XZero771679666304

MURTON! HR!

This strike zone is tiny. I hope Z brought his control today.

Looks like he hit it hard. He did.

It would be nice if Jones completed the cycle here....

A couple of those balls looked like strikes, but I'm not complaining.

Looking good!

Let's keep this a game thread. Great start!

Not allowed. I agree. 2nd favorite teams are crap. You can enjoy watching a certain team play but you can't openly root for them unless it's the playoffs and your team is done. Well they are a distant 2nd. I'm going to the Cards\Sox game this year in Cardinal gear with a bunch of Sox fans. GO SOX! Well played. I'm outta here, I am far too tired for any witty repartee, and my sense of humor is shot for the day. Goodnight everyone.

Funny, as a Cards fan I'd have thought you'd put a higher premium on class. Have you seen the mullets at busch? Not in a long time, thankfully. I guess the Sox and Cards have at least that in common. Besides, I was referring more to the teams themselves. Guys ike Pierzynski and Buehrle aren't exactly ambassadors of sportsmanship and etiquette.

Funny, as a Cards fan I'd have thought you'd put a higher premium on class.

Hey now, it's one thing to be a Cards fan or a Sox fan, but rooting for both might make you the Antichrist.

I hated the bastards long before last year's abortion of a season. That about sums it up. My hatred for the Sox reached terminal mass long before 2005. ok, since I am really bored, wouldn't that be either critical mass or terminal velocity? You're right. I have been up for like 26 hours and I tend to jumble things up when I am tired.

Hey, the Cubs should pick him up. You can never have enough second basemen.

I hated the bastards long before last year's abortion of a season. That about sums it up. My hatred for the Sox reached terminal mass long before 2005.

I think the 75+ IP he had last year at the major league level with a .219 BAA and 10.6 K/9 matters more than the 8+ IP he has in spring training this year. Spoken like Dusty Baker himself, haha. 8) Just kidding man. Seriously though---I don't view Wuertz as established enough to survive on reputation. To me he's a borderline major leaguer. I'd like to go with the hot hand when it comes to those guys. At the end of the day, I hope Wuertz tears it up and proves me totally wrong. I don't know. Wuertz is pretty filthy. Guys have a very tough time getting contact when they do swing. His numbers last season were no fluke. The problem is his stamina. He seems to really lose it as his workload increases. When he gets tired, it's BP. At least that has been my perception.

http://www.bleedcubbieblue.com/

Just because you don't like what they say doesn't mean thier viewpoint has no merit. I was referring mostly to PECOTA, and to this year's predictions. And for the record, I would have agreed the the above prediction a year ago.

In Diamond Mind 2006 simulations The Cubs scored 703 runs in 2005, PECOTA projects the Cubs to score 725 in 2006 Both PECOTA and Diamond Mind project the Cubs to have a record of 85-77 in 2006 and that is WITH Prior and Wood making 55-60 starts. After looking at what both of them say about the rest of the bigs, I put next to zero stock in that.

Mane some. And when you do, let's count up the number of bad moves you can think of, and see what the ratio is. If the ratio is even 1:3 good moves to bad, I'd be shocked. There is a reason Dusty Baker is a punch line in a great many circles. I have been watching Cubs Baseball for a Long time, and I have to go back to Jim Essian to recall another manager as inept as Dusty.

Like I said, I think a full year of Aramis will nullify Lee's inevitable regression. What I am struggling with is how you think that going from the worst pen in the league to possibly the best (especially when the pen cost us so many games last year) isn't worth 5-7 wins. I think that's being conservative. No, everthing didn't go bad last year. But outside of Lee, not much went right. Corey had his worst year, Burnitz declined, Walker got hurt, Aramis got hurt, Prior, Wood, Hollandsworth flopped, Lawton went in the toilet after we aquired him, Nomar missed most of the season, a month of good closing was wasted because Dusty went to Hawkins, Hairston was disappointing and he missed time. Neifi had a career month (which really ended up being superfluous), and Lee and Dempster had breakout years. And the impact of Lee's career year was really deadened by the abysmal performances of Patterson, Perez, Macias & Co. The bad break to good break ratio was pretty lopsided, and some of those bad breaks have been removed (Patterson and Macias), and due to conditioning others (Ramirez) are far less likely to occur. Also I think a bad break would be for Pierre to repeat his 2005, which would still qualify as a huge improvement over last year. Also, I don't think Murton could do any worse or even as badly as our LF's did last year, or Cedeno any worse than Perez did. The bullpen, barring an unprecedented rash of injuries, simply cannot be as bad as last year. Any way you cut it, the odds against having anything other than a net gain are astronomical, IMO.

It's not that bad. Blanco is as good as any other backup catcher. Mabry is a respectable pinch hitter. Neifi is an ideal backup SS off of the bench, especially if he can hit .270 again and keep up his defense. Hairston and Bynum are decent backup guys. We'll see how Pagan does, but at least we know we have plenty of speed off of the bench. The only thing we're missing is that Glenallen Hill type of RH bat off of the bench. I agree that it's not good. But sadly, it's better than last year's version.

Outside of Cano, all the Yanks have is uber-expensive players and riff raff.

Kerry Wood won't be taking a pay cut as long as; a. Some other team will be willing to pay him more guaranteed. b. (more importantly) Scott Boras is his agent. Scott Boras is his agent? Not that I'm aware of. I thought the Hendricks brothers represented Kerry.

Baker tried Macias/Perez once, but he tried Patterson/Perez far too many times. And as for the idea that he was "experimenting" with Macias/Perez, that is silly. You don't need to experiment with that to know it won't work. It's like me going under the sink and "experimenting" by drinking some bleach. When you have guys who have abysmal career OBP consistently batting on top of your order, that has crossed the line from experimentation to foolishness. Walker, who has more success in the leadoff role than all the other players used in that role last year combined, and who had great success in the first half of 2004, was used as "protection" for Ramirez. Meanwhile, Derrek and ARam continued to have no one but each other to drive in. Why? because Dusty seems to think you have to be fast to bat at the top of the order, with actually being on base to use that speed seemingly an afterthough to him. Nevermind the fact that Perez isn't fast, and was third in the entire league in GIDP, so once every blue moon when the leadoff guy got on, Neifi erased them both. Blindly relying on percentage certainly has its pitfalls, but when you blatantly ignore them in favor of longshot gambles and inexplicable loyalties, you are doing far more of a disservice to your team, and are negligent in your duties as manager. Hawkins is the prime example of this. He was terrible in multiple opportunities as a closer in Minnesota, and that was a well known fact. In spite of this, Dusty runs him out there. He is bad, so Dusty runs him out there some more. He continues to be bad. Next season, Hendry suggests using Dempster as closer in ST. Dusty changes his mind and runs Hawkins out there again, and Hawkins is horrible again. The team is hurt, and Hawkins is ruined by the whole fiasco. Prior throwing 116 pitches with an 11 run lead because his PC was supposed to be 115. Consitently leaving his pitcher out there when there is a lead. Batting Macias as the first PH. Leaving vets out there to stink for long periods. Batting Burnitz in between Ramirez and Lee just because he is LH. Batting Lenny Harris leadoff. Pitching Chad Fox three days in a row and leaving him out there to toil in a blowout when he is coming off an injury and shouldn't even be pitch consecutive days. And on, and on, and on. You can try and spin all you want, but Dusty is a poor manager. And Dusty had good team before 2002, plus the West was a weak division. Matt Williams, Ellis Burks, J.T. Snow, Rich Aurilia, Billy Swift, Rod Beck, Robb Nen, John Burkett, Kirk Rueter, Russ Ortiz and Shawn Estes all gave Dusty's Giants their best years along side Kent and Bonds. Other notables who contributed positively to some of those teams include Willie McGee, Robby Thompson and Livan Hernandez. Many of those players had a few superstar caliber seasons during that run. Dusty had good teams in San Francisco, don't kid yourself.

I'm with you. I think the Cubs and Wood agree to throw out that option year and re-negotiate a new deal. But this only happens if Wood stays healthy after his return. Anything less and he's gone. I see absolutely no point in doing this unless he has makes a minimum 15 starts during which he pitches well above avg. Look, I know we all love Woody, but if he can't be relied on it makes no sense to bring him back. Freeing up 13 mill (or 12 or whatever he makes) so that we could sign another big bat would go a long way towards improving this team. I wasn't saying he will make 10+ million next year, but I would be shocked if he isn't still a Cub in 2007. I think they'll buy ouy his option and sign him to a low base, high incentive deal. The market isn't going to be too hot for him after three injury-shortened years. I also think they will sign another starter so there isn't so much riding on Kerry.