2012-06-05 Cubs (Dempster) at Brewers (Gallardo), 7:10 PM CDT [Brewers lose, 10-0]

[rluzinski]

This game has been a disgrace to baseball, we deserved to get perfected. The only players on our team right now that look like they have any interest in playing are Gomez and Maldonado.

I'm surprised you didn't say Ransom and Counsell as well.

 

The reality is, it's very difficult to look like you care when your are getting trounced. You seem to be suggesting that their apparent apathy is why they got destroyed. The opposite is true.

 

And Aoki disappoints again. At least Gomez got on, given the guys on this team finding a lead off hitter isn't easy because then the complaints will focus on the 4 th spot or 2nd spot or wherever since the OBP's for anyone outside of Braun really aren't impressive.

Just because the alternatives aren't impressive doesn't mean they shouldn't be used. Cody Random has a higher career OBP than Gomez. Against a RHP, Gomez has no business leading off on any team in the majors. I don't care what small sample pitcher vs. batter splits say. They are statistically worthless.

[topper09er]

The reality is, it's very difficult to look like you care when your are getting trounced.

 

The reality is that it is very easy to look like you care when doing anything at anytime, you just try your hardest until it is actually over instead of assuming it is over half way through.

 

 

 

 

You seem to be suggesting that their apparent apathy is why they got destroyed.

 

I am not suggesting anything, just making an observation. In the first inning down only 0-3 Braun Ks and immediately throws his bat and helmet on the ground doing his best Shawn Marcum postseason grand slam glove throw impersonation. Aoki takes an off balance 3-0 swing and flies out with Braun on deck, 2 runners on base and the game still in reach. The infield came within 1/4" of going 0-2 in rundowns for the game. I wonder how many times Weeks didn't know how many outs there were but luckily the ball was not hit to him.

 

They make the same mistakes when they have been winning recently also, when they played the Dodgers they got DP balls practically every single time they needed one, which was often. A good manager could get his team to look they care even though things looked bleak, like TLR did with the Cards when they were 10 games out of a playoff spot in September last season.

[rluzinski]

The reality is that it is very easy to look like you care when doing anything at anytime, you just try your hardest until it is actually over instead of assuming it is over half way through.

 

I'm more certain that you thought it was over more than any one player last night. I saw nothing to suggest they didn't want to win.

[MJLiverock]

So the small sample of Cody Ransom's career is significant? A whopping .313 vs. .293 OBP really isn't going to make me think someone is an idiot for batting a guy leadoff in a game.

 

Based on just using the career stats Weeks should never have been moved out of the lead off spot since he has the best OBP of anyone not named Braun. But then then RR would be an idiot for batting Weeks lead off according to the people who hate RR because he has been awful this year. Guys like Green, Aoki, haven't had any results that make one pencil them in at the top automatically. Yet RR is an idiot for not putting Taylor Green and his career .296 OBP in at the top of the order.

 

When the lineup choices are all bad I'm not going to get too worked up about batting player X with a poor OBP or AVG in spot A over player Z with a equally bad statistical line. .310, 293, .320 are all bad at getting on base. But no matter what RR does a certain contingent complain and insinuate that the worst mistake in managing has been made. I seen RR called an idiot playing Ransom (RH) rather than Green (LH) vs. a LH pitcher, not playing Morgan over Gomez vs. RH, not playing Gomez over Morgan vs. a RH, etc. Rants and what I think of as stupid nicknames over trivial and quite meaningless moves in the batting order get tiresome to read.

 

I believe in the large samples and that over a course of a season things even out to abilities but you could roll Connie Mack, LaRussa, Weaver, Herzog, and Harvey Kuehn into one manager and not cause better results with this team. The pitching and hitting have been atrocious and putting one weak hitter in a spot over another really isn't the problem.

[topper09er]

9th inning on the same play they first throw to the wrong base and then screw up a run down. Im sure they would have played it the exact same way if it was game 7 of the World Series. If you cant just sense this team does not have the same attitude as last season and are making more fundamental/mental mistakes than last year than you are missing a part of team sports that matters even though fangraphs does not have a metric for it yet.

[rluzinski]

9th inning on the same play they first throw to the wrong base and then screw up a run down. Im sure they would have played it the exact same way if it was game 7 of the World Series. If you cant just sense this team does not have the same attitude as last season and are making more fundamental/mental mistakes than last year than you are missing a part of team sports that matters even though fangraphs does not have a metric for it yet.

 

I share the same general sentiment that this year's team doesn't have what it takes to seriously compete. But it my opinion, it has little to do with their attitude, desire, heart or whatever other intangible you want to throw out there. I simply don't think they have enough collective talent on the field. Why must baseball fans blame everything else BUT what far-and-away drives whether a team is successful on the field?

 

I'd just love these guys to be running around with the bravado they displayed last year while being buried in the division this year. There would be some 100 post thread criticizing them for being seemingly oblivious to the fact that they are stinking it up.

[logan82]

But then then RR would be an idiot for batting Weeks lead off according to the people who hate RR because he has been awful this year.

That is a strawman. I would have very little problem with leaving Weeks batting leadoff.

 

Rants and what I think of as stupid nicknames over trivial and quite meaningless moves in the batting order get tiresome to read.

In any one game it is pretty meaningless. The problem is that the manager's use of Gomez has been consistently poor at the start of last year and this year. I had hoped he had learned something about Gomez last year.

[MJLiverock]

How is it a strawman? There have been plenty of complaints about Weeks and how RR needed to get him out of the top spot, move him down, even bench him.

[hawing]

It has been years since we were last at such a miserable game. Here's a slice of my life from last night:

 

- Row of Cub fans in front of us; to their credit, they weren't in Brewer fans' faces, but they spent plenty of time on their feet cheering because they had plenty to cheer about.

 

- Group of 6th graders behind us, who realized before the game began that if they screeched and jumped around enough, they could get on the videoboard. So after getting on the videoboard during pregame, they proceeded to screech the rest of the night. They got on the 'board twice more.

 

- Two guys to our immediate right who felt compelled to narrate the election returns from their smartphone (when I was specifically trying to avoid politics for the night).

 

- And Flappy McGloveflap taking a perfecto WAY too long.

 

It's as if the baseball gods are saying to us, "hawing household, you had a nearly flawless 2011 season. Here comes the pendulum!"

 

Interesting jersey sightings: 90s style Seitzer and 1999 Jim Lefebvre.