jdelaney5150

Lookes but didn't see a thread on this. Anybody know if they have announced when these tickets will go on sale? So far the only way to get tickets listed on the 51s' website is by ordering a 12-game package, which isn't exactly appealing.

The worst part about all of this is that I don't even know how I will get myself excited for next year or future years after that. In 98, 03, and last year we were always the underdogs and so you knew it was gonna be an uphill climb. But this year for once we were a dominating team for most of the last 6 months. I just don't know how I'm going to say to myself: "well, if everyone stays healthy and everyone plays well and everything falls into place over the course of 162 games . . ." What then? I might get the joy of watching my team act like a bunch of clowns for 3 games? But of course I'll be back. Because I'm an idiot.

I'd hold off. Last year the ticket prices went down after starting out extremely high. Yeah; I ended up getting 4 for $460 total (lower level terrace about midway up) for Game 3 on the day Game 1 started. Of course, considering how the game turned out I still overpaid by about $1000.

Personally, I wouldn't throw that kind of money around at craigslist. Though unlikely, it's a fact that counterfeit tickets do exist and get sold every year. I'd stick with Stubhub or ebay (where at least you can see feedback ratings and you have some recourse if problems come up). I have bought Cubs tickets on craigslist before and been fine. But that's like $100 - $200 max. I could live with it if I happened to get screwed. But $600 would make me very, very angry. I guess it comes down to how confident you are that you can spot a counterfeit ticket. I'm definitely not $600 confident . . .

No; an utter disaster is this performance in the playoffs. This is just one very, very bad start.

Or if you perfer his human name........Joe Morgan.. While I certainly believe that Joe Morgan is deserving of just about every criticism leveled against him, this is one rare exception. He was quoted in This Old Cub saying that Santo is a Hall of Famer: "I always enjoyed playing against him, and he's still underrated in that he did things day in and day out, and year in and year out...and I will say this, he will get my vote!" Now, if you believe that he is publicly saying that and then secretly not voting for him, that's something else.

And let's also not forget that Z has had a history of cramping up. It's not like this is the first time that he's had to come out of a game early. It's just the timing (September pennant race, losing streak, coming immediately after he was scratched) that has everybody all nervous.

Crusading or masterb - - - Whoops! Forgot this was a family site . . .

It's not exactly surprising. Soriano has missed 8 weeks. My knowledge of the some of the more advanced stats is admittedly limited, but I don't believe that would affect a player's RARP. It's a measure of what you do with the plate appearances you have, not your cumulative stats. Otherwise I have no idea how Daniel Murphy, with 49 plate appearances, could be ranked ahead of Carl Crawford, with 480.

OK, so baseball prospectus has him ranked as 13 based on EQA, EQR, RAR, RAP, and RARP. While I definitely believe in the value of statistics, I don't think they are infallible as I would definitely take Lee over Giambi, Delgado, Pena, and Jackson (who are all ranked ahead of him). Interesting side note: Soriano actually ranks 15th among left fielders based on the same measurements.

Whether you put a lot of weight on it or not, the prime age for position players is generally somewhere between 25-29, with a peak right around 26. Lee is clearly past his prime. It has nothing to do with aging past April. He wasn't that good before coming to the Cubs and he's returned to that level. Not bad, but not that good either. Sort of blah, given his position. First of all, a peak does not mean a precipitous drop immediately follows. A slow decline closely resembling a plateau into a player's mid-30s is far more likely unless there is a catastrophic injury that occurs. You might have made that argument with Lee before last season but I think that's hardly the case now. I guess it also depends on what you mean by "not that good." I don't think there's any question that his numbers this year still put him as one of the top 10 offensive first basemen in all of baseball. I think you may be allowing yourself to be skewed because 3 of the ones ahead of him (Berkman, Pujols, and Fielder) all play in our division. Now, if you're talking about his numbers being blah for a number 3 hitter you have a better case. Still, anyone ready to write the eulogy on Lee's offensive prowess (and I'm not saying you're doing that) is being premature in my opinion. Really, we're talking about a guy who had a horrible May and was bad for half of July but has been solid otherwise. His numbers so far in August AVG and OBP-wise (.280/.393) are good; it's just the slugging that's down. This is not anything new with him. With the exception of 2005, he's had extended periods every year where his power disappears. When asked about it, his response is always the same: "I'm just not elevating the ball" when his power is gone and "I AM elevating the ball" when he's on a good streak. His prodigious GIDPs this year, while extremely painful and frustrating, are at least proof that he is still hitting the ball hard. When he either 1) starts striking out at a much higher rate than his average, 2)starts hitting a lot of lazy pop-ups, or 3) starts hitting a lot of Juan Pierre-esque soft grounders that's when I'll start to be worried that maybe he's on the decline. None of those is the case right now.

I think it's a bit unfair to keep harping on his splits from May 1st through now. He had one of the most ridiculously excellent months ever in April (.371/.446/.705). That was obviously an anomaly so I understand tossing that out, but then he has an atrocious month in May (.234/.269/.411) which is just as clearly an anomaly the other way so I think it makes just as much sense to throw that one out too and just talk about what he's done from June 1st on. And I don't put a lot of weight into the idea that he is now past his prime. Do you really think he has aged that much since April? Lee's overall numbers this year look pretty similar to his years in both 2004 and 2006, and he's rebounded each of those time. Certainly as you get older it gets harder and harder to rebound but, come on, as of today he's still only 32 and he's not a catcher! I do agree that it's evidence that as he is getting older you do have to adjust and give him some additional time off but that's what it should be: time off to rest. Not a reduction in playing time. Throw Ward into the mix until 9/1 to see if he can parlay Friday's performance into something useful, and then throw Hoffpauir into the mix once 9/1 rolls around and we'll see if he can emerge Soto-esque down the stretch. But still I think Lee should be starting 5 games a week (meaning 2 days of rest per week regardless if we play 6 or 7 games that week). As for next year, I think there's a real good shot we'll see Lee in the 2-hole and probably a 50-50 shot that Theriot will move up to leadoff with Soriano moving to 3rd.

Wuertz? He's had plenty of weekends off, and weekdays, and extended rest. This whole "Wuertz never gets used" thing is something of a myth, or at the very least waaaaayyyyy overblown. He has 37 appearances on the year. Compare that to Howry, who has 43 appearances. And considering that we're about 15 weeks into the baseball season now, that means that over the course of about 2 and a half weeks, Howry is getting into a game about once more than Wuertz. And 37 appearances in 92 games (roughly 40% of games) hardly qualifies as letting him "rot" on the bench.

Hmm, that seems . . .odd. That would mean another start for Marshall, right?

In explaining why his comments do not deserve a response, I would like to call upon the wise philospohy of one Katt Williams: "Live your m'fing life. Get your hustle on. Understand people are gonna hate you regardless. Get that out of your head, that fantasy world where people ain't hating on you. You gotta be grateful. You need haters. WTF are you complaining about? WTF do you think a hater's job is? To hate. So let them do their job. WTF are you complaining about? Ladies if you got 14 women hating on you, you need to figure out how the hell to get to 16 before the summer gets here. Fellas, if you got 20 haters, you need 40 of those m'fers. WTF are you complaining about? If there are any haters in here right now that don't have anybody to hate on, feel free to hate on me. Sit back and say my hair ain't luxurious when you know it is, b*tch."