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I think that's 2 out of 8 games now where the Cardinals starter has made it into the 5th inning. They are starting to seemingly fade a little bit, and that is a big reason why.

I think he meant that it was on WGN radio, but yes it was confusing and I got my hopes up for a second for nothing.

It doesn't surprise me too much. Floyd has only started 2 out of the last 11 games. Part of that was because the Cubs have faced 5 left-handers out of 11, but still Floyd has only played 2 out of 6 against right-handers (the other 4 starts against right-handers went to Murton twice and Ward twice). It seems like Floyd is no longer the everyday option and that all the outfielders are rotating.

I know it's expanded rosters, but that Cardinals pitching staff has to be getting tired. Out of their last 6 games, the longest outing by a starting pitcher was 6 innings, and only 2 out of the 6 starts had the starter even reach the 5th inning. That combined with the lack of off days and the double header next week spells big trouble for that bullpen if they cannot get their starters to go longer.

anyone have a video? Click on Ryan Braun's 3 run dinger Cubs fans are way overreacting to this. This is nothing different than ARam sometimes. Hell, it's no different than what Griffey or Bonds do after every homerun. I'm rather surprised at the video after hearing people's descriptions. I've seen at least 2-3 Cubs do similar things this year. That was pretty tame.

Pretty much. I couldn't fall asleep last night from all the noise outside. This weekend is just insane. As much as I like making fun of the place it's a great place to go for a game. This game is a swing game for ND and Penn State, if PSU takes it they ae on their way to solidifying their season and knocking ND out of any BCS contention while ND needs this win badly to stay in the BCS hunt with USC still looming in their schedule. Don't worry about ND and BCS contention. ND will be lucky to get to a bowl game at all. ND just has to find a way to win 3-4 of their first 8. If it's this game, that's great (although I doubt it). Mostly, just get Claussen some experience and hopefully they can win games like Purdue and Michigan State, which both will be hard games but they are more winnable than at Penn State this year.

Yes; he was signed to a two-year contract this past offseason. Bad move by Hendry. I'm sure he would have agreed to a one-year deal, and if he wouldn't they could have found someone else who would have to fill the same role. Yeah, apparently they signed him quickly to keep him away from the Yankees who had shown interest in Blanco. I'd have much rather given him to the Yankees than sign him to a 2 year deal though. 1, maybe-but not 2.

How many catchers are above avg. hitters? If you wait for that, you'll be spending a ton in FA, trading a large % of your farm, or still waiting. If he does well defensively, can hit in the .260-.280 range with some pop with a good eye at the plate, he'll be fine there and better than what they've had since the 93' season w/Wilkins and before that Davis. He's had a nice year this year indeed. Has it been that much of a spike over the rest of his career? Is it possible he's had help and that's why the Cubs didn't call him up before Hill? To show you the spike: Iowa 2005: .253/.357/.342 Iowa 2006: .269/.351/.383 Iowa 2007: .353/.424/.652 So there has been a pretty huge spike. Some of that has been development, some of that has been the offensive inflation at Iowa, and some of that has been just a huge hot streak. It's just hard to tell how much to value each variable.

In a 3 way tie, the team with the best head to head against the other two teams has a choice. They can either A) 1) let the other two teams play a game on Monday, and then they travel to the winner of that game OR 2) have to beat both of the other two teams, but both at home. The only two teams eligible for this choice are the Cardinals and Cubs right now, as the Brewers are way back in the head to head. Cubs 16-10 Cardinals 11-12 So if the Cubs won the choice (which is likely), my guess is that they'd choose to travel to the winner of the Cardinals/Brewers. You'd always rather be the road team for 1 game than the home team needing to win 2 in a row.

I'm happy with that. If I had to pick 1 of the coin flips to win, I'd rather have it be the Brewers one than the Cardinals one.

While I agree with this premise, could it be that Lou didn't feel like he could get someone else ready quickly enough to pitch in Dempster's place? That might be. Also, as I said earlier in the thread, if Dempster hadn't pitched on Wednesday he would have had 3 straight days off. We saw last year how bad he was in those types of situations. He needs regular work, and pitching him was a necessity even with the big lead.

or as I just wrote in another thread, get mad at the guy who put dempster out there at the end of a 6-run win yesterday. He's pitched a lot lately, let's throw him out on the mound when anyone in the bullpen can finish the game off. Dempster needs regular work. If he hadn't pitched last night, he would have had 3 straight days off before the game today, and he wasn't good in those situations last year.

Ankiel just doubled in 2 more. Here is his current line: .358/.408/.765

Yep, he's done a good job this year. Now it's up to his teammates to pick him up and score some runs in the 9th. Dempster - ERA after today 3.5+. SOs/IPs = 48/55 Marmol ERA 1.45. 77/56 Saves are misleading. Dempster gets hit hard and doesn't strike out enough guys to be a good closer which is why he is constantly in trouble even when he does get lucky saves. While I completely agree that saves are misleading, to say that Dempster gets hit hard is inaccurate. Coming into this game, opponent have put up a line of .197/.296/.275 against Dempster this season. Lets compare his ERA to others in the weak Central division. Marmol - 1.45 Izzy - 1.77 Lidge - 2.97 Cordero - 2.96 Eventually all those line smashes against him start to fall in. His ERA is out of whack with his other numbers. If anything, Dempster has been unlucky this season. Opponents aren't hitting for average or power against him. His control could be better, but you were wrong in saying he's been hit hard this year. If you want to say he's been hit hard by the Mets, that would be accurate. Hell, if you take away those two horrible games, his ERA would have been 1.84 coming into today. Ok, but the fact remains the organization keeps saying he is our closer of the future. Well he has proven he can get big league hitters out. We have a team built for the now, not the future. Thus why wouldn't we use him in that role now, when we have a legit shot to win the division. Because there is almost no role for Dempster if you take him out of closer. You can't put him in during the middle of an inning. Marmol is much more versatile than Dempster and can come in with runners on to get 1 out, while Dempster needs to come in with nobody on to be effective. So until Dempster is traded, he needs to be the closer and Marmol needs to come in with runners on to stop people from scoring. Oh so Dempster isnt a good enough pitcher to come in with guys on base and get out of it, yet you support him being our closer. Yes, because Dempster is a good pitcher. He just needs a little leeway of nobody on base. That allows him to throw his junk at the batter-if he walks 1, it's not a big deal because the other hitters usually get themselves out. Think of it this way-at best, Marmol would be 27/28 saves (it's asking too much for anyone to be perfect). That's a 2 game difference from Dempster. If Dempster was coming in all the time in Marmol's spot with runners on, there would be a lot more than 2 games that would have been lost.

Yep, he's done a good job this year. Now it's up to his teammates to pick him up and score some runs in the 9th. Dempster - ERA after today 3.5+. SOs/IPs = 48/55 Marmol ERA 1.45. 77/56 Saves are misleading. Dempster gets hit hard and doesn't strike out enough guys to be a good closer which is why he is constantly in trouble even when he does get lucky saves. While I completely agree that saves are misleading, to say that Dempster gets hit hard is inaccurate. Coming into this game, opponent have put up a line of .197/.296/.275 against Dempster this season. Lets compare his ERA to others in the weak Central division. Marmol - 1.45 Izzy - 1.77 Lidge - 2.97 Cordero - 2.96 Eventually all those line smashes against him start to fall in. His ERA is out of whack with his other numbers. If anything, Dempster has been unlucky this season. Opponents aren't hitting for average or power against him. His control could be better, but you were wrong in saying he's been hit hard this year. If you want to say he's been hit hard by the Mets, that would be accurate. Hell, if you take away those two horrible games, his ERA would have been 1.84 coming into today. Ok, but the fact remains the organization keeps saying he is our closer of the future. Well he has proven he can get big league hitters out. We have a team built for the now, not the future. Thus why wouldn't we use him in that role now, when we have a legit shot to win the division. Because there is almost no role for Dempster if you take him out of closer. You can't put him in during the middle of an inning. Marmol is much more versatile than Dempster and can come in with runners on to get 1 out, while Dempster needs to come in with nobody on to be effective. So until Dempster is traded, he needs to be the closer and Marmol needs to come in with runners on to stop people from scoring. The pieces of the Cubs bullpen fit better that way. The

Exactly. The last 3 months, the whole story with the Cubs and Brewers has been to stay as close to the Brewers as possible at home, and then make up ground on the road. Now it seems like everybody thinks the whole picture changes with every game. The Brewers will struggle once again on the road-they haven't gone .500 or better on a road trip since June. Then, after they finish those road games, they have to play the Cardinals and Padres at home. If the Cubs just can win 3 against the Cardinals (which 3-2 against the Cardials would be worse than what the Cubs have done against them all season) and then go even 2-3 games over .500 the other games, that will probably win the division.

Yep, he's done a good job this year. Now it's up to his teammates to pick him up and score some runs in the 9th. Dempster - ERA after today 3.5+. SOs/IPs = 48/55 Marmol ERA 1.45. 77/56 Saves are misleading. Dempster gets hit hard and doesn't strike out enough guys to be a good closer which is why he is constantly in trouble even when he does get lucky saves. Lucky saves? Is this a stat? :roll: Yes, 25 saves with a 3.5 ERA. Does anyone really think that a well ran organization has both Mamrol and Dempster on their team, yet lets Dempster close? Let's see-the Tigers with Jones and Zumaya last year? Yeah the Tigers are well ran. Remember when they traded for Neifi Perez? The other day I went to watch them play the Royals and their other Perez hit 3rd. Well, what organizations are well run? The Braves had Wickman as their closer role for most of the year, and they would have kept him there if he hadn't refused to come in during non-save situations as well.

The Brewers' next ten games are against the Pirates and Reds. This season is OVER. The Cubs play 5 games left against teams over .500. The Brewers still have 11 games left against teams over .500. The season is far from over.

Yep, he's done a good job this year. Now it's up to his teammates to pick him up and score some runs in the 9th. Dempster - ERA after today 3.5+. SOs/IPs = 48/55 Marmol ERA 1.45. 77/56 Saves are misleading. Dempster gets hit hard and doesn't strike out enough guys to be a good closer which is why he is constantly in trouble even when he does get lucky saves. Lucky saves? Is this a stat? :roll: Yes, 25 saves with a 3.5 ERA. Does anyone really think that a well ran organization has both Mamrol and Dempster on their team, yet lets Dempster close? Let's see-the Tigers with Jones and Zumaya last year?

How's he been in one run save situations so far this year? No stats to back this up, but I don't think he's blown any of them. I think he's blown 1 (the one in Pittsburgh in May if my recollection is right that the Cubs lost in like 15 innings). Overall, he's been quite good though.

No doubt about it.

Is this coming as a surprise to anyone? That freaking team could sign Neifi Perez and Jose Macias and drag 100 OPS+ seasons out of both of them, complete with gold gloves. No they couldn't, and Ankiel isn't that big of surprise because we've known all along he could hit. His batting average in the major leagues right now is 28 points better than his OBP in the minors. Everybody knew that he could hit home runs (although 1 every 10 at-bats like he is doing right now is ridiculous) but everyone thought that at least his OBP would be under .300 in the majors (it was .314 in the minors). Instead, his OBP is around .390.

A pretty nice mostly fluff article on Soto here-here's a couple quotes: http://chicago.cubs.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20070906&content_id=2192781&vkey=news_chc&fext=.jsp&c_id=chc

That's the thing. We have Lee, Ramirez, Soriano, DeRosa. At the other 4 spots we have Pie, Murton, Theriot, and Soto being possible cheap everyday options. Which one do you upgrade, and which 3 do you say are your starters for the next couple years?

No he doesnt suck, he can hit, but he shouldnt be starting I agree. He is starting because we don't have Aram in the lineup today. There are better options Ward's easily the best offensive player the Cubs have to play RF. There is no one else even close. Murtons 2nd half disagrees CCP. And hes a career PH for a reason, the guy cant field, cant run. Murton's 2nd half: .295/.353/.526 Ward's 2nd half: .368/.442/.684 It's not like Murton's the best fielder or baserunner either. When Ramirez is out, the Cubs have to put their best pure hitters at the plate in order to try to generate some offense, and that's Ward.