jersey cubs fan

How is that disturbing? We know he's awesome but an extreme health risk. So, they can't extend him. 5 fantastic innings at a time shouldn't be the least bit disturbing to anybody. Well they could extend him to 7 innings if he didn't throw 90-100 pitches in 5 innings. I completely agree the Cubs are doing the right things with his pitch counts, its just that hes not a very efficient pitcher. Come October when we aren't scoring 8 runs against the likes of the Giants or Braves, its going to be tough to get from Harden's 5 innings to Marmol and Wood in the 8th and 9th. Yeah? And? They could extend everybody to complete games if they didn't get to 100+ in the 6th. So what? What's the disturbing part? Harden has an exception arm that throws a baseball which is very difficult for major league hitters to hit. He also gets hurt easily and can't throw a lot of pitches. We all knew this the day the trade was made, where did it become disturbing?

I know Canada gives a hard time to some people with booze/drug related charges on file. Maybe the "passport issue" was just that the Canucks wouldn't let the little bugger in their country.

Sack totals do not make a defense. You brought up that they lacked an impact pass rusher. I was just pointing out that in 2005 they didnt have one either. I cant argue about the age factor(Wale, but i agree with raw, wale had a very good year last year and maybe his best), but in some areas of this 2008 defense the experience is in their favor. The lack of a star pass rusher was among the things I thought the defense was lacking, the total number of team sacks doesn't mean much. I don't see how experience is going to be much of a factor either. This is a team that relies on absurd physical ability, not smarts and strategy. The Bears defense was at its best when a bunch of 22-27 year old athletes ran around making plays. Those same guys aren't going to do the same things at 25-31. Pretty much every one of them have suffered significant leg/back injuries since 2005, and they haven't brought in any new bodies capable of the same things the past couple years. Add to that the fact that virtually all of these players has received his second big contract, and there just isn't much hope that this unit, made up of all the same players, just older, is going to get back to its past peak. Raw said something about the defense possibly being good enough to allow fewer points than the offense scores more often than not this year. I agree, they could be good enough to be a 9-7 team. But something else to consider is the offensive line is almost certainly going to be worse than 2005, I don't see the running game ranking 7th in the league in yards per attempt or 8th in rushing yards. The defense may face a situation where they spend even more time on the field. The last thing an older speed oriented bend but don't break defense wants is to spend too much time on the field.

Sack totals do not make a defense.

Thanks for the insult. Are you saying the Bears current D-line is old and slow? Wale is the old man at 31, but is coming off maybe his best year as a pro. Anderson is 24 and he is a year removed from a 12-sack season...which means he at least has the ability to be an impact pass rusher. Harris had 8 sacks last year at about 85% health, which was the 2nd most for his position. That also makes him an impact pass rusher in my book. He's 25. The SB Colts and Pats of last year have been near the top in fewest points allowed. Both teams were far from elite defenses. The Bears won't have the luxury of an offense that puts teams in a hole or an offense that doesn't put its team on a short field, but it's very conceivable that this defense can be good enough to allow fewer points than they score more often than not. And if they aren't forced to short fields and TOP isn't horrendous, it's very possible they could be near the top of the league in points allowed again. Being near the top, and being the best in the league are not the same thing. And since when is it an insult to be called drunk?

The Cubs sell out every game, they don't really need to advertise the team. The Bears sell out every game and they are putting out commercials. Advertising does more than help ticket sales. The Cubs mostly run radio ads, although they do run TV commercials during Cubs games (advertising Batters Eye Suites) This is the first big marketing campaign by the Bears in years though, according to the articles about these commercials.

Oliver Perez is shaky, but he can shut down anybody on any given day. I wouldn't look forwad to facing him and Santana in a 5-game series.

I think there is no possible way a rational person could regularly watch CSN sportsnite and sportsrise and think it's a sox biased station that occasionally shows Cubs games. And I think this is the type of ridiculous topic a lot of people like making fun of White Sox fans about.

I don't think this is the right way to think about the issue. Calling him full capable doesn't mean much. What he was capable of at times in the past and what he is likely to do now are entirely different things. He showed he was capable of one great season, 2005, and was probably capable of 2-3 without breaking the wrist. But his past is littered with unimpressive seasons as well, much like this year. The team is great right now and we shouldn't be looking to replace Lee, but there's nothing wrong with looking for ways to get more out of 1B, by resting Lee and hoping that could help him hit better as he ages.

There are going to be problems regardless of Clark's health. You don't need a TE to stay in and act as an extra tackle to help with blocking. They can chip and go on delayed routes. What the Bears need is an offense that allows them to adjust to the heavy blitz.

How is that disturbing? We know he's awesome but an extreme health risk. So, they can't extend him. 5 fantastic innings at a time shouldn't be the least bit disturbing to anybody.

I'm all for resting him once a week and getting Hoff or somebody else some more playing time. I think a rested Lee + part-time platoon help vs RHP is likely to outperform Lee all by himself. But this is the best offense in the league, and it's greatest strength is the lack of any true weak spot. Lee isn't a legit 3 hitter, but he doesn't need to be for this team to succeed. I think there's very little to gain by moving him and quite possibly even more to lose by upsetting the apple cart.

We'll see if he can maintain those rates through the end. He was getting a ton of grounders through the first 6 weeks or so of the season, but until very recently, his GB% was dropping pretty steadily since then. His FB% is relatively consistent, but his LD% is significantly higher than the first 6 weeks or so, as well. Not that those rates early on were sustainable, of course. I don't think any decisions can be made now. If he can avoid tiring out in September and October, then I think Hendry will probably try hard to re-sign him. That made sense in May and June. But we're nearly done with 80% of the season. If he tires down the stretch, that doesn't tell us much other than an arm that hadn't thrown 100 innings in 5 years struggled as he approached 200. If he stumbles a bit, he's still going to finish with fantastic numbers. Dempster is an obvious candidate to be a rich Yankee next year. He looked great pitching in Yankee Stadium and has a chance to shine in October this year. The one thing weighing against him, however, is that the Yankees have had a lot of issues with NL pitchers. Brown, Johnson, Pavano, Wright and Leiter were all guys whose success in the NL was a big reason they became Yankees, and all of them were disappointments to a certain extent.

There is very little chance at all that this defense even matches 2005, let alone performs better. Their defensive line is old and slow, they don't have a single impact pass rusher. The past two drafts have been offensive-oriented, and they've turned off the spigot of young talent on defense. Don't kid yourselves. If you think this year's defense is going to allow the fewest points in the league, or the 2nd fewest yards, you're drunk.

The Bears offense is going to do whatever it can to get the #1 draft choice in 2009, the defense is going to go balls out for the 12th pick. This season is shaping up to be a tremendous battle. Since I'm pretty sure I was the first person to point it out, I don't feel bad repeating the obvious, the offensive line is [expletive] horrible. They were mediocre in 2005 and halfway decent in the first half of 2006. But once teams realized Grossman was going to shred them if they stayed back and that the line could not block them, they've been exposed as slow and old. The fact that the personel people and coaching staff could not or would not see this problem before this past offseason is sad. Their best offensive lineman plays perhaps the least important of the five positions, and he's not that good anymore. This group is a mess. The only real hope is for the team to play with 2 TE on every damn play, and keeping at least one in to block on every pass play.

It is a very stupid decision, but maybe it's the kid's idea.

I don't know about that. Going into the 03 NLDS, I was nervous as all hell and worried about the Braves, who looked like a powerhouse that year. I didn't feel like we were playing with house money. I thought we had a legitimate shot with our dominant pitching staff that eeked out a playoff spot in a crappy division (sound familiar?) ... In 98 I wasn't treating it that way, either. Granted, I was 15, but I was crushed when they lost, even though that team was crap compared to the Braves. Given the nature of the playoffs, I never felt that nothing to lose mentality and I don't see why other fans would either. I suppose it might be different for a Cubs fan, though, given how (at the time of those appearances) rarely we did make it to the postseason and the drought crap along with it. a lot of people were giving the cubs a good chance to win that series, because of the starting pitching. the braves' top 4 starters had an era+ of 112, 112, 108 and 107 - pretty average. the cubs' top 4 had 178, 139, 135 and 105. power pitchers who are on their game are tough to hit, no matter how good your offense is. i guess that d-bag fans would argue that their top 3 of webb, haren and a healthy randy johnson gives them a formidable front 3, but the cubs would counter with zambrano, harden and dempster, which is way better than the braves' 1-3 of russ ortiz, mike hampton and old greg maddux. Isn't that, by definition, significantly above average? I think there's a difference between how Arizona and LA fans would feel going into the playoffs compared to how Cubs fans feel. I think either of those teams would be much more likely to feel like they are just happy to be there and playing with house money than Cubs fans would feel. They've seen WS titles.

Past his prime, bitter, senile.

certain kinds

That is the key. I always thought the crapshoot story was overplayed. Everybody has a chance, and the best team doesn't always win. But the better teams have a better chance of winning. It's just a chance though, and no guarantee.

I'm going to assume this is the part you wrote and mixed into the othe quote. A) Theriot is tied for 5th on the team in games played. B) Who effing cares about how his average ranks in the NL? It's meaningless. It has no baring on who should be the Cubs MVP. Theriot has been a nice role player this year. Nothing more, nothing less.

I'm saying in a general sense that having someone with experience on the team might help in the overall anxiety level of the team. Just like if you're in a room full of anxious people in a crisis, the results probably won't be as good as if you were in a room full of calm, cool-headed people. That's all. A room full of people in a crisis isn't all that similar to a team full of guys playing playoff games.

That's fine. Nobody goes up there trying to strikeout (except for pitchers or Ron Coomer when avoiding the DP is the only goal). But that has nothing to do with anything. The goal is to hit a ball hard. The preference is to get a hit. But an out is still an out and a strikeout is no worse than other outs, they all suck from an offensive standpoint.

Wasn't there talk of doing away with the "can't play WC from same divsision" thing?

fontenot has a .909 OPS... only 6 teams in baseball have better than a .909 OPS out of the 3 hole. 5 in the NL. The Cubs are 7th. Cubs 1B are 6th. (all out of 16)