I don’t see how this season comes down to anything other than this faceoff from last season resulting in the death of one of them.
What are the 2011 Cubs good at?
I wanted to look over various statistics to see what the Cubs were good at. It’s a bad team, but even bad teams excel at something. Right? Batting average is a useless statistic, but I figured if there was one thing the Cubs were good at it would be this. The Cubs .258 team average beats the NL average of …
Starlin Castro and 200 hits in season
Starlin Castro sits at 192 hits entering today’s games. There are 13 games remaining this season and there seems a good chance he ends up with 200 hits. That’s a big number and one that is often talked about. If you get 200 hits, you supposedly are a great hitter. Certainly, at Castro’s age, doing it is quite impressive, but …
Add Mark Shapiro's name to the list
Jayson Stark has heard from an executive that Indians President and former GM Mark Shapiro may have interest in the Cubs general manager job. We’ve heard lots of famous names connected with the Cubs’ general manager gig. Well, here’s one fascinating name we haven’t heard: Indians president (and longtime GM) Mark Shapiro. According to people in the game who are …
Aramis Ramirez and "performing when it counts"
The Cubs and Aramis Ramirez have a mutal option for 2011 at $16 million, but it’s unlikely he exercises that option. Ramirez is looking for more than a one-year deal and as the best free agent 3rd baseman he’ll easily get a multi-year deal on the free agent market. It’s hard to say whether or not the Cubs will offer …
The hunt for a new GM
Shortly after Jim Hendry was fired I wrote about why every big name GM, current or not, is a candidate for the Cubs job. If they are, so is everybody else. The reason I wrote that is that the GM who wins a World Series with the Cubs is going to be the most popular GM in history. He can …
2011 Minor League Wrap Up, Part 2
I figured now was a good time to post something about the Cubs top prospects since it’s past the midway point in the full minor league seasons. The short-season teams just got under way. I’m using Sickel’s top 20. I’m breaking this into three parts. I’ll cover 11-20 here and then 1-10 while the final part will focus on players …
WAR And Salsa
A lot of discussion started yesterday about WAR thanks a very thoughtful article on It’s About The Money, Stupid. Discussion followed in two article on The Book Blog (here and here) and then on Replacement Level Baseball Blog. I’ve mostly been ignoring the defense part of WAR for some time now. Ever since Colin Wyers showed how useless those metrics …
2011 Minor League Wrap Up, Part 1
Now that the minor league regular season is over it seems a good time to take yet another look at the Cubs top prospects. Over the next week I’ll do just that and this time I will publish a new survey and actually post the results. I promise. First, let’s look at how the teams performed and how one non-top …