Archive for September, 2008

Lilly Got The Message, and Gave One Too

Ted Lilly got the message. He apparently took to heart the message Lou was trying to send to his team via shouting his frustrations in a post-game news conference from a room adjacent to the Cubs locker room. Presumably the team could hear Lou going off after Tuesday’s loss but his message was not anything [...]

September 11, 2008   Posted in: Lou Piniella, players, rivalries  No Comments

Cubs, Brews, Phils lose; Lou ready to pop

He holds his lips tighter. He talks louder and faster. You can hear the rumble building in his voice. His words don’t come as easy. No one else gets to say anything when he’s around. The US Geological Survey is measuring all these indicators and confirms is now seems certain:  Mount Lou is going to [...]

September 10, 2008   Posted in: Lou Piniella  One Comment

Revisiting the Harden Trade

Question: So who would you say got the best of this deal so far? Eric Patterson‘s batting average went down from .237 to .198 (going into today’s action) Sean Gallagher‘s ERA went up from 4.45 as a Cub to 5.23 as an Oakland Athletic (going into today’s action) Matt Murton was optioned to AAA Sacramento [...]

September 10, 2008   Posted in: Hot Stove, Jim Hendry, players, roster, stats  2 Comments

Magic Number Magic

The Brewers lost again yesterday while the Cubs regrouped on their off day. This lowers the Cubs Magic Number to win the NL Central Division to 15 games. This is an important number, no doubt. However in my view a more important factor is elimination of the Phillies to lock a playoff berth for the [...]

September 9, 2008   Posted in: playoffs, standings  No Comments

Z update

The Tribune is reporting Cubs ace Carlos Zambrano has inflammation and tendinitis in the rotator cuff of his right arm but is expected to be fine down the stretch.  Obviously good news, but if you followed my advice from yesterday, you weren’t too excited about this story anyway.  In spite of the media’s (particularly sports [...]

September 4, 2008   Posted in: curse/superstition, players, the media  No Comments

Zambrano or Not, Cubs Playoff Bound

Carlos Zambrano left Tuesday’s game this week saying to Larry Rothschild he ‘wasn’t feeling well’. Not sure what that means specifically, and given Lou’s pregame comments today, we still don’t know what to make of his complaint. To add further mystery, Z missed out on his MRI today leaving his physical exam from the Cubs [...]

September 3, 2008   Posted in: observations, players, playoffs  No Comments

Cubs Playoff Ticket Lottery is Open

Got to Cubs.com to enter your name for a drawing to be held “on or about September 19th” for the opportunity (one entry per person or risk disqualification!) to purchase NLDS or NLCS tickets for games at Wrigley Field! There is no obligation to buy the tickets if you name is pulled, and there is [...]

September 3, 2008   Posted in: game day, playoffs  One Comment

Cubs Power Outage of No Concern

The Chicago Cubs have not had an extra base hit since last Friday. That is 106 team at-bats (and counting) since Alfonso Soriano‘s game winning home run in the 7th inning of the Cubs 3-2 win over the Phillies. The Cubs have dipped to second in the NL with a team batting average of .280, [...]

September 2, 2008   Posted in: observations, standings, stats  No Comments

Call-ups play into Lou’s hot hand

Lou Piniella has proven masterful at pulling the right strings in his tenure as Cubs skipper. With the added bodies, Lou has more options for pinch hitting, spot starts and some creative double-switches. Dusty could never figure out how to double-switch, but Lou usually seems to make the right calls. The first round of September call-ups are Micah Hoffpauir, [...]

September 1, 2008   Posted in: Lou Piniella, lineup, players, roster  No Comments