UMFan83

8 runs scored on only 2 XBH - and one of those was from the pitcher

I just can't believe this is our team

Hey the final score is also our record after the W

Let's trade him to the Giants to Samardzija has an old buddy on the team

Make that 2-34 and the Cubs still scored 22 runs in 3 games

Wake me up when he turns into Tommy LaStella

We are 3 outs from sweeping a series that our 2-3-4 hitters went a combined 2-32 in

2 outs on the bases today

Espn predicted the Bears to finish 9-7 this year which I thought was high praise until I saw that they only predicted 1 NFC team to have a record worse than 7-9 and 4 teams total http://espn.go.com/nfl/story/_/id/15204630/2016-nfl-schedule-season-predictions-analysis-regular-season-picks-games

Rizzo struggling a bit on this homestand

Rat boy needs more range at 3B

Yeah reddit thread has been wrong on a lot. I'll just wait until it's announced officially

So far... 1: Bears @ HOU 2: Bears @ PHI (MNF) 3: 4: 5: 6: JAX @ Bears 7: 8: MIN @ Bears (MNF - Halloween) 9: 10: 11: 12: 13: 14: 15: 16: 17: Bears @ GB

Bears will try for their first ever win over Houston in week 1

Your peasant eyes do not have the divine right to see the glory of the new shrine to all that is Cub.

If anyone else like me is a loser and likes to follow the leaks in real time, this is pretty up to date: Chi @ GB in week 17 is the only Bears related one so far.

Yeah again I havent really watched the Lakers much due to their irrelevance, all I've seen of Kobe is occasional flashes of brilliance in youtube videos where he is still able to beat his man or do a reverse layup or hit some 3s, and then looking at some of his box scores when I see he's still playing over 30 minutes a game and taking 20+ shots. So using that evidence, I pieced together he can still occasionally look good, and perhaps not making him log so many minutes and not putting him in a role where he is the 1st 2nd and 3rd option on offense would make him productive as a player in short spurts and contribute to a contender. I think it's solid logic but everytime you stress how bad he's been makes me question that to some degree. And going way back to the original argument, I stated in the beginning that Kobe would never leave the lakers and/or accept a greatly reduced role because he is who he is. So I agree he's not going to suddenly become a different player after all this time. The rest of the argument was whether he'd actually be effective as a role player on a different team if he actually was on board. And in that case I put together examples of former stars, some stars in their era, some HOFers, so low post guys, some alpha dog guards, who successfully did that to different degrees.

nananananananana RAT BOY!

Pierce spent about 14 years playing for the same team and same role. Yes the systems changed and the team dynamic with different players, but the same could easily be said for Kobe who went from a team that was 1 year removed from Magic Johnson and was centered around Shaq, to Phil's triangle offense, to solo Kobe years with multiple coaches, to more triangle with Phil and Pau Gasol to D'Antoni's crazy system, to whatever they are doing now. Pierce was an alpha his entire career until he accepted a lesser role, switched teams for the first time in his career at age 36, which is 1 year younger than Kobe is now, and become a 3rd or 4th option. Anyways we've whittled down my list of 10 names to 1 that I'm clinging to, so you win. I still think its possible though.

The point was the Kobe could be a productive role player. Pretty much all of those guys were productive role players at some point. -Robinson averaged around 38 minutes a game and took 16 shots a game until 96, then for the last years of his career dropped down to 28-30 minutes a game and took 8-10 shots a game. -Tmac maybe a bad comparison because injuries destroyed him and while he tried to be a role player, he wasn't very good -I'll give you Malone too, he was pretty much an alpha dog all the way until his last season in LA where he was part of a semi-disastrous Lakers team (or at least as disastrous as you can get for a team that finished 3 games away from a title) -Paul Pierce has found a good niche as a role player, I'm surprised you take exception to that one as he is pretty much *the* best example of a Kobe like transition, going from alpha dog playing 20-25 minutes a game, playing 3rd or 4th fiddle in an offence but still shooting ~44% from the field and 37% from 3 until this year -Garnett has been worthless for awhile but before that he evolved from the man in Minnesota and 1st year in Boston to a 3rd-4th option and good defender for a few years -Carter has been a journeyman but again an alpha dog who found a role player type role later in his career I will concede that maybe I am guilty of watching too many Kobe highlight videos from this year on Youtube when you only see his flashes of brilliance, he probably has been terrible since the achillies. But those flashes of brilliance make me think that playing 20 minutes a game defended by a teams 3rd best defender (or possibly bench guys), he could show those flashes more frequently.

Is only Fred allowed to give the answer?

To win 90 games: 83-71 To win 97 games: 90-64 To win 100 games: 93-61 To win 117 games: 110-45

I know. In the absence of pretty much no one else sucking (even Ross is swinging the bat well) he is the defacto hated Cub until further notice.

Tim Duncan, Tracy McGrady, David Robinson, Karl Malone, Gary Payton, Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, Shaq, Vince Carter just off the top of my head. Not all quite on his level but many were alpha dogs for years that took reduced roles on contenders to mixed results. I'll be honest I don't watch a lot of Lakers games, so this might be an uninformed theory but I feel like a lot of the reason he sucked is because he still played like the alpha dog and he still logged big minutes. Give him two 8 minute stretches a game, and the last 4 minutes of crunch time and you would see more flashes of good Kobe than godless chucker Kobe imo.

If any team can win the World Series before October, its this Cubs team. Don't doubt them.