35thstreetswarm

You forgot: 4-2 Giants 1917 4-2 Cubs 1906 (sorry) Also, Tampa was 2008. 2000 was Seattle: 0-3

A couple of those teams are likely not even making the playoffs, much less going all the way. I guess I can see the Rays simply because they were there last year -- but unlike most years I look around the league and just don't see a lot of teams that strike me as better positioned than the Sox, especially if we get Eloy and Robert back with a few weeks to tune up.

Who is ready, then? Aside from the Dodgers.

I'll never understand why some fans don't see that winning at a *greater rate than your competitors* against bad teams, or against middling teams, is as good an indicator of your team quality as any.

I’m hardly the first to say this, but Rodon’s problem was always health—plain and simple. I’ve always kind of assumed that if Rodon could put together a full season 100% healthy it would be a successful season from a pitching perspective. So whether to bet on Rodon was really a medical question more than a baseball one. So far so good (knocking on every wood surface I can find). I felt the same way about Kluber, though I’m now glad we didn’t make that losing bet.

The area immediately around Wrigley (“Wrigleyville”) is sterile. But “within a mile” is an enormous swath of Chicago with an infinite number of interesting places.

What’s a Southside color crew?

Ho hum, dominant victory to pad our best in mlb differential. Come on everybody, get in here—pretend we lost!

https://www.nbcchicago.com/news/sports/nbcsports/cubs-anthony-rizzo-face-of-team-now-face-vaccine-shortfall/2530922/?amp Very responsible. Team Three Percenter can’t get to 85. They just can’t get out if their own way.

Nope plenty covered both

This is covered in another thread, but there's way more to a rivalry than being in the same division, and pretending the teams' fortunes are unrelated is folly. Anyway, people root against teams all the time for all kinds of reasons, it's part of sports that nobody questions outside this context. If you say "I don't like the Lakers" or "I don't like Notre Dame" nobody says "WHY? What division is your favorite team in? I must know this information before I can decide whether you're allowed to root against them." It's only with Cub fans, and a smaller sliver Sox fans, where people have this need to make a show of their supposed indifference to the other team--and demand indifference from others--as a way of proving some kind of fan purity. It's fascinating to me.

It's so weird that people are so invested in denying a totally natural cross-town rivalry. If we just "ignored" or didn't care about our cross-town team in the same sport and league we'd be the first city/team in history to do so.

Sarcasm, guys.

Wow. Arrieta of course but I have to say I wouldn't have pegged him. Kind of on-brand for the organization, though.

Oh, Lord. Source?

Thanks for posting this.

Crazy to me that there were posters who looked at that lineup throughout this offseason and were like: "meh"

Publicly begging pitchers to come right at him might make them less likely to come right at him

At least a few executions are also in order.

This is a killer, especially when considering the cumulative effect. But I still think our ultimate success hinges on a successful return of Eloy and Robert. The timeline on that hasn't changed. If those guys return our lineup is absolutely loaded with or without Madrigal.

I don't believe you actually believe these things. I think people use this board for different reasons, and that you have a tendency to use the board in a very particular way. Ask yourself if it's fair to everyone else here -- especially right now -- for you to use it in the way you do.

Yeah, we now know that the Sox were a couple of devastating injuries away from...first place in the division. I think this season has showed us that a video game-worthy lineup is its own type of depth. And I'm not sure what the difference is between starting pitching being good and being a "blessing," but I think I'll take either one.

Yeah, you should be able to position it so you can slide down the bench with the bar resting on safety bars above your upper chest/neck. I always have them set a little higher myself because my physiology and shoulder injury history keeps me from going all the way to touching the bar to my chest anyway. (Yeah, that's right I'm "cheating" - another macho gym-ism I don't care about anymore).

Too much. It’s not like our guys are lost for the season. It hurts, but I think we just soldier on and wait for the reinforcements to start to arrive later in the Summer.

That’s what I keep trying to remember. REALLY bad injury luck would be losing your guys to injury in September, not March, April, May, and June. It sucks, but if we continue to ride the pitching and tread water we still have the chance to go into October at full strength.