Twenty Games over .500
With their 7-4 win over the Blue Jays, the Cubs are now 45-25, a .642 record. That pencils out to 104 wins over a full season.
I don’t need to tell anyone that his is unusual for the Cubs. But let’s look at the post-war Cubs teams that have reached that mark.
2004: The last time the Cubs hit the 20 games over mark. They reached it on September 24th, going 86-66 by completing a three game sweep over the Pirates in PNC Park. Greg Maddux got his 15th win. The team reached its high mark the following day, with a come-from-behind win at Shea Stadium against the Mets. From there, they went 2-7 and blew their chances at the post-season.
1998: The Cubs won 4-3 in San Diego in 10 innings to achieve an 87-67 record on September 17th, the one day that season they were 20 games over .500. From there, they wandered bass-ackwards into a post-season berth, going 2-6 against the Reds, Brewers and Astros, while their rivals’ incompetence forced a one game playoff against the Giants. They finished with a 90-73 record, the only time the Cubs have reached 90 wins in the last nineteen seasons.
1989: The Cubs reached the 20-over mark on August 16th at Cincinnati, reaching 70-50. It was the second win in a three-game sweep which capped a 22-7 stretch from late-July through mid-August. The sweep at Riverfront was followed by what felt like the collapse everyone was waiting for, as the Cubs were swept at Houston and then swept again in Chicago by the fairly hapless Reds. But the Cubs snapped out of it, and went 22-13 from there to win the NL East.
1984: The Cubs reached 65-45 on August 6th, in the first game in a big four-game sweep of the Mets at Wrigley which put them 4.5 games ahead in the NL East. They dominated for the rest of the season, going 31-20, and won the division.
1977: This Cubs team actually got off to a hotter start than the 2008 Cubs. They were 42-22 on June 22nd, completing a three-game sweep of the Giants at Candlestick Park. They followed that up by winning the next five games at home against the Mets, and the first two games against the Expos in Stade Olympique, bringing them to an incredible 47-22 record, a .681 win percentage. From there, they were the proverbial Cubs that everyone talks about, finishing the season with 93 games of .366 ball, finishing the season at .500. A truly legendary collapse.
1969: On June 6th, the Cubs completed a six-game winning streak at home, trouncing the Reds 14-8, and reaching the 36-16 mark, a .692 record. On August 19th, Ken Holtzman no-hit the Braves, taking the Cubs to their zenith of the season at 77-45, maintaining their 8 game lead in the NL East. The Cubs went 15-25 from there in a notorious collapse.
And that’s it.
Half of these teams failed to make the post-season, including the 1977 Cubs who actually outperformed the 2008 team up to this point. That was also the one team that didn’t keep things interesting until nearly the very end of the season, being several games back and in third place by mid-August.
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Funny to think that the Cubs have 10 games remaining against the NL West, 6 against the AL East, 6 against the AL Central, 21 against the NL East, and 49 against the NL Central, and their schedule gets harder from here on out.
Wasn't that Neifi's doing?
Point taken. Still, even W3 has them as the best team in the division by a comfortable margin, and slightly above the Phils for best in the NL.
I'd take Sutter's 1977 performance in total. He was only out a couple of weeks, right?
Anyway, I share your dismay about Marmol.
It's too early to speculate since the Tribe is far from done, but thoughts? Ideas on what sort of package it would take to make that happen?
1) The offer has to have more value than the draft picks/opportunity to resign
2) The offer has to be the best amongst the bidding teams.
I don't know enough about Cleveland's system to figure out what they'd like to get. I guess everyone always wants arms.
Pick a few:
Gallagher, Pie, Cedeno/Theriot, Veal, Vitters, Colvin, Ceda, Marshall, Fontenot
I doubt Theriot would interest them too much, and the Cubs won't want to trade on their everyday regulars. They'd rather not gut the bench, and I don't think anyone sees Fontenot as an everyday option. I'm not sure what value Cedeno has for other teams, but he's definitely a possibility. I could see Gallagher, Marshall, Murton and maybe a low level guy (maybe another arm or someone like Donaldson) being the ideal offer from the Cubs' perspective, considering CC is a FA.
With Wang hurt now, the Cubs will face some serious competition from the Yankees, not to mention any other team that would be looking to add a SP at the deadline. That will seriously drive up the price, but I'm ok with the Cubs completely going for it this year. Outside of CF, the Cubs really won't have a lot of long term holes or immediate needs for upgrades going into next season (depending on your opinion of Theriot).
Then, we started walking through the rest of MLB, and were hard-pressed to name a team that is clearly better than the Cubs.
The DBacks? They've got a number of pretty glaring holes - maybe in a year or 2, but right now, I think I'd still take the Cubs 25 man over the DBacks (long term, I'd certainly prefer the DBacks roster, though).
Even over in the AL, I see a lot of aging teams with serious holes.
So far as Hendry making any moves at the deadline, I think he's always done well for himself in-season (results or not - the Nomar trade was still a steal). It's primarily been offseason deals that have come back to haunt us.
What's more - other than Zambrano and Soto, who obviously aren't going anywhere - I don't think there's a single player in the system I particularly care to see labeled untouchable.
Unlike the 2003 season, when I spent the deadline in mortal fear that we'd mortgage our future - I can't think of a single minor leaguer I'm attached to.
There was perhaps a bit more anticipation. The Cubs were young and promising in the infield. Krukow and Burriss were "top young pitching prospects" (in the Cub fan mind at least). Sutter emerged like a god. But looking back at it, only the last one had any truth to it.
Anyway, the Cubs built a no-speed, low-power though decent on-base offense (4th in the NL) and got pretty much exactly the production you'd have expected.
Rich Hill's had two straight good starts in AZL: 4 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 6 Ks and 5 IP, 3 Hs, 0 R, 1 BB, 5 Ks.
Felix Pie has put up a 355/403/548 line in 63 July ABs, including a .413 average over his last ten games.
Still, encouraging as it is, two straight good starts in Arizona doesn't do it. He's going to need to sustain consistency over several starts, in the high minors as well as the low minors.
Optimistically speaking, in my mind he shouldn't be considered until September, assuming this is a legitimate rebound.
Pie's a different case, in my mind. Unlike Hill, Pie hasn't proved he's capable of success at the MLB level -- even as he has enjoyed success at Iowa. Furthermore, with the emergence of Edmonds, there's really no compelling reason to bring Pie back in the near future. I'm sure he'll be a September call-up, but I would think that the next time he's going to get a serious look would be in spring training . . . and he may very well be dealt before then.
One important thing is that the plate is the same size in Arizona as it is in Chicago. Missing bats has never been Hill's problem. He has shown in the past that he can go down in the middle of the season and come back strong. Hill may very well become our #5 starter when Marquis has his inevitable 2nd half collapse.
Schlitter is vaguely interesting... which is more than I thought would come back.
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