witesoxfan

OK. Thanks. That makes sense. He won't be #1 come the ASB...or come September.

No he's not. Considering you're both a White and Red Sox fan, it's a shame that you don't know that Frank Thomas leads the league in walks and OBP(52 and .465 respectively). Bellhorn is 2nd in walks(45), but way down in OBP(his OBP is .395...15th best in the AL). And they both dwarf in comparison to Bonds(82 BB's, .628 Obp).

Oz is 2? Who the hell is #1?

You mean the high ceiling we saw glimpses of in 2002?

Team ERA includes the bullpen. Aside from Hawkins and maybe Remlinger and Farnsworth, the Cubs bullpen has been s***ty. Ours, aside from Koch, Politte, and a few Jon Adkins, Mike Jackson, and Neal Cotts outings, has been good.

Wood had one bad game. That does not qualify him as a choker. He did choke...but we all have at some point in time. Prior, unlike what you think, did NOT choke. Bartman and AGonz(especially AGonz) ruined any shot he had at ending that series and sending the Cubbies to the World Series. Clemens and Pettitte are playoff proven, yet you do not bring up how THEY choked against the Marlins last year. They couldn't win the World Series for the Yanks last year, could they? You call Wood and Prior chokers because of one year, I call Clemens and Pettitte chokers because of one year. Period. I take Clemens over Wood too. That's not how the Cubbies rotation is though. It is Prior-Wood-Zambrano-Maddux-Clement. If you are going to bring age into consideration with Maddux, but NOT Clemens, you are contradicting your argument. I take Prior over 41-YEAR OLD Clemens(I don't care what his numbers are), I take Wood over Pettitte, Zambrano over Oswalt, Miller over Maddux(if age is brought into the equation here), and Clement over Redding. Quit sipping the orange and black Houston Astros kool-aid and open your eyes. The Cubbies rotation is the best in the league, and, IMO, is the best BY FAR(when healthy of course).

This should be no argument. For the money they are making, Abreu>Maggs. Period. If both make equal amounts of money, I still take Abreu over Maggs.

Yeah, what is it nowadays, like 1.300+? That's insane. 1.000 is very good, 1.100 is damn near unreachable, 1.200 is sickingly good, but 1.300? That's like Ruth-ian good.

Guess I'm not the only one...and I'm not old. She looks like she's my age(16-17) with HUGE knockers.

Who the hell cares. He's not closing. I don't give a s*** if he gives up runs in mopup duty.

You don't have to be in a save situation to blow a save. If you give up the tying or go ahead run(s) in the 7th or 8th(as well as the 9th), you blow a save. However, if you do not close out the game, you are not credited with a save, you are credited with a hold. Hawkins is not 4 of 6 in save opportunities. I don't know what he is exactly, but I'm sure atleast one of those blown "saves" came in the 8th inning.

If that's his attitude, I don't want to trade for him. It is an entirely different story if he's a FA and is bouncing around while never putting it all together, ala Jose Guillen last year. Or if we are out of contention. Corey Patterson is not in the situation Guillen was in, and we are not out of contention.

Hopefully, that's the Phils only run tonight.

- Looks like they're promoting pornography to me. :headshake Then again, why should I care if they are promoting pornography?

That would be f***ing tight. I would look forward to reading that. BTW, Bob, I could probably do some of that stuff. Not sure what, but I could something.

Oh this year, definitely. If you have him, you may as well use him. But if he bolts and gets $14-15 mill a year elsewhere next year, we'll be fine.

They won't get a ton for him. I could see us giving them Timo Perez and a decent prospect(Perez just being there to fill in in Finley). Finley's in the last year of his deal and is a little older. And seeing how he isn't the best player available on the market at his position(Carlos Beltran), Arizona can't ask for a lot for him. Randy Johnson, on the other hand, is a completely different story. Luis Gonzalez too.

LMAO. I don't know which is worse...not getting a pitcher off the DL in time for him to make his start(see Mark Prior against the Bucs, David Wells against the Red Sox), or getting a pitcher in and then seeing him get rocked(see Mark Prior against the Cards). Or maybe it is sitting a player one day, and he homers, then playing him the next, and he goes 0-4 picking up the golden sombrero, and then sitting him the next day, and he homers twice. I don't know exactly. I've done both a couple times.

People make worse mistakes all the time. Hell, I thought Ugie Urbina signed with Cleveland earlier this year.

You're right in one thing. 67% for a closer is s***ty. Too bad LaTroy hasn't been closing all year, huh? He has two blown saves and we are into the 3rd month of the season. Therefore, he had 2 blown saves in the first two months of the year. By that math, it is roughly 6 blown saves, or one per month.

Are they gonna try to sell Billy Koch too?

I'd not heard about Patterson saying those kinds of things. That's interesting...and he's a s***head. He's got the tools to be a good ballplayer, but if that's his attitude, he can go f*** himself. He's not the second coming. Secondly, I don't know why people want to trade Jose. He's hitting for a solid average and he's got a good amount of homers while cutting down on the errors over the past month, let alone the fact that his OPS against RHP is somewhere around .950-1.000. Losing Jose would be bigger then most people realize. I'm not entirely against trading Jose for value, but if he has little value(like he does), why trade him? I'm pretty sure KW has said he won't trade any regulars, so that most likely means Crede, Uribe, Valentin, and Harris are in their positions for good. Here's what I'm wondering. Say we trade for Steve Finley. Do we play him everyday and adjust from there, or do we just play him against RHP in CF while putting Willie at 2B and Uribe at 3B with Crede sitting, and then have Willie play CF, Uribe 2B, and Crede 3B against LHP?

Urbina's in Billy Koch land. 14 walks in less then 20 innings? a 4.58 ERA? a WHIP of 1.58? Some of those are worse then Koch. The one good thing about him is that he hasn't given up a homer yet. But when that's the best thing about you, you are in trouble. Regarding the article...I have no problem with it at all. I usually don't have a problem when people hit a problem right on the head and don't act like an ass about it when they do. Mariotti's a jackass, but he is right on. We do need a closer.

Difference is, we aren't paying him that much. We would pay him $5 mill tops, and in all likelyhood, less then that. It what we'd have to give up in prospects that I wouldn't like. They'd ask for a lot. Regardless, the Braves aren't quite out of it yet. They get another starter, and they got a shot. I still think the Marlins will win their first division crown, but the Braves are not out of it yet.

So Wood and Prior from last year don't count? The Cubs were 5 outs away from going to the World Series and most likely winning it, but Bartman/A-Gonz ruined any shot they had. Wood had one bad start in the playoffs last year, and Prior had no bad starts. Wood and Prior single-handedly shutdown a very, very potent Braves offense, and damn near knocked Florida out in Florida, had it not been for Beckett. And Maddux has a World Series ring too. I think I'd take that him my playoff staff. Not over Roger Clemens, but I'd take him. Maddux is not there to be the ace, he's there to be the #3 or #4 pitcher. I take Prior over Clemens, Wood over Pettitte, Oswalt over Maddux, Zambrano over Miller, and Clement over Redding. And if you switch that around and have Zambrano be the #3 and Maddux #4, I still would probably take Zambrano over Oswalt(Zambrano is less injury prone and puts up better numbers), and possibly Maddux over Miller...I'd have to think about that one. And I take them no matter what park we're talking about.