Transmogrified Tiger

Macias is terrible, there's only been a couple non-catchers in the NL worse than him this year that have near as many PA's as him. He's terrible compared to bench players too. CPatt, That is simply not true. I just did a check of every team's stats. I quit after looking at the first 9 teams because every one of them had at least one player (non-catchers, mind you) who was comparable to or worse than Jose Macias has been this season. We might like to believe that there are enough good players out there such that Macias wouldn't make any major league team if cut from the Cubs, but that simply isn't accurate. Those that have faulted or continue to fault Hendry for having Macias on this roster are simply mistaken and apparently haven't done their homework in this regard. Macias has played the middle infield, 3B and some OF for the Cubs and has hit .294/.312/.353 in 119 ABs. Here is a short list of players who play the same positions for other teams, have comparable or worse numbers and have a similar amount of ABs or more. Marlon Byrd. Jamey Carroll. Quinton McCracken. David Newhan. Pablo Ozuna. Timo Perez. D'Angelo Jimenez. Jose Hernandez. Corey Sullivan. Desi Relaford. Every one of those players has more ABs than Macias this season except for Jimenez who has just 14 less than him. Also, most of those players have performed considerably worse than Jose has this season, and I only checked about 1/3 of the league. There was generally one per team and often times more. To say that "there's only been a couple non-catchers in the NL worse than him this year that have near as many PA's as him. He's terrible compared to bench players too" is simply not the truth. I already did the legwork a week or so ago. Going by Runs Created, Macias only had 5-6 non-catchers that were worse than him in the NL with at least 100 PA's. Grissom, Mondesi, Guzman, a dodgers OF(can't remember which, Grabowski?), and at least one Rockie. I'll do it again to see if anything has changed.

Kelton is an outfielder, he requested the move off of third base.

Wouldn't Hill fill in at 2B? I don't know if he'll hit enough for 3B.

I dunno, Ellis has done well, and Scutaro has performed as well as Bellhorn has.

BP Jerseys

Really? I don't remember the stats, but I thought RJ had a better era, IP, and K rate. Johnson: 2.60 ERA, 246.2 IP, 10.62 K/9, .89 WHIP Zambrano: 2.75 ERA, 210.2 IP, 8.07 K/9, 1.21 WHIP Looks like Johnson was better.

That's not an example; that's fiction. Pujols would no longer be playing on an MLB team. 9 year olds was just an exaggeration to get the point that the team would be terrible. My point was that players on teams with very low win totals could get shortchanged with Win Shares. Have you read the book? I'm at work so I don't have my copy handy but I know that point is addressed multiple times. No I haven't, in fact I don't know which book you're referring to.

That's not an example; that's fiction. Pujols would no longer be playing on an MLB team. 9 year olds was just an exaggeration to get the point that the team would be terrible. My point was that players on teams with very low win totals could get shortchanged with Win Shares.

That WHIP has taken a hit in the last month, good thing it hasn't hurt us yet.

To answer your question, because he's not on the 40 man roster. and yet pitchers who have stunk in AAA like Rohlicek and Bartosh and Leicester ARE on the 40 man. Yet Van Buren who, a lot of Cub "Minor League enthusiasts" say doesn't have Major League stuff, has for 2 seasons now, has had nothing but success, Isn't on the 40 man. But then again, for the most part, this is coming from the same group that thought Hee Seop and Bobby Hill, David Kelton and even Kevin Orie (almost forgot Mitre), were going to be perennial All Stars. Uh, no.

But no one did anything at the deadline, Farnsworth and Lawton were really the only moves. You could say similar things about Bowden, Minaya, Wade, even Garagiola(he's still in AZ, right?).

Macias is terrible, there's only been a couple non-catchers in the NL worse than him this year that have near as many PA's as him. He's terrible compared to bench players too.

I agree with you, but everyone wants to argue this same point when I defend Maddux. People bring up WHIP and ERA and say a starting pitcher's W/L record isn't the best way to judge him. Well, if you look at all those special stats, Maddux and Dempster both suck, but the bottom line is Maddux finds a way to win and Dempster finds a way to save the game. Unless he's gone south since I last checked, Dempster had very good peripherals in the closer role.

I didn't like it a lot, but it's not exactly a comparable situation. The Cubs have neither a double digit lead, nor the least used bullpen in the game.

To continue the car analogy, you wouldn't pay more for the Grand Prix than the Lamborghini just because the Grand Prix has a full tank of gas. The Lamborghini itself is better, and that's all it has control over.

He's never been a top prospect, and he doesn't have the stuff of say, a Wellemeyer. You may see him added this offseason, but since during the season they aren't easy to come by, a AAA reliever is low on the priority list to get put on.

To answer your question, because he's not on the 40 man roster.

But better than losing a game or 3 in standings as well, too. at this point in the season, gaining one game every other week or so may as well be losing three. but i agree...they're playing better of late. I think they have to sweep Colorado next though. They can't just win series anymore.............they have to go on a roll. The weekend series for Wildcard teams: CHC @ COL (3 games) WSH @ PHI (Doubleheader Thursday) WSH @ NYM (3 games) PIT @ NYM (1 game) PIT @ PHI (3 games) MIL @ HOU (4 games) LAD @ FLA (3 games) Looks like the Cubs and Phillies have the easiest go at it. You would root hard for Milwaukee if the Cubs weren't neck and neck with them. Here's the way I look at it: There are so many teams ahead of the Cubs, it's hard to root for or against any one team. Essentially, when the Cubs win, they net a half game on the league (gain 1 game on half the league, keep up with half the league), and when the Cubs lose, they lose a net half game on the league (lose 1 game to half the league, stay even with half the league). Basically, in order to have a realistic shot at the playoffs, they need to make up a total of about 11.5 games on the league, meaning they'd have to play 23 games over .500 for the rest of the season. With 41 games remaining, that entails going 32-9 here on out, which would result in a 91-71 record. That's basically a bare minimum. So I'm not expecting a whole lot, just hoping the team can play well here on out. I don't understand how 90 or 91 wins is a bare minimum. In order for either of the wild card leaders to make it to 91 wins, they have to play .643 baseball for the rest of the year, which is a better percentage than any major league team this year. And that's if one of the leaders takes it. The Cubs need to get hot, but 90 wins would put them in very good shape, considering they play 7 more with Houston and the NL east teams face each other so many times.

Walker's hit chart Patterson's hit chart Walker grounds out and singles more to the right side, but he doubles and flies out more the other way. He's a pretty balanced hitter on the most part. Patterson is pretty much a pull hitter. He has the ability to hit with power to the opposite field, but his failures and successes happen most on the right side.

While I agree that Dusty should be fired, I think we should pick and chose when we argue against him and JH. The fact that Fontenot is hitting 272 at AAA and is blocked by Walker (who is hitting 300 plus in the bigs) is a really silly point and only makes those of us who really want Dusty gone for valid reasons loook as though we would complain about anyone there. When you complain about everything under the sun even if some of it is valid the message gets watered down. It looks as though you are whining and people don't like whiners. See also Democrats complaining about GW. They complained about silly stuff (such as what he wore) to the point where everyone just ignored everything even the valid points. I don't want Fontenot replacing Walker, I want him replacing Macias/Neifi.

Nomar is day-to-day. He says he'll be ready to play Friday after the off day.

Yeah, didn't realize there was a club option on the books... for either of them, actually. (What is "RC"?) RC is Runs Created, a counting metric for offensive performance. There are several variations of calculating RC, googling "define runs created" will link you to some sites if you want to learn more.

Relating to this Nathan, how do you get the split information? Does the team track it? Can you get this info for opposing players? As you know, this sort of information is very useful when evaluating minor leaguers, and yet there is very little of it available to the public. Yeah CP, unfortunately all that info is on a Private Backdoor site that we have to use passwords to get to and they won't even allow us to give the passwords to our local media outlets or beat writers. The Private Stats site is for front office use only to give stats to the coaches and scouts. I can give splits on our players if needed, I have no problem with that. Other than Home-Road, Situational (bases loaded, RISP, RISP & 2outs) Left-Right and Monthly stats, everything I use I track myself...this includes lead-off walks scoring, inherited runners scoring, outfield assists, pick-offs, hit-streaks, multi-hit games, etc. I have excel charts for EVERYTHING....and it takes a while each night/day to update....thank god for interns at home! Bummer, it'd be real nice to have L/R and Home/Road for minor leaguers. Thanks for the info.

Bummer, why couldn't it have been Edmonds instead of Rolen?

There's no way Loretta's option doesn't get picked up by SD. Also, Walker and Loretta have been comparable hitters this year, going by RC Walker is a tick better. We have a cheap option on Walker, and there's no reason not to pick it up and not have to worry about 2B next year.