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What about our other pitchers? Should Lee and Ramirez get booed for having no power this year? Anytime a player has a bad run they should get booed? Its not just about the bad pitching the last month. Its everything else taken into as a whole. The fans of Chicago want to win so badly, and they know this year the team has a chance at the playoffs. Yesterday was a big game for us, as the fans could see Stl losing and Milw losing, and then Z comes out and craps the bed. The fans were upset just like Z was upset with Barret. However its ok for Z to show his emotion towards Barret, but not for the fans to show their emotion towards big Z. That is hipocracy at its finest plain and simple. That's the thing though-it wasn't fine for Z to show his emotion towards Barrett, and he admitted that and apologized for it. If you are going to compare the two situations, then you're saying that the booing was unjustified.

Zambrano can let his emotions get the better of him and deck Michael Barrett, but fans are supposed to sit on their hands the entire game and show zero emotion. Zambrano is the prince of emotion, in line to succeed Ron Santo as king. Cardinal fans were dead wrong to boo any part of their 11 run blowout yesterday, too. If only the fans would have cheered louder at each fundamental blow up, the Cardinal players would have seized the moment and scored 12 runs to come back and win the game. It doesn't work that way. Fans pay money to show some emotion at the game. They all prefer to cheer the whole game. And they don't boo when someone boots a ground ball. Boot 4 or 5 ground balls and yeah, you're going to hear displeasure. It's the nature of the beast. Well when you do it to an emotional guy like Zambrano (which incidentally is what makes him both great and awful), who is sensitive, it's only natural he's confused about the intent of fans. If i was cheered one day, had 4 years of being one of the best players on the team, and then I was booed because of one up or down year, I'd think fans were selfish too. And I'd be right. No you wouldnt be. Z is emotional, and right now in the heat of the pennant race when Z is needed more than ever hes pitching like Kip Wells, he would be a fool to think the fans arent going to show their emotion just like they would with him if he was pitching great. Z cant have it both ways. Its either ok to be emotional during the heat of a game, or its not. Its a 2 way street here. Well it's obvious that Z cares. It's obvious he was hurt yesterday. Not all players are thick skinned. If you want the Cubs to win, we NEED Z. Crushing his spirit when we need him the most won't be productive. But go ahead and think your right to boo is principled. It's as hypocritical as it gets, so enjoy it. Id say thats exactly what hes done to the Cubs fans since the ASB. We all know Z cares, but for him to think its ok for him to be emotional during a game, but the fans arent allowed to is the biggest hypocricy there is in all of this. From the quotes, I think Z thinks of the fans as one of his teammates. If he sees it that way, I can see why he's upset-if you actually were in the dugout, the last thing you would do when Z returned to the dugout would be to walk up to him and say "Boy, that was some really bad pitching today". If you actually were there, you'd try to encourage him and tell him he'd get them next time, and he feels like the fans are not supporting him through the down times. Z is emotional, but he typically is emotional in his support for his team and the fans (the Barrett incident aside, which he apologized for). I can understand why Z is upset, but I don't think the fans did anything wrong either. It's just a matter of different perspectives.

The assumption is that the Cubs will get beat badly in any playoff series. I don't see that as a given at all. In any normal year, yes. Somebody brought up 1998-the Cubs had to face a 106 win Atlanta team, and there was also a 102 win Houston team and a 98 win San Diego team in the playoffs. Those were great teams, and so the Cubs were clear underdogs. This year? There won't be any teams that will get to 95 wins. That might be the first time that's happened. There is no great team in the playoffs, and when there is no great team, it will just end up being whoever is hot that will win it. This Cubs team isn't nearly as big of underdogs as they would be in a normal year, and the Cubs should want to get into the playoffs and take their chances with this weak National League.

Yost takes Braun out just about every time they have a lead like that. He switched him out of the game against the Cubs (Wednesday night) in the late innings when they had the lead.

I have to say, that was one of the worst plays I've seen in a long time. Murton was 10 feet past that ball and still running away from it when it dropped, and then he throws it wild to boot which caused the runner who had tripped to be able to get back to second. The Cubs have been pretty terrible all the way around defensively today, from Soriano bobbling the ball which didn't allow him to throw home last inning to Ramirez's error there.

Well, it didn't hurt us as much now. If there are runners on 2nd and 3rd, the infield stays back and concedes the run and that's a groundout for Theriot.

Marshall has only broke 100 innings once in his career (last year when he threw 147 1/3 innings combined). He clearly wore down last year after he had reached innings pitched that his arm had never experienced before. This year, he's already at 128 innings with a month to go. If he starts all of September, he would already be at 160 innings going into the playoffs plus all the extra he would throw there, which would be complete uncharted territory for him and possibly cause more injuries. If they are looking at this as demotion for him because he is supposedly not pitching well, then I'm not happy. If it's an attempt to try to limit his innings because of his injury history, I think it's a good move.

Why are you citing what is essentially a meaningless stat? It has no predictive value and only tells you how lucky the hitter has been in the past. Meaningless to you, not to me. I like guys who hit well with men on base. Murton's BA with RISP has been much worse than his BA for his entire MLB career. That siad, I support Matt to play in front of Floyd. I like his hot bat now. it's meaningless because, as a general rule, a player's BA w/risp naturally gravitates towards his total ba over the course of his career. i like guys who hit well with runners on base, too. but those same guys are those that hit well in any situation: close and late, blowouts early, full moon, saturnalia, fourth of july, etc. murton's career ops w/risp is below his career ops, but not ridiculously below. given enough pa's that number will come up and run consistent with his career averages. define "ridiculous". The numbers are very significant, both career and this year. no, they're not, considering the relatively short career that murton has had, 661 total pas. .277/.374/.384 to .303/.370/.462 not very significant at all. his numbers are down this season, but that usually means that they'll be up next season, or the season after that. Where are you getting those career numbers with RISP? Here is what I'm looking at: Murton's career Overall: .296/.364/.452 Nobody on: .330/.385/.526 Runners On: .246/.335/.346 RISP: .257/.354/.359 RISP/2outs: .247/.336/.320 So Murton's overall numbers and his numbers with RISP are about 100 points apart. The difference between nobody on and runners on is 230 points.

Yes, that's what I meant. Murton is quite good at working counts and hitting deep in counts. The career stats show that very clearly, in fact typically the deeper into a count he gets the better of a hitter he is. I'm very much in favor of him working the count. When I said I thought he might be too patient with runners on, it's more of the fact that he would take strikes that he would normally drive for base hits with nobody on. That puts him behind in the count, and anybody gets worse when they are behind in the count. That would explain the higher walks and higher strikeouts (higher walks because the pitcher nibbles and Murton has a good eye), and lower BA and power (because with 2 strikes the pitcher isn't going to throw him a good pitch most of the time).

Agreed. Murton should be getting the PT because he is doing well, just like Floyd got the PT deservedly when he was doing better than Murton in the first half of the season. Murton's nobody on and runners on situation just keeps getting stranger and stranger. Here are his career numbers: Nobody on (464 AB's): .330/.385/.526 Runners on (321 AB's): .246/.335/.346 Now, it's still only 785 at-bats, and it still has plenty of time to turn around. 230 points is still an absolutely massive difference for that number of at-bats. Maybe he is too patient with runners on? (his walk rate and strikeout rate on his career are both up with runners on, while his BA and power are way down. That suggests too much patience in those situations). Like I've said before, that still doesn't mean that you don't start Murton. Even if you believe these numbers won't turn around, that just means you have to put him in a spot in the batting order that will come up the most times without runners on.

They'll need it. All 3 of us have home series followed by a long stretch on the road(where we're the only one of the three that is any good). If we're still up more than a game by Friday then I say we're up 4 games on everyone by the end of our trip to StL. Agreed. This week the Cubs just need to try to hold on to the lead in any way possible, because after Thursday the Cubs play nobody besides St Louis in playoff contention. The Cardinals meanwhile will still have 3 against Arizona, 5 against the Cubs, 3 against the Phillies, 3 against Milwaukee, and 1 against the Mets. The Brewers would still have that 4 game series against San Diego along with 4 at Atlanta and the 3 against St. Louis. That's why I honestly don't mind if the Cubs drop a game between now and Friday, because I think they have the easier way in after that.

Hawaii won 63-6, and they still couldn't cover the spread! :D

He's an offensive catcher you know. Just ask him. If he gets to play in Iowa he is. Everybody hits there :D

Ouch. Cherry really got drilled. Here is his final line: 1/3 IP, 3 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 1 BB, 0 K, 1 HR

Colvin has put up a nice second half. Hopefully he can replicate that when he probably starts at Tenn next year. That strikeout to walk ratio is still absolutely horrid-hopefully he'll work on that next year. I wouldn't mind seeing him getting promoted to Iowa early next year in order to work with von Joshua on his patience. 165 AB's, 6 2B, 2 2B, 7 HR, 31 K/4 BB, .315/.337/.503.

Pujols just kills everybody. The Cubs have actually been one of the better teams at stopping him. They have the best results in the NL Central against him, and are 3rd best in the NL against him. I agree with most of the rest of your list. I'd have to go with Edmonds, especially after that confrontation with Z a couple of years ago.

Santana is a pretty bad comparison for this. He was in the bullpen originally so he could hide in the majors after being picked in the Rule V draft. There really wasn't any question that his future was in the rotation. Previous to this year there was no question that Marmol's future was in the rotation... People tend to overemphasize bullpen "roles". If you're asking me whether we should have Marmol throw 90 innings a season or 200, I gotta go with 200. That being said, wanting him to throw 200 innings and him actually doing it are two very different things. But if he comes out of this season with his arm intact, he should be given a chance if we see an injury derail one of our other starters. That's not true at all. People on here were calling for Marmol to eventually be moved to the bullpen. The Cubs organization during the winter said that Marmol was their future closer. There was significant question both last year and in the offseason about which way Marmol's future would go.

Marmol went 2 innings yesterday. I don't believe we will see him today. That was 2 days ago.

I hope Encarnacion recovers well and quickly. That's a scary injury, and I sincerely hope there's no permanent damage.

Welcome to the board! Soriano last did that on June 7th and 8th, so it has been a little while.

Soriano Theriot Lee Ramirez Monroe DeRosa Kendall Jones Marquis Houston lines up like this: Pence Burke Berkman Lee Loretta Scott Wiggington Ausmus Patton

turns out that they did the right thing with DuBois No they didn't. How many times does this have to be gone over? Dubois didn't have to set the world on fire, all he had to do was play better than Todd Hollandsworth. The problem is that we don't know what would have happend becuase Dusty contiuned to trott out a crappy Hollandsworth. It's probably not just the Cubs, its all the MLB. In the NFL you don't see crappy vets given playing time over cheaper and probably just as productive younger players. Kendall is playing well but it's not a good bet that he will put up better numbers than Soto next year or the following. My prediciton if Hendry is still GM, Kendall 2 years @ 4mll/year. Dubois was terrible, he was terrible for the Cubs and for everybody else at the major league level. There just might be a reason he hasn't played in the major leagues since 2005, and it has nothing to do with the CUbs, Hendry, or Dusty. He wished he could have Hollandsworth's career. The Cubs did exactly the right thing by not playing him. It's not about a "career". It's about production, cost, and the future. Hollandswroth/Kendall are/were at the end of their carrer and not likely to get better and much likely to get worse. Nobody knows what the future holds for Soto and at the time for DuBois. But again, all of that is beside the point, somewhat. Hollandsworth was terrible in 2004, DuBois just had to be slightly better than terrible. But he got the Murton treatement (or has Murton got the DuBois treatment?) so we don't know what he would have done given a little consistent playing time. May you be talking about 2005 instead of 2004? Hollandsworth was not terrible in 2004-far from it. He put up a .318/.392/.547 line. In fact, Hollandsworth's 2004 was probably the reason he was taking time away from Dubois in 2005. Going into 2005, Hollandsworth's previous 6 years of OPS+ were: 103, 91, 150, 97, 96, 134. So mostly close to average with 2 very good years mixed in. Yes, he collapsed in 2005, but there was nothing in his history that would suggest that kept in a platoon that he wouldn't be around average or better in 2005.

If that's what he's used for...I'll cope. I still would prefer Gallagher to start vs Stl then Trachsel Gallagher has been hit hard in the majors this year. A 7.82 ERA and a 2.05 WHIP. Now, for a year, I would be furious if they selected Trachsel over Gallagher. Gallagher is going to make adjustments and end up being better than Trachsel. Only 1 start though? I think Trachsel is the better option right now, especially since Trachsel has good numbers against the St. Louis lineup. Now, like I've said before, that still wouldn't be justification for trading for him (they definitely overpaid), but I think Trachsel is an upgrade for that one game. CCP, you are alot better with getting numbers than I am, so Im going to ask you. I think most of that ERA is from the blowout in CO? Other than that I remember 1 hr given up, and then pretty good performances, am I wrong? Gallagher had 7 outings 3.1 IP, 2 ER 0.1 IP, 0 ER 2.0 IP, 4 ER 1.1 IP, 1 ER 4 IP, 1 ER 1.0 IP, 0 ER 0.2 IP, 4 ER Gallagher struggled the whole way through. He had 1 good outing (the 4 IP, 1 ER). The 1.0 IP he gave up a hit and a walk, but that's still a pretty good outing. Gallagher's problems were the walks. He walked 12 in 12 2/3 IP. The only outing he didn't walk anybody in was the 1/3 of an inning outing.

If that's what he's used for...I'll cope. I still would prefer Gallagher to start vs Stl then Trachsel Gallagher has been hit hard in the majors this year. A 7.82 ERA and a 2.05 WHIP. Now, for a year, I would be furious if they selected Trachsel over Gallagher. Gallagher is going to make adjustments and end up being better than Trachsel. Only 1 start though? I think Trachsel is the better option right now, especially since Trachsel has good numbers against the St. Louis lineup. Now, like I've said before, that still wouldn't be justification for trading for him (they definitely overpaid), but I think Trachsel is an upgrade for that one game.

So you want Dempster going 2 innings last night in a tie game and Marmol coming in to face the 9-1-2 hitters with a 2 run lead? I'd want my best relief pitcher pitching the ninth (and eight inning if necessary). Marmol has a 1.47 ERA and threw 22 strikes out of 29 pitches last night. Dempster has a 3.29 ERA and only threw 9 strikes out of 21 pitches. He doesn't have the control or strike out enough guys to be a good closer. A so-called closer walking a guy with the bases loaded - that's ridiculous. I don't care how many cheap saves he gets. That ground ball goes a few more feet to ARam's left and the Brewers win the game. I think you're just defending him because you like his first name. You'd be wasting his value. Your best reliever should pitch in the tighest of spots. That is mostly in the 6th, 7th, or 8th, when the starting pitcher or middle reliever gets in trouble and you need to get through the heart of the order. The closer starts almost all his innings with nobody on, so you can afford to give up a runner. When a guy comes in during the 8th with men on and nobody out, you need your stud reliever. If Marshall goes eight innings today and runs out of gas with the Cubs up by one, Lou better use Marmol instead of Dempster. I hope not. Marmol shouldn't pitch today after pitching 2 innings yesterday. And yes, that is the one situation where the closer being the most dominant pitcher is a good thing. How many times does a starter go 8 full innings anymore though? Not very often. Number of innings is irrelevant. Marmol threw eight more pitcher than Dempster. A team can be up one or two runs in the ninth without a starter pitching eight innings. True, but if the starter doesn't pitch 8 innings Marmol could pitch the 7th or 8th, which is just as important as the 9th. Also, having to warm that arm back up for a second inning does add stress to the outing, at least to me.