Baseball has always been a harbinger. The promise of summer,. Of sunshine. Of warm nights dripping with the air that seemed to be the life’s blood of our game. The electricity surging through the crowds that seemed to power the lights as well as the players. The warm air will come, as will the light […]
In my 40 years of following the Cubs, I have seen a great many men come through town while donning the tools of ignorance—they collectively comprise a tapestry that ranges the entire characteristic gamut. From the outstanding (our current catcher, one Willson Contreras, who after these past 40 years is well on his way to […]
While the North Side weather forecasters argue over whether Chicago will see “some snow” or “ducal assloads of snow”, the sun is shining and the air is warm and baseball is being played in Mesa, Arizona. Some will be quick to point out this isn’t “real baseball”, as though all the games played before Opening […]
Nobody was able to watch Spring Training games on Saturday, as the White Sox were rained out and the Cubs were on the Marquee Network. Sorry, Cub fans…you missed out on the inaugural Ryan Dempster Harry Caray imitation. On Sunday, the White Sox had to be encouraged by Dylan Cease’s outing, going two innings, allowing […]
The Hindenburg. The Titanic. The Tacoma Narrows Bridge. This weekend, the much-anticipated and much-ballyhooed Marquee Network debuts. This is of relevance to the less than 50% of Chicago area homes that don’t subscribe to Comcast. While the Ricketts family (and presumably, Cubs’ Baseball Operations) have been planning this launch for years, they never thought to […]
The Cubs’ ongoing austerity program has now reached beyond the baseball operations segment of the team, and into business operations as the Cubs have announced that not only is President of Business Operations Crane Kenney being forced to flying on commercial flights, but he has been relegated to flying in coach. “He got pretty annoying” […]
Cubs manager David Ross (yeah, that still sounds weird) confirmed that Kris Bryant will be the Cubs’ leadoff hitter to start the 2020 season. He didn’t dance around the issue, saying it made sense to him to have his best hitter getting the most at bats. Of course, having a leadoff hitter whose worst on […]
In this regular feature, we will help you acquaint yourself with some of the finest practitioners of the most thankless task in baseball to ever don the “tools of ignorance” for our beloved Chicago Baseball teams. This week we feature Tim Hosley. Timing is everything. Some people have that uncanny knack for being in the […]
It’s everyone’s (well, at least someone’s) favorite time of year, when seasonal projections start coming out. Fangraphs has dropped the ZiPS projections for both the White Sox and Cubs, and as you can guess, the difference in each team’s trajectory shows. Now here is a quick explanation of how these projections are cooked up: Basically, […]
In this regular feature, we will help you acquaint yourself with some of the finest practitioners of the most thankless task in baseball to ever don the “tools of ignorance” for our beloved Chicago Baseball teams. This week we feature Martin Maldonado. Martin Maldonado is a journeyman catcher who came to the Cubs in July […]