Transmogrified Tiger

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.

The reason the team with the better record has a better record is because they have better players overall. Say Neifi and Eckstein have each had the exact same season to this point, value wise. Eckstein won't have a higher value than Neifi because guys like Pujols and Edmonds will be taking up all those extra win shares. I'm sure now I'm getting into where Win Shares gets really complex, but how do you account for chance? Performance numbers don't correlate precisely with win-loss record, correct? This is something that people complain about. Basically, if a guy is lucky, he gets credit for it. If a team is lucky, they get credit for it. Okay, thanks for indulging me.

More walks for Cedeno, hooray.

The reason the team with the better record has a better record is because they have better players overall. Say Neifi and Eckstein have each had the exact same season to this point, value wise. Eckstein won't have a higher value than Neifi because guys like Pujols and Edmonds will be taking up all those extra win shares. I'm sure now I'm getting into where Win Shares gets really complex, but how do you account for chance? Performance numbers don't correlate precisely with win-loss record, correct?

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.

If I understand the win shares correctly, Pujols has 30 of his team's 228 win shares, or 13%. Lee has 29 of his team's 177 win shares, or 16%. Wouldn't that make him more valuable to his team than Pujols? I don't get win shares as a way of comparing players on different teams. Win Shares is a stat that tells you how many wins a given player has contributed to his team. 3 win shares = 1 win. 1 win share is hardly conclusive evidence, but it indicates that Pujols has contributed one third of a win more than Lee. If you go by percentage of team's win shares, a good player on a bad team will always look best. Bay and Dunn also rate higher than Pujols. Evaluating two players on different teams is simple, the bigger number the better. However, like I said, 1 win share is definitely not a huge margin. How is that evaluation fair, since almost every team has a different number of total win shares? If two players hypothetically performed exactly the same, and were on teams with drastically different records, wouldn't their win shares vary as well? EDIT: Here's an extreme example. Pujols gets traded to an expansion team who's pitching staff consists of 9 year olds. That team wins 12 games all year. Pujols if he is 100% of the team gets 36 win shares, a number that Derrek Lee surpasses if he is on a .500 team. So Pujols could never make an out, and not have as many win shares as Lee will at his current pace.

If I understand the win shares correctly, Pujols has 30 of his team's 228 win shares, or 13%. Lee has 29 of his team's 177 win shares, or 16%. Wouldn't that make him more valuable to his team than Pujols? I don't get win shares as a way of comparing players on different teams.

I think the 0 fer was two nights ago. I'm pretty sure he had something like 3 hits yesterday. EDIT: It was 2 for 3 with a 3B and a SB.

AVG: Lee .347 Pujols .337 OBP: Lee .426 Pujols .432 SLG: Lee .676 Pujols .629 OPS: Lee 1.102 Pujols 1.061 RC: Lee 120.1 Pujols 115.2 RC27: Lee 10.56 Pujols 10.03 ISOP: Lee .329 Pujols .294 Pujols makes strides, but Lee still leads all categories except OBP.

Also, John Kruk gained 10 pounds.

No mas.

Simple, the hitters are better, and there are more of them. Better hitters lead to more hits and runs, which lead to more high effort pitches from pitchers.

For perspective, BA before the season ranked the NL Central as follows: Brewers(3rd overall) Cubs(10th) Pirates(18th) Astros(22nd) Reds(23rd) Cardinals(30th) Also, since I wasn't sure that Reyes should be ranked higher than Pie, here are there pre-season placement in all of baseball by the BA writers. Pie: 33rd, 48th, 46th, 35th, Reyes: N/A, N/A, 41st, N/A

attempted 3-6-1 DP, Nomar threw the relay into the dugout.

hahahahahahahaha

See, I think this really is a situation where you would sit Corey. 0-4 nights do nothing to help confidence which I believe is his main issue right now. Patterson has dominated Oswalt in his career.

FWIW, the White Sox are last in baseball in RISP OBP. And Pittsburgh is 4th.

The Cubs were over .500 on the road before the big losing streak, just throwing that out there.