Cubbie Swagger

From what I've heard... the Ricketts family is still going to get the team... the Cubs are just "talking to other bidders" to try to speed things up and make Ricketts feel a sense of urgency. And as others have pointed out, the recession had been going on long before the Ricketts negotiations. And also... Mark Cuban has zero chance of owning the Cubs, even if he did want to re-enter the sweepstakes. Mostly because the MLB would never approve him.

Nobody is complaining about Gooz Alright, Guzman has been pitching well. I just mean that I don't think Marmol should be one of our biggest concerns... he's talented enough that I think he will pull out of it and improve his control. I think our focus should be on figuring out how we can replace Gregg, Heilman, and Patton. I know there is alot of talk about how we need to pick up a bat... but I'd rather pick up a stud reliever or closer. Even if we win the division, there is no way we'll go anywhere in the playoffs with our current bullpen. Talented, veteran hitters will eat them up.

Agreed.

Wrong. If Soriano stops swinging at that slider and takes his walk like he did there the cubs offense would be in pretty good shape. Well... that's a pretty big "if". Soriano has never taken walks and he's always swung at bad pitches. He is a HORRIBLE baseball player, who just happens to have the ability to hit mistakes out of the ballpark. There also isn't a single aspect of his game that suggests he should hit leadoff. Look at this quote from Lou: "We've been through this many times," Piniella sighed. "When we signed Alfonso, he was a leadoff hitter. We've won two divisions with him being a leadoff hitter. What else can I say? He's struggling. We just got to hope he gets hot." He was not a leadoff hitter, ever. He just bats first because he's a whiny little girl when he doesn't. We've also been swept in the first round twice with him being a leadoff hitter. The problem with Soriano, is that even when he is hot, he is still a horrible leadoff hitter! Lou thinks that he is being a productive leadoff hitter when he is hitting long balls, and that is just not the case. He should be hitting long balls with people on base. [/RANT]

Wow... I thought we were gonna drop this one for sure. But, in the back of my mind, I was thinking, "well, there was that game against the Rockies in 08..." and that's why I didn't turn it off. Soriano is still a horrible excuse for a baseball player but at least we won.

GONE!

People REALLY need to stop complaining about our only decent reliever. He has been a little inconsistent but I still think he's going to finish up with good numbers (even though his numbers aren't bad right now anyway).

Well this is certainly getting interesting. What a big win this would be, especially after coming back yesterday.

Rich Harden is not awesome. The guys ERA is almost 5.50 on the year. Sorry... I wasn't aware that a pitcher's talent can be judged by his numbers over a fraction of a season. Look at his numbers last year and tell me he's not awesome. Every pitcher has had a period of time where their stats sucked. And wow... Reed Johnson crushed that ball.

He's fine. He's got an ERA in the 3's, a .163 BAA and 1.52 WHIP. Plus a bunch of holds. Sure, maybe the WHIP could be lower, but by most people's standards, he's having a good year. Just not quite as dominant as we are used to.

Rich Harden is still awesome. But yeah, ballgame. Then again, it doesn't matter how many runs Harden gives up, because we aren't going to score anyway.

i guess i don't understand why you still want Soriano hitting 3rd if you're so concerned with his current struggles. i mean, you have the guys who are actually starting to hit (Lee, Fontenot and to a lesser degree, Soto) at the bottom of the order. how is that supposed to spark more offense? Well, I meant that should be the lineup if everyone was hitting the way they should be. But actually.. after thinking about it... I would flip-flop Ramirez and Soriano in that lineup. I think with Aramis hitting earlier in the lineup we'd be better off. I'm actually gonna edit my previous post I think.

I feel bad for the guy... he's not responsible for any of our struggles. Still though... trying to think positive... maybe it will spark SOMETHING? Giving people a sense that they need to perform OR ELSE? I dunno...

Well, I would start by getting Soriano out of the leadoff spot. AND YES, LOU, THAT MEANS FOR MORE THAN 2 GAMES. The guy says he likes hitting leadoff, and that he's more comfortable and a better hitter in that spot... but that's obviously total BS. If a .230 batting average and .300 OBP is what happens when he is happy and comfortable, then we are screwed. I don't ever wanna see Soriano hitting leadoff again, for any reason. Theriot should be the man, but honestly, I'd be happy with Fukudome, Bradley, Lee, Fontenot or anyone else not named Soriano leading off. I think that would fix alot. There' s nothing else we could really do except switch a couple other guys in the lineup. I think at this point, we pretty much have to make due with the players that we have. We just have too many non-moveable contracts. Milton Bradley (who has never hit more than 22 homers in a season) isn't much of a 3 hitter. I also don't usually like seeing Lee in the 3 or 4 spot, but since he's been hitting lately, I'll let it slide. If I were Lou, my regular lineup would look like this: 1. Theriot 2. Fukudome 3. Ramirez 4. Bradley 5. Soriano 6. Lee 7. Soto 8. Fontenot Maybe move Fontenot up if you wanted to split up the righties, but other than that, it's a solid lineup. I'm also not totally opposed to the Soriano at 2b idea, if Fontenot falls into another hopeless slump.

I wonder if they are going to take their own advice and use caution with him the rest of the year. Yeah, maybe Lou will think twice about throwing him out there for another inning when he's clearly out of gas.

Sad story. But as far as Dempster... he has just been inconsistent. He's had alot of great starts and alot of bad starts... overall, it averages out to decent numbers. I do think his numbers will keep improving throughout the season, though.

I dunno if I would say that. Neither one of us know Pedro... but I could see how going this long without a deal could change his demands. Maybe in his mind, he's thinking he'll start in the pen, pitch well, and get moved to the rotation. It just doesn't make sense that Hendry would be wasting his time trying to improve our rotation. Then again, something doesn't have to make sense for Jim Hendry to be involved. I guess he could be planning to move Wells to the pen... but until the guy stops throwing lights-out baseball, you can't really do that.

Honestly I think that steroid use should have no effect on hall of fame induction. This is because there's no way of knowing for sure who has used them and who hasn't. With that logic, you're going to let tons of people into the hall who used them and never got caught. Then at the same time, you're going to deny people with better numbers just because they got caught. Doesn't seem fair, if they both used steroids. The only thing you can do is induct people based on their performance, and if they cheated to perform, then that's just the way it is.

'Nuff said. We seem to have trouble identifying which relievers can pitch, and which can't. We give away solid bullpen arms routinely, and we usually get absolutely nothing for them. Then we sit around and cry about having a crappy bullpen. Imagine where we'd be if our bullpen consisted of guys like Marmol, Wuertz, Juan Cruz, David Weathers, Scott Eyre, etc. The list goes on and on. I'm not even gonna complain about Kerry Wood, because we've given away some good pitchers (who were not expensive) as if they were charity donations. EDIT: And not to mention the fact that for YEARS our front office and manager thought that Neal Cotts was better than those guys, despite there being ZERO statistical evidence to support it.

Oh man, I remember Sosa. I'm actually kinda surprised that guys like him and Bonds haven't been given another chance by anyone. There are alot of really bad teams out there... and you'd think they would AT LEAST make decent bench bats.

Nice rip, Hoffpauir.

I remember watching Ozzie Guillen say, "I don't believe in on-base percentage, I believe in runs scored" :-)) RBI's get put up on the scoreboard, but they are a useless stat. OBP is pretty much the most important.

Shame on you [-X

Poor Bobby Scales... :( But at least it didn't cost us the game.

June 15th? I'm thinking about heading up there then, too. That's the one :wink: