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For our purposes, pythagorean wins mean more than their actual record. Soriano is not very good and Garza was here for 10 starts. Maybe for your purposes, but not mine. I don't want the Cubs to be a 95 pythagorean win team, I want them to actually win 95 games. Of course, that's the end goal. So let me ask you this...why do you think the Cubs have under performed their pythagorean win record? Is it luck, is it the result of a bad bullpen, or is it something else in your opinion? I really don't have an answer except that the bullpen would obviously be at least part of the problem. That's reasonable. But if that's the answer, then addressing that part of the team should produce more results from normal. Let me explain. Right now, they are projected to win 78 using the Pythagorean method and on pace for 73 actually. So let's say a bad bullpen accounts for half that difference. 2.5 wins lost because of having a bad record in close games due to the bullpen. But the Cubs have an entire offseason to address that bullpen. Let's say they add relievers that would normally add 3 wins combined to the team. In this case though, they wouldn't add 3 wins, they would add 5.5. The 3 wins would come from them continuing to make the Cubs run differential better. Then 2.5 more would come from them making their record in close games match up better with their overall record. That's why the Pythagorean record still has value when projecting a new season. It allows you to see where your overall talent level might be better or worse than your record. Then you have time to improve the part of your roster that might be causing your actual record to under perform (or just have a better idea of your projection if you believe the difference is mostly luck). It's not the only thing you should look at, but it is a very useful tool.

The Cubs can find another Soriano type player in the offseason to play in LF. Average players there aren't that hard to find. The Cubs have a few of them on their roster right now. The 7 million the Yankees gave the Cubs should be plenty to find that player if the Cubs are interested in looking. Soriano's trade value in the offseason would have been likely nil for that exact reason. The Yankees were willing to trade since they need help now, and there is little on the market at this point of the season. Basically the Cubs are taking on a tiny amount of risk (somehow striking out on all of the LF options) in exchange for a prospect. Plus they've opened up more playing time for the rest of this season for other players they may want to try out. It's a good gamble to take.

For our purposes, pythagorean wins mean more than their actual record. Soriano is not very good and Garza was here for 10 starts. Maybe for your purposes, but not mine. I don't want the Cubs to be a 95 pythagorean win team, I want them to actually win 95 games. Of course, that's the end goal. So let me ask you this...why do you think the Cubs have under performed their pythagorean win record? Is it luck, is it the result of a bad bullpen, or is it something else in your opinion?

PCL average last year was .278/.345/.430 National League average was .254/.318/.400 That's already 55 points right there. That doesn't even account for the normal loss in numbers from jumping up to the majors, or the thought that power hitters tend to have even more inflated numbers in the PCL than the averages would suggest. Vitters' MLE equivalent last year was .253/.291/.409. Not awful for a solid third baseman. Pretty bad for a corner OF or a bad defensive third baseman. The odds of him hitting anywhere near an .800 OPS in major league action are pretty low still, although the limited action this year has some encouraging signs of continued progress. Wouldnt a player significantly above the average slash line stand to lose less OPS point than the average player, though? I've never seen great data for that, but my intuition from comparing those numbers is no. In fact, it's probably the opposite. The no power low K guys probably lose less from level to level because a few more singles turning into outs due to superior defense isn't as steep of a drop as power guys having HR and doubles turning into strikeouts and other outs due to less mistake pitches. Of course, the low power guys also don't have as far to drop before they become unplayable, so it's a hard comparison to make. And of course the further to the extreme you get, the more that becomes the case (for example, Rizzo was almost always going to lose more than just about any other prospect because his numbers were so huge in AAA). I'm guessing the rare elite power bats translate better than the good/great power bats though, but that's just a guess. Now with Vitters, there is always the chance that it clicks and the numbers start to catch up with the great scouting reports all along, but it's going to be awfully hard to decipher from the huge PCL effect.

PCL average last year was .278/.345/.430 National League average was .254/.318/.400 That's already 55 points right there. That doesn't even account for the normal loss in numbers from jumping up to the majors, or the thought that power hitters tend to have even more inflated numbers in the PCL than the averages would suggest. Vitters' MLE equivalent last year was .253/.291/.409. Not awful for a solid third baseman. Pretty bad for a corner OF or a bad defensive third baseman. The odds of him hitting anywhere near an .800 OPS in major league action are pretty low still, although the limited action this year has some encouraging signs of continued progress.

Looking at top 5 college hitter picks over the last several drafts: 2005 Alex Gordon (601 PA's in 2007) Jeff Clement (19 PA's in 2007, 224 in 2008) Ryan Zimmerman (62 PA's in 2005, 682 in 2006) Ryan Braun (492 PA's in 2007) 2006 Evan Longoria (508 PA's in 2008) 2007 Matt Wieters (385 PA's in 2009) 2008 Pedro Alvarez (386 PA's in 2010) Buster Posey (17 PA's in 2009, 443 in 2010) 2009 Dustin Ackley (376 PA's in 2011) Tony Sanchez (8 PA's in 2013, not top 100 this year) 2010 Bryce Harper (597 PA's in 2012) Christian Colon (no major league time, not top 100 this year) 2011 none selected 2012 Mike Zunino (208 PA's in AAA this year) Looks like the vast majority of them had a large amount of time in the majors two years after they were drafted (for better or worse), and none of the ones who took longer have panned out as yet, although there are is still time for them. In the Cubs organization he might not be here until 2016, but it appears in most organizations Bryant would be up by the middle of 2015 unless something went wrong.

With that homer, at the moment the Cubs have a positive run differential on the season once again.

The Cubs still have a chance to finish as a top 5 NL offense in runs scored. In 6th, and less than .05 runs per game behind 5th (if the games were equalized, they'd be 3 or 4 runs behind over the course of the full season). This is definitely a different offensive age.

Yeah I don't know. I don't think it gets them much closer to a championship. I think it would be a stupid trade for Brooklyn. I don't think they have a great chance of a championship even if they do it, but it's pretty much the only chance they have. No one if taking on that Wallace contract without major compensation, and they're already capped out from adding any other significant talent. Pierce and Garnett are major upgrades from Wallace and Humphries, even if it's only for 1 year (Wallace in particular was terrible last year). It just depends on if the ability to go for it is worth 3 first round picks or not. First round picks in the 20s are near worthless. That 3rd one could be valuable I guess.(assuming they're '13, '15, '17) I don't know if the timing of the draft picks is affected by Atlanta being able to swap first round picks with Brooklyn in 2014 or 2015. It's possible the picks might end up being later because of that, and who knows what Brooklyn might look like by then. Especially after years like 2015-2016 where they are paying 62 million to just Williams, Johnson, and Lopez. If Pierce and Garnett happen to retire before then, that year could get ugly for them.

Yeah I don't know. I don't think it gets them much closer to a championship. I think it would be a stupid trade for Brooklyn. I don't think they have a great chance of a championship even if they do it, but it's pretty much the only chance they have. No one if taking on that Wallace contract without major compensation, and they're already capped out from adding any other significant talent. Pierce and Garnett are major upgrades from Wallace and Humphries, even if it's only for 1 year (Wallace in particular was terrible last year). It just depends on if the ability to go for it is worth 3 first round picks or not.

Is it the lack of physical projection/upside with Torreyes that have some people ranking him so low? Youngest player in the Southern League (not sure about all of AA) and doesn't seem to have problems defensively at one of the most difficult positions to find offense at. His numbers aren't great, but he should have less falloff from level to level because of that elite strikeout rate. He seems to me to be the most safe bet the Cubs have to be a major leaguer for at least a couple years, and he very well could be a fine starter for several years.

This selection committee idea will be an utter disaster. Why not release the results of the dry run? If you expect it to be so bad that it overshadows the season itself, what do you think will happen in 2014? http://sports.yahoo.com/news/ncaaf--college-football-playoff-brass-one-step-closer-to-establishing-committee-011130457.html It's not that they expect it to be bad. They expect it could possibly be different though then the results that the BCS gives. And they don't want the debate to rage for weeks on why college football is using the unpopular BCS for the extra year if the selection committee is already assembled and picking teams themselves. I agree with you somewhat that I would rather use the BCS top 4 to seed the playoff rather than a selection committee (much more transparent), but there's so few people that understand the math involved in the BCS to make that transparency mean much, and so I understand why the NCAA is trying to placate the populace by moving the system away from the supposed influence of computers.

I was hoping even before the inning started that Castro would get to be the hero today. So close. He should have had a triple on the play though which might have changed the entire inning.

The Cubs are 25th in percentage of pitches thrown to them in the strike zone. The free swinging part is definitely true, but I don't think the second part holds up. It wouldn't make logical sense either. You don't give a bunch of free swinging mistake type hitters pitches in the zone that they can drive and allow them to be an average offense that way.

It's been a long time, but I don't remember everyone other than Jordan playing like [expletive] for most of the first 3 rounds of the playoffs. They were taken to 7 games against the Pacers in the ECF as well. They also needed overtime to beat a team coached by John Calipari and have the exact same playoff record heading into the Finals as the Heat do. But there I go comparing Michael Jordan to Udonis Haslem again. To be fair, that 97-98 Pacers team was much better then this year's version of the Pacers. That was a 58 win team that was top 5 in both offensive and defensive rating and probably would have beat the Jazz in the Finals. This year's team has wonderful potential, but doesn't have the ability to score in multiple ways and got a little lucky to match up so well with all their opponents. They did not match up well with San Antonio and probably would have gotten destroyed in the Finals.

I don't think tonight's outcome changes anything about the quotes above. Even if the Heat win they have shown that they are indeed "very beatable" no matter what NYCF says. No one had any reason to believe the Heat shooters would stop making shots at their expected rates or that Wade would be murdered and propped up Weekend At Bernie's style. This is a different team than it was when those statements were made and the people who believed Miami would roll on Indiana had more reason to believe than the people who thought Indiana had a good chance to win the series. So yes, [expletive] happens, and anyone who thought this series would be a walk a month ago (me) turned out to be wrong, but that doesn't indicate a lack of understanding of the game of basketball. There was some reason to believe the Heat wouldn't shoot at their expected rates. The Pacers did have the lowest 3 point percentage against on the 2nd fewest attempts in the regular season. Allen had two scoreless games (out of three) against the Pacers this season and went 1 for 9 from 3 during the regular season against them. Battier had games of 0 and 2 and went 3 for 11 from 3 point range against the Pacers. And Battier in particular is a corner 3 point specialist, and the Pacers just don't allow that many of those. Now was that enough evidence to believe that it would likely continue in this series? Probably not. But it didn't come out of nowhere. It was a reasonable possibility before the series started. As far as Wade, it will be interesting to see (if the Heat win tonight) how much is the Indiana defense not allowing Wade to penetrate and Wade not being a good jump shooter versus how much he's hurt. He definitely is hurt, but I'm not even seeing the same moves as I saw him make in the Chicago series. It has been shocking to see his tentativeness at times, especially after Indiana saw Wade at his best last year during the second half of the series.

If you're referring to last night as another example, that wasn't him. He was thrown out in the second inning.

Anderson's chances of playing next game might be diminishing if this tweet from NBC Sports Network is any indication: Usually when Stern comments on something he means business.

Nice double flop with LeBron/West: http://www.cbssports.com/nba/blog/eye-on-basketball/22315303/gif-lebron-james-flops-and-then-david-west-flops-off-his-flop Hopefully they both get fined. If it happens, it would be the first Heat player to be caught for flopping the entire year.

People who go to the games at Banker's Life are always shocked at how much quieter it sounds on TV. The speculation is that it might not be built to pick up crowd mics very well. Of course last night didn't give them much to cheer about either. What a great game by Miami. Just wish they would stop flopping all over the place, and wish the NBA would actually call them out on it once in a while. Wade's flop last night where he just fell out of bounds to try to get a call better get a fine, and Battier has already earned a lifetime achievement award. They play such a pretty brand of basketball on both ends that it's a shame that they feel they have to resort to underhanded tactics as well.

Shawn Bradley and Gheorge Muresan were drafted for their athleticism and ball handling skills? Bradley was a very good shot blocker and solid rebounder. Muresan had a season where he averaged 14.5 points, 9.6 rebounds and 2.3 blocks in under 30 minutes a game. Bradley played over 10 years in the NBA, and Muresan would have as well if he hadn't gotten hurt. They weren't stiffs. They had skills to go with that height.

He can't run with a shooter and if he stays on the block, Bosh has a wide open look. Still better than overplaying LeBron and watching him lay it up on you, but that's the logic. Exactly. And Miami was not running a play to have LeBron drive. In fact, it's not sure if the ball was always intended to go to LeBron at all (they had a Allen/Bosh screen that would have spelled trouble for Hibbert if he had been in the game). It's just too bad that George overplayed so badly which gave LeBron that huge lane. The play before was the much more questionable one. To take Hibbert out and then to just let Miami switch Hill onto LeBron so easily was a bad set of moves.

Knicks have signs of life. Pacers announce Hill is out for game 5 with a concussion (nobody had any idea he was even hurt). No idea if this will be ongoing or not.

The rumors were that OKC went to Golden State and Washington first and asked for Klay Thompson or Beal. They were turned down by both teams which is why they went to Houston. Making those two teams maybe even more insane than OKC. Similar problem for GS as OKC...they would have potentially a large tax bill next year, and I think they are one of teams who has never paid it so I'm not sure how willing they are to do so.

I don't even think Harden was asking for max. I think the Thunder offered him 4 years $52 mil ($13 mil average annually), and he wanted 4 years $60 million ($15 mil average annually). He ended up signing for 5 years, $80 million ($16 mi average annually). I don't really know the cap situation for the Thunder in depth, but in retrospect would the Thunder have extended Ibaka if they could do it over again? Or should they have bit the bullet and amnestied Perkins in order to free up space to keep Ibaka and Harden? I'm guessing for the later scenario, they wouldn't have been able to make it work financially for them. If it wasn't max that Harden was demanding from OKC, it was really close. Harden was still a year away from RFA, so his contract was an extension. And OKC had already used their one 5 year extension on Westbrook, so they could only offer him a 4 year deal unlike Houston's offer of 5. Since the last year is always the most expensive, that accounts for the majority of the difference between what he wanted and what he got from Houston. I don't know what OKC would do if they had to do it again. Clearly Harden is better than Ibaka, but Ibaka fits a lot better with Westbook/Durant than Harden does. And I'm not sure if Harden's value would have gone up that much playing in OKC because he still would have been playing with a ball dominant guard (short of a Westbrook injury, which of course actually happened but Westbrook was the epitome of durability before that). With the financial implications added on, it makes it really difficult to ever get proper value with Harden, either on the court or in a trade. Could they have fit all 4? Possibly. Clearly they didn't think so.