Oh, for the long one
Don't look now, but the Cubs haven't hit a home run since Micah Hoffpauir went deep against Micah Owings on Tuesday. As you recall, it was the only Micah-off-Micah homer in big-league history.
But seriously, the Cubs are in a serious world of hurt, both literally and figuratively down in St. Louis. They should know more today about the status of third baseman Aramis Ramirez (calf) and reliever Carlos Marmol (knee). The Cubs can ill afford to lose either. Ramirez is their best hitter, and Marmol is holding the bullpen together along with Aaron Heilman.
Lou sounded genuinely ticked last night about the lack of depth. Mike Fontenot filled in at third base for Ramirez, but Fontenot is slumping at the plate, with a .213 average. Aaron Miles took over at second for Fontenot, and he's at .095 following a 2-for-17 homestand and an 0-for-1 last night. The Cubs haven't missed Mark DeRosa too much, have they?
If the Cubs have to DL Ramirez, they can call Jake Fox up from Iowa. Fox hit his eighth homer last night, and he appears to be a big-league hitter. Defense is a problem. If the Cubs want more of an infielder, veteran journeyman Bobby Scales is hitting .370 at Iowa. He has no major-league experience.
It's not too early to be concerned (if not worried) about Geovany Soto. He had a 2-for-20 homestand and was 1-for-3 last night. His average stands at .125 heading into this afternoon's game. Soto is 2-for-7 throwing out attempted basestealers, and Lou sounded none too happy with the Cubs allowing Albert Pujols to steal second in the decisive eighth inning. "The Fielding Bible" cites running defense as the weakness in Soto's game. He and the pitchers are going to have to contain it better.
We'll see how long Lou sticks with Ryan Theriot as the leadoff man. Theriot is 8-for-37 over the recently concluded homestand and last night. He also has only 1 walk in his last 6 games. His OBP is "down" to .391. He'll need to keep after it to turn in another season like last year, when the OBP was .387. Theriot doesn't give you any power, so he's going to have to find a way to get on base.
Sean Marshall starts today. He got his last victory as a starter in St. Louis last July 6. He's 2-1 with a 3.67 ERA vs. the Cards.
At Iowa, Mitch Atkins was only fair last night. He worked 6 innings, giving up 7 hits and 4 earned runs. His ERA is 8.06. Lou had talked of Atkins being an emergency starter for the big club. That's an iffy proposition right now. After a sensational season last year at Tennessess and Iowa, Atkins didn't impress in spring training, and he's off to a so-so start at Iowa.
released gaudin. we'll wind up eating 1.6 mil.
released vizcaino. (he's actually in 10-day DFA limbo period, but no one's gonna pay up to trade for him) we'll wind up eating 3.1 mil in salary, 0.5 for buy-out.
that's 4.7 mil just in '09 salaries.
the price of getting harden went up. the price of dumping marquis went up.
the bullpen depth went from bad to really bad.
hendry is just not as good a gm as cub homer fans--and our beat writers--think he is.
he needs a whole lotta payroll to field a good team and cut thru his mistakes--the big ones and the more subtle ones, like the above two.
Pinhead Pinella this stupid aw shucks guy when he interviews with the press had better get a hold of this team otherwise players will start questioning his tactics when it comes to dealing with certain players on this team.This could be a long summer for us cub fans.
Bruce, How long do you think it will be before Lou wakes up from his current "senior moment?
Late last year he finally woke up to the need for a power LH bat for the middle of the lineup, and we heard about it all winter (along with the trade for Peavy). "All we needed was that balance to improve the lineup to boost scoring and offset RH pitching."
Let Hoffpauir, who was a major contributor in his limited action this season, have one poor game in RF, and it's back to the bench in favor of getting another RH bat in the lineup, while ignoring the poor performance of Lee.
The Cubs are getting enough "quality" starts, that they should still be leading the division, but instead, Lou is managing like a rank amatuer with his knee-jerk responses influencing his choice of lineups.
It is understandable, that with Bradley, and now Ramirez, out of the lineup, that he doesn't want to "rest" Lee at this time, but scoring runs is a priority, and he needs Hoffpauir in the middle of the lineup, now more than ever, and he should be playing RF at least until the Cubs have a lead, late.
Now Lou is complaining about the poor start by Miles and the mini-slump of Fontenot. Fonty will be fine after he adjusts to the adjustments pitchers are making to him, and Miles, who like Hoffpauir, was HOT in Spring games, has had precious little playing time until the last few days. Lou wasn't concerned enough about that while he had Miles glued to the bench and losing his Spring swing.
Soto is slumping as well....actually he just hasn't started well, but Hill, who had a great Spring, has sat for nearly two weeks. I suppose Lou will be complaining about him next, if he actually gets a start one of these days. Soto chose to play in the lousy WBC and NOW he is paying the price....well that price may include a return trip to Iowa at least until he regains his swing!
Bradley...though I like the signing, he can NOT be counted on to play more than 3 games in a row. If I, and countless others, know that, why doesn't Lou? And now Jim and Lou seem afraid to put him on the DL. Well, if he is injured put him on the DL and bring up the hot hitting Fox to platoon in RF with Hoffy....and so what if they make a few errors. They will out hit their errors and their D will improve with experience, but it won't improve sitting on the bench.
This isn't "brain surgery" just common sense! Maybe Lou & Jim are BOTH asleep at the switch. When will THEY wake up?
Hey Bruce....
Why no response? You are usually pretty good about responding.
Now, its 15 minutes before game time and as usual lately, your post about today's lineup, etc is NOT up. Your competition, Muskat, has her blog up, and after looking at the lineup, Lou has posted, I am not sure I'll even bother to watch!
Lou has Soriano back in leadoff role...another knee jerk reaction; but this one planned. He was never serious about taking him out in the first place. If he had been, he wouldn't have picked a series as pressure packed as a Cardinal series, AND he certainly wouldn't have picked a series when two of the regulars in the lineup are OUT? No, this was just Lou's way of manipulating the situation to be able to say "we tried"! He wasn't really serious at all.
Not only that with those two middle of the order guys still out, Hoffpauir is sitting on the bench, AGAIN!
I have always liked Lou, but he is quickly losing my support as manager of the Cubs! And THAT is just ONE STEP away from my active pursuit of having him replaced!
This isn't the first time in the last 3 years that Lou has expressed dissatisfaction with his roster. Goes back as far as May 2007, when DeRosa and Barrett were kicking balls around and getting thrown out on the paths, Lou said "We need to get some players who can run the bases and catch the damn ball!" Lou had to see that glaring lack of depth at two critical positions: 3B and relief pitching. Now it's come back to haunt them.
Countdown to "wish we had DeRosa back" in 5, 4, 3, ..........
..and I don't blame him. Fox just interviewed him and he was definitely not in a jovial mood.
..by Soriano. Just pathetic.
Sure was, but then the Cubs play was pathetic all around today. The mistakes were countless. Even the guy whose entire role is pinch running got thrown out stealing and picked off first base. What a waste of a roster spot. And they continue to play short-handed to make matters worse, instead of placing Bradley on the DL. They could call up both Scales and Fox if they would DL Bradley and get rid of Gathright.
..repeat. ONLY WORSE!!!!
Soriano is around .200 lifetime in the 3 hole, and he has 2 or 3 automatic outs behind him.
.....not to have brought up Samardzija and designate Vizcaino (besides the fact that it will cost the Cubs close to $4M and that he hadn't allowed a run or BB yet) was that Samardzija was possibly the only realistic option in the system for a SP if one of the guys in the rotation were to incur an injury. I don't see that he's going to make a difference in the bullpen and he does have options remaining. Is there something I'm missing there Bruce? Did Vizcaino already get himself in Lou's doghouse for arriving late on opening day, and if so, do you think that is sufficient reason to hurt the team by releasing him?
Opinions were mixed even in spring training as to the kind of stuff Vizcaino had. Some believed it wasn't great and that eventually, Vizcaino would get hit hard. I thought when they traded Marquis for Vizcaino, they'd try to turn around and trade him. That didn't happen, and they were stuck. Now, it looks like they're stuck in a different way.
Why would you trade him??? Just dumb!!! Bradley...just dumb!!!