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Gonfalon Cubs
— Cubs Baseball for Thinking Fans
— Cubs Baseball for Thinking Fans
Monday, September 24, 2007
3.5 Games Up!
Perhaps NTNGod has grown weary of posting NL Central updates, so I’ll post my own Cubs-centric thoughts here.
On August 1st, the Cubs entered into a first place tie in the NL Central. They followed that up with a 3-10 stretch, but they only lost 1.5 games in the standings, thanks to the Brewers stinking it up nearly as badly. Unless a serious reversal of fortune occurs in the remaining seven days, a possibility I do not discount, I think we can look back at that failure to capitilize as the key failure in the Brewers season. Since then, the Cubs have not been more than a game behind in the standings.
Since August 1st, the Cubs are a whopping 2 games over .500. Okay, that doesn’t tell the whole story: the Cubs were not good in August, and have been wonderful in September. They are now 15-8 in the month, with six games to go. It will be hard for them to match their 19-8 September of 2003, their best September since 1935, but so far they’ve been a juggernaut. The Brewers’ 12-9 has not been enough.
Brewers fans are familiar with the story behind today’s loss in Atlanta in the way I am familiar with Goodnight Moon: I know it by heart because I read it almost every night. They’re losing in dramatic, heartbreaking fashion, although the drama and heartbreak of such losses deteriorates when you see it happen again and again.
But it ain’t over. The series of events that led to the Cubs’ demise in 2004 was not expected by anyone, and they would not be the first team to blow a 3.5 game lead with 6 games left.
Andere Richtingen
Posted: September 24, 2007 at 12:20 AM | 48 comment(s)
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I believe this to be untrue. The Cubs Chatterers were predicting the impending implosion.
87 wins
Cubs
Brewers
Cards
Reds
Stros
Pirates
*Cabbage Patch*
I can see that. I do think it's worthy of reflection, however. I mean, whether the Brewers win or lose, this past weekend will be remembered as a crucial turning point.
The Cubs fans on this board are probably unanimous in favoring this development but it's nice to see a manager go to the young guy in the heat of a divisional race. Now, if he would only give Marmol some higher leverage innings...
BTW, how has Kerry looked in his last couple of outings? I didn't see them on television but I have heard favorable things.
The crucial turning point in the Brewers season was August 26th. Aside from the loss to the Giants thanks to the bullpen it was on that day that Ned Yost benched Bill Hall for "poor performance". Bill had struck out five times over two games so Yost planted him on the bench and specifically told everyone in the local press what he had done and why.
Bill took offense. And said so.
The clubhouse was now in a state of discontent. Hall is a well-respected guy on the Milwaukee team and the squad had already developed growing doubts about their manager's judgement. This move caused multiple players to conclude that their manager was indeed "lacking".
Yost then compounded the situation by tow days later pinch-hitting for Hall in a key situation in a 5-3 loss to the Cubs. While the focus in the popular press was the loss and how the bullpen blew one of the unmentioned items was that Hall was seething. And he had company.
Eventually, Yost benched Hall for most of September until about three days ago.
In the heat of a divisional race Ned Yost picked a fight with the team's most popular player. All because Hall thought Yost was being uneven in his application of discipline. Everyone on the team had watched Yost continue to support Turnbow and then Capuano as they flamed out repeatedly. Hall wasn't even playing that poorly and he gets benched. Bill stated it was because he wasn't the kind to complain and he didn't think that was fair.
Yost took umbrage at being challenged. And he made his point.
And now the entire franchise will suffer for it.
Nice work Ned. And nice job by Melvin. Letting his manager run amok over petty nonsense.........
If the Cubs go 4-2 to finish the season, you should change your name to Popstradamus.
I can only comment on the two innings he threw yesterday when his stuff looked filthy. He was getting ahead in the count, his breaking stuff seemed to have incredible movement, and IIRC the only balls hit off him were weak grounders. The crowd was chanting his name as he struck out the last guy to finish the 8th. It was one of the better moments of the year, IMO.
It would be a terrific story if Kerry grabbed a little postseason glory of his own.
I feel like he has been the worst victim of the Cubs' desperation and self destructive idiocy. It's been fairly popular for the press to bash him as one of those proverbial ten cent heads but the organization repeatedly failed him in big ways over his career.
I'm disappointed to have missed his time in sun yesterday.
From memory:
In the great green room
there was a telephone
and a red balloon
and a picture of
the cow jumping over the moon
and there were two little bears, sitting on chairs
and two little kittens
and a pair of mittens
and a little toy house, and a young mouse
and a comb and a brush and bowl full of mush
and a quiet old lady who was whispering hush
goodnight room
goodnight moon
goodnight cow jumping over the moon
goodnight light and the red balloon
goodnight bears
goodnight chairs
goodnight kittens
and goodnight mittens
goodnight house
and goodnight mouse
goodnight comb
goodnight brush
goodnight nobody
goodnight mush
and goodnight to the old lady whispering hush
goodnight stars
goodnight air
goodnight noises everywhere
And I'm hopeful that he's able to forever cement his legacy as "Don Geovany." I'm particularly proud of that nickname. :)
I think Soto HAS earned Piniella's trust as the starting catcher, and that the Soto situation is the ultimate instance of Piniella's complete lack of sentimentality with regard to playing time decisions. Not that Kendall's a long-term Cub who's really had time to become "bonded" to the organization, but he WAS the veteran guy Jim Hendry picked to plug the team's yawning chasm at catcher--and he did so quite capably for over a month. And yet, when he started to stumble, Piniella didn't hesitate long to plug in the young guy who'd torn up AAA but had almost no big league experience, because he thought (correctly) that that was what gave the team the best chance to win, player egos be damned.
Stark refreshing contrast between Piniella and Baker No. 3,258,399.
I predicted 91 wins and a first-place finish. Obviously, I overshot the former by a bit--I'm of course hoping to've been spot-on with the latter.
He seems to have regained a great deal of his command the last several times out, and there's never been any doubt that he can still bring it. Nice to have yet another flamethrower in the pen who's a good bet to shut down the opponent.
A healthy and effective Kerry Wood would bring the Cubs: Dempster, Howry, Marmol & Wood to use in the pen for 2008. If only the Cubs had some left handed relief pitching...
Will Sean Marshall be the answer to that problem next year?
Stark refreshing contrast between Piniella and Baker No. 3,258,399.
STRONGLY CONCUR.
Will Sean Marshall be the answer to that problem next year?
I don't know about that (Marshall's repertoire seems better suited to starting to me), but I reckon there'll be a cattle call of decent LOOGY options brought to spring training, with the thinking being that one or two will be useful. Are there any decent lefty relievers on the free agent list this year?
And of course, Eyre's still under contract for another year, which seems a lot less horrifying now than it did in June. He's been lights-out in the second half.
Does he have a dominant pitch like Marmol? If not, he probably wouldn't be a great reliever.
Man bites dog! ;)
I'm really excited to see Soto getting the bulk of the playing time and playing well and I do think that if the playoffs started tomorrow, Lou would probably go with him.
Overall, Piniella has really impressed me. I was so used to seeing a manager who had irrational favorites and refused to play kids, that I'd come to expect that sort of thing. But Lou has really been exceptionally good at not playing irrational favorites, at giving guys a chance, and at making really good decisions about who to play. He's done a nice job working Murton into the mix here lately; he was really quick to replace Izturis with Theriot; he's worked Marmol into the mix fairly nicely (I'd just go ahead and make him the closer and forget Dempster, but Piniella's handled the situation far better than Baker, who would have buried Marmol at the back end of the bullpen as a mop-up man).
The other thing that's really impressed me about this team is their bullpen in general. I was talking to my wife about this yesterday. It seems that every year every team has one guy in the bullpen who the fans dread coming into a game. In 2003, we had Alfonseca; in 2004, it was Hawkins (always bad when that guy's your closer). It was Farnsworth about half his time here in Chicago. But this year, the Cubs have nobody in the bullpen that I actually dread seeing. Eyre's turned his season around nicely; Dempster's just a mediocre closer, but in the classic sense of "mediocre" (he's average-ish), and everybody else strikes me as being comfortably above-average. A lot of this is because Lou's been pretty quick to stop using the guys who might have become that guy (Ohman comes to mind). But come playoff time, I think I'd be pretty comfortable with the Cubs using any of Dempster, Howry, Marmol, Wood, Wuertz, or Eyre as needed. That's pretty nice.
Of course, now that I've said nice things about the team and made two references to the playoffs in this post, they'll go out and lose 5 of 6 on this road trip and let the Brewers back into it.
--Man bites dog! ;)
Acorn, blind squirrel. I'll let you decide which one of us is which.
Eyre's resurgence has me feeling better about him now. He was good in 2006, and the second half of 2007.
A few things about Eyre.
Right handed batters have a .402 BABIP on him, and in the first half all batters had a .426 BABIP.
March/April saw a .571 BABIP
May saw a .400 BABIP
June saw a .395 BABIP.
And finally, a .550 BABIP on 0 days rest.
Can someone with PI see if he was used on 0 days rest and against RHB more often in the first three months? If so, then usage itself might have been the problem.
The nice thing about the Cubs having 5 other reliable bullpen arms is that they can just use Eyre as a LOOGY without losing much in the way of bullpen flexibility.
Hm. Tough one. I'm both squirrelly and nutty.
Very good fastball for a left handed pitcher. My impression is that his breaking ball has been touch-and-go.
Looking at his numbers, he hasn't shown a very strong platoon split at the major league level but that could be partially due to sample size.
Aren't lefty relievers always available?
Retro, you're probably right about Eyre. He will have as good a resume as anyone the Cubs can bring in. I suppose the real question is whether to deploy Marshall as a starter in 2008.
It depends on whether or not Trachsel gets to become a starter, or if he's moved before then. My guess is that Trachsel gets traded for a prospect and Marshall gets to start based on how bad Trachsel was. Marshall just needs to get more consistent to be a good starter.
I would be happier with Marshall penciled into the rotation next year than Marquis but that isn't going to happen.
My guess is that Marshall will be a starter unless Prior gets healthy *knock Kerry*.
You beat me to it; I would be impressed if it wasn’t for the fact that I have read that book multiple times a day for the last 4 months. It's to the point of anger towards some of the things in the book...I mean who leaves a bowl of mush sitting out all night, and who lets cats play with a ball of yarn so close to a fire, and honestly how do we know the mouse is young!
That's kind of what I would be thinking. That's not to say I don't like him, but a young, cheap guy who put up a 4ish ERA as a starter might land you a good position prospect. My feeling is that the other Sean should be ahead of him on the depth chart.
You beat me to it; I would be impressed if it wasn’t for the fact that I have read that book multiple times a day for the last 4 months. It's to the point of anger towards some of the things in the book...I mean who leaves a bowl of mush sitting out all night, and who lets cats play with a ball of yarn so close to a fire, and honestly how do we know the mouse is young!
What I want to know is why the kittens are playing with a stupid ball of yarn when there's a mouse wandering around a few feet away. Those are some lameass kittens.
I have read this book more times than I can count over the last few years. This line (which is actually a whole page) is just lazy writing. I mean, there's nothing else in that room that could be mentioned here?!
Though to be honest, I much prefer this book to the various Cinderella/Snow White/Little Mermaid stories that my daughter is so fond of.
He's made 19 starts, so he's only averaged a little over 5 IP/start. I'm not sure exactly why that is, since he's generally been excellent. Probably mostly a matter of being careful with him since he's only 21.
I believe the New York Times, maybe 4 or 5 years ago, had an article where someone went through and "cleaned up" all of the things in Goodnight Moon that parents today would never do. It was pretty funny (and I think it was Goodnight Moon, but it might have been a different children's book).
He threw 151 and 164 innings over the past two years. Could the Cubs be taking a different approach with their pitchers? If you add his ML innings, which I forgot to do, he's thrown about 115 this season - still significantly fewer than at age 19.
In a context-neutral world, I would give Gallagher one more year in the minors (his four starts in AAA went very well) and see what Marshall offers when he isn't handled with kid gloves.
His minor league season was disrupted three times by call-ups where he received little use in the majors, so that has something to do with it.
This year in the minors he was used solely as a starter, and yet the low innings totals. He must have been babied for some reason.
Cubs starters have a 4.20 ERA, good for a 109 ERA+
Relievers have a 3.71 ERA, good for a 123ERA+
goodnight nobody
Far from lazy writing, I think this is one of the great lines in all of children's literature. It's an acknowledgment of the ineffable and potentially terrifying things that inhabit a child's room (i.e., his mind) as he prepares to face the darkness of nighttime and sleep. Saying "goodnight" to "nobody" puts those bogeys to rest just as surely and serenly as if they were a kitten playing with a ball of string. It gave me the chills the first few times I read it.
The NYT article Eamus mentions: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/04/opinion/04karbo.html
There's a children's museum in New Haven, CT that recreates the great green room. It's a little freaky, actually.
OK, enough on that. (I'm not obsessed, I promise, though it is one of my favorite children's books.0
On the Cubs:
- I think Marshall's a fine pitcher, but I wouldn't be surprised to see him traded this winter, particularly if both Prior and Guzman are in the mix next year. Lou (or possibly Hendry) has commented that they'd prefer to have three righties in the rotation than three lefties. (I don't necessary endorse this view -- I'd prefer the five best pitchers, regardless of handedness -- but I do think it's a glimpse into the club's mindset.) Marshall doesn't seem to me to be cut out for bullpen work; he doesn't have a single dominating pitch, though his curve is good, and he seems more like the the steady, unspectacular type than the short-but-sweet shutdown specialist. Trading Jerry Blevins, while maybe justified, is going to hurt next year when he's a key part of the Oakland pen and we sign John Franco for 3 years, $15 million.
- One thought on Eyre: he's been vastly better since the ASB than he was before, but his peripherals don't quite justify the improvement in ERA. (TOo lazy too look them up right now.) He still makes me nervous.
August 1st? I disagree.
On May 9th the Brewers were 6.5 up. Over the next 20 games they went 6-14 and were 6.5 up. They go 10-10 and they are in first right now. They go 11-9 and they are 1.5 games up. After those 20 games they have another 10 games in which they go 4-6 including two losses to the Cubs and at the end of it they are still 5.5 games up. So from May 11th to to June 12th the Brewers go 10-20 and only lose a game in the standings. That right there is what cost them the season.
Sarcasm, I know, but if we spend a penny on a bullpen arm this offseason that isn't Kerry Wood, I'm gonna be really pissed.
Soto -
Bringing in a rookie catcher in the September of a tight race is pretty damned adventurous for any manager to do (is there any other position for which veteran-ness seems to traditionally have more import?) and I salute Lou for doing it. I was especially impressed when Geo literally grabbed Z's attention (by the shirt-button) yesterday. I think Soto is for real and I'm glad to see a young Cub being used when the easy and safe thing to do would be to stay with the old hand.
Pitching - Eyre's WHIP since the ASB is unimpressive. I think that his post-ASB ERA looks so good because A) he has been used more as a LOOGY than previously, and B) because other relievers have bailed him out when the #### has been nearing the fan.
DTM wondered about Trachsel's future. IIRC, he has a 100k buy-out this fall and I fully expect him to recieve the check before the ink is dry.
Marshall - I think he has trade value and I would definitely market him. Kevin Hart looks like he could be ready, the club is clearly high on Gallagher, and who knows maybe Guzman or Prior might actually show up healthy.
Any consideration of roster additions or subtractions for next year should be framed in the context of Hendry's words on WGN tv the day that Zambrano's new deal was announced. He told Len & Bob that he did not expect the Cubs to get involved in the FA market, but that he expected to be actively trading.
He's had 8 outings where no one has reached base. Two of those were 0.3 IP, and another was 0.7 IP. To be fair, I guess, all 8 have come in his last 16 appearances.
He has 12 times he's only allowed one man to reach base.
He's only allowed three extra base hits - a triple and two doubles.
I'd be interested to see how he does in terms on inherited runners.
We should all be high on Gallagher. He's a pitching prospect without any great weaknesses. He has very nice K rates, his walk rates are acceptable, and he suppresses home runs. The icing on that cake is that he has succeeded at AAA and has a totally clean health record to this point.
Were it another dismal year for the Cubs we would have been drooling over him on a fairly regular basis.
Hart's walk rates have been all over the map. I don't know what to think of him but he is an interesting prospect.
There will be much revision of BA's prospect list for this organization. And most of it, thankfully, is due to improvements rather than failures.
Who are the others, if any?
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