Media Chutzpah Thread

[Tbadder]

The Cubs are rightfully the favorites. The Cubs win at 1B, 3B, C, LF Brewers are better at 2B, SS, CF, RF. I trust the Cubs starters more, but our starters have more upside. I trust our bullpen more, but the Cubs bullpen has more upside by a lot.

 

Hmmmmm...I think I just convinced myself that the Crew is gonna take it.

[JohnBriggs12]

Not to beat a dead horse, but the Cubs manager has actually won something.

 

The Cubs also play 3 vs. TB instead of 3 vs. the Red Sox.

 

The Cubs also have the means and the supply of young talent to pull off deals if they need to.

 

The Cubs ace actually starts every 5th day.

 

The Brewers have the talent to overcome all of this but it's not going to be easy.

[fondybrewfan]

I fail to see how the Cubs win 1st base. Lee may have a big edge in defense but Fielder more than make up for it with his studliness at the plate. Also wouldnt be quick to proclaim Soto to be better than Kendall, although it probably wouldnt take much, I will reserve judgement on RF with Hart/Fukodome. Obviously Hart is a known commodity where Fuk is not, we wont know that till this season gets underway

[endaround]

Lee is no slouch with the bat, however his biggest problem has been staying healthy. Chone for example has him at .301/.390/.524 vs Fielder at .290/.394/.574 but Prince gets an extra 100 PAs.

[Klements Bratwurst]

The Cubs also play 3 vs. TB instead of 3 vs. the Red Sox.

JBriggs,

 

I agree that this stinks regarding the schedule, but I think it may be more even than that.

 

Would you agree that the D-Rays may be better than Baltimore? We play Baltimore. Both teams play Toronto. Then it comes down to the Santana/Liriano-less Twins versus the Whitesox as the other Interleague games that they play. I think the White Sox are better than the Twins will be this year given the Twins seem to be rebuilding. With that said, the Red Sox are a tough competitor for the Crew, but if you factor in what should be an easier set of games for the Crew in Baltimore and the home and away Twins, I think we are closer to even.

[endaround]

I always feel that the interleague stuff is way overplayed. Yes The Red Sox could easily win 10 more games than the Rays (and yes its the Rays, I don't want any nasty letters!) but if the Cubs catch Kazmir and the Brewers miss Beckett suddenly the odds shift dramatically.

[Ennder]

Not sure how you see the Cubs with a win in LF either. At best that is a push in my opinion. Soriano is 32 as well, Aramis will be 30 this year, DeRosa is 33. That is a relatively old team compared to the Brewers.

 

If you want to talk straight question marks there is not a single position on the Cubs team that doesn't come with a question mark other than Rich Hill so we aren't going to 'lose' that battle.

 

Soriano - is he healthy? he is only going 75% in spring training.

Lee - is his wrist healed?

DeRosa - can he keep that BABIP up so he is still productive, will his heart cause problems?

Theriot - can he actually hit? He had one good month last year.

Ramirez - Is he going to be healthy? He had chronic type injuries last year that he didn't fix, just rested.

Soto - Is he just a one year wonder? He was not good until his 3rd year in AAA.

Pie - is he a AAAA player like Patterson?

Fukudome - how long will the adjustment last and how is the elbow?

Zambrano - is his arm dead, he has gotten worse 3 years in a row.

Lilly - he has had one healthy yaer in his entire career and one year with good control, can he repeat it?

Marquis - he fell apart in second half last year.

Leiber - is he done?

Dempster - can he be a starter?

Marmol - will the league catch up to him, his BB rate was as bad as Turnbows in the 2nd half last year.

Wood - can he stay healthy?

 

 

You could do this same exercise with the Brewers but I don't get why the discussion always turns to the Brewers question marks and ignores the Cubs. This team has a ton of downside potential too. The Brewer bullpen might stink but so might the Cubs! Marmol BB's 5 per 9 again, Wood can't stay healthy. Howry's peripherals regressed last year. This Bullpen could be pretty bad too.

 

The Cubs lineup could stink, if Lee doesn't get his power back, Aramis and Soriano continue to struggle with injuries and Pie, Soto and Fukudome don't explode onto the scene.

 

The Cubs rotation could be pretty pathetic, Zambrano regresses again, their 4-5 starters look like ours did last year (marquis isn't any better than capuano and neither is leiber or dempster).

 

If you are gonna play the what if game at least do it with both sides of the argument. From a straight up talent standpoint I think the two teams are pretty darn even, I just think the Brewers have youth on their side and that will make the difference. I think it was the difference last year as the team collapsed under the pressure and I think it will be the difference this year as the team has the experience to not do it again and the youth to stay healthier and improve on their current talent level more.

[TooLiveBrew]

The Brewers improvements are arguable. Bullpen could be great or terrible. Braun in left is a ? just as Hall was in center last year. Hall at third has 17 errors in 84 career games; not much better than Braun.

 

E's are the wrong way to try to determine defensive worth. Hall is light-years better than Braun was at 3B in 2007. Neither Hall in CF nor Braun in LF will be as catastrophically horrible & impactful as Braun was at 3B. I don't see any way that "The Brewers have dramatically improved their team from 2007 heading into 2008" can be viewed as anything but an objective statement.

 

 

I guess the real answer will come down to will the Brewers retooled bullpen be more of an advantage than the addition of Fukkodome.

 

Fukudome's projected production isn't really that much better than what the Cubs got from their CF or RF in 2007. It's just not that huge of an upgrade.

[nate82]

The team that has a winning record over the Reds will win the division this year. I see the Reds and to a lesser extent the Astros being the teams that the Brewers and Cubs could stumble on and make the race really close.

 

The Reds and Astros are teams to look out for. Even though I don't believe in the Astros really with their pitching rotation the way it is right now. The Reds scare me more than the Cubs do. The Reds have a mixture of young and veteran guys who can get the job done not to mention they have a nice one two punch with Harang and Arroyo.

[RobertR]

I've no problem with people picking the Cubs to win the NL Central. You pick the Cardinals, Astros, or Pirates and I question your touch with reality, but the Cubs are a more than defensible pick.

 

I do question blindly adding Brian Roberts though. He's not a free agent and the Cubs are going to have to give up something to get him. If the Cubs gave up, say Gallagher and Pie, I'd question whether they truly helped themselves or just made a trade to get attention. Until that trade happens and you see what the Cubs give up, it's truly getting ahead of yourselves to say it help the Cubs.

 

Robert

[logan82]

Brewguru2 wrote:

1) The Cubs won 85 games, the Brewers 83.

2 games is practically nothing. The difference is one HR by A-Ram.

[jason21nl]

Brewguru2 wrote:

1) The Cubs won 85 games, the Brewers 83.

2 games is practically nothing. The difference is one HR by A-Ram.

while 2 games is practically nothing, it is the difference between playing in the playoffs and watching the playoffs. 2 games is huge

 

[rluzinski]

while 2 games is practically nothing, it is the difference between playing in the playoffs and watching the playoffs. 2 games is huge

 

That has nothing to do with why it was even brought up in this thread. When you are trying to use season win totals to say team A had more talent than team B because team A won 2 more games, you are fooling yourself. That difference is pretty insignificant. The fact that one AB accounts for the difference in win totals is a perfect illustration of that. It really tells us very little with respect to what team cumulatively had more talent.

 

The other problem with using team win totals from the previous year and then looking at personnel changes is that such an approach assumes that the players that haven't changed have the exact same performance expectations as the previous year. If team A and team B both had 81 wins but the average age of team A was 25 and the average age of team B was 33, that needs to be considered.

[trwi7]

I'm sorry but I read this and it just angers me that writers can't look up simple things

Oakland is a template because baseball's economics forced the A's to trade Barry Zito, Mark Mulder and Tim Hudson before their free-agent years.

This is a column by Michael Hunt in today's Journal-Sentinel.

Link

[razzzorsharp]

BBT is going to be talking about Fielder/Braun coming up.

[razzzorsharp]

Gammons predicts Fielder will hit 63 HRs.

 

Eric Young predicts Braun to win the batting title.

[logan82]

Homer arguing with Tom Oats and Jeff Potrykus about lineups. Sort of shows how set in tradition some people are. Gives a little insight into our state writers. About 3:50 in. Homer says protection is overrated. Homer as read "The Book." http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/

 

http://www.c3ktogo.com/news-video/?section=6

[bucks2281]

while 2 games is practically nothing, it is the difference between playing in the playoffs and watching the playoffs. 2 games is huge

 

There are so many opportunities that the Brewers spoiled to make up the two games: A-Ram HR on June 29, Cordero's blown save in Texas on June 9, the blown lead against Philadelphia in August, etc. That's what made the "collapse" so difficult to swallow.

 

Look, if people want to pick the Cubs, fine. I know when I get my SI baseball preview, they'll probably have the Cubs facing the Mets in the NLCS (I wouldn't be surprised at all). However, Kurkjian's reasons for picking the Cubs were idiotic. Geez, man, you're paid to talk about baseball. How about talking about something concrete, instead of "maybes."

 

The Brewers should be the pick if they can moderately improve in two categories: bullpen and winning on the road.