Soul

Who is accepting low standards? Hendry isn't accepting low standards, either. He just has no idea what he's doing and actually believes he's buidling a winner. Standards are too low if anything other than a Championship is acceptable. Hendry may have convinced himself he's building a winner, but he's put himself in the sweepstakes for better players than what we have. He just settles for less and the Trib, being the board room faceless owners that they are, don't allow him to spend whatever it takes. We could build from the minors and save alot of money; that's an alternate route to spending a ton of cash. Other teams have done it. But Hendry has built a farm system of crap with no emphasis on fundamentals, no emphasis on OBP. It's terrible. Those are low standards. Takes alot of work to build a winning franchise. Ours has never shown---and I mean NEVER shown----the gumption to do the damn difficult work and the long hours and the digging in the dirt that it would take to turn this thing around, either from the FA perspective, or the development perspective. Those are low standards. Where is the teaching? Where is the commitment to acquiring the best, no matter the cost? Where is the accountability? Don't hand me the payroll figures, either. I'm so sick of that argument. Trib bloats it's payroll on junk players so it can claim it wants to win. Bull-pucky. They care like a millionaire cares when he buys his 15th Mercedes. Some may think they're going to live forever so they can handle a few more years of terrible baseball in the hopes that it works out. I did this in the '80s. I'm too old now. Seriously, I've bled Cubbie blue for 40+ years. I want to see a Champion before I die. I watched my Dad die without ever having seen one just last year. I'm sick of this nonsense. Everyone has a clever argument why this stuff is all going to work out, or it isn't as bad as it seems. Meanwhile, we continue to tank over & over. Enough! I want some accountability. Who among us would have a job with this kind of performance?

I'll take the Jones contract if I can show Pierre the door in turn for a real center fielder, and someone to platoon with Murton in LF. Pierre must go. Preferrably today. Yes, I would call up Pie---as long as Clines and Sarge get a nice long vacation; the kind with a one-way ticket out of town. I need to see the end of Neifi. It's like a man who just had surgery for lung cancer, and the doctor says "you must quit smoking or you will die." That's Neifi. We must be rid of him or we'll die. Wood must go. He will never be a workhorse starter again, and everyone on the planet knows it. Prior gets one more chance to prove he will carry the load. Yes, you heard me, one more chance or Prior must go. Sorry, but this Irish tap-dance routine with pitchers hitting the D/L before spring training even begins must stop. Prior and Wood are worse than Rusch and Williams----because Prior and Wood are the REASON Rusch and Williams must trot to the mound and give up massive runs. I'm sick of Gooz. He's either a prime prospect or a bust. You don't get to languish in the minors for a damn decade and still be called a good prospect. Yes, I'm exaggerating, but Gooz gets one more callup. If he pulls the crap he did last time, then bye. Pitching: Williamson, yep. Eyre, yep. Howry, yep. Dempster, still yep. Blanco must go. At some point the defensive skills can't outweigh bad offense. Blanco is well past that point. Minor leagues: we need a coaching clean-house. Those jokers haven't developed a position player of real substance since Mark Grace. The players they bring us are most often unable to discern the strikezone, and have terrible fundamentals all around. Enough of this crap. When will someone see this and make some changes? We are a minor-league catastrophe position-player wise. Worst ever.

Welcome to the boards, Jim Hendry!

The only acceptable rock bottom for a winner is anything less than a championship. If that sounds ridiculous to you, then you just hit on why we are a perennial loser, while other teams make runs at World Series titles. We have been lulled into accepting low standards. We take the scraps from winners and pray for a miracle, while others are implementing strategies designed to produce champions.

Go for the Gusto. Hire Piniella.

Jason Dubois turned into Justin Berg, a high A pitcher with a 2-3 record and a 4.40 ERA Jody Gerut and Matt Lawton were just middlemen in that whole process. I don't know how any of that can be a good thing. It can't, especially considering the minor leagues are now pretty much drained and it has yielded what is likely a 95 loss ballclub. Hendry's a vampire; he's sucked all the blood out of this franchise top to bottom. The ARam/Lofton trade doesn't excuse the cavalcade of crap he's foisted on us ever since.

Of course the Cubs will win this game, and likely two of three. Anything to get our hopes up for a moment and then... smack! down again. Except at this point, the best thing that could happen is for us to continue losing, and losing badly.

It's too bad MacPhail is such a dullard he didn't see Hendry starting to choke on his mission last year, when many of us on this very board were seeing the cracks in the armor. We saw it, but MacPhail couldn't. Hmmmmm......strange that unpaid fans can see what multi-million dollar executives cannot. Instead he signed him to an extension, which has this entire franchise trapped in a corner like an animal. Except unlike many animals who are cornered, this one has no fight... Terrible situation. This will go on for awhile. I hope we're prepared to see the blue "L" flag flying, because that's what it is going to be for a good long while. ...and once again Cub fans are left with that "punched in the gut" feeling. May 25th, wow. Didn't take long for this season to tank.

Cuban would bring an all-consuming desire to win that doesn't exist with the Tribune. Is it motivated by a vain desire to be worshipped? You bet. So freaking what? Like he's the first owner to be full of himself. Hah. I'd love to see him here. Although, to be fair, all of this was sparked by an off-the-cuff remark Cuban made on a radio show one day. There isn't anything serious that points to Cuban buying the Cubs. Nothing I'm aware of, anyway. A few comments made to Tony Kornheiser or whoever doesn't mean much.

states simply. 3-3 is a whole lot better then 0-6. I see improvement. It might be small but I see it. Well----they did have a great comeback win in a hostile ballpark yesterday. Sure it was sparked by a Uribe error, but the bats still needed to take advantage afterwards and they did. That's definitely something to hang your hat on going into this week. Let's see what happens in Miami.

Good to see Hill own up to his comments. Sure, he has a right to say them. We all have the right to say whatever we wish. But it wasn't a good idea for him to inject himself into that situation, especially when it was a clean play and everyone knows it, and Barrett was already trying to own up to his mistake, calling it a clean play. Hill showed some character. Good for him.

Barrett's is appropriate. Love the guy, but what he did was dead wrong. Not so sure about Mabry though---? Anderson should get some games.

I definitely agree he's annoying as hell. Still though, if I'm a rook with an 0-6 record, I'm not giving the likes of Ozzie any ammunition on the eve of being sent down. I hope Hill can recover from it. I'll bet he slept very little last night---and he didn't strike me as a guy with the thickest of skins.

HAHAHHAAHHA Defending a teammate = headcase. Greg Maddux when he beaned a guy in retaliation his rookie year to stand up for a teammate = crazy headcase. Shoulda traded him for a 2B. He's a headcase because he says stuff like he pitches like Sandy Koufax before he even threw a major league pitch. Then he backs it up with one of the worst starts to a major league career in history. If you think we're watching a young Koufax, I apologize to you. Personally, I don't think he is or ever will be near that good, but that's just my opinion. Koufax? This guy might not ever make it back to the major leagues. He really said that? That's insulting to baseball fans everywhere.

I just had a feeling this would be the case. You can't continually visit the DL time after time without there being a long term effect eventually. Same with Wood.

Give me Bobby V. any day of the week. I'd take Brenly, though I think there are better options. Cuban would rule. I'd love to see someone own this club who would make it his PERSONAL mission to bring a world series to the north side. Face it, the Tribune is faceless----they may have good intentions, but nobody in those board rooms are making the Cubs their personal crusade. Especially if it means telling stockholders the bottom line won't look quite as good this year.

Says you. I wasn't aware until now that if one is a rookie they're not allowed to say or do anything to defend a teammate. How long has this "established" practice been going on? Is there some sort of level system? If you are a second year player do you get to do it once? How about if you are rookie but make the all-star team; is it ok then? Please, tell me the rules so I can make an informed judgment. Not giving up a slam the day you do it might help. Winning a single big league game also would be good. Look, Hill can say whatever he wants. But he's an easy target because he sucks, and Ozzie made him look like an absolute fool. I'd rather not watch my team's players make fools out of themselves, thanks.

He's got to be better than Rusch.

I'm giddy. It's a miracle we even took one game from the Sox. You all should be too. That was the high point of our season.

He never recovered from that error. It destroyed his career, as did the Leon Durham error in '84. That error, like Durham's, kept the Cubs from the World Series and reaffirmed the curse of the goat. In truth, the Cubs haven't recovered from Gonzalez's error, either. It was devastating on a level that is difficult to comprehend.

Its like that other places too.Some people feel if you haven't been " on the job" long enough you do not have a right to an opinion. But for some strange reason it was ok for both Prior and Zambrano to stand up to Bonds? I mean afterall he is an established player and they weren't at the time. Oh that's right, nobody likes Bonds so it was ok. Any time someone stands up to a cheater it's a good thing. No. What is happening in this thread is hypocricy at its finest. If Hill were 4-0 with a respectable ERA I suspect some of the opinions in this thread would change. I don't like what Barrett did, but I think Hill was trying to defend a teammate. Since when is that a bad thing? Oh, yeah when the player is playing well. Go figure. It's a bad thing when you're a rookie who sucks bones, and you call an established veteran a dirty player. That's when. Especially when Barrett himself admitted it was a clean play. No hypocrisy here. Hill should shut up. And learn how to pitch.

Its like that other places too.Some people feel if you haven't been " on the job" long enough you do not have a right to an opinion. But for some strange reason it was ok for both Prior and Zambrano to stand up to Bonds? I mean afterall he is an established player and they weren't at the time. Oh that's right, nobody likes Bonds so it was ok. Any time someone stands up to a cheater it's a good thing.

Of course Hill has the right to comment. But for his own sake, he shouldn't have. Ozzie pretty much owned him in his response, and then the kid was sent down. One day he's a major leaguer. The next he's slammed into the mud by a World Champion manager and sent packing. PWNED. I don't like seeing that from my team. It makes us look stupid.

ozzie managed his team to a world series. Maybe Rich Hill will when he finishes his playing career. I bet if we go back through the press clippings we'll find that Ozzie didn't wait until he achieved that little fait accompli before he ran his mouth. Probably not. But Hill has done absolutely nothing. He should shut up. Forget what Ozzie does with himself.

Dusty confirms Wood may not start Tues. He's sore. After 1 start. Hear that sound? That's the soft, weak, whimper that is the end of Kerry Wood's career.