neely crenshaw

I just like it because I can turn in on during work, and makes everything go by much faster. Of course, I can then complain because there is nothing to watch when I get home...mixed bag I guess.

no never, I'm sure he doesn't lead the league in lob.

makes for a long day at work...at least i'll be able to actually watch this one.

perhaps we should stop posting 6 week stats like they show a huge trend and are a definitive answer.

The only potential change I see in the platoon is losing Sappelt, I'm guessing Borbon moves into this spot soon. Hairston has a lengthy track record. It's not great, but very solid vs lefties. He'll add pop when he gets his at bats. It's tempting to play Nate more, but I'd hate to mess with his success right now as long as you have a proven option. Infield ride Ransom and Valbuena for as long as you can. History says it won't last but doesn't matter right now.

Many of these new stats have to have a large sample size to be accurate. They are based on average data from major league games. The more data you accumulate, the closer to your norm you will be.

Don't know how long it will last but with Ransom/Valbuena's play right now 3B is almost a strength. Certainly gives the Cubs no reason to rush back Stewart, if they even bring him back. Question: how long can they keep Stewart on a "rehab" assignment?

No I read it. I know what he says about having our guy...I'm just saying that in 2 weeks these stats could completely change. He throws out a lot of data that "shows" how valuable he has been as a cubs starter. My post basically says fangraphs itself states that there isn't enough data to show what the true value of Valbuena has been. In this case you can't even apply it to what his past performance because of the small amount of data. It looks good, but could be very flawed. That's all.

Hey how about we win the opener and go from there. Gotta win 1 in row in order to win 4 in a row!

Fangraphs itself says you should look at 3 years of stats to be accurate. Also fwar and rwar are not predictive stats they fluctuate pretty much every single year. Posting a 5.0 war last year(or half a year), does not make you any more likely to post it the next year. Josh Hamilton= 2009 1.2, 2010(#1) 8.4, 2011 3.9, 2012 4.1 Jacob Ellsbury=2012 1.4, 2011(#1)9.1, 2010 -0.2, 2009 2.1 from fangraphs- misconceptions about war 2) Measuring the past, not “true talent level”. WAR totals measure past performance, and shouldn’t necessarily be used as predictive tools. If a player was worth +5 wins last year, it’s entirely possible that he’ll be worth +5 wins again next year…but then again, depending on the rest of that player’s history, he could also dramatically under- or over-perform that level. If you want to get an idea about a player’s true talent win level, look at their past three seasons of WAR totals and average them out, weighing the most recent seasons more heavily (5/3/1 weighting is standard). He has provided us with something more than a cardboard cutout so far. As I said after the Marlins game, he also has 4 home runs in 60 at bats this year (on pace for roughly 30) but has only 17 in 1000 other major league at bats. He's also done most of this damage in the last 9 games (raised average from .188 to .258, hit 3 of 4 hrs), so is this the high point or where he will stay the rest of the year I hope he can keep his average close to .250, and hopefully his ob% close to .325 but I just can't see his slugging staying over .700. As long as he plays defense, and is not an automatic out, we can live with him this year but we might want a little more data before we end our search.

Not sure if there's room. They have Stewart on a rehab assignment, Lake on the 7 day DL, and already picked up 30 year old 3B donnie murphy, who is also on the 7 day dl(i'm guessing to open 3b for stewart rehab. Then you still have Vitters there. Lillibridge and Gonzales are also getting regular at bats down there. Hard to get everyone the at bats they need. Funny thing is the average age of infielders at AAA is about 10 years older than our major league team. Ian Stewart is the youngest regular at AAA right now...

Could have mentioned they've won 4 straight including sweeping the Giants...

before we get carried away with the awfulness of the Padres...a few facts Padres 9-15 Cubs 9-15 Padres runs scored 85, Cubs runs scored 80 Padres Runs Allowed 111 Cubs runs allowed 95 Worst team the Padres have played 10-13 Mets (who were above .500 until losing 4 straight) Worst team the Cubs have played 6-19 Miami Although starting pitching seems to strongly favor the Cubs, the Padres are not the Marlins. The Cubs are 6-14 against the major league teams and 3-1 against AAA Miami. This will be a much better test for the Cubs.

Since they don't seem to want to give him a night off, at what point do they switch he and Schierholtz in the lineup. It may take off some pressure but mainly the team would be better off(right now) offensively with Nate hitting 3rd.

slow down... it's Miami, they look like the team from Major League 1, I was looking for the guy on the roster that was dead. 2nd- Valbuena, playing well. I hope he can do anything close to this BUT in 1000 at bats he had 17 hrs, he has 4 in 59 this year. he has career OPS of .645, last year was the only year he had an 0b% above .300, his career BA is ,225-he hit .250 once... I think he will be hard pressed to continue these stats, or actually improve them especially his power stats. I think if he can get/keep his average around .250, and ob% over .325 that would be a good year for him. Sometimes things happen but I can't see a 20 HR season from him, and he is currently on pace for 30. Posting a OPS above .700 would be outstanding for him.

Why is that even though we haven't won 2 in a row yet, this actually sounds possible? Also, how is it that we have 1 more win than Miami but our pitching and (believe it or not) offense is clearly much better.

Shark looking at 1-4 3.03 era....got to be frustrating!

I just hope our starters don't start pressing to be perfect because they aren't getting support.

I was referring to the last one, and now I get it. Gameday can be deceiving...

Cursed? he hit a flippin' puff ball to center...that's an out in babe ruth league. Someone should mention that corky miller isn't catching today.

I see the point. It's hard to argue they haven't been awful. A bigger problem would be that because of injuries to stewart last year and barney this year they have played too many innings. I also think in the big picture we have so many problems this is a little one. If we had back up infielders that were a 0.0 and lost us no games on paper, we get the 4 games back and that makes us a 65 win team. Also over 1/4 of the negative rating comes from Vitters(-1.2) who only really played because Stewart was out (and bad) and they wanted to give him a full look.

I don't see a scenario that has Garza and Price in our rotation. If Garza comes back healthy enough that we would want to keep him it would seem his trade value would be too high to keep. If he comes back ok, I don't see why we would pay the money to keep him again. I have to think we aren't signing two front end of the rotation guys in the offseason at least not with all the other holes we have to fill.

It's called cutting off your nose to spite your face. Even if they were on pace to lose 50 games, you don't sit two of the few players you're counting on in the future so you can punish them and waste playing time on Brent Lillibridge, Brad Nelson, or whomever's taking up space in AAAA. Actually yes, you do. If players no matter who, are not playing hard, or doing dumb things you bench them. I am not saying you bench them for hitting poorly or making physical errors. Everyone is accountable to play the game correctly not perfectly but correctly.

You make moves you think will work. Prospects are a crapshoot no matter what. I'm pretty sure most FO's would feel that they could find a suitable replacement for DJ. On the other hand, you have to trade something to get something. Trading marshall for a potential decent starter makes sense. With the team we have last year, and this year exactly how valauble is a really good set up guy? Let's say he makes us 10 games better (which is a huge amount) We win 71 games? yeah! keeping expensive guys, in order to be less crappy is short sighted. Stewart for Colvin. Both had issues. Stewart was oft-injured, Colvin struggled all year. At the time, we had Soriano, DeJesus and Byrd(who was one of our better players the previous year), we had Lahair and Rizzo covering 1st-colvin's other potential spot. We had no one at 3b and no one close to ready. While we were also hoping Jackson would/will be ready soon. we reached for potential help. It failed last year but it still made sense to make the move. And it is well documented that I am not a Stewart fan, but I get the move. It's very easy to pick apart moves in hindsight. Every GM/FO has failures. They all miss. Usually trades are made because both teams think it's the best move for their team...usually that right there tells you someone is going to be wrong. I think this group tends to like their guys over the leftovers. They tend to give their guys unlimited chances, but then again that also makes sense. If they are putting their reps on the line for a guy, then you give them every chance to succeed.

Again, I have to think before you threaten this, wouldn't you sit them down? Also the front office sends people down not the manager. When making a move they may listen to the managers feelings on what is needed on the roster but they aren't sending down Castro or Rizzo for lack of effort/mental mistakes. Now back to sitting them, don't you think it would make a bigger impact on the other players if they were benched for mental mistakes, or seeming lack of effort. When you are playing poorly enough to start talk of making a run at losing 100 games again, does it really matter if you sit anyone for any amount of time?