fromthestretch

Gotta like Yosh.

How does Tony Pena Jr. have a spot on a major league roster?

How long of a contract did he get? If it's only one year, I'm surprised there's no rumor of him being on the hot seat. If I'm Jocketty, I didn't hire him and I don't want him around my kids. He'd be gone already. There would have been four managers canned last week. He may be under instructions to allow him to last the year since they don't have any expectations of competing this year anyways. The Reds have enough pieces in place to be scary in another year or two, so I'd like to see Dusty keep hanging around there in the mean time. dude thats uncalled for. lets keep this about baseball. I believe by "kids" he's referring to the Reds' young players like Bruce, Votto, Cueto, Volquez, and Bailey. What irony, you fell in the sarchasm. :doh: I guess the word "dude" should have tipped me off. Negative 10 points for me.

It's not? He's hasn't been stellar, but he's able to eat up some innings out of the pen when needed (granted, it hasn't been needed a lot this season). Are there better options? Perhaps, but I don't think it's fair to say that he hasn't worked out all that great. I wouldn't want him out there with the game on the line, nor do I really want him starting, but he's been effective in his role. He definitely kept them in the game last night with a couple scoreless innings.

Gerald Perry just shed a tear.

How long of a contract did he get? If it's only one year, I'm surprised there's no rumor of him being on the hot seat. If I'm Jocketty, I didn't hire him and I don't want him around my kids. He'd be gone already. There would have been four managers canned last week. He may be under instructions to allow him to last the year since they don't have any expectations of competing this year anyways. The Reds have enough pieces in place to be scary in another year or two, so I'd like to see Dusty keep hanging around there in the mean time. dude thats uncalled for. lets keep this about baseball. I believe by "kids" he's referring to the Reds' young players like Bruce, Votto, Cueto, Volquez, and Bailey.

You should complain about Lee and ARam so more. Immediate results. ETA: my problem with Lou...well, one of my problems with Lou, is his wasting our short bench by bringing in Micah to pitch hit and taking him out for another hitter when the other manager goes to the pen. If he's so terrible against LHP, don't bring him in unless the manager has just put in a new RHP. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't he hit lefties well in the minors?

Not to make excuses because, let's face it, he sucked tonight, but he'd probably benefit from pitching more than once every 87 days. Hopefully, his back is fine so he can get some regular work on the mound and get things straightened out.

Hostile? Come on, really? :roll: I wouldn't classify them as hostile. More like ignorant or immature.

You mean like the character shown by their (as of 20 minutes ago ex-)manager when he got in a fist-fight with a starting pitcher a couple years ago? Or the character of a GM who goes on the air and trashes an opposing player?

How exactly are those the worst things the Cubs can do?

And if I just heard correctly on XM, he just fired Gibbons.

Maybe he just doesn't like baseball....or Canada. Not a good day to be a Blue Jay... Burnett got shelled, Prince Fielder hit an inside the park homer against them, they're currently being held hitless through 6.2 innings by Dave Bush of all people, and Russell Branyan continues to think he's Babe Ruth.

That's fantastic.

Ryan Zimmerman Pete Incaviglia

I think that's rather absurd. 140 innings of starting every 5th day is not the same as 100 innings of relief work every other day. I think you could say that the latter is significantly easier, as it pertains to injury prevention. When it comes to overuse, what's the cause of the injury? Fatigue leading to poor mechanics. When you've thrown more innings than that prior to the usage, and the usage isn't long enough to fatigue the arm and cause mechanical breakdown, then I don't think it's a particularly large risk(while noting the all pitchers are risks because pitching is unnatural, etc.). In your theory, any pitcher who has ever thrown 150+ innings as a starter could throw 140 innings as a reliever and suffer no consequences. I do not know where the danger zone lies, but there has to be one. Being on the very edge of usage patterns compared to all relievers has to be risky. If there's no risk in relieving there would be no relievers that get hurt throwing. On top of that, if you know you're only going to throw an inning, you can air it out. If you know you're going out there to try to throw 6+ innings, you're probably going to pace yourself more. You also get more rest between outings as a starter. Even if he doesn't get hurt, I'm a bit concerned about how effective he might be down the stretch.

Sinking a 12 foot putt, especially at a major, is a hell of a lot harder than shooting a free throw. Exactly. With a free throw, no matter where you're playing, the basket is always the same height and the same distance from the person shooting. And while there may be screaming fans, it's still the same shot you've taken over and over and over again.

The bolded part is not accurate. His line with runners in scoring position is .333/.470/.556. With men on base, he's at .333/.455/.518. He has struggled with two outs and runners in scoring position (in only 35 plate appearances), but all his other "clutch" stats are fine.

Must be that damn metric system.

A few posts about it makes it an obsession? It's fair to say that it would be nice to have someone that can hit for power against left-handers off the bench. That's not an out-of-this-world request. I really don't see anyone here arguing to bring him up to start everyday.

I'm not sure what that really means. They look like baseball players to me, at least when they wear baseball uniforms. Murton is slugging under .400 against AAA pitching. He can't play defense. He runs the bases like he's drunk. I understand that he can get on base at a decent clip, but he's nothing more than 4th OF material at this point in his career. I don't know why people are so upset he didn't get called up. Because we already had Eric Patterson on the roster, his name is Mike Fontenot. Someone who can hit LHP with power off the bench is something we don't have, and Murton could have provided it. Again, I'm trying to figure out how a guy that can't slug over 400 in the PCL can provide consistent power at the MLB level. TT said "someone who can hit LHP with power." It should be no secret to anyone who has followed the Cubs the past few years that Murton hits lefties well.

As pointed out with Edmonds, career batting average is not indicative of what kind of hitter Zambrano is today. And where Edmonds is in a down trend at the end of his career, Zambrano is in an up trend in the prime of his career.... Going by the stats you posted, Zambrano raised his average .100 in 07 from 06, and as of now he's raised his average another .100 in 08 from 07.... Again, in an uptrend, he's hitting right around .290 the last two seasons. Zambrano's BABIP this season is .516. He's not going to sustain that. His approach at the plate isn't the greatest. He's a pitcher first and foremost, and any offense they get out of him is a bonus. Using him to pinch hit in extra innings when you're out of bench players is one thing. It's another to count on him for the big hit with two outs.

Wuertz has never exactly had great control, but he has had a lot of success at the big league level. Considering his age, it's reasonable to think he can still be an effective reliever. The odd thing is that he pitched in five out of six days from 5/29 through 6/3, including four games in a row. He hasn't pitched since 6/3. There's really no reason for Piniella to not use him unless Wuertz is hurt. And if he's hurt bad enough to not pitch for 10 days, put him on the DL. If they continue to use Marmol as frequently as they have, there's a good chance he'll wear down and possibly be less effective later in the year. They need to start relying on others in the pen.

Career? How is that relevant?....Magic & Jabar had great careers for the Lakers, how much help would they have been tonight? For relevant, how's Zambrano's ops+ this year? With a pitcher who doesn't get very many at bats over the course of the season, it's very relevant. Zambrano has less than 50 plate appearances this year, that's not sample enough to tell anything, especially when he's got 400+ PA's of being a terible hitter prior to 2008. I don't see What Zambrano did as a hitter from 2001-2007 mattered in that at-bat yesterday-- I do see what Zambrano is doing as a hitter in 2008 mattered.... Zambrano's limited at-bats this year doesn't "tell anything"- really? If career numbers mattered more than numbers from this year, why did a lot of Cub fans think Edmonds would stink for the Cubs? A sub-50 PA sample has no predictive value, especially when it's running completely counter to the previous 400+ PA's. People didn't want Edmonds because he showed through the last 4 years(two THOUSAND PA's) that he was trending downward, and his small sample from this year was more of the same. Even outside the numbers it doesn't make sense. Carlos doesn't have a very pretty swing, he's just a very good athlete(enabling him to make contact) who swings as hard as he can every time he's up there. Agree 100%. Not only has Edmonds been trending downward, but he's also 38 years old. That reduces the chances that he was going to return to his peak production. Carlos is the same hitter he's been throughout his career. He fans in roughly 1/3 of his at-bats, chasing bad pitches and rarely walking. Even with his power, a good pitcher can get him out by keeping the ball down and away. If you want to know how to pitch to Zambrano, go back and watch the 5/28 game against the Dodgers. Lowe pitched him perfectly. The best option yesterday would have been to pinch hit for him.

He stole 18 bases in 78 games for West Tenn in 2005. I wouldn't expect him to reach double figures very often, if ever again, but he has done it before.