I'll just say right now that there is nothing to win, but bragging rights. So if you're someone wanting to win something, well, we can give you a Kyuji Fujikawa bobblehead and that's it. Seriously, if you really want the bobblehead, we'll send it along. So if that's incentive, great. Otherwise, there is none. It's a free agent contest, but …
Race to the Top (of the 2014 Draft)
Welcome back to the 3rd installment of OV's annual Race to the Top series! This has become an extremely fun tradition where we flip the stadings upside down, reverse wins and losses and track the Cubs "progress" towards achieving the top draft pick in the next draft! We sure do know how to have fun around here! In previous years, …
The American League All-Star Merit Team
The ASB is here, and as we know, This Time It Really Matters (No, Really, Please Watch This Game). I'd like to take to remake each team and not abide by the silly rule of having a player from each team. Today, I'll look at the AL. Catcher Joe Mauer wins here, pretty easily. He sports a wOBA of .380 and an OBP …
Talking Cubs/Mets on the Met Musings Podcast
I had an opportunity to join Gary McDonald on his Mets Musings podcast earlier today to talk a bit about the Cubs as we get ready to see Matt Harvey and the Mets this weekend at Wrigley Field. My part starts at about the 20 minute mark, but before that Gary talks about Ike Davis' struggles and some of the other …
Cubs Regression To The Mean
The Cubs have been an enigmatic team this year in a few ways. I was looking earlier for reasons to be optimistic about the Cubs, and I found some; however, the Cubs have been equally lucky in a few ways. The Cubs are 29th in the league in Offensive Batting Average on Balls In Play, with .265. That is a …
Chance to win $200 gift card at The Outside Corner on Bloguin
We're glad that we're among your go to destinations for Cubs blogs. Despite my occasional attempts to cover MLB more thoroughly, it ends up failing. Since we don't cover MLB thoroughly, we wanted to suggest you spend some time over at The Outside Corner every now and again. They're in our 5 site rotation of daily national reads and have …
Assume the Position: MLB Starting Pitchers
For pitching, I'm going to break it down into more easily-digestible bunches. For this version, I'm going to look at the Cubs in 2012 and then the people most likely to make the team (for Opening Day) in 2013. Last Year 2013 Career Name Age GS IP ERA FIP pwFIP ERA FIP Samardzija …
Interview with Tom Tango (aka tangotiger)
As most of you probably know, Tom Tango now exclusively consults with the Cubs. This is incredible news: Tom Tango, also knows as tangotiger, is one of the greatest baseball minds in the game today. Many of the foundational statistics that we have today come from The Book, the spiritual successor to The Hidden Game of Baseball. Mr. Tango has …
US Roster for World Baseball Classic
The rosters for the World Baseball Classic (WBC) were announced yesterday's and here is the US roster. Player Pos. Team Mark Teixeira 1B Yankees Brandon Phillips 2B Reds Jimmy Rollins SS Phillies David Wright 3B Mets Joe Mauer C Twins Ryan Braun LF Brewers Adam Jones CF Orioles Giancarlo Stanton RF Marlins Ben Zobrist INF Rays Willie Bloomquist INF D-backs …
How good is Anthony Rizzo?
Not long after the Cubs hired Theo Epstein and Jed Hoyer, the two traded Andrew Cashner and Kyung-Min Na to the Padres for Anthony Rizzo and Zach Cates. Rizzo had just completed his age 21 season with the Padres and to say it didn't go well would be putting it nicely. Still, he had hit well in the minor leagues …