XZero771679666304

It's no more insane than $10+ million for .500 pitchers and $8-!2 million for mediocre hitters. It's all pretty insane right now. I bet ARod is licking his chops.

Ah, a wonderful pissing match, full of sound and fury....

Strictly as a player, you're right. But for being a player + putting butts in Safeco's seats, he might be worth it.

Better yet, move Fonz to right and Rowand to center. Either way, TLR is either prodigiously stupid or just didn't want to use Albert for his own team's benefit. I'll go with the latter. I mean saving Albert that one AB might make the difference between 3rd or 4th place. I didn't want Albert to PH for Lee, but I was literally stunned that he let Hudson go up there. It's inexcusable.

You mean CF? And he has hit as many as 15 homers, and carries a mid-.400's SLG to go with his .379 career OBP, 30+ steals per year and stellar defense. Granted the OBP is AVG heavy, but he does it year in and year out, so who cares? Currently, his OPS is .865, which is 6th among CF, but would be 7th among RF, his old position. His career OPS of .818 would be at least adequate at any OF position.

I read that article and it appears like a way for Williams to say he improved this year and the future. He and Guillen have recently had another meeting discussing the state of the 2007 team, and they both agreed if the Sox are still in the race, especially if they have a good showing against the Twins this weekend. The Sox have long been out of the race, and I'm sensing Williams is too scared to admit it because he's afraid of losing the trades that are inevitable for his sinking club. The Sox are not only out of the race, but I think they are in very serious trouble for the next 3-4 years. The Indians and Twins are not only better, but much younger and the Tigers are certainly better for now. Kenny Williams needs to trade Buerhle et al. for as many good prospects as he can get to think about competing in 2009-2010. Don't forget that he has an owner that won't spend much on the free agent market. I would agree. Kenny needs to deal his potential fa's. If he doesn't he'll be screwing the team for years. And I am no fan of Williams, but he can't be stupid enough to think he could get Greene and Linebrink for Dye.

Two wrongs don't make a right. The Cubs just need to swap Hill for Soto and get it over with.

no kidding...he hasn't had ANY success to this point. You know Shawn Estes had isolated stretches of success for the Cubs in 2003. maybe the worst comparison i've ever heard. I like Rich too, but it's clear something is wrong beyond just having a few bad outings. It seems that unless he has total command of his curveball(s), he's increasingly horrible. His fastball is adequate, but only with paired with an effective curve. Without the curve being sharp and thrown for strikes, he's a BP pitcher. Fortunately for Rich, he has gone through prolonged stretches where his curve was good, and the league was still trying to get a solid read on him. It appears they have, and a trend has developed, and it's not a good one. Rich needs another pitch to cover his butt when his curve is less than spectacular. Either that, or he is going to have to continually change up his pitch/situation strategies to prevent hitters from sitting on pitches. It seems a lot simpler to just add a pitch. Plenty of players have come into the league and looked awesome, only to fade into obscurity as they were figured out. Rich can still be awesome, but it may be evolve or die time for him. wow, that is being ridiculously harsh. It's a metaphor, abuck. What I am trying to say is that he may be at a key juncture in his career. His m.o. has been figured out, and his bad outings are becoming much more frequent. Since early May, he's had as many bad outings (4 or more ER) as good ones (QS), and as many horrible outings (5+ ER, less than 5 IP) as great ones 6+ IP, one or less ER). Why? He has one great pitch, and one average pitch to to complement it. When it is great, so is he. When his great pitch is ineffective, so is he. This makes it much easier to anticipate what he is going to do. The league is starting to figure this out. And when his great pitch can be anticipated, it lessens its effectiveness. Now he can keep going as is, but be inconsistent and go from being potentially great to mediocre. Or he can augment his repertoire by adding a pitch and regain some of the advantage he has lost. Either way, he's still going to have great outings. But with some adjustment he can increase their frequency, and perhaps turn some of those garbage starts into quality ones.

no kidding...he hasn't had ANY success to this point. You know Shawn Estes had isolated stretches of success for the Cubs in 2003. maybe the worst comparison i've ever heard. I like Rich too, but it's clear something is wrong beyond just having a few bad outings. It seems that unless he has total command of his curveball(s), he's increasingly horrible. His fastball is adequate, but only with paired with an effective curve. Without the curve being sharp and thrown for strikes, he's a BP pitcher. Fortunately for Rich, he has gone through prolonged stretches where his curve was good, and the league was still trying to get a solid read on him. It appears they have, and a trend has developed, and it's not a good one. Rich needs another pitch to cover his butt when his curve is less than spectacular. Either that, or he is going to have to continually change up his pitch/situation strategies to prevent hitters from sitting on pitches. It seems a lot simpler to just add a pitch. Plenty of players have come into the league and looked awesome, only to fade into obscurity as they were figured out. Rich can still be awesome, but it may be evolve or die time for him.

Throw Izturis at him and hope he gets eaten.

I think Koyie and Soto should swap places, and Soto should start.

There's no doubt it was rigged. People were speculating about how Bonds was going to get into the ASG and the headache it was causing the commissioner, and perhaps the least popular player in the game gets a huge surge in voting at the last second. It's clear as day. Having said that, I don't care. The ASG rosters are a perennial joke anyway, and Bonds probably deserves it (statistically, at least).

this was his first quality start since May 24th. he has been mediocre or worse in every start since then (besides today, when he really should have gone 8 or perhaps more. lou sucks at BP management). 6-4 3.31 ERA .226 BAA .309 OBPA .636 OPS against He's a well above average 5th starter. The Marquis talk is ridiculous. that's because he had a fluky good first month and a half of the season. he had a 5.09 ERA in June. 823 OPS against. .382 OBP against. He is not above average. His numbers will even out by the end of the year because he is not a particularly good pitcher. I think it is being too pessimistic to assume that he can't have a good year. At this point I think it's 50/50 that he wins 10+ games and finishes with a sub-4 era. It's not as if he's never done it before. Also, he's victimized himself with one or two bad innings in recent starts, which have actually been pretty good otherwise. And even if he adds a full run to his ERA by the end of the year (which would bring him to just below his career era) and wins only 3 or 4 more games, that's still pretty good for a fifth starter.

Marmoltastic Marmolicious Marmolosity

I so thought DeRo was gonna drop that.

Its better than it might be. I'm still a little tentative. I think a lot of people (myself included) are still waiting for the other shoe to drop. From what I read in the paper today, Marquis has the second best ERA, in MLB, among all pitchers that signed FA contracts last season (Lilly is 4th). They both have been inconsistent but overall very good. I don't think it is unreasonable to think that he could keep his era under 4 and win 12-13 games. He has been bad in recent years, but his peripherals are pretty good this year, and it's not like he hasn't had a good year before. Not saying he will, but I think there is a good probability at this point.

Especially since the pen has been so overworked. It doesn't make a lot of sense.

Why not? I guess not. I don't know why Lou turned to pen when Marquis had thrown only 77 pitches, but oh well.

Why not?

Good. After he went 3-1 on Hardy, I was afraid he was gonna lose it.

Hart looks like a skinny caveman.

That's my biggest complaint about Len. Aside from ARam's blast today, I can't remember that last time that he called a HR from the moment it left the bat. Don't get me wrong, I love Len. I think he's a great announcer and he adds a lot to the broadcast. But his depth perception leaves a lot to be desired. "Swung on, belted!"... is so much better than "high fly ball to right field... it's outta here!" But how many times did Chip miss with his, "swung on, belted!" comments? There were times when he was like a fan with a poor angle in the ballpark who would get excited for any flyball to the outfield (HR or easy flyout). He missed a lot, but not much more than most. We Cubs fans are too spoiled. We can nitpick about Harry, Chip, Len & Co., but they all were much better than the average pbp guy. If I have learned anything from seeing broadcasts from other teams and having XM, it is that the vast majority of broadcasters flat out suck compared to what we're used to.

No one said Lens misses them all, just a lot of them. I have praised today's call a few times in this thread. And Uecker is quite good despite his affiliation. At least what I've heard.

That's my biggest complaint about Len. Aside from ARam's blast today, I can't remember that last time that he called a HR from the moment it left the bat. Don't get me wrong, I love Len. I think he's a great announcer and he adds a lot to the broadcast. But his depth perception leaves a lot to be desired. "Swung on, belted!"... is so much better than "high fly ball to right field... it's outta here!" It's my only complaint about Len. And Chip had a great HR call.