goonys evil twin

Lots of good pitchers looked like Guzman did in their debut (at times fantastic, at times out of control, but not in over his head). While I agree with you, I never felt Gooz was ready given how he was pitching at Iowa. He's still rusty from throwing so few innings the past few seasons and recovering from the injuries. Ready is a relative term. Few pitchers are ready when they are brought up. They struggle early and develop. He's 24 years old, he's got 300+ professional innings under his belt. He might be rusty and he might not be ready to start 32 games in the bigs, but he's as ready as any prospect to get some time starting. And he's only doing it for emergency purposes.

Admittedly I haven't see him run much this year, since he's never even getting on base. But from the sounds of the game the other day, and the couple I have see recently, he is running hard. He's just slow.

Isn't that simply a product of him not having the talent to alter his approach and be effective? The fact that we see him do the same thing over and over tells me that he probably sees it, too, but can't do anything to change it. I doubt it. It doesn't take talent to not slap a grounder to 2nd to GIDP. It doesn't take talent to not swing at the first pitch a foot out of the zone.

Lots of good pitchers looked like Guzman did in their debut (at times fantastic, at times out of control, but not in over his head).

It's kind of unfair to ask Aramis to put up Sammy's 2001 numbers. For a whole season, yes, but Aramis has shown that he can have a two-week hot streak or two over the course of a season, and it'd be nice if he had one now. It'd be nice, but it's just not realistic in baseball to ask guys to carry a team, especially not at the drop of a hat.

I would say players who have bad seasons, in relation to expectations, can be blamed. But if guys play to expectations, it's the GM and managers fault when they fail. And if a good player has a bad month, I'll give him some slack. Also, when players routinely make outs swinging at garbage, I still blame them, somewhat, for not fixing that problem. If a player routinely grounds into DPs with the same pathetic slap it to 2nd swing, I blame him. But when I complain about sucky players for sucking, it's implied that I blame their presence on the roster or in the lineup or on the mound for the troubles. Most of my hostility is directed at management for poor planning.

So would I, Rocket. So would I. That's hardly an excuse to sign the praises of Alou. It's the same as saying back to back .500 seasons is an accomplishment and we should be happy because past Cubs teams didn't do that. Alou came here and failed to live up to his contract for most of the time. Not only that, he had an abysmal attitude, was incompetent in the field and a joke on the basepaths. Yes, I'd love his production, but nobody can honestly say they knew he'd produce what he produced in 2005.

1. If the excuse is that "Ramirez isn't doing this on purpose," then doesn't that apply to everyone, including Baker, Hendry, and all the standard whipping boys? Trying hard shouldn't be an excuse for anyone. 2. Of course Ramirez shouldn't be blamed for the team's struggles. But he also shouldn't get a pass now because he's done well in previous seasons. This team needs him now, and he's not getting the job done. I completely agree with your first statement. As for the 2nd..... I think a guy who has consistently produced does deserve a pass for a bad month. I don't believe in the "he has to step up right now or else he's letting everybody down" philosophy. Trying to step up usually just means pressing, which leads to bad results. I have no problem admitting Aramis was bad last month and they need him to get better. But a guy who usually produces and is his age gets the bulk of the season to play before I start "blaming" him for anything.

I don't deny that he's produced more than Cubs LF since then. But that doesn't change the fact that he was a major disappointment over the course of his contract with the Cubs. Plus, that says more about Jim Hendry's ability to field a quality OF than it does about Alou.

Moises Alou's OPS+ 1998 - 157 (HOU) 2000 - 151 (HOU) 2001 - 138 (HOU) 2002 - 100 (CHC) 2003 - 113 (CHC) 2004 - 128 (CHC) 2005 - 141 (SFG) Career - 128 He lived up to his career average OPS+ once in 3 years as a Cub. The other two years he was nothing but average to above average, nowhere near a $10m corner OF. You know who had a higher OPS+ on the Cubs in 2003? Corey Patterson (116), then Lofton (122). Sammy's 135 carried the offense, even though everybody wants to pretend he was nothing that year. In 2002 the Cubs got more help from Mueller (101) and Bellhorn (133).

i wouldnt go that far, he produced better than anyone since in 2003 He was a $10m corner OF in 2003, and he did not produce like a $10m corner OF.

He was Greg Maddux before Greg Maddux was Greg Maddux. He lived up to his contract only in his walk year. I'd really like his production, but I don't miss him.

Yep, Aramis is a major problem right now. His lack of offense hurts a lot, the the relative decline from what you might expect him to produce and what he is producing is much more significant than every other player. He needs to step up. Of course, the difference is, his past gives you more hope that he'll improve soon, so despite being the most shocking decline from expectations, he doesn't bring many worries from fans who know he'll get over it. Many of the other non-producers were pretty much expected to be non-producers, so that just pisses people off.

Yeah right. Like the Cubs will have a young great lefty outfield prospect in eight years.

when and for whom was he a hot prospect? not to pic bones, I just am not at all famular with him before the Cubs... Minnesota really? huh..when was he drafted and at what pos? how were his minor league #'s? http://www.thebaseballcube.com/players/R/michael-restovich.shtml

Our offense is below average, but it isn't as bad as it is right now either. Trust me, we are just in a bad slump. I've seen worse. I remember a POST-Nomar Cubs series in 2004 when we scored just 2 runs (all in one inning) in a three game series against the Brewers. This feast or famine is not new to the Cubs. Apparently when you take away the home runs and add a bunch of speed to the Cubs old feast or famine offense...you just get the famine part. Yeah, this is no longer a feast and famine offense, it's a mid-afternoon snak and famine offense.

But the bench does suck and it is a problem.

But it is as bad as it's ever been.

Like I said last night. Neifi struck out to allow Maddux to walk in a run. He was just trying to save us again, by NOT GIDP. The pop-up was the greatest contribution we could have expected from Neifi. I was so happy he didn't GIDP that just having one out was reason to celebrate.

I am more concerned with the lineup. The lineup has been my biggest concern for several years now. But it's okay to have more than one concern at the same time. And it's to point out flaws when they exist.

A "great bench" is relative. There are not great baseball players on the bench. But there are guys who are good at what they do, and bench players need to be as well. The Cardinals have multiple bench players with solid OBPs. In fact, several teams have guys with .330+ OBPs on the bench. And they have HR threats and guys that could challenge for starting jobs on other teams. Most good teams have multiple threats off their bench. The Cubs have no threats. Again, EVERY SINGLE CUBS BENCH PLAYER HAS AN OPS UNDER 600 RIGHT NOW. EVERY SINGLE CUBS BENCH PLAYER HAS AN OBP UNDER .300 RIGHT NOW. At the bare minimum, you want your bench players over the 600 OPS point. 1 or 2 below won't hurt you, but all of them? You'd like to have at least 2 over the 700 threshold. Likewise, you'd like to have all but 1 or 2 over the .300 OBP level, and hopefully at least a couple over .320. Right now, the Cubs best bench players are producing like most teams worst bench players. They are truly awful. And a lot of people expected them to be awful. I'm not asking for a .290/.340/.450 line off the bench (although it's hardly unheard of to get that kind of production). But they absolutely cannot continue with the crap they've gotten so far from this band of bottom feeders.

For an established pro pitcher, those aren't big innings. But 2002 was his first pro season, and he went well beyond what he was used to. 2003 was only his 2nd season, and he was just 22. While pitching injuries are still a mystery, most people who have put much thought into the issue agree that pre 24 year old pitchers are at the greatest risk, and should be treated accordingly. That means not overexerting the youngest pitchers, both in individual games and for the season. Prior threw over 100 pitches in his first major league start. Not a real big deal, but he did it in 6 innings, which means he had some big pitch count innings. He then threw 124 in his 4th start of his career, absurd. He followed that up with 12 straight 100+ pitch outings, including 6 over 110 pitches, and one of 136 pitches (more absurdity). He had 3 more 100+ pitch outings before being shut down. That's a string of risky treatment of a 21 year old kid pitcher who had never before pitched against professional hitters. In 2003, at 22/23, with under 200 pro innings under his belt (most pitchers, even really good ones, get several hundred under their belt before they debut) his first outing was 100+. 3 of his next 4 were 110+. He then went on a string of 12 straight 100+ pitch outings, including 124, 123, 124, 119 and 127. Then, he went out and injured his shoulder in a game, BUT WENT BACK OUT TO PITCH ANYWAY. Following that game, in which he pitched 3 innings after the injury, he missed a month of the season, due to that injury. Some excused Dusty and the Cubs saying, "well, he said he was fine", to which the only reasonable response is "HE WAS 22 YEARS OLD WITH VERY LIMITED EXPERIENCE AND HE WAS TRYING TO IMPRESS HIS MANAGER AND TEAMMATES, OF COURSE HE SAID HE WAS FINE, THAT SHOULDN'T BE HIS CALL TO MAKE. YOU DON'T ASK A BOXER IF HE IS GOOD ENOUGH TO GO ON, HIS TRAINER/CORNERMAN MAKES THAT DECISION FOR HIM." So anyway, after this nearly month long abscense, they eased him back in with a nice little 79 pitch outing. Then they let him go 116, 118, 100, 116, 131, 129, 110, 124, 131 and 133 to finish off the season. Mind you, he turned 23 the day after the 129 pitch outing. In his first postseason experience, he goes 9 full innings throwing 133 pitches. In his 2nd outing, he went 7 innings, racking up 116 pitches (and the Cubs were blowing out Florida in a 12-3 win, the perfect opportunity to rest a starting pitcher). It came out later that during this stretch run, Prior was complaining of a little ankle issue, that many attributed to his later achilles problem. So, going into what would be his last playoff start of the year, his third start of the playoffs, Prior came in averaging 121.4 pitches per game for 12 games over the course of 2 months, COMING OFF INJURY. He threw 119 pitches in that fateful game, about 110 of which were brilliant. And some people have the audacity for calling him out for "blowing the game", even though, with any sense of perspective, somebody could look at the treatment of a 21, 22 and 23 year old kid seeing his first pro competition, and say no wonder he started to unravel at the end. The Cubs and Dusty Baker abused Prior so much that he racked up an incredible number of pitcher abuse points. He could ask out of games early because he would be seen as a coward in the macho man culture of baseball, where injuries are a sign of mental weakness and losing a game is due to not being tough enough to know how to win. Is it any wonder how, at 23, 24 and 25, Prior has come down with a string of strange ailments, and has, at times, not pitched as brilliantly as some would expect? The kid was killed, in a baseball sense, at an incredibly young age. The Cubs don't throw established veterans with no future out there that frequently that long and that recklessly. But they treat their kids that way. Brilliant!

My panties are in a bunch for an entirely different reason. I don't care about whether he's on the bench. I think his injuries could easily be related to the misuse of past years. When Dusty was hired I predicted that at least 1 of the big 3 (who were all healthy at the time), and probably 2, would miss a lot of time to injury and/or lose effectiveness during his tenure. I'm not pissed at Prior himself. I'm pissed that the Cubs decided 12 years ago to try and emulate the Braves, and have thus far done a piss-poor job of even coming close. I think the "we'll put all our hopes on the arms and just trade for bats later" gameplan was a very bad one. And not only was the plan bad, but the implementation of the plan has been bad. Pitcher injuries are extremely common, and when you risk pitcher's health as brazenly as the Cubs do, you should not be surprised when multiple pitchers go down.

2 of those players you named are part of the bench. And I think it's rather absurd to request that people hold off any complaints about the bench until the everyday players start hitting better. The bench players have jobs, and they aren't doing them well. That's not entirely unexpected becaue they were all, for the most part, terrible players before this season. But bench players should still bring value. And the bulk of that value has to come from their bat.

Food poisoning is often a euphemism given by teams to cover-up a plethora of ailments.