Sammy Sofa

I wouldn't exactly say they HAD to, Bob.

Ehhhhh...I think given what who they traded to get him, and given the type of pitcher Quintana is, I'm pretty confident they were thinking/hoping they were basically trading for a young Lester.

Sure, because to this point he's had an OK year at best, and, as pointed out, he's been a disappointment this season relative to expectations. Yeah, it's great his ERA has been trending the right direction for a while now, but it's not like anyone has to dig deep to see where he's struggled or been noticeably worse this year. Like, I'm much more encouraged if he stops walking so many guys (and he did that last night, huzzah!) and gets that walk rate and WHIP down than really ever worrying about his ERA. He's walked 3 or less batters every game in his last 9 games and 12 of his last 14 (2 or less in 9 of those). He's largely been the same pitcher he's always been going back to late April. "Largely" is pretty loaded, and arguably pretty inaccurate, in this case. No, he hasn't been terrible, but he's been significantly worse than expected/hoped. It's not like the guy's overall value is taking a pretty big hit just for kicks. Like, I get that guys like Quintana and Rizzo aren't THAT far off from the mark for the most part, but there seems to be a disconnect between "they're basically the same guys" and then looking at their numbers and seeing they're going to be settling for a relatively pretty subpar total value even if/when they truly are back to themselves in the second half. 2.5+ fWAR Rizzo is not the same guy this year. 2+ fWAR Quintana is not the same guy this year.

is that happening here? i know brett wasn't speaking about here, but i don't really care what the twitter idiots and everyone's uncle think about quintana. he's been fine. but, given his track record, age, stuff, and health, he really should be the best performer on this staff. instead, this year, he's been less valuable than pedro strop and as valuable as cishek. my disappointment is always going to be relative to my super high, but i think reasonable, expectations for him. i want him to go back to being a super stud. I’ve definitely seen that sentiment here, not as bad or over the top or as prevalent as twitter and social media but I’ve seen it here. Sure, because to this point he's had an OK year at best, and, as pointed out, he's been a disappointment this season relative to expectations. Yeah, it's great his ERA has been trending the right direction for a while now, but it's not like anyone has to dig deep to see where he's struggled or been noticeably worse this year. Like, I'm much more encouraged if he stops walking so many guys (and he did that last night, huzzah!) and gets that walk rate and WHIP down than really ever worrying about his ERA.

Not much.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/baseball/cubs/ct-spt-cubs-kris-bryant-return-javier-baez-20180711-story.html Odds that Baez genuinely thinks there is anywhere between 9 and 20 batters in a lineup given his face/name blindness? Pretty damn good.

Hey, nice job on your first game thread win. Pretty impressive given the lineup the Cubs put out there.

Man, 2017 was weird.

This dumb game made me fall asleep really early on the couch, and then wake up to watch the suck, and then not fall back asleep until almost 2 AM. BE BETTER.

He's the same guy this year, but not good. Rizzo, please be a super jerk in your own time and not on the field, thanks.

Oh my god, it's horsefeathering 11 already. These games are diabolical.

So yes. Got it. http://37.media.tumblr.com/12a0b34e0c80a8d942acd0bee062adf1/tumblr_mwfixyYN8r1s3dbxwo1_500.gif

Sociopaths know how to approximate acceptable behaviors to allow themselves to slip mostly unnoticed in everyday society. The terrifying truth about his tinyface is that it just means his mask of sanity is even smaller.

But that's typically not what happens. Again, you're taking someone like r_mack or even Schwarber Fan and applying it to anyone grousing about a cruddy game. And, even then, there's a huge difference between, "I'm worried that X might be a bigger/ongoing problem," and, "I think the Cubs are terrible."

IT WAS A HOT DOG.

Sadly, I basically had this argument with my brain when I started going to the gym every other day and trying to crunch the fitness/nutrition numbers.

I mean, when the Cubs were a perennial 85 loss team, every couple inning stretch of suckiness threatened to set me off. But I literally cannot get the least bit worked up for a couple inning stretches of suckiness now, because of context. Its fine to get upset and say that things suck or that AB blew or Joe Maddon's glasses are out of style now or whatever. But when you extrapolate your 2 inning anger to pretending the offense is somehow "a joke" over the course of the season, then you've gone off the rails and deep breaths need to be taken. The Cubs are, in fact, awesome. Our rational minds know this. I think a lot of us have programmed ourselves not to believe our rational minds when it says the Cubs are good, because our rational minds knew our meatball minds were tilting the scales in favor of crappy Cub teams for a long, long time. It is...crazy idea, I know...almost like a bunch of fans following sports. There's a big ol' middle ground between, "I don't even own an emotion about my favorite sports squadron," and, "THIS TERRIBLE GAME MEANS THE CUBS ARE GOING BACK INTO THE CELLAR FOR YEARS TO COME."

I mean, when the Cubs were a perennial 85 loss team, every couple inning stretch of suckiness threatened to set me off. But I literally cannot get the least bit worked up for a couple inning stretches of suckiness now, because of context. That's fantastic!

Very cute, Pedantic Pete; when people encounter something sucky, it's not unusual for them to complain about it even if it's something that's sucky only for a limited period of time. The only weird thing is pretending to have to explain this concept to jersey cubs fan.

"Oh god, it horsefeathering sucks how sick I am right now." "Quit complaining, you weirdo."

This is glorious.

Yeah, and it's that Baez is an awesome baseball freak and that Almora is likely Just Some Dude, so get outta here with that stuff.

Yeah it would be nice to win these two series and go 4-2 going in to the break, though I'd be fine going 3-3 (just basically don't go like 1-5). Hopefully, somehow, the VBs will finally lose but I'm not holding my breath in the Marlins series with them. The Pirates series this weekend is a 5 game series with a DH so hopefully they only win 2 of those games, somehow. It's tremendously annoying that the Cubs can't handle the dumb VB themselves for a while.