Browse >
Home / January 2011
The Chicago Cubs have already traded for starting pitcher Matt Garza and traded away starting pitcher Tom Gorzelanny this winter, and it seems very possible that that will be enough for GM Jim Hendry. There is relatively little else Chicago could do at this point, with the key free agents off the market and the team unlikely to leapfrog the Brewers and Reds into the top spot in a rational prognosticator's picture of the 2011 NL Central division.
Of course, miracles happen every day (see Wells, Vernon), so perhaps the Cubs can find a diamond somewhere in the January rough and make ...
While Joe Mauer and Brian McCann rate as the best-known offensive catchers in baseball, Geovany Soto was the best hitter in the league at that position in 2010.Though he got only 387 plate appearances due to a mixture of injuries and managerial stupidity, Soto logged a career-best .890 OPS and socked 17 home runs. He did all that despite batting mostly seventh and eighth for the Cubs. National League hitters performed nine percent worse than their overall numbers when batting in those slots in 2010, so if Soto had been batting fourth (where he belonged in a beleaguered Cubs lineup, ...
We here at Baseball Professor think about our readers first and ourselves second—albeit a close second. That’s why we decided to reach out to other bloggers (who follow their respective teams more closely than we do) to give you a deeper look into the important issues every fantasy owner has to come to grips with this season.
Our second installment is with the Chicago Cubs and comes courtesy of Joe Aiello from View from the Bleachers.
Be sure to also check out our 2011 Tampa Bay Rays Q&A.
1) In the minors, Starlin Castro averaged nearly 26 stolen bases per 500 at-bats, but he stole ...
After 102 years of failure and disappointment, there have to be some excuses as to why the Chicago Cubs cannot win a World Series, let alone make it to one. Cubs fans have suffered, but remained loyal for inexplicable circumstances, including injuries and blunders. It has been a highlight reel of misfortune. This will discuss the top five reasons as to why the Cubs cannot win.Begin Slideshow
Someone’s name value can certainly cause many people to overvalue them. You think that, based on the name alone, the player should be able to live up to the expectations we have attributed to them in the past. It doesn’t matter what the player has done in recent years, the name holds value. It’s engrained in our minds.
It’s a mistake you do not want to make.
A perfect example of this phenomenon as we head into 2011 is Alfonso Soriano. According to Mock Draft Central, he has an ADP of 100.81 and is the 25th outfielder coming off the board. In ...
Rise, bleacher bums. Rise, Ricketts family. Rise, all you North siders. This is your time. This is Cubs baseball time!
Sure, it’s been a little while since the Cubbies have won the NL Pennant, but I’m telling you, this is the year! The pieces are starting to come together, and it’s all happening with the pitching rotation.
Ryan Dempster is entering his fourth season as a Cubs starter. Dempster has been a consistent and reliable pitcher in most fantasy leagues, and there are no signs of this changing. His 208 strikeouts were 12th in the majors, and 15 wins were among the ...
With so many of the big name free agents signed early on this off season, it has been a winter of trade rumors, and while most have proved to be nothing beyond just rumors, the Brewers managed to pull off two of the bigger trades of the off season.
However, the rest of the NL Central has been fairly busy as well, as the Cubs, Reds, Cardinals, and Brewers all look to be in the running for the division. Even the Astros and Pirates made a handful of moves that could make series' against them that much tougher.
So here are the ...
Another way of asking this question is have the moves Jim Hendry made in the offseason improved the team and have the moves their division rivals made improved those teams more? On the latter score, though the Brewers have improved their pitching, they have done so at the expense of their rather suspect defense. On balance, they remain a very flawed team. Let's remember they had CC Sabathia for the better part of a year and they lost.
The same can be said of the Cardinals, whose major move has been adding an aging Lance Berkman as their everyday left-fielder, in ...
The Chicago Cubs have not won a World Series since 1908, a painful 102 years ago.
Their fans have thought "this will be the year" year after year and their front office has been aggressive enough through free agency and trades in recent offseasons to keep expectations high.
But while they have failed to measure up to those expectations, a division that was once between them and the St. Louis Cardinals is now a four-horse race.
Cincinnati emerged this past season as a contender, winning 91 games to take the division over St. Louis by a comfortable spread. They will continue to give ...
San Francisco Giants Manager Bruce Bochy said a bunch of castoffs and misfits won the World Series in 2010. After enormously disappointing seasons in 2009 and 2010, the Cubs definitely fall in the category of misfits. How did a team that seemed to be the odds on favorite to advance to the World Series in 2008 drop so far so fast? The Cubs won 98 games during the 2008 season but were swept out of the playoffs by the Dodgers. The Dodger sweep brought the Cubs postseason losing streak to nine games, dating all the way back to the infamous Steve Bartman game in the 2003 National League ...
Next Page »
