"At the end of the day, boys, you don't tell me how rough the water is, you bring in the ship." – Steve Stone
A Goat Riders Affiliate
Go Cubs!

Wrigley Rooftop Directory
Ryne Sandberg Fan Page
The Cubdom Photo Gallery
The Cubs Prayer
Cubs Calendar
Jim Hendry Page
Cubs Ownership History
Baseball Business Essays
TheCubdom Hall of Cubs


Recent Blog Updates

Editor's Pick:

Goat Riders of the Apocalypse
Bleed Cubbie Blue
Desipio Media Ventures
Hire Jim Essian!
Cub Reporter
Ivy Chat
Cub Town
Ghost of Paul Noce
The Cubdom
Thunder Matt's Saloon
View From the Bleachers
Cubby-Blue
WGN-TV Baseball Blog

Honorable Mention:

A Hundred Next Years
A League of Her Own
Agony and Ivy
Bad News Cubs
Baseball Diamond News
Boys of Spring
Bush League Times
Chicago Cubs Baseball
Chicago Cubs Blog
Chicago Cubs Online
Church of Baseball
Clark & Addison blog
College of Idiots
Cubs f/x
Cubs Hot Stove
Cubs Hub
CubsNet.com
Cubs Obsession
Five Outs to go
Gonfalon Cubs
Kosuke Fukodome
Lollygaggers
Out of Right Field
The Cubs Brickyard
The Other Fifteen
The Ted Lilly Fan Club
Temporary Bleachers
TheCubsfan.com
Wrigleyville23

Newbies:

Cubbie Nation
Holy Cow Bell
Ivy Envy
Towel Drills
Turning Two
Wasting away in Wrigleyville

Soldiering On:

Die-hard Cubs Fun
Fire Dusty Baker
Northside Lounge
Peoria Northsider Report
Yarbage Cub Review

Cubs Sites:

Desipio Boards
North Side Baseball
Cubscast.com
Inside the Ivy
The Heckler
My Wrigleyville

Just Read 'em!

Baseball Analysts
Baseball Musings
Baseball Prospectus
Baseball Think Factory
Hardball Times

Conglomerates

Baseball Toaster
Most Valuable Network
SportsBlog Nation

NL Central

Brew Crew Ball MIL
Bucs Dugout PIT
Crawfish Boxes HOU
Get Up Baby STL
Honest Wagner PIT
Red Hot Mama CIN
Red Reporter CIN
Viva El Birdos STL

NL East

Amazin Avenue NYM
Citizens Blog PHI
Federal Baseball WAS
Fish Stripes FLA
The Good Phight PHI
Sabernomics ATL

NL West

6-4-2 LAD, LAA
AZ Snake Pit AZ
Dodger Thoughts LAD
Ducksnorts SD
Gas Lamp Ball SD
McCovey Chronicles SF
Only Baseball Matters SF
Purple Row COL

AL East

Batters Box TOR
Bronx Banter NYY
Camden Chat BAL
DRays Bay TB
Futility Infielder NYY
Joy of Sox BOS
Over the Monster BOS
Pinstripe Alley NYY
Replacement Level Yankees Weblog NYY

AL Central

Aaron's Baseball Blog MIN
Bless You Boys DET
Let's Go Tribe CLE
Royals Review KC
South Side Sox CHW
Sox Machine CHW
Tiger Blog DET
Twins Geek MIN

AL West

Athletics Nation OAK
Halo's Heaven LAA
Lone Star Ball TEX
Lookout Landing SEA
USS Mariner SEA

Miscellany

Beyond the Boxscore
Minor League Ball

Chicago Sports

Blog-A-Bull
Section 8 Fire
Windy City Gridiron Bears

News Sources

Chicagosports.com
Cubs.com
MLB.com
Sun-Times Cubs
Daily Herald Sports
Daily Southtown Sports
BaseballReference.com

5 Reasons for mid-season optimism

Sunday, July 19, 2009

Depressed that our much ballyhooed 2009 Cubs were .500 at the All-Star break? Here's 5 reasons to stoke your Cubbie-Optimism.

5. Milton Bradley is hitting .239 and slugging .369. For a guy with a .277 career average and a .451 slugging percentage, he's severely underperforming his career numbers... and there's a long history of ballplayers who have horrible halves of a season, but typically they come back to perform in line with their past achievements (the technical term is 'reversion to the mean'). So, even if Milton merely performs at his career numbers, we're looking at a 40 point bump to his average and 80 points to his slugging. Sure, Bradley might not turn it around, but with the return of Aramis Ramirez in the lineup, Bradley's likely to see better pitches as he'll often be batting with Ramirez on base. Or, better yet, with Ramirez protecting him from lower in the order. So, no matter how Lou fills out the lineup card, I foresee Milton as the biggest beneficiary of Ramirez' return.

4. Geovany Soto is injured - the extra rest should help. Geovany Soto has struggled this year, but he was just starting to turn it around when he strained his oblique muscle. He's likely to miss all of July and the first chunk of August. While no team wants to lose any starter, the Cubs are fortunate to have a solid backup in Koyie Hill. While Hill will shoulder most of the catching burden in July, Geovany Soto is getting a rare opportunity to heal from the first half of nagging injuries that notoriously destroy a catcher's production in late August, September, and October. Provided we can make it through July, the Cubs should have a well-rested healthy starting catcher down the stretch. That could end up being a huge factor in a tight NL Central race.

3. Rich Harden will be better in the second half. Harden's season so far has been a study in contrasts. He has a 7.59 home ERA, but is clocking a 2.17 ERA away from Wrigley. Some games he's unhittable, in others he struggles to throw strikes, and in some games he gets hit around like a rag doll. These home/away splits are an unusual combination for a pitcher who has started 15 games, but I don't think they will persist. For one, Harden has historically pitched better in the second half of the season than the first half (.321 second-half ERA vs. a .364 first-half ERA). Furthermore, Harden's had better results with Koyie Hill behind the plate than Geovany Soto. (With Hill catching, Harden's SO/BB ratio, batting average against, on-base percentage, and slugging percentage are all lower than when Soto is catching.) If these trends continue to play out over the next month, Lou will identify the pattern and Koyie Hill will be appointed Harden's personal catcher.

2. Derrek Lee is having a great year. At the bat, 2009 has been Derrek's best year since his monster 2005 season. The wrist is fully healed and Derrek's got his power stroke back. In the past two years, Derrek has finished the season with 22 and 20 home runs respectively. This year, he already has 18 round-trippers. Assuming similar production, Derrek could very easily finish the season with 30-35 home runs. And if Lee is a legitimate power bat, the Cubs could potentially play August and September with 6 power hitters hacking away in the lineup.

1. 2003. The Cubs have done this before. In '03, the Cubs were .500 at the break. They went 1-2 immediately after the all-star game and then started stringing together wins. They finished with 88 wins and an NL Central flag. This scenario is still in the cards for the Cubs. The NL Central isn't all that strong in 2009 and the Cubs find themselves only 2 games in back of St. Louis right now. We're not likely to run away with the division, but as long as the team stays focused and keeps winning the games they should, I'm optimistic we'll be in the mix at the end of September. The just-completed four game sweep of the Nationals certainly helps us on our way.

Posted by Byron at July 19, 2009 4:26 PM | Bookmark and Share | BallHype: hype it up!
Subscribe to The Cubdom - get emails with the latest Cubs info and pictures

This post has been tagged:


AddThis Feed Button

Get The Cubdom email updates


Search

Google
Web
TheCubdom.com

eXTReMe Tracker
Since Mar 18, 2004

Recent Entries


Monthly Archives



Cubs Sale Articles

© 2004 – 2015 Byron Clarke
legal - about thecubdom.com - site index