MSG T

This. Yep. 98, high and inside followed by that slider? As a lefty? Nope, don't want to go there.

=D>

why? you want ryan howard practicing bunts on the one in a million chance he's going to be asked to do it? just because you could bunt in high school against a guy throwing 68 mph doesn't mean every major leaguer is going to be able to do it against a major league pitcher. What he said. And I'd add half of ML position players to that list, not just Pujols or Howard.

I think I'm sensing sarcasm, and if so I agree. A good friend of mine spent a few years at AAA and had a few cups of coffee with the Royals. He had been a power hitter since he was in Little League, and remained that until he was done playing. I'm not sure he laid down a bunt in his entire life, including LL. Why would someone like that be expected to lay one down at the ML level? Because it's a basic skill of the game that every major league hitter should know how to do. Unless your name is Albert Pujols, I guess. Basic skill for some guys. Stealing a base is a basic skill, and there's a lot of guys that can't do that. And people, rightfully, get upset if one of them gets thrown out trying to steal in a big spot. That is no different than a bunt.

I think I'm sensing sarcasm, and if so I agree. A good friend of mine spent a few years at AAA and had a few cups of coffee with the Royals. He had been a power hitter since he was in Little League, and remained that until he was done playing. I'm not sure he laid down a bunt in his entire life, including LL. Why would someone like that be expected to lay one down at the ML level?

:lol: =D>

Pretty sure Howard would win that one by default. ETA: Also, I had no idea Mauer has been in such a HR-slump as of late. It's mainly been because of his SLG%, but Soto has a higher OPS since 1 JUN than Mauer. Mauer still has great numbers, but he's been just alright since the May. His first month he was over 1.300 OPS and since he's posted .897(Jun) and .829(Jul, sample size). He has had an OBP above .400 every month, his power just disappeared.

That's a pretty sub-par list for the AL - excluding Mauer. Pena leads the AL in HR with 24, Cruz is second with 22. Inge is third with 21. Mauer has 15. Why do you say its a sub par group? If anything Mauer is the one out of the group who is subpar. Especially considering Mauer has 4 HR since he hit #11 on May 23. 3 in June and 1 in Jul, so far.

That's what happens when you have no walks and 3 sacrifices in those 74 PAs. In 6276 career PAs, he had 29 fewer walks (203) than Bonds did in 617 PAs (232 walks) in 2004.

Bah. Doug Daszenzo's career ERA is 0.00. http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/CHN/CHN199107020.shtml I was at ^^^ game. My wife wanted to leave during the 7th, but I jokingly said I wanted to see Doug pitch. So we stayed. Lo and behold, he pitches the 9th and even gets a K (Redfield). What started as a beautiful afternoon shot to hell. I look back at some of those Cubs lineups and realize how bad they truly were. It didn't seem, at the time, the roster was filled with crappy players, but outside of 2-3 teams, the 80's and 90's versions of the Cubs really were awful.

Can you think of another sport where the head coach wear's the same uni as the players? Baseball is weird like that. With the notable exception of Conrad McGillicudy, eh? Connie Mack never wore a uni as well. Crap, I think I just figured out why managers wear uni's in baseball. Not sure why I hadn't thought of it before. But when I was writing out Connie Mack's name, my mind went to the other greatest manager ever, John McGraw. John McGraw was a damn good player and first became manager while he was still a player. The same goes for many great players who were also managers back in those days, such as Cap Anson, Tris Speaker, etc. Baseball managers wear uni's because most managers back in the day were ALSO on the roster as players. Duh. How could you forget Frank Chance?

Let's see. - Everyone here knew signing Miles, especially as basically DeRosa's replacement, was a stupid idea. - Everyone here knew that Bradley was injury-prone. - Everyone here, for the most part, could see that Derrek Lee had been declining throughout most of 2008. (I'm glad he's on the uptick right now, but he's got a long way to go before having a productive full season.) - Most here, while glad to be rid of Jason Marquis, thought it was iffy to bring in a nothing reliever for him. - Everyone here was skeptical as to why we were shedding like 5M in bullpen pitchers for no apparent reason less than two weeks in when we weren't exactly loaded with great relievers. - Most here were skeptical of Dempster's contract considering his career numbers. This isn't hindsight. For the most part, these moves were bad even in foresight. Spot on. Miles was signed as a reserve IF and not as an everyday player (like DeRosa). Also, it was pointed out that the Cubs ended up paying him what the Cards were offering. Everyone knew Bradley was injury prone, but he was the most productive OF available. DLee was signed to a large NTC after a great year like dozens of other ML players, some of whom are mediocre at best. Trading Marquis for Viscaino is a perfect example of hindsight, since nobody knew if there were any other offers for Marquis. Everyone wanted Marquis gone and the deal saved app. 5 million. The bullpen has been a problem, so I'll give you that one. Dempster was signed at the going rate for pitchers coming off of a very good season. Not signing him would have left a hole in the rotation that would have meant signing some other pitcher. Given all the the information that Hendry had at the time and the parameters he had to use, I'm sure he thought he was doing the right thing. Of course, in our fantasy-league minds with no information at the time, all of us could have done better. Not that they even considered him, but Adam Dunn was available over the winter, right?

So the Cubs should stop scoring on those days when they're knocking the crap out of the ball and save those runs for the days the wind is blowing in?

Considering the way the offense has been playing, this plan is a whole lot less offensive than I'd have thought a few weeks ago.

Yay! Being a GM is hard marbles Yeah, but you haven't spent your whole life playing the game so you don't know what you're talking about. :roll:

Maybe I'm missing the sarcasm, but isn't .900 OPS really good out of CF? I know I'd take it, even at Fukudome's salary.

Fixed.

Cobb and Jackson are the 2 guys I wonder about, as far as how would their games translate to a different era. It would be interesting to have seen their power numbers if they had started their careers, say, 25 years later. I suppose you could throw Tris Speaker and Nap Lajoie into that category as well. Playing most, or all, of their careers in the dead ball era just makes them so hard to compare to those that came later. I mean, even the approach to hitting was so much different then the 20's on. That season from Cobb is a perfect example. A .947 OPS translates to a 194 OPS+? That shows just how low the offensive averages for those different stats were at the time. 9 HR helps him get to .517 SLG? It's not like he had a ton of extra base hits either( a total of 52 XBH). How do you compare that to a season from Ruth, Gehrig, Bonds or Williams? Cobb was a great hitter, but completely different approach than any of the later guys. Cobb's SLG was that high due in part to his high BA. He did get a lot of doubles and triples, which also helped, but when you hit .377, if you have any sort of power, you're going to have at least a decent slugging. His career IsoP was .146 (.512 SLG, .366 BA) and he only had three years where it was over .200. Compare that to a guy like Alfonso Soriano who has a career IsoP of .237 and, at the moment, has a higher career SLG than Cobb (.517). Soriano's BA however is only .280. I understand that part, and agree he had some numbers that, in the big picture, aren't quite what they seem when you see some of his rate stats. But again, how much of that is from what guys back then tried to do at the plate. How many guys took the same kind of cuts that players now do? Was a guy going to try to mash the ball knowing the result was going to be 8-12HR a year(I'm trying to ignore any "new" Theriot jokes here)? It just seems from what I've read and watched that up until the mid-late 20's(for anyone not named Ruth or Gehrig), the approach was to put the ball into play and hopefully scoot the ball through the IF. They weren't concerned with driving the ball past the OF or over the fence. The Wee Willie Keeler idea of "hit it where they ain't", as it were.

Cobb and Jackson are the 2 guys I wonder about, as far as how would their games translate to a different era. It would be interesting to have seen their power numbers if they had started their careers, say, 25 years later. I suppose you could throw Tris Speaker and Nap Lajoie into that category as well. Playing most, or all, of their careers in the dead ball era just makes them so hard to compare to those that came later. I mean, even the approach to hitting was so much different then the 20's on. That season from Cobb is a perfect example. A .947 OPS translates to a 194 OPS+? That shows just how low the offensive averages for those different stats were at the time. 9 HR helps him get to .517 SLG? It's not like he had a ton of extra base hits either( a total of 52 XBH). How do you compare that to a season from Ruth, Gehrig, Bonds or Williams? Cobb was a great hitter, but completely different approach than any of the later guys.

I'd guess FLA as well. Besides the reason you gave, he also was there the longest and had 2 of his 3 best offensive seasons there as well. Of course, with the way Sheff is, he may try to go in with a Giants or Rangers hat, just to be difficult.

The funny thing is, Jose Cruz had a great one at one time, but doesn't on that card.

He used to come in and help me with my hair.

:-)) I just thought this needed to be posted again.

I truly believe if Wells was in his 3rd or 4th year instead of being a rookie, he'd beat the hell out of Gregg.

Lee will ground to the pitcher with fuku going on contact, tag fuku out and then...well lord knows we can't score with a guy on first, let alone third. Alllllllllllllllmost. \ Good guess, FC.