goonys evil twin

You think Hendry will be fired that soon and replaced with a competent GM?

By pantsing them as they circle the bases?

IsoD = OBP minus Batting Average (OBP-BA=IsoD) Somebody with a lot of patience might have an IsoD of .100 (.400 OBP - .300 AVG), while somebody with very little patience might be around .015 (Neifi's .222 OBP - .207 AVG).

nice shot, looked like he took a while to set that up.

Jeff's last 4-5 starts have been respectable, though. Respectable, but not lights out like Jered's were. Baseball people are much more interested in striving for respectability and mediocrity than flaunting conventional wisdom and risking failure in the pursuit of greatness. And if they can stick with the age old rule of giving service time more thought than performance, all the better.

Maybe he did some things in college that made him look better than he really is. He's been a pro now for 6 seasons though and his numbers have shown, pretty convincingly, that he's no better than a bench player. Comparisons to the Corey Patterson situation hold no water. A 2nd round pick does not have the same value as the 3rd overall pick. And Bynum has never shown anywhere close to the same upside as Patterson. I agree that Bynum should be on the bench. Trust me I'm not fighting for Bynum getting playing time. I'm just trying to figure out what was seen in him. In terms of Patterson, I'm not even sure where that comparison came from. I didn't throw that out there. I knew it wasn't you, but just included that in the response. I don't know the history of Bynum. But 2nd round draft status doesn't mean he was that well thought of. Lots of crap players get taken by the 2nd round. My guess is they liked his athleticism and that he showed relatively decent patience, his IsoD has been consistently between .060 and .080 as a pro. And he was probably relatively affordable. He's just shown limited power and has very little ability to hit for average, so his overall production has remained weak. Basically, he's hit like a utility infielder. And I wouldn't be surprised if Oakland was hoping that is what he'd become. A utility player who can give you similar to what he put up at age 22 in high A (.306/.385/.390) can be very useful. The problem is that was a career year for him in the minors and he hasn't been close to that AVG or OBP since. His career minor league line of .275/.347/.363 is acceptable for a utility player. But that's the type of guy you let walk after he reaches free agency or if his arbitration numbers get out of whack, and I'm guessing Oakland was looking for 4-5 years of his service at or around those levels as something that could help them. He's got no business being in a corner outfield platoon

Maybe he did some things in college that made him look better than he really is. He's been a pro now for 6 seasons though and his numbers have shown, pretty convincingly, that he's no better than a bench player. Comparisons to the Corey Patterson situation hold no water. A 2nd round pick does not have the same value as the 3rd overall pick. And Bynum has never shown anywhere close to the same upside as Patterson.

It's not the 5th rounders they are worried about. It's the 1st rounders who see that a guy got $7+m signing bonus just for making the sport his full-time job.

I've got no interest in seeing Pie in the leadoff spot next year. I'd rather have Walker leadoff and play 2nd, play Soriano in LF and platoon Murton with Jones in RF.

How could he be killing us when the Cubs were dead long before June? Young guys who are not the elite players are going to have bad stretches, including very long stretches when they are very bad. It happens. Teams have to be willing to let kids play through those stretches and improve. It would have been nice if they were smart enough to realize the importance of letting him play more last year. But if they delay the "getting through the rough spots" time frame even more then we might go into next season not knowing what we can get from the guy.

I'm not a Soriano fan, and would not target him for my ideal team. But I wouldn't mind having him on the Cubs. The problem would be trading for him during a lost season and having him walk this offseason, or risk overpaying heavily to keep him here.

The point is you don't know. Guzman gives you the opportunity for success. You don't know if he will, but he can. Rusch on the other hand is almost a guaranteed suck game. You aren't disagreeing with him, you are stating the same thing he said: "This, folks, this is what people are talking about when they say that the management of this team cost us a win. You knew that Rusch was going to stink. You didn't know that about Angel. Angel has not had 286 games of (mostly) sucking to let us know he's going to be bad. " Nobody thinks Angel is a guaranteed great outing. But he's showed promise before, so this should not be a surprise.

33 starts means it would be awful difficult to have missed a few. But even if he missed a turn or had a start pushed back that doesn't mean much, very few pitchers literally throw every 5 days during a season. 2001 was only his 2nd year back after TJS, missing some starts is hardly alarming. In my opinion he had his TJS and related injury/recovery issues solved by 2002. The 2004/2005/2006 stuff has been completely different. Roy Oswalt has been banged up pretty much every single season, but that doesn't mean his manager shouldn't take responsibility for using him properly.

I'm confused, how does your lack of confidence in Hendry have anything to do with predicting Neifi's starts?

In 2002 he started 33 games for 213 innings with a 3.66 ERA. 2000 was his first year back from TJS, when it was absurd to expect much from him. 2001 he started 28 games for 174 IP with a 3.36 ERA, an excellent 2nd season after TJS performance. He was fine at the start of 2003, and in fact had a career year. But Dusty extended him to ridiculous amounts, ignoring his past health scares, throwing him 140+ pitches in games. Dusty got a healthy Wood, Prior and Zambrano when he showed up at the door. 2 are down.

We're one game closer to the end of the season.

I bet Dal that the Cubs would start Perez 140 times this year. I think I'm going to lose but I think Neifi will be close to 140 played though. Hey Cuse, I believe the bet was barring injuries Perez wouldn't play in 140 games. I still think had Lee not gotten hurt, he wouldn't have been used nearly as often. Then again, Hendry should've gotten Nevin or any other replacement far sooner than when he did to see that wouldn't happen. We already knew for some stupid reason Baker saw a lot of value in Perez. With Hendry throwing darn near a blank check at Neifi, I don't think Hendry minds seeing Perez playing. Did I give you the no injury thing in the bet? I must have been drinking the same stuff Hendry was when he signed Perez. "Barring injury" is a terrible thing to put in any sports related bet. Injuries are part of the game, and still no excuse to play Neifi.

Because none of the critics played the game or managed the game or know the game.

Dusty is eager to ruin Zambrano the way he has ruined Prior and Wood. Wood was hurt quite frequently before Baker even got to Chicago. The thing I hate with pitch counts as it relates to Wood, Prior and Zambrano, it frustrates me to see how easy it is for them to get guys down 0-2 or 1-2, but they need seven or eight more pitches to retire them. Wood was looking perfectly healthy when Dusty arrived.

No man, a bad week by a young pitcher is all it takes to be sent down. Perfectly legitimate use of roster space.

I have found that joe baseballfan thinks that neifi is good. Even joe cubfan thinks neifi is good. I have no idea why or how or what is wrong with these people. If used properly, Neifi would be a great 25th man / late inning defensive sub / $400,000 salaried player. He wouldn't be a great anything. He'd be an acceptable 25th man if he was cheap and used properly, but none of those is a possibility on the Cubs. Casual fans hear the leader talk about Neifi saving them, and they get swayed by the one or two big hits, which stick in their memory.

The Cubs are going to set an attendence record this year, aren't they? Probably will set a team record for attendance...... but with the new capacity of 41,118.... we still haven't seen a sellout this year !! edit..... I spoke too soon. The 2 weekend games vs. Atlanta at the end of May were sellouts. :oops: The attendance record was virtually assured in February, because it's based on tickets sold, not actual bodies in the stands. And lots of people boughts seats in February who probably wouldn't have bought if they knew what was coming.

They've got that part down, it's the admitting it that is the problem.

13 under .500, .390 W% It just keeps getting harder and harder. 14 games under, .394 W%. Need to go 64-32 to reach 90 wins, that's .666 W%. Bleak.

It would be interesting to see a comparison between the most stable coaching staffs since the start of 2004. I can't imagine many with less turnover than the Cubs over that time, and I don't think there's been a more disappointing team in the league over that time either.