CubmanPi

Thanks for the input everyone, good to know I don't make these things up ALL the time. So now my question is, how much of the rest of this book should I be taking with a grain of salt when it messes up the team and city for a game as recent as '03? I'm kinda disappointed, personally, and when I go back and read about the teams of the 1890's or early 1900's, it's not like I can rely on my memory to do any fact-checking. (Though I'm sure I can just ask Fred what he remembers about those days :) )

I'm reading through my new Cubs journal and decided to go back and relive the 2003 season (minus the last 11 innings). One thing that caught my eye was one point in middle of the season where it says that, on July 21st, the Cubs beat the Pirates 15-6 at Wrigley field the day after beating the Marlins 16-2 in Miami. I don't remember the exact date, but I DO remember going to a Cubs-Braves game in middle of the summer in Atlanta in which the Cubs won 15-6. I also remember that this was the day after the Cubs played in Florida and beat the Marlins 16-2. Does anyone know where I can find a 2003 schedule of the Cubs so I can verify that I'm not on crack here? Also, if the journal was wrong about both the team and the city in which the game occured, does this logically introduce the possibility that there are other games/stats in the journal that are less credible? (In its summary of the 2000 decade through the end of the '05 season, it describes the acquisition of Alou as the best move the team has made in that span, so that also introduces the possibility of lower credibility.) This is the book entitled "Cubs Journal" by Dan Snyder, btw. Does anyone else have it? What are your thoughts on the book? I've only been reading it for a couple hours so far, so I still haven't gotten through too much of it.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v483/cubbybear314/DontDoIt.jpg

Looks like Prior is indeed on the table. http://insider.espn.go.com/mlb/features/rumors Holy crap. Prior is on the table and the Orioles are asking for more. Their stupidity could be a divine gift sent to combat Hendry's.

Way to look out for your health! I think I'll follow your example and go do some early Christmas shopping. For clothes to wear in a lynch mob, that is. Just in case.

in before lock/merge

But at least he'll rise with the Orioles, win three CYAs, and redeem us for our currently unrelenting negativity.

I wasn't terribly disappointed with the Jones move. It's not the blockbuster everyone wanted (at this point, no blockbuster at all is a MUCH better option), but I think Hendry's timing with Jones is similar to Barrett's, where he came over just in time to regain full productivity. In Barrett's case, that means we got him cheap, which is a key difference, but I still have a hard time complaining too much about this move. (Previous cynicism was inspired by other possible pending moves, which ARE truly boneheaded.)

Or maybe this is incentive for the O's to pull the trigger or perhaps lower their demands. If the other propsed deal was already on the table and awaiting nothing more than the O's to pull the trigger, then they don't deserve the steal that landed in their laps, and hopefully we can use this potentially lucrative situation in Boston to land a deal which is a little less...how you say...murderous-rampage-inspiring.

Isn't masochism a requisite of being a Cubs fan??

And here I thought this thread was just a mercy bump to take our minds off nasty rumor talk and realize that the Jones deal isn't so bad after all.

You think they're serious? The vast majority of people who say that sort of thing are blowing off steam. It's like having feelings for a girl in high school who finds a new crowd to hang with. She was great to you before, and now her new friends have got her treating you like crap, cheating on you, spitting in your beer, and pushing your mom down the stairs. It doesn't matter how strong your feelings for her are or what kind of past the two of you have together, you're better off keeping your distance until her friends quit trying to trade Mark Freaking Prior.

Yeah.... and you can still be disowned, boy !! If you disown me for this, the terrorists win! Jim Hendry is a terrorist? If this doesn't make him fit the bill, then I don't know what does.

The best news about this is that it takes away at least a little credibility from the dirty rumors rising in the Prior-Tejada threads, which include Patterson to the O's.

Yeah.... and you can still be disowned, boy !! If you disown me for this, the terrorists win!

It will be simply unbelievable if this happens. I have a hard time believing the credibility of it all as it stands, but when more detailed rumors keep getting thrown onto the fire, it's hard to ignore them. I'm taking down the flag on my wall and buying an Orioles hat if this trade happens. Then I'll make it a point to send hand-written hate mail to Jim Hendry every day between now and his much-awaited last with the Cubs. Unfathomable. I have no words left in my vocabulary suitable for a family site.

It's easy for the Cards fan to be supportive and optmistic. He gets to be comfortaby distant from all this, knowing that regardless of how unlikely it is that the Cubs pull off a record better than last year's, the Cubs still have no chance of competing for the division come August 1st. Some call it being a good sport, and I bet he's chuckling to himself with every word. I would be if I were him.

Agree. But replace "think" with "know for sure". Having Dusty take care of your team is like having Michael Jackson take care of your children. I like it! I'm going to have to add that to a sig which, for more than a year, has been inhabited only by the quote from the dude himself.

That's generally the result when you don't feel someone should be traded at all. It's not like Prior is going to turn out to be another Corey or Kerry. He's proven that, when healthy, he's better than 90 percent of the pitchers in baseball, and his bad health track record isn't as bad or as long as Wood's, so I don't think holding out on him another season or two is a terrible idea. If the Cubs DO get rid of him, the price had better freaking be right, and by that, I mean Tejada along with someone who we can rely on to effectively hold the 4th or 5th spot in the rotation for most of the year. Maybe throw in a mid-level prospect for a top-level one to boot.

I'd love to see him in the NL. I think he deserves to throw a perfect game, and that won't happen until he faces off against an offense featuring Neifi and God knows who else by then.

Kleenex, Rollerblades

Is he really asking for "too much" if the other GM is willing to give it? Maybe part of the Bobby Hill for Simon/Lofton/Ramirez deal was that Hendry had to promise to follow it up with a couple years of being an exponentially bigger dumbass and make everyone forget about how stupid previous deal was. Trade Mark Prior for... entire 2005 AL ASG roster? hmm, maybe - I'd be willing to discuss it over lunch. any 12 people the Orioles have to offer? no freaking way.

(a little late with this, but I don't care)

let's see...the bullpen cost us at least 10, and maybe 15, games last year? we had no leadoff hitter and no one to steal bases. prior takes a line drive off the elbow and misses an additional month of action. wood makes all of 10 starts and LF was essentially non-existent most of the year. so hendry goes out and overpays to fix the bullpen - and you simply can't argue with him signing the two best setup men available; signs a true leadoff hitter, something the cubs didn't have in 04 or 05; we're expecting prior to be healty all season and wood to be healthy for most, if not, all of the season; and murton figures to give us at least a .270 avg in LF...AND YOU SEE JUST A 5 GAME IMPROVEMENT? talk about seeing the glass as half empty. i understand that all of us wanted hendry to make an additional deal or two, but some of us are coming on here and acting like we're trotting out the pirates or royals lineup next season. i'm sure hendry has explored every possible trade he thinks would make his team better, but it takes two to dance. he overpaid to get eyre, howry and pierre and it's likely potential trade partners are wanting him to do the same thing in current discussions. given how crappy this offseason's FA market was, i'd much rather hit the field with what we've got now, see how things go and assess who's available at midseason or next offseason when more talent will be available. I am not among the "we" in the group that expects Wood to stay healthy this year. Unlike the Prior injury, Wood's injury was yet again due simply to throwing the ball. In 4 of 8 seasons since '98, injury has prevented Wood from reaching 150 IP for the year. Sounds more like a coin flip than an expectation.

I agree with the sentiments that things pretty much HAVE to go right in a lot of ways for the Cubs to turn out looking good. All those little breaks, some non-bad breaks (elbow line drive), and a player or three who breaks out and performs above and beyond what anyone would have expected of him. Unfortunately, things like that happen much more with well-managed teams...