Ex-Yankees star Bobby Murcer dies at 62
Had short stint with Chicago Cubs

The Associated Press
5:20 PM CDT, July 12, 2008

www.chicagotribune.com/sports/baseball/whitesox/cs-080712-bobby-murcer-dead-new-york-yankees,0,2274224.story

Our condolences to his family, friends and fans.

Bad outfield defense can kill a team, giving up more extra-base hits and allowing teams to take extra bases. Today's starting outfield of Eric Patterson, Jim Edmonds, and Daryle Ward made me wince when I saw the lineup. It was like the days of Glenallen Hill, Sammy Sosa, and Henry Rodriguez, only without the offensive ability.

Patterson had not played a game in leftfield in the minors this year, but has played left in 11 games now for the big league club. Today may have been his last for awhile. "We'll put somebody else out here in left field. … We'll make some changes, and go from there," said Lou Piniella after the game. Patterson misplayed a base hit for a two-base error today and has misplayed some fly balls in previous games. Additionally, the White Sox clearly had it in their game plan to send runners when the ball was in Patterson's hand, as anyone and everyone was taking extra bases against him today.

Other options while Alfonso Soriano and Reed Johnson remain on the disabled list: Matt Murton, Mark DeRosa, Ryan Theriot (with Ronny Cedeno playing shortstop), recalling Micah Hoffpauir. Return soon, Mr. Soriano.

Alfonso Soriano was hit in the left hand by a pitch in tonight's 7-2 win and broke a bone in that hand. He will be out, it appears, at least six weeks. Interesting that it happens on the same day the St. Louis Cardinals lose Albert Pujols to a calf injury for three weeks.

The Cubs will call up Micah Hoffpauir, who went 8-for-19 with 3 doubles in a brief stint in May. He was going to be called up when the Cubs go to Toronto this weekend, anyway. However, Hoffpauir has drawn just 1 walk in 65 plate appearances for Iowa this year.

Meanwhile, two players who thought they were major league players at the beginning of this year, continue on in Iowa. Felix Pie has hit just .171/.223/.333 for Iowa since his demotion in mid-May. And Matt Murton has hit .311 with a .411 OBA, but has just 1 home run in 50 games for Iowa. Newly signed, and old Cub, Jason Dubois already has 5 in 12 games. After Hoffpauir, the position player most likely to be recalled is Eric Patterson, who is hitting .326/.361/.514 for Iowa. Patterson is also 10-for-10 in stolen bases.

Derrek Lee has played in every game this year. It may be time to give him a day off. After his 0-for-5 performance in today's 7-6 loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates, he is hitting .164/.179/.304 in the past 13 games. Prior to that, he had been hitting .352/.433/.639 over the first 30 games.

Thankfully, Alfonso Soriano has heated up significantly during Lee's slump, including 7 home runs in the past 6 games.

Sabathia struggling to find out what's wrong
By Bob Nightengale, USA TODAY

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/baseball/dailypitch/2008-04-17-sabathia_N.htm

Interesting bits of info from this article...

(He is also a former Cubs manager)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preston_G%C3%B3mez

Baseball Crank analyzes the NL Central according to Established Win Share Levels (EWSL). The report is not kind to the Cubs, who are hoping for a number of players to exceed normal expectations. Predicted wins: 78.

It's as good of an excuse as any: "Lou Piniella plans to experiment with the Cubs lineup, dropping leadoff man Alfonso Soriano to No. 2 in an attempt to keep him healthy while inserting Kosuke Fukudome fifth," reports MLB.com. Soriano continues to have difficulties with his quadriceps and the move is designed to have him making fewer steal attempts, apparently. Whether that is a valid reason or not, having his free-swinging ways move down in the order is a move in the right direction.

Unfortunately, this now apparently means that the Cubs' worst hitter in the everyday lineup -- Ryan Theriot -- is going to be leading off instead of hitting second.

So who should be in the leadoff spot? Mark DeRosa appears to be the best option, absent doing something radical like putting Derrek Lee there or moving Fukudome to center and placing Matt Murton in right field and the leadoff spot.

All of this is, of course, subject to change, and to change quickly.

And it may change with a trade. As much as the Cubs like Theriot, I believe they would prefer a better hitter in the leadoff spot. Moving Soriano down may make a trade for Brian Roberts or a center fielder even more likely.

Cubs f/x thinks Soriano and Fukudome should switch in Piniella's experimentation. Perhaps. But the idea that Fukudome is an ideal #2 hitter is based on his Japanese numbers. I would like to see a couple of month's worth of performance before handing him the keys to a table-setting position in the order.

Joe Aiello at View from the Bleachers presents some interesting bits of information on the Cubs from Bill James' new book. Specifically, Alfonso Soriano's free-swinging ways and Felix Pie's excellent baserunning.

Well, if that's the case, he can go somewhere else. Win a spot in the rotation, you don't have to worry about it. ... I've got seven starters here for five spots, you know? It's a little bit too early to start talking about what he wants to do or not do.

....

You know, that galls me about Marquis, it really does. I'm not pleased with that comment. We've had a good camp over here, everybody's getting an opportunity. Go out and win a spot in the rotation.

Marquis would do well to go to Piniella immediately and unequivocally apologize and state that he's ready, willing, and able to compete for, and win, a spot in the rotation. Who's Marquis afraid of? Ryan Dempster? Jon Lieber?

Rich Hill has allowed an 83% (39/47) stolen base rate during his career. To help improve that, he has made some alterations to his delivery, which he will use whether or not runners are on base, reports the Chicago Tribune's Paul Sullivan.

"Chicago Cubs second baseman Mark DeRosa has left spring training in Arizona to undergo further tests on his heart at a Chicago hospital," reports the AP. "DeRosa met briefly with reporters at the Cubs spring training camp on Monday and said he may consider an unspecified surgical procedure to get his heart back into rhythm." He does hope to be back on the field within a week. The Cubs are certainly losing bargaining power in a possible Brian Roberts trade with this news. We wish DeRosa the best.

If you send your kids to public school, how often are you sending them to this:

When asked about his substitute teaching experience during the off-season, minor-league baseball player Bobby Scales, currently in the Chicago Cubs spring training camp as a non-roster invitee, gave us the gist of his routine with his students:

"I'm Mr. Scales, for those of you who don't know me. Your teacher is not here today. Your assignment is on the board."

He then asks one of the students to take roll call.

He then asks another student to start a DVD.

"I'm going to be right here, reading the paper."

Says Mr. Scales about his off-season job, "It's so flexible, so easy."

Mr. Scales has been substitute "teaching" since 1999. During that same time period, he has played 871 minor league games without touching a major league diamond.

Lots of notes from the first day of camp, from the Chicago Sun-Times and MLB.com:

Jason Marquis, Jon Lieber, Ryan Dempster, and Sean Marshall are battling for the final two rotation spots, after Carlos Zambrano, Ted Lilly, and Rich Hill. One gets the impression that the best of the four--Marshall--is the least likely to get a job.

The Cubs won't take any action against Aramis Ramirez for being "dedicated entirely" to his cockfighting roosters when he is home in the Dominican Republic. "It's understanding and respecting what's acceptable in their culture,'' said Oneri Fleita, player development director and head of the Cubs' Latin American operations. ''We tend to think we have all the answers in our country, but there are people in other parts of the world that think their [customs] are better than ours.'' Moral relativism is alive and well in the Cubs front office.

"Piniella said former Notre Dame football star Jeff Samardzija, who pitched his first full season of professional ball last year, will get a longer look in camp this year and could be ready to make his major-league debut this summer if his progress remains on pace." Samardzija pitching for the big league club this summer would be a miracle.

Angel Guzman might be pitching off a mound by July. Guzman almost became the Cubs' closer last May before going down with an elbow injury and having Tommy John surgery.

This is a good sign: "Eric Patterson was one of the early position players in camp. He has spent most of his Minor League career as a second baseman but will get some playing time in the outfield." That's a good sign because the last we heard from Patterson was that he was being demoted to double-A from the big league club for showing up late to the park last September. (That demotion resulted in Sam Fuld's promotion, which resulted in this, and after this, has Fuld fighting for the starting centerfield job this spring.)

Kevin Hart didn't have a job this winter other than working out, so he learned to cook mashed potatoes.

Dora the Explorer day at Wrigley Field. April 19. Grab your backpack, let's go! Swiper no swiping!