Friday Notes

...it's like Friday Notes, but on Thursday...and on 'roids.

Alright, I've been compiling links and notes for about three weeks now and finally had a chance to get it all down today, so plenty of diversions for the off-day today before we knock the silly out of the Redbirds this weekend. And yeah, some of this stuff is old.

- Let's go back in the time machine and talk about home field advantage for the All-Star game. I think most of the sentient baseball universe realizes the absurdity of awarding home field advantage for the most important games of the year to the league that wins an exhibition contest. MLB says they can't do the rational thing of awarding it to the team with the best overall record, as it won't give them enough time to plan and book events in the potential cities. I call SHENANIGANS!!!

When do they start booking these hotels and start planning? Using the current All-Star method, you know that after the season ends, one of four teams could be hosting the majority of the games. After one round, it's down to two teams. If they use the best record, there are seven teams that could host the majority of the games (throw out the playoff team with the worst record), and after the first round, it would be down to three cities (once again throw out the record of the worst team left). This doesn't seem like such a scheduling catastrophe as MLB makes it. And the NBA and NHL seem to have figured it out.

...the triumphant return.

- Fun with projections: At their current .642 winning percentage, the Cubs would win 104 games. They have played a considerable amount of extra home games though to this point, so if you use their current .784 home winning percentage and their current .467 road winning percentage, that comes out to (roughly) 63 home wins and 37 on the road for a total of 100 wins. If they "tank" the rest of the way and just play .500 ball, they'd still be good for 90 wins on the year. This would also be a good time to note though that the highest home win total since 2002 is 57 wins done by the 2003 A's and Giants and the 2004 Yankees.

Read the rest of this entry>>>

...returns after a one week break.

- There was a brief discussion in the comments about who should be the Cubs All-Stars. I think the deserving candidates are Carlos Zambrano (leads NL pitchers in VORP), Carlos Marmol (leads NL relievers in WPA), Geovany Soto (leads NL catchers in VORP) and Aramis Ramirez as a backup at third base to Chipper Jones. Ramirez is just a few notches behind Garrett Atkins in VORP for the backup spot, but he has a slight edge in home runs, RBI's and huge lead in OBP...and the Rockie kind of suck right now.

On the outside looking in, are Kosuke Fukudome(12th among all NL outfielders), Ryan Dempster (12th in VORP) and Derrek Lee (4th in VORP). And don't be surprised if Soriano gets himself back into the mix before too long.

- I noticed today that you can view Iowa Cubs highlights from their home page. Neat.

Read the rest of this entry>>>

- I wanted to once again thank everyone who took the time and hit to their bank accounts to donate during our April pledge drive. I have to say, some of you went well beyond the call of duty and while I would happily thank each of the 35 individuals that did contribute, but most of you I only know by your usernames on here and I don't want to give away your super-secret identities. But I will acknowledge the six who contributed $50 or more that helped us to our final tally of...... $912.30. Holy Cow!

UPDATE: Last second donation in, make it 36 total for $942.30. 

4 $50 Donations from:
Mr. Whipple
DC Tom
Jumbo
(I don't know the username) Buzz Music Inc.

$51 Donation (someone's a Price is Right Fan)
Tony S.

The Big Giver after the jump...

Read the rest of this entry>>>

And I recall seeing an electric young pitcher, Kerry Wood, when he was the ripe old age of 19. He had yet to set foot in a major league stadium when we watched him pitch in an instructional league game in Arizona. Nevertheless, that didn’t stop me and everyone else from realizing that he was a man among boys. Years later, he would set the record for most strikeouts in a game. He just had something that made his blank sheet of experience rise to the top of a pile of bullet-point-riddled résumés.

- As one astute reader noticed - replacing the big bat of Alfonso Soriano with Mike Fontenot has all the makings of replacing Derrek Lee's bat in 2006 with Neifi Perez. After today's showing, it's hard to see if Eric Patterson is much better.. But with two lefties scheduled after today, I think it's time to (wait for it)....Free Matt Murton!

- A quick shout-out to a new member of the Cubs Blog Army. One of our readers has started Harry and Hawk, which covers both Chicago baseball teams. You can stop by and read half the articles.

Some site notes after the jump...

Read the rest of this entry>>>

...Friday's game thread is below...

- As you've probably heard by now, the Cubs received 25-year old outfielder/first basemen Doug Deeds from the Twins today as the PTBNL in the Craig Monroe deal. A ninth-round selection of the Twins in 2002, the lefty was an honorable mention on John Sickels top 20 Twins prospects before 2007, but didn't make the cut in 2008 after a rough year in AAA. His scouting report on Scout.com before the 2007 season sure had some encourging notes:

Deeds is one of the more polished hitters in the Twins’ organization, and each year he seems to grow at the plate. He has the ability to hit to all fields, and has shown the ability to hit at every level he has played at during his Minor League career.

Deeds is a great defensive outfielder, and should have a future as an everyday corner outfielder in some organization, hopefully the Twins. He makes all the plays in right field, and has a tremendous arm that enables him to scare potential base runners from advancing a base. He uses good closing speed to get to balls that most outfielders do not get to, and has had his fair share of outfield assists throughout his Minor League career.

His career line is still a solid 291/374/463 and hopefully a change of scenery will benefit him. I imagine he'll be headed Mike Wellman's way and on to Iowa.

Read the rest of this entry>>>

we kid...we kid.

Observations from the first three games:

• A bad idea is a bad idea and I'm glad Lou doesn't take 20 games to come to these conclusions. Theriot batting leadoff was just never a good idea and Soriano batting second is even a worse idea. Soriano doesn't have the patience or bat control needed for that spot and Theriot doesn't get on nearly enough that it's going to help the teams bottom line - scoring runs. Kudos to Lou to for the willingness to admit his mistake quickly and moving on just as quickly.
• Has Geovany Soto been listening to Henry Blanco or did he dust-off a copy of "Michael Barrett's Defensive Drills for Catchers"? It's never good when between you and Jason Kendall, Kendall looks like the better defensive backstop.
• While legal, Weeks took one heckuva cheap shot at Soto. I'm not sure if Weeks was just angry at getting plunked a few times, but he's made a career of getting hit by pitches, so he needs to get over it quick. As for the play itself, the ball wasn't all that close to Soto and it wouldn't have taken any effort by Weeks to go around him. I'm frankly shocked that the Cubs didn't retaliate later in the game. On the other hand, we needed the win pretty badly and maybe it's best to save that for down the road.
• This Fukudome character is pretty good.

....counting down to Vegas (I'm going next week, Cubs arrive at the end of the month).

- Feel free to use this as today's game thread, Cubs stay home in Mesa and battle the Angels; Ryan Dempster vs. Ervin Santana. 

- The big news of the week was another Lou lineup change, this one involving our highest paid player though. I immediately expressed my displeasure over the experiment, but I'll save my final judgement when it's actual put to use in a game that counts. Lou still has a few weeks to change his mind. I have no problems with moving Soriano to the 2-spot or the 5-spot or the 4-spot or even the 3-spot. I have all kinds of problems with giving Ryan Theriot even more plate appearances, even if it's just a handful more.

On the other hand...

There's just something about the Lou tenure so far that makes me give him the benefit of the doubt. It's not that I think he's infallible or anything. It's just that if he does go down this road with Theriot at the top of the order, I feel just as confident that he'll abandon it if it's not working. This is the complete opposite of how I felt about Dusty, who was stubbornly stupid.

Read the rest of this entry>>>