imb

see what happens when i force a little optimism

Probability that can be mathematically measured != takes filtered through fan biases Hey, I'm the guy who was mad at Joe for how we used Chapman at the end of the 2016 WS when everyone was talking about results over process. It wasn't biased to say that the Cubs were likely going to win the division up until the very end based on all of the information that we had on hand. That it took Milwaukee winning 8 straight to close the season to win it is even more evidence of that. If that makes my take stupid, so be it. i think this is the overall point i've been trying to get at since early this summer here are some things i said were true then and guess what they held true 1 - the cubs, viewed with a wide-ass lens, were the best team before the season started and even with the difficulties they faced with injuries, performance, looked to be the best team 2- the brewers were also good 3 - the cubs had some problems that made them vulnerable 4 - sometimes weird horsefeathers happens and the team who is best in July or whatever doesn't finish on top and the response to those posts was LOOK AT THE RUN DIFFERENTIAL, LOL THEY'RE GONNA PLAY SCHOOP AT SECOND, WE HAVE THE BEST RECORD, NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT. having other good teams in your division makes it really really stupid to jerk yourself off too soon. even the pollyanna dorks on here *knew* that the injuries and weird offense we were dealing with made us vulnerable but they ignored it because there was always something in the standings or hidden in some metric that made it impossible that we wouldn't win the division. And now it's October and we are potentially 1 game from the season ending and us looking at our coaching staff and roster and going oh lord we fucked up. And we're also one game away from being essentially right where we should be and everything is fine. Because that's how baseball works.

like it's ok to not blame the cubs as a whole for what happened (built a big division lead then played above .500 ball in september) while also criticizing the offense for being so feast-or-famine (at best) AND also giving credit to milwaukee for playing their balls off.

They hit 223 HRs last year and 161 this year with a roster of mostly the same players after hiring a hitting coach that has a philosophy of going the other way and sacrificing power for contact (I could be just making that up or explaining it wrong) im all for firing chili into the sun just because his record isn't that great even pre-cubs and we already had a roster full of guys that played to whatever his imagined strengths were in the first place so he seemed pointless, but it's just as likely the power outage is entirely due to bryant getting beaned in the head/his shoulder injury and whatever happened to willson contreras. everyone else seemed about as predicted?

i tried to warn you idiots but noooo "lol schoop what is stearns thinking lol the brewers are trash lol look at the run differential" anyway all we have to do is beat colorado* (please be colorado) tomorrow and everything is essentially fine. sucks watching the brewers win on your field in a game you didn't even really need to play but whatever, just win one game and our {entering david mode} win probability for the playoffs or whatever is not meaningfully different than it would have been had we won today. Plus lester is going You do realize that the Brewers won the division by 1 game and closed the season with 8 in a row, right? You were whining about amazing they were long before they pulled off an extremely improbable end to the season. Kudos to Milwaukee for pulling it off, but the hubris was always based on probability. It sucks for us that this is how the division was lost but your warnings in mid-July were still dumb. yeah my warning of "hey guys sometimes teams with worse run differentials win divisions because things like health and performance can change drastically over the course of 162 games rendering early season totals as moot" was totally dumb, while on the other hand extremely smart posts like "yeah our sure our offense has only scored 0 or 1 run in like a quarter of the games this year but we have the best record in the NL so everything is fine" were good

yelich carried a .500 wOBA for a month and the cubs played well in september. milwaukee went balls out. why is it a bad thing that i'm willing to give more credit to milwaukee than blame to the cubs? Because the Cubs are a bunch of gutless choking dogs and no rational explanation matters. /abuck lol the cubs just got 2-hit by jouhlys chacin on their home field in a clinching game big dog

im actually not meaning to criticize the cubs because 95 wins is like ... what can you even say? I would have taken that with a healthy team. It's just the constant "well here's the thing, the cubs are good and the brewers are actually bad. ok they're not bad but they aren't good. ok they're good now but they're not real good and we're better. ok actually now we got 2 hit at home and lost the division OK NOW THEY"RE BETTER THAN WE ARE SORRY GUYS" that's obnoxious and wrong. To be fair I kind of get that. As more data was added, we all changed our opinions on the Brewers. Any whining from me on that is because I used Duke and others to calm me down throughout the year and I feel let down even though it completely isnt their fault everyone being like "well look we all had to change our opinion on the brewers when more information came in!" should go back and look at 99 percent of the posts about the brewers on this board from April until like late August. anyway my real point is that it really doesnt matter because this cubs team is the same team tomorrow having lost today as they would have been had they won today. A 95 win team in the playoffs with a couple hot pitchers is as good a threat to win as anyone.

i mean a pretty good player became prime barry bonds for the past month what the hell can we do Happens all the time in baseball, mistake is counting on it to happen again, Yelich' a very good baseball player. However, expecting to keep up this recent pace is far fetched. Maybe he is this good but, there's a better chance he's not. now do one for the post 2016 cubs

Yeah, that sums up the 2018 regular season perfectly. It was frustrating and mind-boggling and the Brewers played much better than anyone would have thought. i tried to warn you idiots but noooo "lol schoop what is stearns thinking lol the brewers are trash lol look at the run differential" anyway all we have to do is beat colorado* (please be colorado) tomorrow and everything is essentially fine. sucks watching the brewers win on your field in a game you didn't even really need to play but whatever, just win one game and our {entering david mode} win probability for the playoffs or whatever is not meaningfully different than it would have been had we won today. Plus lester is going

theo is probably in his box with a sniper rifle aimed right at chili davis as we speak

and while you guys were jerking yourselves off in june about "vaunted run differential" or whatever you totally missed the big picture. on the one hand your self-delusion probably made the games more bearable so there is that the cubs won 95 games while having a thousand things go wrong you psychopath im actually not meaning to criticize the cubs because 95 wins is like ... what can you even say? I would have taken that with a healthy team. It's just the constant "well here's the thing, the cubs are good and the brewers are actually bad. ok they're not bad but they aren't good. ok they're good now but they're not real good and we're better. ok actually now we got 2 hit at home and lost the division OK NOW THEY"RE BETTER THAN WE ARE SORRY GUYS" that's obnoxious and wrong.

that's super good looking at 2019, especially if they sign harper or machado. unfortunately it does us no good right now despite the fact that everyone said the same horsefeathers last year (oh we'll just sign a starter and a bullpen guy and then we'll get heyward fixed and we're all good.)

jesus christ just throw a slider so i can turn this off

prepare for the worst baez swing in recorded history on this 3-2 pitch

Being set up better doesn't guarantee anything of course, but come on man it's not meaningless at all. Anything can happen but looking at these two teams if I had to pick who is probably going to be better next year, I'm taking the Cubs 9 times out of 10. yeah obviously, i mean it's great to have a head start but it means zilch.

here's the thing people like you don't think about - it doesn't matter who is or isn't "set up better." It's a meaningless term. All season long you dorks have been dismissing anything the brewers have done and then constantly ratcheting it back ever so slightly as they kept playing well. That's kinda the rational thing to do. The Cubs have a better roster. They had a better chance to win the division. It looked like that nearly all year. There wasn't much need to worry. Then there was, and we all started worrying. and while you guys were jerking yourselves off in june about "vaunted run differential" or whatever you totally missed the big picture. on the one hand your self-delusion probably made the games more bearable so there is that

is there a way we can opt to play in colorado tomorrow instead of chicago so we might be capable of getting a god damn hit

And yet were outscored in the second half and our offense plummeted to the bottom of the league. Some might be due to the schedule but its clear something stinks in Chicago. We will be fine, I'm just trying to drive the final nail in the "Cubs are better than the Brewers and will win the division stop worrying ninny" argument. Stop trying to make these 2nd half stats mean more than they should. yeah only the first half stats mean anything, idiot

there it is It’s true. Tell me how they possibly are set up better than us moving forward here's the thing people like you don't think about - it doesn't matter who is or isn't "set up better." It's a meaningless term. All season long you dorks have been dismissing anything the brewers have done and then constantly ratcheting it back ever so slightly as they kept playing well. Guess who was "better set up" than the brewers after 2017. But here we are, because sometimes players fall off or get injured or don't improve like you'd think they would. If you want to console yourself that we have a bigger payroll, go for it. Im glad we do, because if we keep horsefeathering up with Darvishes and Morrows and Heywards etc we're going to need every funking cent.

They’re playing better right now/last month but they aren’t much better and aren’t better long term. But if you want to think that go for it. there it is

Let Rizzo Pitch

in defense of our bats it's tough to score runs off of {squints] bartolo colon

this inning is going to be so horsefeathering sad lol

one more day and then i can move on with my life so that's nice

the chavez find is a net-negative because the same group of big brains also though trading for kintzler was a good idea