UMFan83

Yea... would be nice if we could have like a sunny 70 degree day on opening day for once... We certainly didn't have one of those last year. OH WAIT What's a "last year?" I'm trying to remember anything about last year. I remember Castro, Colving hitting some homeruns and that's about all he did and I remember Heyward hitting a home run off us opening day. That's about all I got. Same here. I honestly don't remember anything about last year. I completely shut out the Cubs from May on. I have no idea why, because I watched them in 2000, 2002, 2006 when they sucked..every game. Last year I just didn't care at all. About the only vivid memory I have of last year was Castro hitting a HR in his first AB in Cincinnati. It feels like I went into a coma at that moment and woke up yesterday as far as baseball is concerned.

I am one of these odd people. Derranged is more like it. What next, Cubs and Red Wings fans?

The players have cars shipped to AZ then back to CHI? Why wouldn't they just rent cars for ST or have the organization set up a deal with a local car dealership to get loaner cars for a month or so. Seems like quite a waste of money doing what they do. Anyways, what kind of car does Marshall have? Not sure...his car was still being unloaded from the truck when I walked by. I am such a loser, I made eye contact with Marshall and then immediately looked the other way and then spent the next 10 minutes thinking about all the cool things I could have casually said in that situation.

It's not that he thinks Rose is terrible at defense, he just thinks Thibodeau should get all of the credit for any defensive improvement, and Rose should get none. That's a little absurd. Problem is, there isn't a really good way to determine how effective a player is defensively. Going by straight defensive rating, Boozer is in the top 10 (along with the rest of the team, practically). Going merely by the difference in team defensive rating when a player is on the floor vs. without, Rose is the worst defender in the NBA, and Howard is in the bottom 10. No, the problem is that the award is subjective and this dude took a stand a long time ago and now has to search out ways to make it seem right. That compounded with the fact he is the inventor of a decidedly flawed statistic that shows Derrick in a negative light give him little choice but to make his stand. The problem is also that we Derrick Rose fans are super, giddily annoying and when someone presents opinions that are anything but completely positive, they get a lot of attention from us in the form of page views and more generated discussion. Seriously, we Rose fans are almost intolerable in our devotion and even though he deserves the positive attention, from a rhetorical perspective, we cause a lot of people to form adversarial opinions based mostly on how over the top we are. Completely agree. I read that Daily Dime Live chats on ESPN.com and almost every day, there is a long Derrick Rose discussion, and half of it is people ripping on the bloggers for "dissing" Rose. Love me some Rose, but I can understand the backlash.

I walked by Wrigley to grab my tickets for tomorrow at Will Call and they were unloading all the players cars, shipped from Arizona. I saw Sean Marshall waiting for his car to get unloaded. Cool story right?

The Reds won by a run. Looks like Dusty is justified in playing from 1 run down 3 in the first inning. Keep it coming Dusty!

What are your Pirate expectations this year?

Wait what? When did Barney become our starting 2B? Having a non-prospect with little upside start on Opening Day is something a team like the Pirates is forced to do, not the Cubs.

Jimm-....Raul Ib...does Bobby Abreu still play for them?

Mine is just a gut feeling based on the injuries and the age of their offensive regulars. 32,31,32,32,35,38,23. Those are the ages of their expected offensive regulars (once Utley and Brown come back). While most of them are still young enough to mostly be in their prime, they are still at the age where decline and injuries are not that uncommon. We'll see. It's mostly a gut prediction based on how everyone loves the phillies this year despite a shaky offense.

It's not baseless, and I don't irrationally hate Soriano. I just don't think he's going to be very good this year, based on a number of factors. I readily admit I could be wrong. I really hope he does great though, even if it means I have to see him do that John Cena thing 40 times this year.

Possibly. He was injured all of 09 so we have no idea where his skills when healthy were. He's certainly declined from 08 to 10. All I know is he had a great start to last year and fairly awful the last 3/4 of the year.

This Agreed. It's the worst thing ever. I think fans everywhere can agree with this.

Why just his last 400 PA? Because that's when he started his downward spiral, and was convenient for me because I believe Soriano continues his decline this year. I don't think he'll be awful but I'm not really holding out hope he returns to his 07-08 levels. To the other responder, it depends on what you are looking at. BR has him at -0.1 dWAR, fangraphs has him at 5.2 UZR. Either way, he's not someone you keep in the lineup for his defense.

He's no Koyie Hill, and the comment above is too extreme, but I'm not going to pretend the 35 year old declining hitter with negative defensive value and a .734 OPS in his last 400 PA last year is anything but a below average player with an bad contract.

Soooo St. Louis

Where did you get 2.9?? It was 1.4 according to baseball-reference. http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/s/soriaal01.shtml Also, he was never quite a superstar.

I'll be incredibly wrong as always.... East *Yankees 100-62 *Red Sox 93-69 Orioles 82-80 Rays 76-86 Blue Jays 74-88 Central *Twins 91-71 Tigers 88-74 White Sox 83-79 Royals 70-92 Indians 66-96 West *Rangers 86-76 Athletics 85-77 Angels 81-81 Mariners 73-89 Red Sox over Twins 3-0 Yankees over Rangers 3-0 Yankees over Red Sox 4-2 East *Braves 93-69 *Phillies 90-72 Marlins 79-83 Nationals 71-91 Mets 68-94 Central *Reds 91-71 Brewers 86-76 Cardinals 85-77 Cubs 76-86 Pirates 71-91 Astros 61-101 West *Giants 94-68 Rockies 90-72 Dodgers 80-82 Padres 73-89 Diamondbacks 69-93 Giants over Phillies 3-2 Reds over Braves 3-1 Giants over Reds 4-1 Yankees over Giants 4-1 I don't like how that turned out. I didn't really put much thought into it. AL MVP: Mark Teixeria NL MVP: Albert Pujols AL Cy: David Price NL Cy: Tim Lincecum

I wasn't a fan of the move at the time (primarily because it resulted in us signing Aaron Miles), but there's no way to argue it wasn't a good move at this point. DeRo dropped off considerably in 2009, while Stevens and Gaub have shown potential and Archer was excellent (until we turned him and Lee into Garza). Keeping DeRo wouldn't have been a good idea. DeRo was good for Cleveland, but got hurt and dropped off in St. Louis, then went to SF and got hurt. Who knows what he'd done if healthy. Plus, DeRo was our glue dude, we win the Central in 2009 with him. OK yeah maybe not :)

Meh, they have some pieces. If Bruce can become a .950 OPS hitter like many think he can be, its hard to beat him and Votto in the middle of the order. Pitching wise they have a few decent starters but nothing dominating. I think they are hoping Volquez can return to the form he had in his all star year, and eventually hope that Chapman can be an ace quality starter. That's gonna give them a good chance to compete every year. Their farm system is decent from what I've read, but clearly not at the level it was a few years ago. Chapman is the best one they have, but they also have 3-4 more guys that would make a top 100 list (Hamilton, that catcher dude, and a first baseman come to mind). Overall, they could end up being a great team for many years...its possible. But I'm not thinking 'the central is unwinnable for the next few years'

You don't take very general references to Michael Jordan and turn it into complaining about how MJ got all the calls from the refs?

this totally makes me feel better about the pistons walking off the court, they weren't doing it because they were bad sports, but because jordan probably treated them in that series like he treated chamillionaire, both on and off the court. he most likely literally stuck his wiener in them. No they were just mad because Jordan didn't get touched all series and still shot 578 FTAs. /SSR

byrd should not be batting 3rd, it should be Ramirez/Pena/Soto 3/4/5. Byrd 6th, let Soriano flail away at the 7 spot, and then the 2 pitchers at 8/9

I would be stunned if he was a Cub. We have 3 second baseman on the roster already, and all have more upside than whatever Castillo could give us offensively and defensively. The only reason he would become a Cub is if Jim Hendry's fetish for collecting broken down second basemen returned. We have three underwhelming young guys who don't offer anything we might be able to call consistent. Just knowing what you're gonna get is something Hendry seems to place a premium on. Hendry will send DeWitt down to AAA, platoon Castillo and Baker, and let Barney play backup MI. He'll then look to upgrade the position with an Aaron Hill or Kelly Johnson (maybe even a Jose Reyes) around the deadline if we're still in it. proclamation> I just don't see Jim Hendry picking up a 36 year old 2B that had a .600 OPS last year in 250 AB and has been cut by 2 seperate teams this offseason, 1 of which ate $6 million to get rid of him, and the other whose starting 2B is going to be out at least a couple of months, and signed Castillo, took a look at him, and then cut him a week later. He's done and will get no major league offers. Say what you want about the underwhelming trio of Baker, DeWitt and Barney but neither of them will OPS lower than .615 this year.

A far cry from 2009 when 17 of the 21 "experts" picked the Cubs to win the Central http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/preview09/news/story?page=09expertpicks