I know AC (and others) are very antsy for the Cubs, and anyone in MLB for that matter, to stop their faux collusion and start spending already, but the calendar is the calendar and both the agents/players and the owners/front offices are in a staring contest at the moment before the Winter Meetings in a couple weeks. I was going …
Bending the Rules
Towards the end of the previous post, in between waiting for the Cubs (and really all of MLB) to show signs of life on the transactional front, AC and I started pondering how batters might mess with pitchers with the new pitch clock rule coming in 2023. As a reminder, in addition to the defensive shift restrictions and the larger …
The Roster Check Before the Storm
The Cubs did make their transactions prior to the nontender deadline, and the 40-man roster is at 37 for the moment: As we said in prior posts and in the latest Dreamcast, there were some very obvious nontender candidates, and it wasn’t too surprising to see the three names on the announcement. As stated in Bastian’s rundown, Vizcaíno was on …
A Wish List For Fun Baseball
So anyway, while waiting for the World Series to resume and then for the offseason rumor mill to start churning at maximum speed, I was thinking about what new stuff to throw up on this website and decided to take another crack and stuff that I really like about baseball that need to be emphasized. Part of this is to …
Do Something!
I think I want to see another few years of this version of the postseason before I start lobbying for one of AC’s fun ideas to change things up. What I am sure of, at this time, is that the NLCS was a lot of fun to watch. Even if I’ve been a little bored with three-true-outcomes baseball, when the …
Is MLB’s Postseason Broke? Let’s Fix it Anyway.
Whatever your reason might be for wanting to reformat the postseason or MLB in general, here are a few alternatives to the current system. We’ll start with some that could be incorporated into the league without dramatically altering the way the league is constructed. We’ll propose a few ideas for really blowing everything up later.
The Still-Too-Early Cubs Free Agency Pitch
The postseason thus far has brought us plenty of fun and exciting moments and equally intense discourse, but generally, even if the best team doesn’t always win the World Series, getting a shot into the postseason field is the goal. So it makes sense to discuss how the 2023 Chicago Cubs will be constructed to pull off a purported upset …
Speaking of weird seasons
This was originally going to be a preachy post about how MLB owners are the ones who should be playing for the love of the game, since they’re the ones playing the sport we actually love most. (I’m going out on a limb assuming few of us actually play baseball but we all like to play baseball owner, arguing about …
Cubs 4, Nats 9
OSS: Cubs bullpen in shambles (again) as Nats make late comeback Three up: Willson Contreras smacked two solo homers bringing his total to 21. His wOBA is up to .369. His ISO is 45 points better than last year. Jon Lester pitched a good game until running into trouble in the 7th. Prior to the 7th, Lester had 7 Ks through …
The Cubs historic start part 2
A month ago I looked at the Cubs historic start to the 2016 season by using Baseball Prospectus's 3rd order winning percentage.The Cubs didn't have any comparables at the time and today I set out to find the top team in 3rd order winning percentage each season going back 50 years. I looked for the top team as of games …