"I can hear it now from every f'in Cardinal fan. "It took a Cardinal player to show you how to get to the WS." As if that will ever happen with this suck wad on the payroll." --jpepitone on the Edmonds signing
Ryan Dempster struck out 12 batters today in the Cubs 4-0 win over the Ruschless and Edmondsless (btw--we're calling him "Butters" Padres. That's like, 8 strikeouts away from being Kerry. What would any of us do if Dempster struck out 20 batters?
Ok, so I'm not getting much more into the Edmonds thing. He's here, apparently he's starting, barf. Everyone knows how everyone feels and any further commentary would be "Eight Bellesing."
(As an aside, isn't it interesting that the overdone coverage of a dead horse can be summed up with the phrase "beating a dead horse?" To me, that's amusing. But I digress...)
Today's starter for the Padres is old pal Greg Maddux. It can't be put any better than it is on the sidebar: "The One That Got Away." Lots of truth in that. Maddux came up with the Cubs, and was excellent, winning the Cy Young Award with them in 1992. The Cubs must have thought that was his peak, as they let him walk in free agency to the Atlanta Braves.
And the Cubs were right, as ... whoops. Maddux went on to win three straight Cy Youngs from 1993-95. Smooth move, guys.
Welcome to the never-ending "Class A Experience," asshole:
By taking a gamble that Jim Edmonds still can be a productive center fielder and hitter, Cubs general manager Jim Hendry knew he was inviting criticism from fans who have invested a lot of time loathing the former Cardinals star.
"There is really no negative in it," Hendry said. "You're not giving up players. You're not spending a lot of dollars, so you look at things like that and, hopefully, he'll be able to give us at least a great portion of the Jim Edmonds we all knew and used to fear in a lot of ways."
Really? No negative? How about we all hate him and he sucks at baseball? THOSE are negatives.
And yes you ARE giving up a player, you're jerking around your top prospect, you moron. I suspect you need more practice working you "Baseball GM Machine."
I'm coming to ruin your team and steal your women (and possibly the men too)! HaHA!
So apparently Jim Edmonds is officially a Cub. This is quite terrible. No one really has a good explanation. The only fun thing is that Jim Edmonds has banded the Cubs blogosphere together for the first time in Interweb history, which is really a feat unto itself.
I'm so mad you're getting an abbreviated game thread tonight. It's Lilly, who has been awesome of late, against Peavy, who is awesome all the time.
I was working on rewriting 'Twas the Night Before Christmas," calling it "Night Before Edmonds," but good gosh, that poem is long. Perhaps if I had more time and/or Jack Daniels. But here were some of the better excerpts:
Things were going great, winning four in a row
Laughing at the Brewers and Cards down below
When what to my wondering eyes should appear
"That piece of crap Edmonds is coming ... here?!?!?!
With a confusing G.M., so idiotic and dim
I knew in a moment that it must be Big Jim
More often than not his moves have been bad
Here are just a few, it's really quite sad
Now Jacque! Now Monroe! Now Nomar and Theriot!
On Burnitz! On Novoa! On Fox and Fontenot!
Play for the Cubs, no matter how bad you are
I'll give you cash, the most money by far!
Then I started to get writer's block. Anyway, the Cubs have won five out of six and still are in first, so things aren't all that bad. Maybe he'll play himself out of Chicago in a month. What's $284,000 anyway?
I'm afraid to say anything for fear of j-i-n-x-i-n-g the s-t-r-e-a-k.
Let's just say we're playing awfully well. Though we do have Marquis going tonight, so that could all come to a screeching hault. Also, there was this little bit of good news on FoxSports:
News: If the Cubs sign Jim Edmonds Wednesday, Pie is likely to be demoted, the Chicago Sun-Times reports. (RotoWire - Tue. May 13, 2008)
So that's fun to contemplate. I'd like to know what Felix Pie ever did to deserve the humiliation of being demoted for an over-the-hill Jim Edmonds. We might want to take his shoe laces if this comes to pass. . .
Lineups and chat to come. I'll be out until probably the fifth inning or so. Keep it safe, keep it legal, and keep it (semi)clean.
Mike Downey wants to know why you guys aren't excited about the Sox. Of course, he chooses to do this in the paper owned by the same people who own in the Cubs and read largely by the North Siders. Brilliant.
As of Monday morning the White Sox were only a game out of first place.
Oh bench-clearing brawl, what I wouldn't give to see you again
In case you missed it, both Daryle Ward AND his butt are on fire, Soriano has decided to play baseball again, Ryan Dempster is denying us a reason to make fun of him, Kerry is a total badass, and we're back in first place.
Tonight the Cubs try to take over sole possession of first, as we play a team that is not only last in batting average, on-base percentage, and runs scored, but has at least ONE Mark Prior (who is now experiencing shoulder "discomfort", and one Glendon Rusch.
Sean Gallagher not only became the emergency starter for Sunday's rain-delayed 6-4 victory over Arizona, it looks like he'll get at least one more start next weekend against Pittsburgh.
Phil Rogers enlightens us on National League Closers.
He entered the weekend series against Arizona having made 16 appearances. He had allowed 11 hits and three walks in 17 innings. The opponents' batting average against him was .183, the best of his career, with a .258 on-base percentage, again the best of his career. He had 5.3 strikeouts for every walk, again his best mark. He has thrown only 13.4 pitches per inning, by far the most efficient pitching of his career.
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