College of Idiots

Not just a solid CD.

It is the story of the dayOur Cubs handed the putrid Pirates their 14th head-to-head loss today by a score of 2-0. This series should serve notice to the other contenders out there that this team can an American League style game or a National League matchup like today. I consider myself a bit of a purist and I can't help but get excited about a team that thrashes a team one day then comes back the next day without their bats and uses situational hitting to win a game. Oh, did I mention that Marquis was unhittable? I know. I could barely say that with a straight face.

OK, so realistically this team should win the division. 6 games with 29 games left is definitely a commanding lead. There is pretty much no way we will miss the playoffs but we should not even be considering the wild card. If this team is going to compete for a World Series they need to use this last month to step on the Brewers fat necks. We have a better lineup, a better bench, a better rotation, and a better bullpen. Mark your calender for those 3 games against the Brewers in mid-Sept at Wrigley. That series could very well end the Brewers hope for a divisional title. It could also propel them back into the race. Smart money is on the former.

The lazy and ginger idiots will be going to a couple Cubs games in the next few days and I may have managed to screw myself out of going to playoff games here in AZ. I bought plane tickets back to the Chicago area for 10/3 through 10/6 to visit family before heading to Hawaii for 6 weeks. Yeah, if things stay as they are right now I will be missing out. IDIOT! Couple that with the fact that I will likely have to sneak peeks at the playoff scores while working 5 time zones away and I could get screwed out of something great. That doesn't really matter though. If these guys keep rolling like this I will light up that island with some celebrations of the likes it has never seen. I'm getting ahead of myself.

Dempster v Hamels tomorrow evening on WGN. Let's stretch this lead to 6.5 games! GO CUBS!

Posted by Angry Mike at 9:10 PM | 0 comments    
Labels: Cubs

Some Cub fans like their beer, so sue us. A few of us even have useless drinking talents. Exhibit A:



Go Cubs!

Posted by Ginger Russ at 8:58 PM | 0 comments    
Labels: Video of the Day

Mets, Padres, Reds, Phillies, and Pirates.

Despite how you feel about the cities of NY, San Diego, Cincinnati, Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh, these are your new teams to root for coming in September. These are the teams that the Brew-Crew must beat out to have any chance of sneaking past the Cubs by Playoff time. I know not many of you are worried and are already planing your World Series parties, but there are still a lot of games to be played.

Luckily, the Mets and Phillies are still in the race for the NL East Pennant, and neither of these teams have a viable shot at the Wild Card so each team will be battling it out till the end. Unfortunately, the Padres, Reds and Pirates have a combined record of 165-232 and can only play the role of the spoiler at this time.

Thankfully for the Cubs, they have numbers on their side. Let's look at it this way: the Cubs have 29 games left to play. If they somehow breakdown and start playing just under .500 (14-15) ball they would finish the season at 97-65.


With a record of 77-55, the Brewers would have to win 20 of their last 30 games to even tie the Cubs record. They basically have to win out each series against their opponents (2 out of 3) to tie the Cubs - who again will have to play less than .500 ball.

Now as Cub fans we know good teams can win series. The Cubs have won 9 in a row. We also know that the bridge can collapse at any time, as was seen with the '69 Cubs. But with Cubs looking at a 100 win season, it looks almost inconceivable that the Cubs won't make it to the Playoffs. Unlike the '69 team, we have the Wild Card. Plus we finish the season with Milwaukee up at Miller Park, don't forget that.


Well, Lazy Steve is on a plane right now back to DeKalb, IL. I will be joining him on Friday and the 2 Idiots will be heading into Chicago to watch the Cubs at Wrigley on Saturday. I will make sure to watch the game, and not get caught up in all the beer and beautiful people. We will (hopefully) be in the bleachers, which will be my first time sitting in the outfield. Should be a blast, the Bulldog is scheduled to start and ever since we saw his temper tantrum against the D-Bags last fall, I want to see a confident TRL in person.

Angry Mike will be back to regular posting after he finishes his MBA this weekend. I'm sure all the 4 readers to our site are looking forward to some actually thought-out and factual posts down the stretch. Let's hope we can keep him posting into the Playoffs when he heads out to the Islands (not sure which ones?) for his job in October.

Go Cubs!

*Yeah, I failed my last math class in HS, so some of these numbers may be off (they probably are).

Posted by Ginger Russ at 4:02 PM | 0 comments    
Labels: Cubs Minor Leaguers, numbers

Posted by Angry Mike at 9:38 PM | 2 comments    
Labels: Brewers = The Suck, Cubs, Fonsie likes to hop

Let's take a break from sports for a while and focus on another topic near to my heart: Politics. ESPN presented an interview with Barack Obama on Tuesday, in which Stuart Scott asked the Democratic candidate the following:

Stuart Scott: “If the Cubs and the White Sox both make it to the World Series?
Obama: “I would be going.”

Scott: “Who would you root for?
Obama: “Oh, that's easy. White Sox. I'm not one of these fair weather fans. You go to Wrigley Field, you have a beer, beautiful people up there. People aren't watching."

Wow. Did Obama just have a conversation about Wrigley with Marty Brennaman? He didn't go as far to say that Cubs fans are the worst in baseball, but really Obama, have you ever been to a Cubs game at Wrigley? Living in AZ and being forced to go to the BOB Chase Field I have experienced first hand what "fair weather" fans are. But this isn't about D-Bag fans. It's about Sox fans.

For the sake of brevity, let's get a definition of "fair weather fan" first.

Wikipedia:
A fairweather fan is a fan that roots for teams that are playing well.

Urban Dictionary:
A fan of a sports team who only shows support when the team is doing well. During hard times they usually bandwagon other teams. They basically have no real loyalty to the team, but still manage to get better seats than you at the game. Strangely they mysteriously vanish at the first sign of trouble.

Strangely, both definitions left out the part about beer and beautiful people. So let's ignore that part of Obama's statement. That just sounds like jealousy to me, but both parks have beer and we're not getting into that stupid Sun Times article about whose fans are hotter.

It seems to me the best way to understand a fair weather fan is by attendance. If the team is doing bad, the attendance will drop if most of it's fans are "fair weathered." So I lifted this chart from Wasting Away in Wrigleyville:


Hmmmm...interesting. It seems the attendance at Comiskular peaked in 2006 and then dropped off since then. What could have possibly happened at the end of 2005 that would make Sox fans want to attend the games more often? I can't put my finger on it. Did they have more "Fireworks Nights"? Maybe more "$5 tickets with a Pepsi Can" games? I remember even popular Cub fan John Cusak was quoted as saying he was a "Chicago Fan" during this time. What could it be?

Oh yeah, that little World Series thingy. All of a sudden it wasn't only the south side gang-bangers that were wearing Sox hats. It was everyone. It was a Sox explosion. But then what happened? Since then the Sox have sucked (sans recently) and what has happened to the fans? Where did they all go? Interesting...well not really if you consider most those fans were "fair weather fans".

Meanwhile, while the Cubs have been okay to pretty good those years, the fans just keep coming. The only reason the Cubs aren't closer to the top of MLB attendance is because the stadium only holds about 42,000 people, and that has grown by thousands each year with Wrigley continually adding new seating. What other team can sell-out it's park on a Tuesday morning? The Cubs play more day games than any other team, a time slot which is dreaded by most teams. But year after year the attendance grows.

Okay, granted you will have your fair share of douchbags in their popped collared shirts and their faux-hawks at the game, but if you notice the crowd shots during the game, most people ARE watching the game. In fact, it's the only team I know where the fans are so into the game that even in the third inning if the Cubs load the bases or a Cubs pitcher is about to get out of a tough jam, everyone gets on their feet and cheers. Players have said that Wrigley is one the greatest places to play BECAUSE of it's fans. It's a playoff atmosphere every inning of every game.

Apparently Obama must think that because Sox fans have the tendency to run on the field, they must be paying attention to the game. Never mind that your season ticket holding fans were selling their World Series tickets in '05 because they were making a huge profit to other "fair weather fans" who probably don't even know how many outs are in an inning.

So GFY Obama. Join the legions of other Chi-town politicians. Go move to the South Side with Mayor Daly, at least for a couple more months till you get to move into that big house in Washington. But when the Cubs win the Series, don't try jumping on our bandwagon. Don't expect the Cubs to invite you to throw out the first pitch at the beginning of next year or sing the seventh inning stretch. Because our fans, at least those not waving "It's Gonna Happen" signs, are real fans. We have been there through the bad and the good, and will keep coming out to the games and supporting our team, no matter what.

Go Cubs!

Posted by Ginger Russ at 6:23 PM | 2 comments    
Labels: Idiots of the Moment

What a weekend. After the debacle on Friday, the Cubs came back to win the final 2 games against the Gnats, making it 8 series wins in a row. The win on Sunday made the Cubs the first team in the majors to 80 in the W column. That means the W flag has flown on our site 80 times this year. Not too shabby.

How good is Harden? 11 strikeouts was a career high as he handcuffed the Nats at the plate. It will be awesome when the playoffs come and we can go to a 3 or 4 man rotation. Either way, Marquis will probably be left off the roster AGAIN this year.

How stupid is Carrie Muskbag:

Mailbag:

Looking at Minor League stats, I've seen Jason Dubois tearing it up in Triple-A. Is there any chance we might see him with the big league club this year, and if so, in what role?
-- Javi T., San Juan, Puerto Rico

Carrie:

Dubois is not on the Cubs' 40-man roster, so in order for him to be called up, the team would have to make a move. And there's really no place for him to play. Among the names you can expect to see on Sept. 1 are Micah Hoffpauir, Angel Guzman, Koyie Hill and Michael Wuertz.

Wow. And I thought I was wrong all the time. At least I don't write for the Cubs. Let's see...Angel Guzman is on the 60-day disabled. Although he is on the 40-man roster, it's unlikely he will be playing in September. Koyie Hill isn't even on the 40-man roster. I looked him up and he is listed as NRI, which I guess means Non-Roster Invitee for Spring Training. He is probably still out here in AZ on some sort of team, but is definitely not going to make the extended roster in September.

Of course later in the mailbag she admitted her dumb-ass-hat-nous::

Mailbag:
I have to correct you on Greg Maddux's wins with the Cubs. He has won 133, not 178. I had to look it up because I knew he couldn't have won a majority of his games with the Cubs.
-- Ryan D., Springfield, Ill.

Carrie:

You -- and many others -- are correct. I had the wrong numbers in last week's mailbag. My calculator failed me.

It's not your calculator Carrie, it's called the Internet. You know, you write for it? Or don't you know?

Well it looks like the Cubs have smeared the Bucs 12-3. TRL looked pretty good, at least from the radio descriptions I listened to. No dingers for McDreamy DeRo. That broke a streak of 4 games in a row. Luckily K-Fuk has started to turn it around after re-evaluating his swing with Sweet Lou and Gerald Perry. He was tonight's CPOTG.

In a final note, check out this video of the Kerry Wood Bowling Thingy for a Charity. Mark Cuban swears, Dempster is still a clown and Zambrano thinks you win bowling by being the first person to 200. Plus the Cubs must not be paying the Marmot enough money because he was working the bar for tips. Ha!



Thanks to Desipio for the video.

Go Cubs!

Posted by Ginger Russ at 7:12 PM | 1 comments    
Labels: Big Z, Cubs, Hard-On for Harden

Okay, well maybe a little bit. He did load the bases in the sixth. And for once it wasn't Howry that came in and fucked it all. Damn Cotts. Damn Gaudin.

"We still have the opportunity to win the series, and that's what we need to do."

That's right Lee. We can't drop another series to the Gnats...er Nats.

Go Cubs!

Posted by Ginger Russ at 6:49 PM | 0 comments    
Labels: Shitty Pitching

Hey Big Z:

1. It's called bananas. Eat more.

2. Less jerking on the computer.

3. No more gum. Use chewing tobacco, which despite it's name, you don't chew.

Don't worry, we still love you and it's good to have you back. Btw, do ever read our blog since you are on the computer so much? If so, I have a couple questions:

1. Can you teach K-Fuk how to hit dingers?

2. What do you think about Ron's new hair piece?

3. Can I be your Facebook friend? Michael Phelps rejected me and now I'm depressed.

Well that's it. Keep up the good job.

Go Cubs!

Posted by Ginger Russ at 5:19 PM | 4 comments    
Labels: Big Z

That's right kiddos, just like Bobby Valentine I've snuck back into the COI Lounge for a small update.* Did anyone happen to notice our hot streak lately? The Cubs are now 5.5 games over the Brew-Crew. Plus, after tonight the Cubs will play 3 games before the Drunk-Fatty-Cheese Heads play again (I just heard this from Pat, so it must be true). Just more games to put it out of reach.

Speaking of crappy teams, the Reds management has issued a formal written apology to it's fans. HAHAHA!!

Unfortunately they forgot to apologize to the fans for hiring Dusty. Although what they should do is apologize to the rest of baseball fans when Dusty returns to broadcast booth for nationally televised games after the Reds fire him at the end of the season.

In true HJE form, here is the letter, with my comments in italics and red:

Dear Fans,

Dear all 5 people in Cincinnati that are still paying attention to us and not already dressed up in your orange-striped Carson Palmer jersey.

Thank you for your loyalty and support of the Cincinnati Reds. You are extremely vital to the success of the Reds, and it is important we share with you the thinking behind our recent personnel decisions.

Thanks for the money you gave us coming to see Griffey hit his 600th homer assholes. Now that we've blown it all on hookers and blow, we would like explain to you why we now have the worst case of crabs EVER!

Since taking ownership of this franchise, we have aggressively tried to improve our Major League roster for the purpose of restoring championship baseball to Cincinnati.

Remember "the Big Red Machine"? No? Frank Robinson? No? Joe Morgan? Johnny Bench? Charlie Hustle? No, no, no? Damn It!

We have sought and signed proven players.

Like Paul Bako and Corey Patterson.

We have extended the contracts of select current players. We added Dusty Baker, a proven winning manager.

Dusty's wife says he's a SUPER-WINNER! And Darin agrees.

And, we have capitalized on our burgeoning younger players like Joey Votto, Jay Bruce and Johnny Cueto.

We fired the team driver, chef, and clubhouse manager. Votto can pop a wheelie in a bus, Bruce makes a mean spaghetti and meatballs, and Cueto can get out those pesky grass stains like no other.

We had high expectations for the 2008 season. Unfortunately the team has not played up to our expectations and we have sustained injuries to key players within our starting lineup and rotation.

We had hoped to finish above the Pirates. But we suck. Suck super bad. And for some reason with Dusty in, our players kept getting injured?

We opted to trade Ken Griffey Jr. and Adam Dunn at this time because we believe it provided the best outcome for the long-term success of the organization.

We secured a deal with the meth dealers in Chicago and Arizona to form the greatest 3-city meth ring in the history of America. We see this partnership lasting long into the future.

By executing these inevitable changes now, we secured more players as part of our focus towards building a deeper, stronger inventory of young talent.

Like the deep, strong young boys in Taiwan I f*ed on my last trip.

We are pleased that the trades allow Griffey and Dunn the opportunity to play for teams in tight division races. Both Ken and Adam made significant contributions to the Reds and we are extremely proud and grateful they wore the Reds uniform.

If you love something let it go free. If it doesn't come back, you never had it. If it comes back, love it forever.

While the run production generated by these two veterans will not be quickly replaced, we chose to endure the short-term ramifications for the sake of building a strong, competitive team for 2009 and many seasons to come.

Dusty has been begging for us to pick up Neifi Perez.

The vast majority of our 50 draft picks were signed, culminating last week with first-rounder Yonder Alonso and a pair of talented pitchers. Our expanded scouting operations also signed Juan Duran from the Dominican Republic and Yorman Rodriguez from Venezuela, who are arguably the best amateur free agent position players from their respective countries.

Who Dusty will never play if they ever make it to the starting roster.

As we near September, we will continue to provide valuable playing time to our young players and new acquisitions who we feel can become significant contributors at the Major League level.

We drugged Dusty so he is basically asleep in the dugout and won't make any starting player decisions.

We ask your continued trust and patience as we build the roster that will get us back on top. We appreciate your support and look forward to seeing you at the ballpark.

HAHAHA!!! We just fucked you in the ass! How does it feel? No really, keep coming out to the Great American Ballpark. We're gonna be good soon, we promise...hahahaha, suckers!

Sincerely,

Bob Castellini
President & CEO

Walt Jocketty
President of Baseball Operations & GM



And in always exciting Olympic news, I caught the longest game of softball ever last night (not really, but it seemed like it). Japan and the USA went 8 innings (7 innings is a usual softball game) of scoreless softball. Apparently in extra innings the team batting gets to start a runner at second base before anyone even bats. Wouldn't it be funny if we let the Reds, Expos, and Pirates do this after the 7th inning? It might make the games more interesting at least. Starting Japanese pitcher Yukiko Ueno threw over 140 pitches in the game. Take that C.C. D-Nice's female counterpart, Crystl Bustos hit her 5th home run of the Olympics, putting the U.S. out of reach of Japanese.

Well, it looks like I've been spotted. Don't worry kids, I will be back soon enough with more pointless and un-factual blogs.

Go Cubs!

*Ginger Russ has suspended himself until September for posting that Evan Longoria plays for the Marlins. What an Idiot!

Posted by Ginger Russ at 6:38 PM | 1 comments    
Labels: I Hate Dusty, Softball

GFY! So, it shouldn't have come down to the last f'n out. True. But fuck, man! WTF. Make the right call. If I wasn't still so amused by Soriano's every camera appearance, I might have tried to stab Russ a few more times.

Oh, and if you didn't catch the big news tonight, Brett Farvera made his major league football debut tonight. Here I thought he made that debut 37 years ago. My Bad. Fuck him. Did you see his boyfriend Tom Cruise was on site for the big game? Not just a coincidence.

I'm sorry Rusty had to be suspended for so long. Now you're going to have to deal with stupid posts like this. I'm searching for a minor leaguer to bring up in his place, but I have not found him yet. We'll get through this, though.

Posted by Steve at 10:54 PM | 0 comments    
Labels: Cubs, Fav rah is Yahtzee