Miniature Yankees

The post title sums up how I feel about this year's Cubs team. I've seen about half the games this year, but then again, I got back from the gym today and realized that they were up by a ton, and shrugged. I checked the box score to see who did well, but to be honest if you get ten walks against the Padres the writing is on the wall. If you haven't had the chance to read Taibbi's takedown of Brian Cashman do yourself a favor and do it.

Besides the particulars of his argument, the general form holds. Baseball is overwhelmingly tilted toward the top teams (Yanks, Sox, Mets, Angels, Dodgers, Cubs,etc) If those teams aren't challenging for a championship year in and year out then there is something organizationally askew. And at this point, it honestly looks like the team is moving backwards.

We lost Wood and DeRosa, two of our team leaders and DeRo's flexibility sure would be coming in handy right about now, hey Jim. When you have the kind of resources we do and Wrigley Field just printing money, how did we go into the season with a bullpen where Lou didn't trust anybody. How the hell did we let Bob Howry get away? Oh that's right, we declined to offer him arbitration. He signed for 2.75 mil with one of the worst teams in the league. I know San Fran is a cool place to live but look at Howry's face when he's on the mound and don't tell me that he is not one hell of a competitor. He is exactly what this team is missing, which is a major injection of intestinal fortitude. I mean for crying out loud every one of our major contributors has issues, D Lee is almost 34 and has a bad back, I hear that's a recipe for athletic excellence, Aramis usually gets hurt running the bases, this time it was a freak accident in the field, and Soriano has baseball Tourette's and can't stand the mental pressure of hitting 3rd in the lineup, so how are his teammates supposed to rely on him in the clutch/postseason.
No disrespect to guys battling injuries or physical limitations (Aaron Miles is just not a major league offensive player, or at least he hits like one of those old-school #8 in the lineup shortstops when he hits .290+ but apparently he cant do that anymore and he's only a mediocre defensive replacement. He is effectively Lindsey Hunter without the veteran leadership.) Basically though this team is battling injuries and still 5 games over even, I don't like how we got here from last year's team, which was one of my favorites ever. Howry-Marmol-Wood, Reed Johnson making crazy defensive plays. Dempster shuttin em down like he did today. I don't know hopefully Ryan Freel can show me something, and then Hendry can keep showing me something. And then since I'm in a bad mood, I thought I'd kick off the old school hip hop for the blog. WEST WEST.