Hairyducked Idiot

Basically, you're more than 100 "points" below what the average player is producing. So like Wolf said... you can go over 200, so you can go below 0. yeah, it means you're pretty awful That doesn't make sense, because OPS+ is a normalization, right? It's OPS/LeagueAverageOPS*100*park factor, right? None of those numbers should be negative, so how is the result negative?

Marquis isn't depth. Marquis is an average starting pitcher. That has value to a ton of teams. Right now, that includes the Cubs, so I don't see much sense in trading him.

Someone explain to me how you can have a negative OPS+?

People have taken a good understanding of probability and misapplied it. The Brewers' 8 game-streak doesn't tell us much about the quality of the team, because of sample-sizes. That's certainly true. But their underlying ability level is irrelevant. What matters is the results in this season, not the theoretical results of a million Monte Carlo simulation-seasons. And an eight-game streak in THIS season, lucky or not, has a profound influence on their playoff odds and by extension, ours. Losing the number of games in the standings that we have over the last few games is a serious matter. It can't just be shrugged off, because it does seriously change our playoff odds. We are almost sure, at this point, that we are one of the two best teams in the NL. Certainly one of the three best. But being one of the three best does not guarantee that you won't lose 2 games on the Brewers and 4+ games on someone else over two months. And a month ago, this team had every reason to believe it was virtually guaranteed to be in. Who would challenge us for the Wild Card, assuming the Cards do fade away and Milwaukee can't be beat? 85% is still a pretty darn good number. What were our chances last year at this time? All it would take would be 2 good months from the Cardinals, Marlins or Phillies. The odds of one of those three teams playing wildly over their heads for two months aren't that remote.

People have taken a good understanding of probability and misapplied it. The Brewers' 8 game-streak doesn't tell us much about the quality of the team, because of sample-sizes. That's certainly true. But their underlying ability level is irrelevant. What matters is the results in this season, not the theoretical results of a million Monte Carlo simulation-seasons. And an eight-game streak in THIS season, lucky or not, has a profound influence on their playoff odds and by extension, ours. Losing the number of games in the standings that we have over the last few games is a serious matter. It can't just be shrugged off, because it does seriously change our playoff odds. We are almost sure, at this point, that we are one of the two best teams in the NL. Certainly one of the three best. But being one of the three best does not guarantee that you won't lose 2 games on the Brewers and 4+ games on someone else over two months. And a month ago, this team had every reason to believe it was virtually guaranteed to be in.

If the Brewers and one wild-card contender have a great two months and squeak ahead of us, am I supposed to be okay with it? What should have been a sure bet is now down to a good bet, and I see no reason not to be very unhappy about that. Yes, I think a well-managed team could have easily maintained the frantic pace we set in the first half of the year. Just because we're used to winning division titles with 88 games doesn't mean 100 is impossible. To be fair though, the Brewers weren't playing nearly this good earlier. It could be that we're pretty equal and just decided to have the spurt at a different time. At the moment, we are still talking about 2 teams with top-tier records. I'm still upset we're not tearing it up anymore because I hate losing, but I'm also trying to maintain some objectivity here. On the objective points, we probably basically agree. The Cubs have gone from about a 95% playoff chance at their peak to around an 85% chance now. Whether that lost 10% bothers you, and how much, is the subjective part. It bothers me a lot.

That's called a strawman. You restated my argument to be something I never said and mocked it. And this is an equivocation. You are trying to make things seem equal that aren't. Every team has strengths and weaknesses, sure, and every GM makes good and bad decisions. But that doesn't mean the net results of either are equal. They aren't. Right now, the Cubs will probably continue to be a great team and that will probably be enough to make the playoffs, where fortunately you don't have to be the best team to win. But given what I see from this team and what I've seen from past Cubs' teams that *do* have connections to this team, I think it is uncomfortably possible (though improbable) that we may not be a great team from here on out, or that we may be but variance will leave us outside the playoffs.

If the Brewers and one wild-card contender have a great two months and squeak ahead of us, am I supposed to be okay with it? What should have been a sure bet is now down to a good bet, and I see no reason not to be very unhappy about that. Yes, I think a well-managed team could have easily maintained the frantic pace we set in the first half of the year. Just because we're used to winning division titles with 88 games doesn't mean 100 is impossible.

I see no problem with using the past to evaluate possible futures. Every member of this ballclub was picked by the same people as those who picked previous ballclubs. Every executive of front-office member was picked by previous ones, as well. Each edition of the Cubs team is not an independent simulation of a baseball team. It is a continuation of an organization that has shown time and again it is capable of failure from almost any situation. Just because someone was "picked" to play for the cubs, that does not make them a choke artist. They are different players, playing in a different time, against different opposition. I expect, given those factors, that results may vary just a tad from previous years, no? I'm not sure what to make of the executive point, other than they obviously pick players that fold? How about a more concrete example, then: The same GM that did not smack Dusty Baker in the head and say "Hey, stop being an idiot with Mark Prior's arm. Every inning you waste him with now is an inning we might wish his arm still had in it later." Is the same GM that did not smack Lou Piniella in the head and say "Hey, stop being an idiot with Carlos Marmol's arm. Every inning you waste him with now is an inning we might wish his arm had later." Andy MacPhail is the guy who refused to accept age-based concerns about Sosa in the summer he was almost traded, which would have been much better for the team, and instead kept him at an age for too long. Andy MacPhail is the guy who hired Jim Hendry, presumably because he liked and agreed with his views on building a baseball team. Jim Hendry is the guy who thought Alfonso Soriano would be a great investment at his age (and with middle-infield miles on his legs, which is never a good thing long-term) and wasn't concerned that both of our other star hitters are also entering the age where skill drops are quite possible. Alfonso Soriano's legs and the possibly skill drops of our two best hitters have been a drag on the team to this point in teh season. See how little bad decisions build on themselves and become detriments to winning?

And we aren't? Dude seriously, it's easy to bag on a team that is in a slump and easy to pump up a team when they are playing great. The fact remains is the Brewers and the Cubs are two very good ball clubs and they will be battling all summer long. Get used to it. With only two months remaining and the lead we had built being virtually completely gone, the fact that we are a very good team now means a lot less than it did a week ago. A great team needs all six months to separate themselves from the pack. If they fail to do it, they risk being beaten by a slightly inferior team over a small sample. That's a position I never wanted to see this Cubs team put themselves into.

And the fans enjoyed 95% of the season and were disappointed 5% of the season, while the Chicken Littles complained and made life as a Cubs fan worse for everyone 100% of the season. I'll take stupid optimism over idiotic pessimism every day. Then you may feel free to slap me on ignore, because what I consider to be reasoned concern you will doubtlessly dismiss as idiotic pessimism.

I see no problem with using the past to evaluate possible futures. Every member of this ballclub was picked by the same people as those who picked previous ballclubs. Every executive of front-office member was picked by previous ones, as well. Each edition of the Cubs team is not an independent simulation of a baseball team. It is a continuation of an organization that has shown time and again it is capable of failure from almost any situation.

Fans' reply to concerns about starting usage in 2003: May: Shut up, it's early. August/Sept.: Shut up, it's working. October: Man, I wish we hadn't done that... Fans' reply to concerns about bullpen usage that many of us have been bringing up all season: April/May: Shut up, it's early. June/July: Shut up, we're still in first place. August/Sept: (predicted) Shut up, it hasn't sunk our season yet. October: (predicted) Man, I wish we hadn't done that.

People sure do love to belittle people of opinions they don't want to hear. Get real. Nobody is panicking because we lost a few games. I've been strongly concerned about this team for quite awhile because we have serious bullpen problems, not the least of which are that our manager doesn't have the slightest clue how to manage one, and we are in a very tough division. This isn't about a bad week and a half. It's about the Brewers being an exceptional team, several other good teams in the NL, our bullpen showing all kinds of negative indicators, and many other negative signs that were easy to brush aside the first time we reached 20 over.

You'd think they were in a brutal slump and losing ground so fast it's hard to keep track or something. Hey, guess who has the better track record? The people predicting doom for the Cubs or the people telling them not to?

Why is it so hard for us to accept it when the evidence is so abundantly clear that he does? A slow 2001-style death might be less painful than some of our more recent failures, though.

Human beings aren't rational by nature. We are strongly motivated by emotions such as hope and fear, moreso than we should be. The hope of a non-disappointing season and the fear of abandoning the team right before they finally don't disappoint outweighs any rational assessment of the utility of being a fan. And...ballgame.

(quoted from memory, so probably off) Slartibartfast: At my age, you begin to realize the odds of understanding what's really going on are almost nil, so just hang the sense of it and do what makes you happy. Arthur: Do you? S: Do I what? A: Do what makes you happy? S: No. That's where it falls apart. Nice in theory, though.

Score: Universe 8 million, Cubs -2 Going on: Another disappointing Cubs season only an 88% chance of making the playoffs, WE'RE SCREWED 12% chance of wiping and missing the playoffs 44% chance of repeating the disappointments of 2007 and 1998 22% chance of repeating the disappointments of 2003 and 1984 Odds of disappointment: Extremely high.

Sad thing about this is, Lou can't seem to see the obvious. He just keeps trotting Bob "Blown leads, holds, games" Howry out there day after day after day. If the Cubs have a flaw, it will burn them. It always does. Their stupidity always seems to be brutally punished out of proportion. Piniella's bullpen usage was stupid all season, and it's now coming around to hurt us.

Score: Universe 8 million, Cubs -2 Going on: Another disappointing Cubs season

So does only scoring 2 runs on 10 hits today. Would Howry's pitching been less bad in a 5-5 game? Less of an impact on our chances of winning from that point on?

Six hours or so till first-place tie?

No, it was basically a single that got stretched because the outfielder was watching the runner heading to third.

They've been almost completely unreadable the last couple of weeks. You guys missed me that much? Honestly, though, when were gamethreads ever readable or productive? Not since I can remember.