CubColtPacer

4 players, 2 coaches.

No-next left-hander the Cubs will face is Wednesday in Atlanta. Murton has a good chance of getting the start on Tuesday-he hasn't faced Maddux, and Floyd hasn't been very good against him in his 78 at-bats. They face Clay Hensley tomorrow, and neither one of them has faced him much, so Floyd will probably start.

Wow. So the Cubs World Series hopes rest on the who wins the classic good/evil battle between Cliff Floyd and Matt Murton. Alright then! :lol: I have said if the Cubs were a legitimate WS contender this year, I would be for Murton and Floyd platoon. Since they are not playing Floyd makes no sense. If the Cubs surprise me and become a WS contender this year I will be the first to come in here and say I am wrong. This makes sense. If you believe they have no chance to win it all then it make sense to go with the better long-term option. The Cubs obviously do believe they have a WS contender here-their spending spree and their comments since then seem to back that up. Only time will tell which opinion is closer to correct. The problem of course is what is a WS contender. I would say that winning the weak central does not make the Cubs a WS contender. I am guessing this is what really is debatable? I don't know-if they did win the Central, I see no reason why the Cubs would not be a WS contender. Their biggest worry right now is depth in the starting pitching. Getting into the playoffs and going with a rotation of Z, Hill, and Lilly-I'd be hard pressed to find another potential playoff team with a playoff rotation like that in the National League. The offense would also probably be the 2nd best in the playoffs behind the Mets (not saying they'll be 2nd best overall in the NL, but can't see another playoff team right now besides the Mets that is likely to have a better one), and the bullpen and bench are not detriments. So if they did win the Central, I'd see no reason why they would be any less of a favorite to win the NL as any other team out there. Once they reached the WS, they'd be facing a better team then them, but anything can happen in a series like that. So I'd say if they reached the playoffs they should be considered a WS contender.

If Floyd starts today (and there's a pretty decent chance that he does) remember that Murton will get some starts this week. Monday-not sure who will start Tuesday-Murton will probably start Wednesday-Murton will start Thursday-Murton has a pretty good chance to start No pitchers currently known after that. The matchups for Floyd are not as favorable this week as they were last week. The team is facing some pitchers that Floyd has not done as well against, along with the left-hander on Wednesday (oddly enough Floyd has done better against the left-hander than either right-hander on Tuesday or Thursday). Murton will likely the majority of starts this next week, even if Floyd starts today and tomorrow (and I bet Murton starts one of those 2 games).

My guess is that it all stems from the promise they made to Soriano when he signed to have him be an OF only. Who knows, they may have even written it into his contract.

Wow. So the Cubs World Series hopes rest on the who wins the classic good/evil battle between Cliff Floyd and Matt Murton. Alright then! :lol: I have said if the Cubs were a legitimate WS contender this year, I would be for Murton and Floyd platoon. Since they are not playing Floyd makes no sense. If the Cubs surprise me and become a WS contender this year I will be the first to come in here and say I am wrong. This makes sense. If you believe they have no chance to win it all then it make sense to go with the better long-term option. The Cubs obviously do believe they have a WS contender here-their spending spree and their comments since then seem to back that up. Only time will tell which opinion is closer to correct.

So-for the maybe 75-100 points of OPS extra you would get by doing that, you would make 2 more defensive black holes than the team already possesses (right field and second base) along with making your free agent who just signed for 8 years very, very angry. Would it really be worth it?

Yeah, this is another complaint I have. If the org. was bound and determined to turn Matt Murton into a platoon player then they already had the guy who is screaming to be his platoon partner: Jacque Jones. If they really wanted to sign Floyd and platoon him then it's not hard to find somebody who can play LF and hit passably vs. LHP. How about Ryan Theriot? Or maybe bring back some cheap vet like Michael Restovich. Wait a second. So you are suggesting that Murton platoons with Jacque in right, and then Floyd platoons with Theriot in left. Correct? I know that's not your ideal, but that's your suggestion to at least make it better. My question-how is that any different than what they are doing now-so far (1 game) Jacque has platooned with Theriot in right, and Murton is somewhat platooning with Floyd in left but he's getting more at-bats against right-handers than if he was platooning with Jacque. Isn't that the better solution if you're not going to have any of them playing everyday?

Yeah, he got 2 hits, but they were both singles, and he also got a GIDP and got picked off. Multihit game, but overall not an impressive performance. He's struggling a little. I'm not all that suprised. I'll be shocked if it continues for months. Cub fans will boo him senselessly like they did with Jones. Not saying that can't, it's their prerogative. But how wrong were the fans about Jones? Pretty damn wrong --- to the point of coming to the stadium with apology placards and signs. They should learn their lesson and look at the bigger picture. Not to mention their booing of Lee in 2004-that didn't work out too well either. Lee was booed in 04? Boy, I don't remember that at all. Yup. He struggled out of the gates in April, and he was booed for a decent part of the month. Here is an article from this year that makes a passing mention to it: http://chicagosports.chicagotribune.com/sports/baseball/cubs/cs-070331cubs,1,1957041.story?coll=cs-cubs-headlines

Yeah, he got 2 hits, but they were both singles, and he also got a GIDP and got picked off. Multihit game, but overall not an impressive performance. He's struggling a little. I'm not all that suprised. I'll be shocked if it continues for months. Cub fans will boo him senselessly like they did with Jones. Not saying that can't, it's their prerogative. But how wrong were the fans about Jones? Pretty damn wrong --- to the point of coming to the stadium with apology placards and signs. They should learn their lesson and look at the bigger picture. Not to mention their booing of Lee in 2004-that didn't work out too well either.

Murton AB R H 2B 3B HR TB RBI BB SO BA OBP SLG OPS 04/03 - 04/30 77 12 22 4 1 2 34 16 10 13 0.286 0.368 0.442 0.809 05/01 - 05/31 84 13 24 3 0 2 33 4 8 12 0.286 0.358 0.393 0.751 06/02 - 06/30 66 8 16 0 0 0 16 1 4 11 0.242 0.286 0.242 0.528 07/01 - 07/31 49 9 18 2 1 0 22 7 6 4 0.367 0.429 0.449 0.878 08/01 - 08/30 82 12 26 5 0 5 46 22 6 8 0.317 0.364 0.561 0.925 09/01 - 09/30 92 15 31 7 1 4 52 10 11 16 0.337 0.425 0.565 0.990 10/01 4 1 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0.250 0.250 0.250 0.500 04/03 - 10/01 454 70 138 21 3 13 204 60 45 64 0.304 0.372 0.449 0.821 Much more than I thought. At least this year, we have a backup that is capable of starting. Last year, we had the likes of Freddie Bynum backing up Murton. I like Floyd as well. I think he's a good hitter in the situation that we have given him. But I still think Murton is getting the shaft here. I agree. I would like Floyd to get some starts. Maybe 3/10 games with Murton getting 1 or 2 of those games in RF. I think Floyd has a to offer to this team, but I think Murton is the better/younger/healthier option and should get the bulk of the playing time. Do you believe that Murton is a better option than Floyd against RHP? IMO, the only way that is true if you fully believe in Floyd's 2006 when he was injured a large amount of the time. If he's healthy, he's going to hit right-handers very hard, and if he has nagging injuries he's not going to play this year to bring down his numbers like that. If I were just playing for this year, Floyd would get as many starts against right-handers as I felt his health would allow with Murton getting the rest of those and all the left-handers. I think that would make the team the best it could be in 2007. Since I know there are long-term implications as well, I believe that Murton should get the majority of starts, but not the vast majority of starts. I would love to see Murton get some starts in RF, but it does not look like management trusts either him or Floyd out there (as evidenced by them playing a combined 0 ST games at the position). Since they are only LF's, I would propose to have batter/pitcher matchups help dictate which right handers each one of them starts against, with Murton getting every single start against left-handers. This will likely result in Murton getting 60-70 percent of the PA's overall.

He's always hit. He hit at every minor league level and he hit his rookie year and the beginning of last year. The time he struggled last year was the only time he's struggled in his career. He was bound to break out of it. Just wanted to compare Murton's minor league stats to his major league stats: MI: .309 .380 .451 831 MLB: .303 .370 .462 832 The guy seems pretty consistent. Just let him play and you'll end up with a .300/.370/.450'ish guy, who might improve past that. Both of the years in the majors have been skewed statistically though-Murton was put in situations he could succeed when he was playing part of the time in 05 and 06, and he often sat against pitchers that he would likely struggle against. So in projecting a year for him that would have to be taken into account. In 447 PA's vs. RH: .289 .351 .431 .782 In 237 PA's vs. LH: .325 .401 .507 .908 He's better against LH, but very solid against RH and has had nearly double the PA's against RH. So its not like they just put him in there against LH. I would agree-I'm not saying that if he played full-time he would be terrible. But when he tended to sit last year, it was either when he was struggling, or sometimes it was when the team was facing a right-handed pitcher that had a decent right/left split. If Murton had played full-time against all those pitchers, his numbers probably would have trended downward-not all that much (he probably still would have been around .775-.780 last year) but it almost certainly would have gone down.

He's always hit. He hit at every minor league level and he hit his rookie year and the beginning of last year. The time he struggled last year was the only time he's struggled in his career. He was bound to break out of it. Just wanted to compare Murton's minor league stats to his major league stats: MI: .309 .380 .451 831 MLB: .303 .370 .462 832 The guy seems pretty consistent. Just let him play and you'll end up with a .300/.370/.450'ish guy, who might improve past that. Both of the years in the majors have been skewed statistically though-Murton was put in situations he could succeed when he was playing part of the time in 05 and 06, and he often sat against pitchers that he would likely struggle against. So in projecting a year for him that would have to be taken into account.

From taking a glance through the batter/pitcher matchups this week, my guess is that Murton will get the majority of starts (only updated through Thursday), mostly because Floyd has struggled against a couple right-handers that the Cubs will face this week, as well as the Cubs will face a left-hander on Wednesday I believe. I'm not sure about the start tomorrow though, in fact I'm leaning towards Floyd getting that one. I definitely think Murton will start getting some more starts here soon though. This past week has just been a couple pitching matchups that were favorable to Floyd, and then the club wanting Floyd's power when Ramirez went out, plus Murton not being able to get a start that he certainly would have gotten because of the snowed out game.

I found the note about Murton and Bynum. For all the talk about Bynum (the fantasy note was dated June 15th) he started 3 out of the next 10 games before he got hurt, while Murton started 6 of those games. I don't think Murton ever got benched for Bynum.

Give me a break. Dusty started Murton 122 times in left field last season. That's more than 75% of the time !! By "young guy", I wasn't just referring to Murton. And besides, when Murton was struggling last year, thats exactly what Dusty did. He barely played him and gave him scattered at bats. Nice attempt at a save there...... but there were only 3 instances all season where Murton did not start for more than 2 consecutive games. Twice he sat for 3 games in a row, and once for 4. The kid got over 500 PAs last year. Now..... you wanna talk about Cedeno ?? What are you talking about? "Dusty's method of helping out the young guy" is an obvious reference to Dusty's management of young players. If you want to take it as me only referring to Murton so you can pull out your obscure stats, then so be it. And where I'm specifically referring to Murton is when he was struggling last year. What are the dates for those times when Murton sat for multiple games? Is it during the stretch where he struggled? If so, then what I am saying is true. Dusty has a history of poorly handling young players and Murton was one such example. I don't know how you can prove it was poorly handled. Murton was struggling, Dusty sat him down for a few games and then platooned him for a while, and when Murton started to hit well again. Some people could even make the argument that Murton sitting down was the best thing for him in order for him to get back on his game. Even if you don't want to go that far though, I certainly don't see how it hurt him last year-if it had, he should have continued to slump with the lack of playing time. That's not what happened though.

Through the end of games on June 4th, Murton had started all but 4 games through the first 2 months of the season.

I would agree. I hope that they think that one of the two can play RF defensively because as you said this is a perfect game to pair them together. If they don't feel that way, then this is one of the few games where I don't care which of the LF's gets the start (as opposed to me wanting Murton to start on Friday and Floyd on Saturday).

he did take it away from someone. when he was starting at the end of last year. shouldn't floyd have to take it from him? Yep this is typical cub crap. Like when Corey had to earn at bats from Damon Buford. Or when we had to let Fred McGriff get his 30 homers even at Choi's expense. But, at least this year they wrapped the turd up by letting us all think Murton was going to play by giving him all the Spring ABs and the opening day start. First off, this is not a straight platoon like everyone feared. That alone proves they value Murton that they would bench a guy like Floyd against a right-handed pitcher where he has been so good over his career. Second, your other situations are not great analogies. Buford was not a good ballplayer when Patterson was trying to take at-bats away. The McGriff/Choi situation happened in September to a team that was hopelessly out of the race-if they had been in the race, there would have been no problems with McGriff starting everyday because he was still having a very good season that year. This is a team who wants to put out their best lineup everyday. Against a decent amount of right-handers, that might mean Cliff Floyd plays, because he has been so great against right-handed pitching over the years. Now, like I said I would have put Murton in against Harang and have a 5-5 start split so far instead of 6-4. The fact that it's only 6-4 when they have faced one left-hander is telling though-they want to get Murton at-bats, even if it has to come against right-handers. Murton will end up with more PA's than Floyd at the end of the year.

What does that mean exactly? Jones in the three spot and no Murton yet again. It wasn't a mistake though yesterday. Jones had 2 hits from the 3 spot, and Floyd had 2 hits as well. Now-I wanted Murton to play yesterday because of his numbers against Harang. If you look at their numbers against Arroyo though, it was pretty obvious that Floyd was going to play-he had a hit and 2 balls hit hard last week when the Cubs played the Reds against Arroyo. Also, the team still has faced a much smaller sample of left-handers than they really should have so far (based on last year's numbers, they should have faced 2 more left-handers so far than they actually have). If Murton continues to even get 33% of the starts against right-handers like he has so far, he will play more than Floyd will on the season when the number of left-handers evens themselves out.

What does that mean exactly?

Well, it's possible DeRosa will be back, unless there was something I didn't hear tonight.

He definitely could do that-I was just referencing the idea of him pinch-hitting for Jones. I bet Murton will still pinch-hit sometime later in this game. Edit: Oh, I understand now. You were responding to the same thing. Never mind :D

He can't be unfortunately-the club doesn't trust Murton or Floyd in RF, and Theriot or DeRosa are already playing positions that nobody can come in for them. Jones cannot really be replaced other than an emergency.

How is Lou responsible for the fact that freakin Ohman couldn't throw a strike. So who made the decision to put Ohman in? He should have put in Wuertz to begin with. I'm sure everyone on here would have made that call. Hatteberg can't hit left-handers. If you're facing Jacque Jones, do you put in your LOOGY, or a better right-handed reliever?