Big

Jesus we've been playing some INTENSE baseball as of late

I can't wait for this final game of the series to be over so at least my blood pressure can get back to normal. all three games have been like this.

It looks like Cubs are in ownership limbo and can't get any kind of even tentative approval to increase payroll, whether or not they have the pieces. I still say he goes by the trade deadline, but not to the cubs!

Milton Bradley hit .320 with a with a .389 BABIP last year. edit: and we've gotten off topic. All of yesterday when you typed "peavy" into google news the sole two articles in the most current grouping were as such: the bleacherreport.com saying "Come To Think Of It...Cubs Fans: Tom Ricketts ? Jake Peavy" (which is a rescension of their last few articles which said in typical post pie deal in excited fashion that a deal was imminent) and this article out of california: PADRES ANALYSIS: Peavy to Cubs making more sense?. So This speculation is becoming a bore. reports suggest that Hendry and Towers haven't really talked since Winter and the cubs are very close atm to 140m which is their soft or rumored payroll for 09 and Tom Ricketts bought the team for 900m but he only came to the table with 450m which doesn't speak volumes for him as a cash-machine and even in a best case scenario it would hard to imagine the transfer of ownership process to be complete by opening day. I don't think anyone knows %#% is going on.

200

I think your use of BABIP to guarantee a down year uses an absurd kind of Gambler's logic. In theriot's case It's particularly confusing. Obviously, any team can have a down year, but for the cubs, 08 wasn't one of them, and if you're looking for cracks in the foundation it doesn't look too good for the brewers and the cardinals either. This is all on paper, thank god.

you should do this for every other team in the NL central in a "Why the Brew Crew's gonna win in 09 thread"

If you look at the numbers the cubs record of 97 wins last year is an underperformance given their runs scored/runs allowed and to say that it banked on players having career years offensively is not exactly, players like Lee and Soriano underperformed a bit and the only player with a real track record that had a career year was DeRosa, and there is certainly no evidence that Soto's performance is inflated (in limited abs he hit 389 is 07). This aside, jjfanec is right on the money with his evaluation the moves are definitely lateral at best, and I think most cubs fans would agree with him. The DeRosa deal is mind boggling because replacing him with miles only trims 3M, though no one is exactly sure what the Cubs have to spend atm. Anyway, There are a couple articles to read: the bleacherreport says a new cubs owner is imminent (middle of next week) and people have speculated that cubs management would like the thumbs up from the new cubs ownership before they ok the acquisition, but Hendry is obviously optimistic on this front if his moves are indeed a precursor to a deal. The other article comes out of San Diego and has some interesting stuff in it but it ends up reiterating that Peavy's 11m is an obstacle to the padres target payroll of 40m. Towers is tight-lipped right now. These circumstances give the media and cubs fans a lot of optimism for a deal. that being said, it's all just speculation. And Hendry's not really saying anything beyond that he wants to add another pitcher. http://bleacherreport.com/mlb http://www3.signonsandieg...adres-peavy-deal-elusive/

The assumption is that the pitching prospects received by trading DeRosa and Pie would go to San Diego, along with some other pieces like SS Ronny Cedeno (and likely including the cubs best prospect, 3B Josh Vitters). Padres said explicitly that it would definitely take pitching to get a deal done. DeRosa was extremely valuable to the cubs and on a very reasonable salary-- for a team trying to win now, these moves would only make real sense if they added up to Peavy.

CC vs Guzman is the mismatch of the century... GO BREWERS

CC vs Guzman is the mismatch of the century... GO BREWERS

There's no way Lou takes Gaudin into the postseason.

Brewers caught a lucky break with Soto.. Koyie Hill has been awful

Dempster = Out Marshall = In

5/5