showing emotion" crap is dumb. He's showing emotion like a spazzy 5-year-old throwing a tantrum.

It's amusing how some people keep trying to find roundabout ways to justify Zambrano's actions. I don't care how bad the team is; what he did was inexcusable.

Hendry's extension happened under Zell and the Tribune in the fall of 2008.

Exactly. I'm ready to lay the hammer down in terms of criticizing if the Ricketts effectively do nothing this off season when it comes to getting rid of Hendry and other people that need to go in the front office, but until then I prefer this approach. I think an initial culling by a new ownership of the front office would have been stupid. I'm hoping this season is being spent determining who needs to stay and who needs to go instead just blindly dumping too many people and having to start from too far behind when it comes to rebuilding the front office. I also expected money to pretty tight the first year except in terms of starting work at Wrigley and if the Cubs had actually been decent and needed deadline help because they had a legitimate shot.

i really don't see a problem with it at all. Yeah, what a dumb spin. Wasn't it a charity dinner that had already been lined up for a while?

How do any of us know they're not going to do it?

DON'T BOTHER ME WITH THE DETAILS.