CubColtPacer

BTW, one more thing to be noted-Lou Piniella has been cited for his teams annually having one of the best SB percentages in the league-so for all league managers that the Cubs can have, Piniella will likely hurt the team least with the stolen base. http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=2607

Ok, obviously stealing 3rd with 2 outs is silly-let's throw that completely out of the discussion. With that said, the rates show that stealing 3rd can have a lower break-even rate than stealing 2nd-so the original post who said that stealing 3rd was silly (and didn't mention stealing 2nd, which meant that he thought that stealing 2nd was better than stealing 3rd) has been disproven. Also, I'd love to see the stats on the percentages of break-evens if it is a double steal. Obviously, a double steal would lower the break-even percentage by at least another few percent. If that is true, than Soriano's career numbers of stealing 3rd by himself or as part of a double steal would be slightly above break even. If you can at least break even on your steals, then it is a good idea to do it because of the extra threat to the pitcher and catcher that it provides as well.

The other thing I forgot-having a player who has the ability to steal 3rd as part of a double steal can be quite an effective weapon as well if used correctly and sparingly. Stealing 3rd shouldn't be a routine thing, but if used correctly it can really help a team if the the team and/or baserunner knows when to call it and when not to.

You should only steal 3rd if you're very sure you can make it-stealing 3rd is all about getting to score on an out, not a better chance of scoring on a hit. I t shouldn't be a routine thing, but if a good basestealer gets a good jump, it can be valuable as long as their success rate stealing 3rd is very high. Use Lou's quote for instance. He's talking about Soriano stealing third. He's the best basestealer on the team, but 99.99% of the time, I dont want him even thinking about stealing third with Lee, Ramirez and Jones coming up behind him. Sure, a guy on third will score on a passed ball/wild pitch, whereas a guy on second won't, but how many times in a season does that happen to a team? Five? Ten? How many times will it happen when Soriano has stolen third? At best one or two? It's not worth it. There will be times when you need to play for the one run, and then i would be ok with it, and that is the 0.01% of the time. Maybe on a wild pitch or passed ball it happens 5 or 10 times, but runners score a decent amount from 3rd on a ground ball out or a sacrifice fly. I wouldn't expect Soriano to try it more than 4 or 5 times all season-the less times he tries it but remains a threat to do it, the better it is.

http://msn.foxsports.com/nfl/story/6485778 So I guess Rivera wasn't that essential to the Bears success.. Have the Chargers hired anyone for defense yet? If not maybe Rivera is going there to help Turner. Rivera's run a standard 4-3 defense throughout his coaching career. I'm not sure how big of a shift going to a 3-4 is for a defensive coordinator, or if Turner will keep a 3-4, but it may require a change in thinking on Turner's part. Yeah, I would see it more likely that Rivera would be going to Dallas as the D-coordinator-they wouldn't be that bad switching, but SD would lose much of its defensive effectiveness if they switched defenses.

I suppose he'd be a decent bench option but the team is pretty much set... The Cubs are the only place where Finley could even potentially start-he is just trying to gamble that somehow the Cubs don't have anybody play center. He's just desperate-I don't think that it would be likely at all that 1)Soriano can't play center, 2) Jones can't play center, and 3)Pie isn't ready, which would all have to happen before Finley would be signed.

Even if Jones sits 80% of the time against left-handers (which I fully support and hopefully it's even more than that) he likely will still have the most-at bats because he has an advantage on the other two outfielders with starting against right-handers (Murton because he is right-handed, and Floyd because Floyd would be terrible defensively in RF). Even with Jones getting the most at-bats though, if they are sitting him against left-handers the Cubs outfield will be incredibly productive. I don't expect Jones to come close to the numbers he posted last year, except OBP. http://www.fangraphs.com/graphs.aspx?playerid=735&position=OF&page=0&type=full Fangraphs also has an article on Big Z (not optimistic). http://www.fangraphs.com/ True, but this could also have something to do with it: OPS 2002-Home-.721 Away-.977 2003-Home-.822 Away-.770 2004-Home-.694 Away-.784 2005-Home-.722 Away-.793 Home-.841 Away-.821 In the past 5 years, Jone has never had less than a .770 OPS away from his home park. Considering that most people are better at home than away from home, he would seem to be a guaranteed .800 every year, but that didn't happen in Minnesota because except for 2003, he was absolutely miserable at home. When he changed to Wrigley Field, his home numbers went up, and so did his total OPS. I do expect him to be a little lower overall if he had the same type of at-bats (20-30 points of OPS), but the drop should be offset by a few less at-bats against left-handers, so I would expect his OPS to be around the same as last year.

You should only steal 3rd if you're very sure you can make it-stealing 3rd is all about getting to score on an out, not a better chance of scoring on a hit. I t shouldn't be a routine thing, but if a good basestealer gets a good jump, it can be valuable as long as their success rate stealing 3rd is very high.

Even if Jones sits 80% of the time against left-handers (which I fully support and hopefully it's even more than that) he likely will still have the most-at bats because he has an advantage on the other two outfielders with starting against right-handers (Murton because he is right-handed, and Floyd because Floyd would be terrible defensively in RF). Even with Jones getting the most at-bats though, if they are sitting him against left-handers the Cubs outfield will be incredibly productive.

That seems about right to me. Murton should get every at-bat against left-handed starters. That should be somewhere around 200 PA right there. If he gets even 1/3 of the starts aginst right-handed starters, then that would put him at 350, and pinch-hitting and double switches could probably push him up to 400. Jones ends up getting the most at-bats because he is the only one reliable enough to play RF right now (I hope that Murton gets out there and gets acclimated quickly to RF so Murton and Floyd can play against some lefties, I don't want to see Floyd in RF at all), and Floyd takes the rest of the right handed at-bats from Murton and a few of the left-handed bats from Jones. I know many of you hate this practice, but history against certain pitchers might dictate some of the matchups. I don't mind it in a situation like this when the players are likely to be similarly productive anyway (although in different ways)-it's bad when you start Blanco over Barrett because of it, but I think it can be helpful in deciding between similar players for that day. I can also see Lou changing his lineup based on which way the wind is blowing at Wrigley.

Murton has proven he is a major league caliber player. He doesn't need spring training to prove anything. As far as playing time, it's up to Lou Piniella to find plenty of playing time for all 4 outfielders, and the ones who are playing the best deserve the most playing time. I think however much he's overstated his point that this is his point as well. If Floyd is playing better than Murton at the end of ST, then it's not a problem if he gets the majority of starts at the beginning of the season. Murton should still get plenty of time in any scenario, and if he then started out-performing Floyd (assuming the prior scenario) than Murton would start getting the majority of time. No matter who starts when though, all 3 corner outfielders should get plenty of at-bats.

not really relevant to this conversation, but I do imagine Cubs hitters walking a LOT more this year with the new hitting coach and with Dusty being gone. I think just getting the opposing pitchers to throw more pitches is the key and walks are just a byproduct of that. I'd put it the opposite. Well, not exactly. IMO, walks and getting the pitchers to throw more pitches are a byproduct of waiting for a pitch you can hit hard somewhere. Making contact with anything in the strike zone just for the sake of making contact (outside of some situations, obviously, like a close two strike pitch) is the one thing they need to stay totally away from. If they go up there with the approach that before 2 strikes, they're only going to swing if they get a pitch to hit, I think the rest will come. I just hope to see a lot less swinging early in the count this year. We've been letting the opposing pitcher off the hook way too easily, especially since 2003. What's to stop a pitcher from getting strike 1 and 2 then if you have the proverbial bat on the shoulder? I think each batter has to have a plan when they go up there and sometimes circumstances dictate what they have to do. Knowing your zones and your pitches you can drive help immensely and obviously getting into a hitters count increases that and I agree that it would make the hitters more successful if they can do that. I like Murtons approach to hitting but it doesn't work for everybody and I don't think it could work for Soriano or Jones because of the habits they already have which are very hard to break. Being selective/aggresive is a very hard thing to to learn. I agree with you, especially on Jones. He is a hitter that is best when agressive on the first couple pitches. When he is struggling, he tends to be more patient, which leads to more walks for him but his hitting is down. He is better when he is hitting before it gets to 2 strikes-even when he is 3-2, Jacque struggles a bit more than a normal hitter does. I would of course love to see him lay off the obvious non-strikes much more, but he needs to be able to attack balls around the strike zone early in the count-that is where he has proven that he can be effective and can drive pitches in a few different locations. For some of the other hitters, especially those without the power capabilities, I definitely agree that they need to be more selective in which pitch they want to hit though.

Trib Hmmm-it seems like they have decided that it's basically 3 equal players for 2 spots. Murton may not have a guaranteed starting job, but neither does Jones or Floyd. That is definitely going to be an interesting situation to watch as it progresses throughout the season. I'm not too worried about it though-they all should be good players, so production should hopefully be good no matter which two they run out there.

Well, I think it would take a little more than Eyre, but I'm sure there are-it's not going to matter though. If Izturis sinks, it won't be at least until the All-Star break that they move on him-Hendry is high on him, and Lou is high on him. I don't even see them making a move then unless 1) Izturis is hurt or 2) the offense needs a big upgrade and Izturis is struggling (.255 or below average with poor slugging, basically meaning that he hasn't come back from his surgery at all like he was right before the injuries). Edit: BTW, I didn't list his OBP only because I don't think the Cubs management would make a move purely based on that-I do agree with Rob's comments on another thread though that Izturis is continuing to slowly get better in plate discipline, and hopefully he can make greater strides in that this year.

Why do people keep saying this? Why didn't he get a fair shot with the Cubs last year? Because they sent him back down after four starts where he had a 9.00+ ERA? It certainly looks like him going back down ended up being the right move considering how much differently he pitched when he came back up. "Lisa, I'd like to buy your rock." It could just as easily be argued that he was shaky because his first few starts were going to decide his immediate future with the team and he was nervous. I don't have any notes on it, but his stats don't look much different in his stint with the ICubs after being sent back down than they were when he pitched for the ICubs in April. I think posters on this board have had this discussion before and it went nowhere. Yeah, it's hard for it to go anywhere because it's impossible to run it again the other way and see the results. The Cubs sending him down might have been the best thing for Hill re-gaining his confidence, and the Cubs sending him down might have delayed Hill getting his confidence in the major leagues-it's really impossible to know which one it is. It's all just a matter of perspective I guess.

Had you taken the time to read MY posts, you would see that I never said that. I've only said that I am not going to get all worried about the possibility forwarded by some uninformed writer that Hill won't be in the rotation until some quote or action by the Cubs organization itself leads me to believe that will be the case. Unfounded? I've read nothing that says that Hill will be in the rotation for the Chicago Cubs. All I've read is that he will be competing for a job. It speaks volumes about Jim Hendry and the Cubs. Volumes. Hill has been the best pitching propspect in the Cubs organization for going on three years now. Instead he's been brought up, used sparingly, demoted to the bullpen, sent down, brought up, used sparingly, sent down, brought up, in trouble with Dusty and Larry, sent down, and brought up again. In my opinion Marquis is supposed to be an insurance policy on Prior. Instad it seems as if he has an inside track in the rotation. Z Lilly Marquis Prior That leaves Miller, Guzman, and Hill fighting it out for the last spot, when perhaps all three of them will be better than Marquis. I haven't found any quotes that say Hill will be in the rotation or not. I have seen other articles like this one though that say he will be in the rotation, so it seems like the opinion is split on if his spot is guaranteed or not. http://www.suntimes.com/sports/baseball/cubs/238918,CST-SPT-cub01.article

While it is an honor to receive MVP votes, it is not the best item to use when justifying that side of the Grudz/Bobby Hill argument. Much like the Gold Glove isn't exactly a great hallmark of defensive prowess, MVP votes are not indicative of a player's worth. That's certainly true and a valid point. Now for the part that is directed at somebody else (I can't remember who-it's the person who still is not sure that Grudz over Hill was the correct choice)-Grudz put up a better OBP and a better SLG in 2003 than Hill has done in his best year of each of his 3 years in the majors. I cannot see how with the benefit of hindsight that this move could not be seen as a good one.

I'm not so sure of that. Didn't Grudz get a vote or two for the NL MVP that year? So did Russ Ortiz (complete with 3.81 ERA), what's your point? I think he's just saying that if he got a vote for the MVP, he at least must have played well enough to justify the team playing him over a prospect who is waiting also, even if he didn't really completely deserve that MVP vote (I don't think anybody would really argue that he did. :D)

No, they acquired Adam Kennedy.

Nope-McGriff was never useless for the Cubs, so that doesn't ring any bells for me. false. A useless veteran would be one that plays badly, right? When did McGriff play badly for us? when he absolutely crapped the bed for the first 1 3/4 months of 2002. So he had 1 terrible month-in 2001 for us, he had a .921 OPS-even with that terrible month, in 2002 he had an .858 OPS-I wouldn't exactly call that "useless". While I do agree with some who said that McGriff may have blocked Choi a little bit in a pointless season, I think they had to do that if they weren't going to trade him. The best thing they could have done was trade him before the deadline. When they didn't do that, it would be bad public relations to completely bench a productive veteran who had agreed to waive his no-trade clause for you just the year before-it might have led to other players not wanting to come to the Cubs. As it was though, they split the at-bats between McGriff and Choi 50/50 in September, which again is still pretty good for taking at-bats away from a productive veteran. Let's put it this way-some of you were saying after the Izturis trade last year that they would have rather kept Maddux. If you had kept Maddux, would you have benched him the last two months to allow the young pitchers to play because he would be pointless for this season?

Nope-McGriff was never useless for the Cubs, so that doesn't ring any bells for me. false. A useless veteran would be one that plays badly, right? When did McGriff play badly for us?

Nope-McGriff was never useless for the Cubs, so that doesn't ring any bells for me.

If he plays gold glove caliber defense and hits about .280+ in the 8 hole, I think his health is definitely important. If Cesar Izturis hits over .280 I'll buy everyone here a Coke. Because the odds are signifigantly stacked against him. As was noted, his career OBP is .295. He's only OBP's over .300 twice, and one of those was a hearty .302. He's terrible, and he'd help the team more on the DL than he would in the batting order. I'll remember that, because if he had stopped when he got hurt initially in 2005 rather than trying to play through the injuries he would have hit 280+ in 2 of the last 3 years, and 2006 was another injury-filled season. If he gets healthy, who knows what could happen from him-he could be the 2004 or 2005 healthy version, or he could be the other Cesar Izturis who has shown himself so far after the injuries-I have no idea which one it will be.

it is his fault he didn't do well the first half in the majors. but the point is, his 12 games started after the all-star break were phenomenal, and that alone should guarantee him a spot in this year's rotation. his last 12 starts last season made him earn that spot a lot more than 3-4 starts in spring training. it's absurd not to guarantee hill a spot in the rotation. As much as I'm arguing that the Cubs do not have a large history about sticking Hill behind a veteran undeservedly (like I said, 2 months at most) I completely agree with this-Z, Hill, and Lilly should be the ones with guaranteed spots, with Prior having the leg up on the next one if he can prove he is healthy.

He didn't give much of an indication that he belonged in the majors the first half of last season. Hard to say there is a "should have" there when he was getting shallacked most every time they sent him out early on. Hill at AAA: April - .149/.221/.230 with a 0.80 WHIP and 33/7 K/BB May - .245/.275/.265 with a 1.03 WHIP and 21/1 K/BB June - .180/.225/.261 with a 0.79 WHIP and 41/6 K/BB July - .170/.239/.260 with a 0.82 WHIP and 40/7 K/BB And the big league team/rotation sucked. Rothshild was never very patient with Hill, nor was Hendry. We'll have to see if that changes this year. The thing is-he came up May 4th. For a person who didn't make the big league team out of ST and for no injuries, that's about as fast as a pitcher can usually make it because the major league club likes to give the people on the roster a couple of chances to succeed before calling for an option from the minors. Once Hill had put 4 great starts at Triple A together, he got called right back up. Once he did make it, he was horrible again-considering the state of the season we were in, I probably wouldn't have sent him down, but I can see why they did. Even if you think they should have kept him up there though, that's only 2 months at most that he was in the minors that he shouldn't have been.