Dusty Says

Boston may resist trading Ramirez because it is short in the outfield. With Nixon on the 15-day disabled list and Ramirez not playing, Francona used first baseman Kevin Millar in left field and rookie Adam Stern in right Wednesday.

Despite leading the division, Red Sox officials would like to improve their postseason chances with a trade. Last year, Epstein sent shortstop Nomar Garciaparra to the Chicago Cubs at the deadline.

“It is the time of year when you consider all manner of trades,” Lucchino said. “Theo is certainly willing to be bold and make moves that other GMs might shy away from, so this is the time for us to think about trades and, certainly, Manny’s name will come up from time to time, I’m sure, in the next 72 hours.”

Interesting.

Article From the Sun-Times
It’s here.

BY JOE GODDARD

Cubbie blue sounds good to Johnny Damon, who wears red as a key member of the Red Sox.

The American League’s premier leadoff hitter with a .339 batting average and AL-best runs with 73 can be a free agent after the season and admitted Thursday night before the Red Sox-White Sox game that he would have interest in the Cubs, who are having center-field problems.

‘’I'll have my eyes open to any team with interest in me, but the Cubs would have an appeal,'’ he said. ‘’The fans were not really on me when we played at Wrigley Field in June. They were rooting for me to come to Chicago. They have guys like Derrek Lee and Aramis Ramirez to drive me in, but I wouldn’t mind staying here where I’ve got [Manny] Ramirez and [David] Ortiz to get me home.'’

First things first, however. There are the White Sox to take care of.

‘’I think the White Sox are the success story of the year from all their changes,'’ Damon continued. ‘’They’ve had the best record all year. There are reasons for that, and Scott Podsednik is a big reason. He can change the rhythm of a game with his stolen bases [49]. It’s a new attitude over there.'’

Damon approached Podsednik at the All-Star Game in Detroit last week and congratulated him on making the American League team as the fans’ choice.

‘’I told him, ‘That’s quite a team you guys have going in Chicago, and you’re a big part of it. You deserve to be here.’ ‘’

The Red Sox have been battling the Baltimore Orioles and New York Yankees all season for Eastern Division supremacy after winning the world championship last season while the White Sox have led the Central Division this year for all 119 games.

‘’Our goal is to gain ground on the others and keep it that way,'’ Damon said. ‘’Everyone has been gunning for us the way everyone is starting to gun for the White Sox, but you have to remember that the best teams don’t always win. I felt the 2003 Red Sox and 2001 Oakland Athletics were the best teams, but they didn’t win.”

Red Sox first baseman Kevin Millar said weather can be a factor in burning out flag hopefuls.

“It’s warm here, but it was like 179 degrees at Wrigley Field,” he said. “It was like butter. We were all melting. Florida, same way.”

Millar laughingly said reporters wouldn’t understand that.

Trade Rumor Database.

I did a roundup of the many, many rumors that have appeared in the past few months; along with each one, I added a meter and the likely destination for each player.

Players to trade away

Players to trade for

I’ll review tonight’s game tomorrow.

I’ve been quite busy for the last couple of days, but I’ve managed to watch the last two games before today’s blowout loss, a game which I followed online along with other The Cub Reporter readers.

I won’t get into major details of the past games, because, actually, there’s not a new thing to report. Carlos Zambrano is definitely hurt, and with the balls he has he doesn’t tell anyone. Not only that, he apparently lies to the press and keeps himself out of the DL. I know that’s a major thing to do, but still; it’s no coincidence, at least for me, that his performance has gone from terrible to just plain pathetic in his last two starts, including his career’s worst outing in which a linedrive from Carlos Lee (who else? He’s already taken twenty or so games off T-Walk’s season and now plans to DL Z.) clearly hit his right hand his pitching hand of course.

With the confirmed return of Prior on Sunday against the White Sox and Jon Garland, I can easily see Carlos Zambrano going into the DL to make space for Prior on the active roster, because we need every bit of valuable bullpen help we can, after this weeks’ bullpen explosions. But he’s too stubborn to accept such an assignment and will pitch in pain if it’s possible. We know him. So, it’s either that or DFAing Joe Borowski who looked terrible a couple of games ago, throwing a 91mph fastball only to see it get hit to Alaska by Carlos Lee; though, Joe looked okay today allowing no hits and no runs to score, and striking out two in one inning of work.

See? I summed up a whole set of game notes in various article links, so you haven’t missed the smallest scoop there ever was.

Back to today’s game, Sergio Mitre had his worst outing of the season so far today, and that combined with three walks to Speed Demon Scott Podsednik were the Death of today’s Cubs; not only we sparked a rally everytime we walked him, but he also stole two bases (after being picked off by Mitre in the first inning, which gave us leads of a brilliant game by young mr. Groundball.) and we did him a favor by raising his OBP from a decent .363 to a brutal .372 just in today’s game. We also walked the guy who pinch hit for him, in the eight. Oh well. I shall repeat to you that we should have pursued him in the offseason.

Another option to save this team would be Grady Sizemore, but that topic will be covered in some other entry.

I say, move on, and we’ll get the White Sox tomorrow.

I have a friend who works for our cross-town buddies. So far he has yet to let me down on the rumors he hears, but I am not guaranteeing anything.

Was talking to him online a few moments ago and it seems as though there may be a Kotsay for KKKorey trade in the making. Any thoughts?

My personal take is that KKKorey, despite his struggles needs to be given a bigger kick in the butt, lets stop with the kid gloves already, before getting rid of him especially for Kotsay, who is a solid player does not have the upside of KKKorey. As I say this, it would be real nice to have Kotsay’s high OBP in front of MV-Lee, Burnitz, Ramirez.

I had absolutely no expectations for this game. In fact, I slept through most of the afternoon and woke up to catch only the last four innings; boy, do I regret that.

The Cubs had one of those abnormal games in which their top four hitters have multi-hit games, as they went 8 for 18 with four runs scored, four RBIs, a homerun and two walks; all that with just one strikeout. Throw in Aramís Ramírez and you have another homerun, of the two run kind. Korey, surprisingly, didn’t strikeout at all tonight — okay, I’m lying. He did and twice, but he did have two hits, so I’m gonna lay off him tonight. Just for tonight. Plus, he stole a base. His tenth of the year. And, just so you know, all our runs came with two outs.

The pitching was especially good, with Greg Maddux (6-4; 6 IP; 7 H; 3 BB; 3 ER; 2 SO) earning a win after his worst outing of the year; Wuertz was not so good –as most of his June has been, performance-wise– and retired one batter before walking two, only to leave the game for Reverse Split Remlinger to save, though he was again misused as a LOOGY when he was brought in to face Lyle Overbay (lefty) but surprised us all striking him out and then proceeding to do the same with Red Hot Carlitos Lee, all of that in nine pitches. After that, we thought we had seen an epiphany. But, Reverse Split Remlinger was kept in the game for the eight and, of course, got crushed by Bill Hall and — lefty — Geoff Jenkins. Just for fun, I thought I’d post Mike’s splits as of yesterday.

Against LHP= .320/.393/.520
Against RHP= .152/.188/.348

After Remlinger left, we felt the game slipping out of our hands… when Ryan Dempster (Redster — according to Meg) came in for a five-out save opportunity. That’s when a good friend said:

Here we go again. –John.

But Redster had something else in mind. In just two pitches, he got a double play. A nifty, crafty, pretty 6-4-3. Neifi!, of course, started it and in a brilliant way. Now, that’s our GGSS. Golden Globe Shortstop. As for Redster, I posted a little article about his statistics since he became our official closer in BleedCubbieClue, and I’ll quote a part of the text here:

He started a game in May, so that game is substracted. Ever since he became our official closer, he has the following statistics: (Includes tonight’s 1.2 IP, 0 H, 2 SO — Twelve pitch performance.).
15 IP; 6 H; 3.60 ERA; 6 ER; 1 HR; 3 BB; 12 SO; 1 Win; 7.2 K/9; 1.8 BB/9; 3.6 H/9;
1-0 when blowing a save. Plus, he has nine saves in a row.

To read the whole article (there’s not a lot more, though), click here.

It’s amazing what a role switch can do for a pitcher. Dempster was mediocre, at best, as a starter. He did spend all the offseason claiming for the closer job, as he was sure he could achieve success pitching in the late/last innings in pressure situations. But we know who was given the job — and that turned out to be the best. Starting really built Dempster’s arm through the first month of the season, and now that he’s a reliever, he can count on his arm’ strenght to dominate. His mindset is already fixed. He’s the prototype closer now.

After his first shaky relief apperance, I did get frustrated. And I won’t lie. I lost confidence in him. But now, he’s shown that he’s capable of handling the role, and excelling while keeping the games hermetical.

Only another pitcher tonight was nearly as impressive as Redster, and that was Julio Santana, a candidate for comeback player of the year, after two years of being nowhere to be found. The Dominican struck out six Cubs in two innings of work, and just walked one (mind you, that was an intentional walk to Lee.); he now sports a pretty amazing 9.6 K/9 and a decent ERA of 3.57. I wonder if he’s tradeable, because this is exactly the kind of player the Cubs’ bullpen needs. An inexpensive (he’s probably making the minimum) power reliever who walks not a lot of people; now we need to work out a deal for him. Maybe… no, no. I won’t speculate. Not tonight, at least.

It seems that Dusty isn’t the only one who makes odd pinch-hit decisions, because trailing by one run in the ninth, Brewers manager Ned Yost sent out C. Magruder, having Wes Helms, a notable Cub Killer (CK) earlier this season in the bench and apparently available; needless to say, Magruder, a near Mendoza Line hitter (.215/.296/.391) grounded out to our GGS.

Don’t lose hope. We’ll sweep the Brewers.

In site news, I uploaded today the Image Fun sections and the main browse Feature section. Check them out. Most sections will be ready by Sunday.