Cubnut's Archives
The Ryan Dempster Question
Today, Carrie Muskat asks herself, "Can Dempster make a successful conversion from closer to starter?"
Her answer:
After three seasons as the closer, Dempster is switching back to the rotation for the first time, full-time, since 2002. The right-hander has trained hard this offseason, but it won't be easy to go from one-inning outings to seven or eight. He'll be challenged with the addition of Lieber.I think Dempster will mostly be challenged by the fact that he is not a very good starting pitcher. Dempster's career numbers as a starting pitcher only, along with those of another guy who we often kick around:
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No Love for Sam
According to Crain’s Chicago Business, Sam Zell’s plan to sell Wrigley Field to the Illinois Sports Facilities Authority is “alienating would-be buyers” of the ballclub, A member of one of the prospective ownership groups says, “Splitting (the team and ballpark) absolutely diminishes the value of the team and my interest level.”
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Friday Notes (Late Night Version)
• There has been a lot of talk–some of it here–about how Milwaukee's signing of Mike Cameron and resultant shifting of Bill Hall to 3B and Ryan Braun to LF will improve the Brewers' overall defense. On Friday, Jay Jaffe of Baseball Prospectus (subscription req'd) tried to gauge what that improvement might be.
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Playing Ex-Cub Roulette
Jerry Crasnick has a story up at espn.com about the significant number of free agents still looking for work.
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Has Bedard Finally Been Traded? Will Roberts To Cubs Follow?
mlbtraderumors.com flagged this story by Geoff Baker of the Seattle Times, reporting that Adam Jones of the Mariners is on his way to Baltimore in a deal for Eric Bedard. According to Baker, Jones is scheduled to be in Baltimore Monday so he can take a physical.
Cubs Lineup Fun
With the wind chill factor in Chicago approaching 137 degrees below zero and Spring Training still 21 days, 14 hours, 9 minutes and 41 seconds away, I found this fun little diversion courtesy of David Pinto at Baseball Musings.
Based on work by Cyril Morong (Beyond The Box Score), Ken Arneson (Catfish Stew), and Ryan Armbrust (The Pastime), Pinto has fashioned a Lineup Analysis machine. You simply feed nine players into the formula along with their OBP's and slugging percentages, and what you get back is a series of run projection numbers, based on various lineup permutations of the players you entered.
For yucks, I entered numbers for Soriano, Theriot, Lee, Ramirez, Fukudome, Pie, DeRosa and Soto, plus a generic Cub Pitchers line (.167 OBP, .207 SLG, based on the Cub pitchers’ ’07 hitting performance).
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Around The NL Central In Six Sentences
In his last 22 appearances in 2007, the Brewers' Chris Capuano went 0-12 (a franchise record 12 losses in a row) with a 6.08 ERA, which explains why he only received a $500,000 raise for 2008.
Kip Wells, Troy Percival, David Eckstein, Scott Rolen, Gary Bennett, So Taguchi, Jim Edmonds, and Walt Jocketty may be gone from Saint Loo, but Yadier Molina
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Murton For Byrd--A Texan's Perspective
On Saturday Texas Rangers observer Jamey Newberg of The Newberg Report reacted to this story at mlb.com regarding the Cubs' interest in 30-year-old outfielder Marlon Byrd and the possibility that Matt Murton could be heade
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Cubs Convention Opens Friday Night
The 23rd annual Cubs Convention begins Friday night. As usual, it’s sold out. If you have passes, enjoy yourself and, if you’re so inclined, please add your observations to the Comments.
If you don’t have passes, you’ll want to steer clear of the Chicago Hilton and Towers.
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Enemy Off-Season Update: The Brewers
Milwaukee's signing of outfielder Mike Cameron, made official on Monday, was just the latest maneuver in what has been a busy off-season for GM Doug Melvin.
The Brewers bid adieu (lot of French people up there in Milwaukee) to the following key players from the '07 club:
- Relievers Francisco Cordero and Scott Linebrink, who left for big free-agent money in Cincinnati and on Chicago's South Side, respectively. (Melvin made Cordero a competitive offer but has acknowledged he may have bungled the negotiations.)
- Longtime Brewer Geoff Jenkins, whose $9MM club option was declined. Jenkins signed with the Phillies.
- Catcher Johnny Estrada, who was made to learn that screaming at your boss while on television isn't a good career move. Estrada was traded to the Mets, who wound up non-tendering him.
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Cubs Sign Lieber; Jason Bere And Kevin Tapani Consider Comebacks
What Ken Rosenthal reported earlier this morning, cubs.com is now confirming:
The Cubs have signed righthander Jon Lieber to a one-year, $3.5 million deal. Lieber pitched for the Cubs from 1999 through 2002.
Looking In On Corey Patterson
Former Cub Corey Patterson has come a long way, and not in the direction any player wants to see his career go.
Since the Cubs traded Patterson to Baltimore in January, 2006, he's had seasons of .276 and .269, with OPS+ numbers of 94 and 80, OBPs of .314 and .304, and a combined 159 strikeouts and 42 walks.
On Friday, Baseball Prospectus (subscription) pointed out that as recently as 2000, Baseball America had this to say about Eric
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Renaming Wrigley Field
With all of the hand-wringing about the possible sale of naming rights to Wrigley Field, I have a suggestion:
How about "Jacobs Field"?
It’s not taken anymore.
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The NL Central Goes Shopping
The editors at mlb.com obviously sent all of the team correspondents a mass email ordering them to write Winter Meeting shopping list stories...pronto!
Well, their loss of editorial independence is your gain. Here, based on those stories and reports from a few of the hometown papers, is a summary of what the Cubs’ NL Central brothers might be looking for during next week’s meetings in Nashville:
Brewers
NL Central teams posted four of the five worst bullpen ERAs in the National League last season, with Milwaukee (4.15/12th in NL), Houston (4.62/14th), Pittsburgh (4.77/15th) and Cincy (5.10/16th) positively embarrassing the Cubs (3.76/3rd) and Cardinals (4.00/9th). No surprise then that so many of the division’s teams are hoping to address bullpen issues.
The Brewers actually lost their best reliever, closer Francisco Cordero, who signed last week with the Reds, plus set-up man Scott Linebrink, who signed with the White Sox. (You think Kenny Williams will ask him to play centerfield?) GM Doug Melvin says he doesn’t anticipate trading for an established closer given the typical asking price, but he’s also understandably wary of the three remaining, free-agent closers—Gagne, Percival, and Dotel—given their colorful injury histories.
Sounds to me like Doug Melvin has a problem.
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Kerry As Kloser? Krazy
Jim Hendry acknowledges that Kerry Wood will have to show he can occasionally pitch on three consecutive days to become a full-fledged closer. But can he even pitch on two?
Woody pitched in both ends of the 9/15 doubleheader in St. Louis, but other than that, he never pitched in consecutive days in ’07; in half of his 22 appearances, he was going on two, three or four days rest.
The Cubs also saved Kerry for the low-leverage innings.
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Recent comments
Childersb3 (view)
Things I've been wrong about:
-Tauchman is fine as a 4th OF. I knew that. I just want a better LH DH option and he was really the DH for us until Seiya got hurt. I'm glad Mervis is getting a chance at it. Caissie is coming for that job for sure. But Tauchman continues to be highly useful as a 4th OF with Seiya being hurt
-I wanted Yency to go to get guys at Iowa a chance. Guys like Palencia and Sanders or RileyT. Maybe even Hodge! But Yency has been better the last two plus weeks. He did hit 96 the other day. He was 93 in Texas to open the season.
-Leiter has his split working enough. It just needs to stay there
-I was surprised Jed picked Wisdom over Cooper. I wonder if this happens if Seiya wasn't hurt. Wisdom has more power. Cooper is the better hitter. Jed picked Wisdom and Wisdom had an option left as well.
-Palencia just doesn't miss enough bats. Similar to ManRod, just two yrs younger. ManRod is killing AAA for TB right now!
Things I got right so far:
-Hendricks. Sorry Kyle. You got paid though!
Jed, you missed there.
-Smyly. If Jed could've traded him before or during ST, then he should have and saved some cash.
-Mastro. Not a LH DH. Pinch runner. Defensive utility. Maybe he's better than Madrigal but didn't get a legit chance to prove it.
-Luke Little is good. He's had one bad outing. That's it. Needs to get better entering with guys on base. But he needs to stay in MLB.
-Oh yeah....Morel is doing fine at 3B! He'll get better as well!!
crunch (view)
bellinger "right rib contusion"
Childersb3 (view)
South Bend just lost the lead in the bottom of the 9th on the weirdest scenario, ever.
It's absolutely pouring rain....men on 1st and 2nd, 1out....JPatterson asks for a new ball, but no time out was called....he throws the old ball toward the dugout (not sure if it rolled out of play).....the ump declares the runners get two bases each so one run scores. Then a single up the middle ties the game.
The rain was coming down in buckets at this point.
Just weird
crunch (view)
...and bellinger is gone in the 7th because of that 2nd blown chance and the wall he bounced off of...
hopefully his rib cage/shoulder feels better tomorrow, we just got happ back.
Childersb3 (view)
Phil,
Any thoughts on Y. Rojas' stuff and Y. Melendez's game (I believe I've asked about him before, sorry)?
crunch (view)
wow, things are moving fast. hopefully it continues.
crunch (view)
morel with 4 clean plays in 4 innings...showed off his 100000000mph arm a couple times.
cody bellinger not having a good 4th, though...5 run leads are handy when your CF is making your pitcher have a 5-out inning. 2nd blown chance was ruled a hit even though it went in/out of his glove...1st was lost in the lights, also ruled a hit.
crunch (view)
welcome back happ! double off the wall 1st PA back.
crunch (view)
oh yeah, totally, i was just chiming about why i fan like i fan.
i would like nothing more than hendricks to keep on hendricks'ing. guys with his stuff can throw for a long, long time as long as it works.
he velocity is actually up a minor amount this year. it's really "damn" when a guy like him not only has gas in the tank, but it's looking like it was years ago. he added a curve a few years ago and it helped a little bit, but he's throwing it less and less while the fb/change combo are less effective.
Alexander Dimm (view)
CRUNCH—There is no one person in this community I’m talking about. My remarks were not directed at you or anyone, but at a tone I’ve noticed lately.
You have a great, dry sense of humor and there is thought behind your comments. You and I don’t always agree but I always understand your position.
Lastly, and I’ll be quiet, I agree with you on Hendricks. We can dislike the recent performance but still love the guy. Lots of questions about his future.