Revisiting my childhood baseball days (1980 Cubs) - PureSim 2007 1.86 - Page 6

hoopsguy · 09-10-2009, 11:58 PM

Retiring players:
Jim Bibby: 31-11 2.45 ERA. He killed us in 1981.
Ken Forsch: 29-26 2.80 ERA. Tied for league lead in wins one season.
Fergie Jenkins
Tug McGraw: had 42 saves in 1980.
Carl Yastrzemski: out at 45 years young.

hoopsguy · 09-11-2009, 08:10 PM

The most expensive hitter in this draft is Eric Davis, but I think the best is Alvin Davis. He has much more potential than Davis, although both have high skill levels right now. On the pitching side, Dwight Gooden is going to be a stud - bigger impact than DeLeon or Hudson had last year, I'm guessing. Roger Clemens should also be very good. We are hoping that there is a significant contributor still out there for us at the end of the first round.

1. Houston - Kirby Puckett. He is a long way from a finished product right now, with little power and a pretty poor eye. May turn into a good player, but there are guys who are much better right now.
2. Seattle - Terry Pendleton. This is a bad pick, given how much talent is out there. I can only suspect that this is budget driven.
3. Philadelphia - Roger Clemens. This 22 year old is going to be a star for a lot of years. I'm not happy to see him in my division, but with the Phillies picking here I expected them to get a really good player. I just did not think they would have their pick of great players thanks to Houston + Seattle.
4. Milwaukee - Eric Davis will join Strawberry in the outfield. Wow, what a 1-2 punch for power/speed.
5. San Diego - Kevin Mitchell. I think he will be better than Pendleton at same position. But I have a hard time accepting that Alvin Davis is on the board with those two guys getting picked.
6. Yankees - SS Danny Tartabull. Sleeper good pick, excluding Davis I like him better than any of the previous hitters.
7. Los Angeles - Alvin Davis. Big shot in the arm for a team that has some horses already on the pitching staff. Definitely helped themselves more than division rival Houston.
8. Cleveland - Bret Saberhagen. Only 20 years old, I expect he will be great.
9. St. Louis - Dwight Gooden. This draft has been a nightmare for your Chicago Cubs. Best pitcher in draft, probably best I've seen in any of the first four drafts.
10. Atlanta - Glenn Davis. Will have a tremendous base of hitting talent by pairing him with Horner + Murphy. I imagine they were bummed to see Saberhagen + Gooden go with last two picks.
11. Mets - Jimmy Key. May turn into a good pitcher, but won't have impact this year. Huge drop-off from first three guys to Key.
12. Baltimore - Jim Presley. Decent pick, but not a lot of value picking in this spot as difference between guys available now and when we pick does not appear that large.
13. Pittsburgh - Mike Pagliarulo. Looks like a young Barfield, but most guys with those type of attributes do not turn into 48/154 players. Most of them become Ron Kittle.
14. Boston - Tom Browning. Can't break a window with his fastball, but has good potential if you can overlook this.
15. Minnesota - Jose Rijo. This 19 year old is all potential right now.
16. California - Jim Deshaies. He comes cheap at 180K. Bottom of rotation talent next year, perhaps?
17. San Francisco - Mickey Tettleton. Not a bad pick considering he is a catcher and most of the guys playing that position can't hit their weight.
18. Kansas City - Kelly Gruber. Decidedly average player right now, may grow into being a good one.
19. Texas - Ivan Calderon. Good pick, is better player with more potential than guys like Gruber picked before him.
20. White Sox - Larry Sheets. Basically Kelly Gruber, but plays RF instead of 3B.
21. Detroit - Franklin Stubbs. A little better version of Tettleton, but plays 1B instead of catcher. Still, he has a chance to be a contributor to a winning team by next year if things break right.
22. Cincinnati - Mark Bailey. Really good looking C prospect. Wish he had fallen to us.
23. Toronto - Mark Gubicza. Very nice young pitcher, would have loved to grab him with our pick. Toronto adds him to an already impressive stable of starters. SP is definitely where the value is right now in this draft.
24. Oakland - Barbaro Garbey. I really don't like this pick, as he is 28 years old. I think there are better hitters out there right now and a ton of better pitchers.
25. Montreal - Darryl Boston. This is the hitter I would have taken if I was looking at hitters. But the pitching prospects are so much better right now. Still, Montreal has a bunch of good starters so this pick probably was what was best for them.
26. We've got several really strong pitching prospects to choose from, with Mark Langston and Ron Romanick being the top two. Closer John Franco would be very welcome in the second round if he sticks around. The decision between the starters comes down to liking Langston's power more than Romanick's control. Five year deal, just over 2 million per year. I'll be interested to see where the computer slots him versus our current guys. This pick also pretty much spells the end of the road for Dennis Martinez, despite his 21 wins last year.

Round #2:
- San Diego snags Franco early in the second round. Damn.
- The Cardinals add another pitching weapon, reliever Ken Howell. They have gotten tons better in this draft.
- California gets a good starter in Joe Hesketh. I like this pick better than their 1st rounder.
- Romanick lasts until our 2nd round pick. Looks like we are going to be leveraging our pitchers for position players next season. We sign him for 4 years @ 1.7 million.

3rd - MR Freddie Tolliver, 3 years @ 200K. Fringe prospect.
4th - SP Ken Dixon, 2 years @ 300K. Better prospect than Tolliver, but probably not making our roster in next two seasons.
5th - SP Kurt Kepshire, 1 year @ 300K. More less same thoughts as Dixon above.

hoopsguy · 09-11-2009, 09:25 PM

FA asking for the most money - Cliff Johnson (dude, you are 37 and suck), Mike Schmidt, Chet Lemon, and Jim Rice. All are looking for 15+ million.

The next tier, looking for about half that amount, includes Gorman Thomas, John Wockenfuss, Darrell Evans, and Greg Luzinski.

Pitchers asking for 10-15 million = Floyd Bannister, Mike Norris, J.R. Richard, Ron Guidry, and Lee Smith.

These guys are outside of our price range. We do have two spots to fill, and I would prefer not to just add min-sal guys so time to find some value options.

#1 - 27 RF Clint Hurdle looks like he can hit. I would like to bring him in with the goal of being a 4th outfielder. He could potentially be a starter if Joe Carter is not ready or if we cannot swing a deal for a player we like later in the year. He is asking for 2.7 million initially. We'll probably offer about 3.1 million and see if that gets us our guy.

#2 - SP Andy Hawkins. 24 year old with a lot of potential. This guy should not have made it to the market. I'm going to see if I can grab him as a marketable asset for later. I'm guessing he'll cost 3 million as well.

LA is offering Hurdle about 3.4 million. We pop our offer up to 3 years @ 3.75 million to avoid him instantly signing with them.

Early FA signings:
- Phillies signed Doug Corbett to a one year deal for 4.6 million. He was probably among the five best MR/CL on the market but was asking a little more than what I wanted to pay.
- LA signed J.R. Richard to a one year deal for 14.5 million.

Hawkins spurns us for the Yankees, taking 500K less per year. 4 years @ 2.6 million per season. And in other not-so-good news, Hurdle gets big money from Boston, 5 years @ 4.5 million a year. He just priced himself out of Chicago.

Jorge Orta, at 34, falls just under our age limit. He is asking for just over 2 million per year. Let's see if we can sign him for the contract we tried to give Hurdle. We'll also pursue 33 year old RF Jeff Burroughs. He might be had for less than 2 million a year.

Both of those guys sign on with us. So our FA spending was about 4 million this season as we have now filled our roster. I'm sure I'll be doing a lot more tinkering this season to figure out playing time and contracts, but we've got our 35 heading into spring training.
-

rjolley · 09-11-2009, 09:37 PM

That draft looks a lot better than the earlier ones in the dynasty. That's 2 in a row. Good to see.

hoopsguy · 09-11-2009, 09:42 PM

PSPN Pre-Season Power Rankings:
1. Chicago
2. San Francisco
3. Detroit
4. Los Angeles - two of top 4 in NL West
5. Pittsburgh
6. Oakland
7. Montreal
8. Toronto
9. St. Louis - 4th NL East team in top 9
10. Kansas City
16. Cincinnati

Most Feared Hitters - projections:
Eddie Murray (Bal) - .287/27
Dave Winfield (SD) - .325/20
Bob Horner (Atl) - .289/34
Kent Hrbek (Min) - .306/26
Harold Baines (CHW) - .292/27
Cal Ripken (Tex) - .303/24
Tony Armas (Oak) - .253/37
Don Mattingly (SF) - .323/20
Jack Clark (SF) - .293/26
Mike Easler (Pit) - .303/23

OK, no Strawberry or Barfield listed here? Huh? I would also have Brunansky on this list, as he has been a heck of a lot more feared than Easler or Hrbek, to pick on two guys on this list. Finally, I would bet the ranch on the "under" on Winfield hitting .325. Crazy talk.

Payrolls are beginning to emerge as have/have not. There are only three teams over 100K and Chicago is #20 out of 26.
1. Los Angeles - $134,251,804
2. Detroit - $117,228,226
3. Montreal $111,905,137

hoopsguy · 09-11-2009, 09:53 PM

So the manager rankings are pretty interesting. Here is how they project our starting five:
1. Romanick
2. Viola
3. Langston
4. Gullickson
5. Witt

The next three are Morgan, Black, and Martinez. So two rookies are #1/#3, Witt is #5, and a 21 game winner is #8. I'm going to have to make some adjustments here.

Barfield is not included in the starting lineup, instead we see Orta. Um, no.

They list Orosco as our closer. I'm willing to give him a shot at this, but he'll have a short leash.

Time to see what I can get for Martinez and maybe another starter as well ... we've got moves to make before the start of this year.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 06:06 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

Here is the list of guys who have one year left on their deals:
- Robin Yount
- Dennis Martinez
- Gary Templeton (I think I know how I will handle this one)
- Dennis Lamp
- Mike Scioscia
- Ed Vande Berg
- Mel Hall
- Oil Can Boyd (needs to improve like Black did)
- Jay Pettibone (gone)

So three starters (two of whom won Silver Slugger awards this year, the other a Gold Glove), a 20 game winner, and a very good reliever. Yep, there will be some interesting negotiations.

OK, the trade market on Martinez is not quite as good as I might have hoped, especially with the 25% rule on salaries in play. That one is going to be very tough to deal with, and will likely lead to me having to let a fair number of guys just walk in the offseason.

But before I go too far down this path, I think it makes sense to see what each of these guys is looking to get paid next year and maybe settle up with some of them early on if the price is absolutely right.
1.) We will not be bringing back Lamp or Pettibone - too old or lacking talent.
2.) Templeton is only 28 and his batting eye has improved a ton. He won't be a guy that struggles to hit .200 going forward. I'm willing to work on a deal with him, if conditions are right, despite bagging on him for years and not starting him since early in 1982.

OK, that brings us around to the actual demands:
1.) Mike Scioscia is a pretty loyal dude, apparently. He is making 1.7 million this year and will take a one year extension for the same money or a longer contract at less money. I'm surprised he would do this at 26 years of age, but I need to take advantage of this. I offer him four more years at $1,422,274 per year. That leaves $8,577,726 for our remaining players.
2.) Yount, currently at 5.4 million, wants 16 for his next one year deal. The only way I can keep him is by exemption, but that would preclude me from using it next season. My thinking right now is that I'm going to have to part ways with Yount, who is 29 and in the prime of his career.
3.) Martinez, also 29, is making just over 4 million this year. His salary requests are extremely fair for a guy who won as many games as he did last year: 4.75 for a one year extension. But we have so many good young pitchers that I have a very hard time justifying this. The only way he stays is if we are moving multiple pitchers ahead of him on the depth chart.
4.) Hall wants a big raise from his 580K contract, but it is doable. He would get about 6 million if we were to extend him. That would severely hamper my ability to bring back other players but I would love to keep a 24 year old who was very productive last season.
5.) Vande Berg is at 677K now and would like to move into the 1.5 million range. I think that this is doable, but he is not at the top of my list of decisions.
6.) Boyd, at 250K right now, is looking for 1.7 million next year. That is not a horrible deal for a guy who is 25 and still improving but he is playing the wrong position to be making demands of our front office. I'll probably see if there is a trade market for him.
7.) Templeton is at 3.7 million now and would come back for the same money next year or a smaller salary long-term but still > 3 million. I may have to exercise this option if we allow Yount to leave.

Re: Yount, next years FA guys include the following players: Boggs, Morgan, Barfield. Boggs is not asking for any real money on his extension, but Barfield wants > 10 million. So we can't keep both Barfield (25 years old, coming off MVP season) and Yount (29 years old, coming off monster season at position not nearly as deep as OF).

I pull the trigger on a Boggs extension, elated at my good fortune in being able to keep him around for many more years in a Chicago uniform. 3 extra years @ 1,014,585. We now have $7,563,141 for our remaining players. It just got a little tougher to keep Mel Hall around but if I can squeeze him + VandeBerg in then I'm probably willing to scramble for a SS.

So, marching orders for now on trades:
#1 - SS
#2 - OF who can replace Hall

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 07:03 AM

A trade is struck:
Martinez to Minnesota for Roy Smalley.

For now, we'll move Yount to third and give Smalley the SS position. That means that Gaetti will be on the bench, but that should be a short-term (one year, max) deal. Smalley, age 32, is under contract for four years @ 3.9 million a season.

I don't think Smalley for Yount is a good deal in the long-term, but this deal should probably help us for this year. If I feel that I need Yount for the three-peat then I can do so and not worry about being stuck going into next year with the house rules on FA spending.

It also allows me to keep my "exemption" in place for Barfield for next year. If he produces at 60% of what he did this year I'll probably want to use it on him.

Smalley's comments on coming to Chicago - "I'm just happy to be out of the American League. Competing with Cal Ripken was fricking impossible."

Yount's comments on moving to third - "For Roy Smalley? Are you remotely serious?"

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 07:11 AM

We demote Samuel down to the minors again. Right now he is not good enough to beat out Randolph or Oberkfell. Those two guys will platoon at 2B for us.

We'll also have a platoon in LF, where Carter gets the nod against lefties and Orta against righties.

I'm still scratching my head about Gullickson as the #4 starter, but a review of his ratings tells the story. Back when we had initially acquired him he had some heat, with his Velocity ranking north of 80. But now, at the age of 25, it has sunk down to 58. He still has elite control and strong stuff, but the velocity is mediocre. Still, it is better than Romanick so I flip-flop those guys in our rotation.

I also am struggling with Morgan, who is 33-9 in 1.5 seasons in the majors, as our long reliever/spot starter. With all due respect to Langston and Romanick, I'm not going to let that happen to start the year. Morgan is in our starting five and one of those guys can take a spot if someone falters. I decide that I want the lefty Langston over the right-handed Romanick, so Romanick has just moved from opening day starter to long relief man.

OK, time to play some actual games.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 07:31 AM

We start the season visiting San Francisco, in a matchup of the top two teams in the game according to PSPN. But I find it hard to believe that the second best team is starting Ed Whitson on opening day. We take the opener 4-1 behind a Scioscia three run homer, 8 strong innings by Gullickson, and the first save for new closer Jesse Orosco. Smalley was 0-4 in his debut. The Giants turn the tables in game 2, winning 5-1 to split the series. Viola allowed all the runs early, bringing back memories of his uneven postseason.

San Diego is the next stop, and they are off to a 2-0 start. Langston throws six scoreless innings in his debut but we lose 1-0. Second straight game where we have gotten plenty of hits but meager run scoring. What makes this one especially galling is that the Padres lost their starter in the first inning, so we were shut out by a "bullpen by committee". Witt, like Viola, is in postseason form but this is a good thing. He threw eight shutout innings, striking out 8. Hall and Barfield each hit their first homers of the year in a 3-0 win. The bats are active on our final day in San Diego, providing Morgan with plenty of run support in a 10-7 win. Randolph had three RBIs and Barfield was 4-5 with 2 RBIs. Dave Winfield, who is supposed to hit .320 this year, is batting .045 after five games.

On to LA, continuing a long west coast trip to start the year. Oh well, the weather is better here than it is in Chicago in early April. The Dodgers have started 4-1 to jump to an early lead in their division. We go 12 innings for a 4-3 victory in the opener. That was required after Orosco blew his first save of the year to waste a gem by Gullickson. Viola bounces back with a great outing, and we needed it to beat Fernando Valenzuela 1-0.

The Brewers have started off red hot, winning their first six games.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 08:02 AM

Our home opener is against the Mets. Langston is ridiculous, going eight innings and only surrendering a 4th inning single to Bob Brenly. Barfield hit a solo shot in the 7th that turned out to be the only run scored this game. Jim Gott fanned 13 in the loss. Witt is sharp again during a 9-1 win that takes us to six straight wins. Carter was 3-5 with a pair of RBIs and is hitting .393 on the year. The Mets win the last game of our series 6-1, the second straight lackluster start for Morgan.

Kirby Puckett has started his major league career with an eleven game hitting streak for Houston.

Pete Vukovich of the Cards has a strain in his elbow ligament. Although that sounds serious, he is only expected to miss three weeks. Vance Law, an All Star last year in Montreal, has a more serious version of the same injury and is expected to be out until June.

We welcome the Vukovich-less Cardinals to Wrigley with a 13-1 beatdown. Smalley hits his first homer and Carter continues to give us Jim Rice style production with 3 RBIs. But all the runs must have been used up in the opener, because we lose 2-0 the following day. I'll give some of the credit to Dwight Gooden, who picked up his first major league win by allowing only one hit over seven innings. But our rookie, Langston, nearly matches him in a 2-0 win to give us the series victory.

Our homestand continues the next day against the Pirates and we pick up a 7-3 win. Carter hits his first homer on the season; he is doing a great job in the middle of the order along with Barfield. Both of those guys are hitting over .380, although the home run production is not there quite yet. Morgan gets his first quality start (6 IP, 3 ER) but his second loss in a 4-3 contest. We win the third game of the set to cap a 6-3 homestand. 8-2 final, with Yount hitting his first homer on the year.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 08:31 AM

The Blue Jays have won seven in a row, bumping their record to 13-3, to assume a two game lead in the competitive AL East. The Tigers, at 7-8, are already 5.5 games out.

KC, at 10-6, is the only team above .500 in the AL West. Traditional laughingstock Seattle is 8-8, while California has an MLB worst 5-13 record.

We are 11-5, two games up on the Mets in the NL East. All of the other teams in the division that were projected "top 10" teams by PSPN are currently below .500.

Only two games separates first/worst in the NL West, with all teams between 9-7 and 7-9. Atlanta is one of the 9-7 teams and has a +30 run discrepancy that gives an early indicator that they may be positioned to win the division. Or maybe it just means they were on the right end of one blowout win

Off to St. Louis to get our second look at Gooden. It is only marginally better than the first, as we lose 3-2. Gooden had 13 strikeouts in 6 innings. Ron Darling also stymies us, as we fall 2-1 in extra innings the next day. We've wasted a couple of pretty good pitching performances so far. Witt moves to 4-0 with a 8-4 win where we scored four in the 8th to salvage one game from the series. The top of the order got it done, with Boggs and Yount combining for five hits, 3 runs, and 3 RBIs.

Next stop - Pittsburgh. Don Robinson is a guy who has given us trouble over the years and does so again in a 3-0 loss. We are shut out again the following day, 2-0, as this road trip is turning morbid. Sid Fernandez struck out 10; we seem to be swinging and missing quite a bit this year. Viola responds by pitching us to a 7-0 shutout win. He is just happy to get some run support, as he lost twice against Gooden already this month. Boggs had three hits to raise his average up to .330.

Some guys putting up big numbers in April:
Tom Brunansky (Sea): .330/11/23
Ken Phelps (KC): .341/8/19
Paul Molitor (Tex): .333/4/17, leading league in runs with 23

Jack Clark of the Giants is out three weeks with a back injury.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 08:51 AM

We head north to New York, with the Mets looming just one game back in the standings. Langston goes to 3-0 with a microscopic 0.49 ERA after winning 4-1 in the first game. Barfield hit a two run homer, his 3rd on the year. Smalley is not adjusting the NL pitching, as he is mired at .181. Witt did not allow a single hit in six innings but was lifted for a pinch hitter, paving the way for Romanick to get his first big league win in a 2-0 pitchers duel. Orosco registered his 7th save in 8 tries. That wraps up a two game series at Shea and a 4-4 road trip.

The Padres come calling at Wrigley, and the first game is a close affair. We get a 3-2 win thanks in part to a two run homer by Carter. Our four game winning streak comes to a screeching halt when Bud Black wets the bed in a relief appearance. You know it is bad when you give up a three run homer to Jose Oquendo. 7-3 final in a game where Smalley hit a solo shot. We also fall in the finale, 3-1. Viola is now 2-4 on the year; he has pitched better than that.

The Giants are the next team to visit. At 13-16 they are struggling to keep up with the Reds (18-12) in the West. But they solve Langston in a 4-0 win. Don Mattingly hits a homer and is having a fine season: .336/5/14. Witt stops the skid by picking up his 5th win, 6-2 final.

The Dodgers and their huge payroll are next up, and Bill Laskey is up to the task of silencing our bats. 5-0 final and I'm getting antsy about our lack of production. Alvin Davis hit his 7th homer on the year. The bats wake up against the tough Bob Welch, as we post 10 runs in a 10-6 win. Yount had a pair of homers and 5 RBIs. 3-3 homestand.

Oakland rookie 1B Barbaro Garbey is giving me the Dan Driessen treatment, posting .339/4/18 and leading the majors in doubles.

Milwaukee's George Bell has a 15 game hitting streak. Man, what an outfield! Bell, Strawberry, and Eric Davis! Those guys are off to a good start this year at 19-12 but trail Toronto by 3.5.

In other divisions, KC (18-14) is a half game up on Minnesota and one up on the White Sox. The Angels stink; at 9-25 they are a world removed from the playoff team of just two seasons ago.

We are percentage points ahead of Montreal (18-13 to 19-14), with St. Louis (1.5 back) and New York (2) looming.

The Reds have an NL best 21-13 record and are three in front of Atlanta.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 10:00 AM

We hit the road hoping to change a few trends:
1.) Score runs more consistently - too many guys shutting us out
2.) Hit the ball over the fence a little more often - this applied to all three of our starting outfielders, who have 7 between them
3.) Get more wins out of Viola and Morgan

Smalley is knicked up right now so we put Templeton in the lineup against right handers. Gary is hitting .313 against them on the year so far, so it seems worth a shot.

I also shuffle our bullpen around, as Romanick and Black were getting the lions share of appearances without matching results. Pena only had one (!) appearance so far this year. That is just wrong.

After all the changes Viola falls to 2-5 with a 3-2 loss at Houston. He has not given up more than three runs in a start since the opener but the run support just is not there. The runs are there the following day, but the pitching lets us down in a 9-7 loss. Pena celebrates his promotion by just handing over a 7-4 lead in the bottom of the 8th. We waste the first Cubs homer for Jeff Burroughs. And it is a clean sweep for the Astros when they win 6-3 the following day.

Just in case I'm feeling too bad about our plight (2.5 out of first as Montreal keeps winning) - the Phillies have dropped 9 straight and are now 10-25.

We slink into Cincinnati trying to find some respectability on the road. It does not come easily, but we get a 6-3 win in 11 innings. Randolph, who somehow wound up at catcher for a few innings, had two RBIs in the victory. But Gullickson got pounded the next day in an 8-6 loss. But we pick up a hard fought 4-3 win in the finale, with Viola beating DeLeon. Barfield homered for the second straight game. Good end to a lousy 2-4 trip.

We get a chance to pay back the Astros at Wrigley but for some reason do not seem that interested in doing so. The April dominance of Langston has morphed into May vulnerability. Three RBIs by Barfield (up to 28) are wasted in a 7-5 loss. But he is back at it again the following day, driving in four and adding his 7th homer in a 6-0 victory. And we end the series with a 9-5 victory. Unfortunately, Scioscia sustains a neck injury. We are pretty thin at catcher so this is not good at all. He'll miss two weeks and we'll rush him back after that time. Don Slaught, who is having an off-year at AAA Iowa, is going to see some time.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 10:28 AM

So what has gone right for the Angels this year? Well, how about 1B Mike Ivie having a 17 game hitting streak? If that does not do it for the Angels fans then, well, I've got nothing.

We host the 24-17 Braves. It is odd seeing teams playing against us with better records. I guess I've gotten pretty spoiled the last couple of years. They widen the gap with a 6-5 win in the opener in 10 innings. Boggs was 3-5 in the loss to bring his average up to .354. But we are not getting anything at all out of the bottom of the order. And I'm this close to platooning Hall as his batting average is now .206. Not the way to perform in a contract year, buddy.

Viola moves to 4-5 with a 3-2 win against Doyle Alexander (6-1, 2.04 ERA), who left after 3 innings with an injury. Even in his wins, Viola is not getting run support. Then Orel Hershiser slams the door on us 2-0 to wrap up another blah series.

Meanwhile, we have fallen to third in the division race as the Cardinals have ripped off six straight wins.

We lose another close game, 5-4 in 10 innings, to the Reds. Barfield knocks in three runs to help us find a 5-2 win. And the bullpen comes through in a 5-4 win (again in 10 innings) the next night by posting four scoreless frames. Oberkfell had three hits to raise his average to .244. It was refreshing to see our comes come back from an early 4-0 deficit. The series concludes with a 1-0 win with Gaetti driving home the winning run in the bottom of the 9th. More impressive run support for Viola (sigh).

So, we are just about at the end of May and here is how the divisions look:
AL East - Toronto has cooled off a bit, but still has the best record in baseball at 31-18. That is three better than Milwaukee.

AL West - The White Sox have taken over the lead (27-22) by a half game over KC. Minnesota is 1.5 back. The White Sox? Wow, just two years ago these guys were a joke.

NL East - Montreal is 28-21, which is .5 ahead of the Cardinals and one in front of us. New York is .500 and still in the race. The Phillies have another losing streak going; up to 8 and counting. They are 12-35 and are by far the worst team in baseball.

NL West - Atlanta is 28-20, putting them one in front of LA and two up on San Diego. The Reds are three back and the Astros trail by four.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 10:45 AM

Off to Atlanta to see if we can do any better against these guys. Not in the first game, as we take another one run loss. 4-3, as Bob James blows a 3-2 lead in the 8th. Different guys, same results. That is followed with another loss, 7-5 this time. Witt was bad in this outing and has seen his ERA balloon up to 3.18. That is a big jump considering how good his ERA was in April. That mercifully ends our visit to Atlanta. Maybe we can bully the Phillies around?

Nope, Dickie Noles was 1-8 coming into the game but we lose 2-1. Meanwhile, my manager seems to have completely ignored my idea of placing Orta in the starting lineup ahead of Hall. This is forcing my hand to make a move. I put Hall on the market. Only to find that no one in baseball wants him. Very well, Hall is going to the minors for the month of June while we see if we can get something going. We lose 7-0 to the Phillies the next day, as the Phillies now have 14% of their wins on the season against us. That percentage goes up the next day as 1-8 Dave Dravecky beats us 2-1. So, we've scored 2 runs in three games against a team wining 30% of their games. God, we are such a steaming pile of suck right now. We've also lost five in a row and are .500 on the year.

We salvage one game in Philadelphia, beating their best pitcher - rookie Roger Clemens, who fell to 3-7. Don't give any credit to our offense, however. It was a 2-0 game that was won almost solely by Langston.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 11:30 AM

Slaught batted .056 in his time with the Cubs with 1 RBI. He is shipped back to Iowa and will never see our roster again. Backup catcher just shot up our priority list going forward.

We are off to Montreal to see if Scioscia's return can help spark a resurgence. Right now we are three back of the Expos and facing Cy Young winner Sanderson in the opener. Tough assignment. Too tough, as we find another one run loss, 4-3. Our old closer Lee Smith blew a 3-2 lead in the 9th but picked up a win when Mike Morgan (what the hell was he doing in relief?) gave up a run. Clearly my manager is just trying to screw with me right now ... first Hall and now this. God, I wish there was an option to can the manager when playing in GM mode.

Gullickson keeps us above .500 with a 6-0 shutout win that featured homers by Barfield and Smalley. That looks great, but it was a 1-0 game heading into the 9th. The offense still has issues that cannot be easily masked, but getting Smalley going would certainly help. A 15-9 win the next day helps with the healing process. We had five players homer, while Montreal got two from Gary Carter. Smalley and Scioscia each had four hits.

OK, two out of three in Montreal is nice but how about keeping it up in St. Louis against the division leading Cardinals? We are 2.5 back heading into the opener against their longtime ace Vukovich. Well, we get a 3-1 win but Scioscia is hurt again. I can not deal with Don fricking Slaught again so something will have to happen on the trade front.

Bud Black is moved to Minnesota for 28 year old Butch Wynegar. Wynegar has two years remaining on his deal @ 1.192 million. He looks like a guy that should be able to make consistent contact and is a positive defender (1982 Gold Glove). He is hitting .254/1/16 this year and is a career .247 hitter as a four year starter for the Twins. Minnesota is "thrilled with this trade" as they are getting a starting pitcher with pretty good stuff and reasonable salary demands. Wynegar will be the starter for at least the next two months while Scioscia recovers.

We bring up Boyd to take a spot in the bullpen and once again demote Samuel. Next year should be your time, Juan. Keep working hard at Iowa.

The first game of the Wynegar era ends in a 4-3 loss. We tie it in the 9th against their closer Ken Howell but Vande Berg surrenders his first run of the season to give the game back to St. Louis. Jeffrey Leonard was 4-5 for the Cards with 2 RBIs. We win the finale 9-2, with Barfield going deep for the 9th time. Morgan helped his own cause with a grand slam.

Although Barfield is not putting up crazy numbers right now, he is definitely not the problem with this team. He is at .293/9/44. The black holes at C and SS have definitely hampered our offensive production and we have not been very clutch as a staff, despite the bullpen having good stats.

Still, a 4-2 roadtrip against the teams ahead of us in the division seems like a good sign. We're heading home for some more games against Montreal next.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 12:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SteveBollea

Hmm...either the team is underperforming or the house rules are actually working.

I feel like it is the former right now. The house rules are making me have to work harder for trades, but I still think I'm getting useful pieces. Where I think the house rules are going to really come into play is next season and beyond ... right now I should have enough assets to still be very good. But there will be a slow drain on high-end talent with the 10 million cap and probably more turnover on our middle tier guys as I make trades for necessary pieces like Wynegar just now.

If there was a team that was blazing ahead of us at a .650 clip or something like that I do not think that I would be as annoyed with the team as I have been this season. Up to this point, that has not happened. We have just fallen way backwards. Some of it is law of averages ... you are not going to win 117 every time. Some of it is one run games, where we are 8-12 despite only having one blown save by our new closer. But all in all, this has been a challenging/vexing first 2.5 months.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 12:24 PM

Back home, we fall to 8-13 in one run games with a 3-2 loss to the Expos. Ellis Valentine hit a go-ahead homer in the 8th to give them the win. Viola moves his record on the year back to .500 (6-6) with a 4-2 decision. Valentine again went deep, but it was in the 9th and was more or less meaningless. The meaningful homer was the three run job by Boggs in the first. And we again take 2 of 3 from Montreal thanks to a 10-6 win in the finale. Smalley hit his 2nd homer of the series and is up to 6 on the year. He also had five RBIs, bringing his line on the season up to .229/6/21. Not very good, but a world better than where he was a month ago. Willie Randolph hit a pinch three run homer to ice the game in the 8th.

It is with a sense of relief that I report that we beat the Phillies at Wrigley, 3-2 in 10 innings. It seems like almost all of our extra inning games (7 on the year) have been 10 innings. Three more hits for Smalley. The next day we win our fourth in a row, this time by a 5-3 margin. Gaetti hits his first homer on the year, a huge 3 run walk-off number that sent a buzz through the crowd. He has really struggled off the bench up to this point, but that one was huge. But the buzz dies the next day as we lose 1-0. Dickie Noles apparently owns us, but not anyone else in baseball. A Boggs single in the third was our only hit. We win the finale, 4-3 in 12 innings. Romanick pitched four scoreless innings for the win.

That was enough to put us back in first in the NL Central, at 36-30. There are three teams within 2.5, but this has not been a particularly good division this year and we have played well against our division foes over the last two weeks.

Rudy Law is a pretty good bet to break the triples record (14), given that he already has 10 on the year. Run, Rudy, run.

So I've talked about the Milwaukee outfield before, but they have another player putting up big numbers this year. 1B Greg Walker is at .326/10/43. This third year player has improved every season for the Brew Crew.

Barfield is not the only MVP struggling to match his numbers from a year ago. Darryl Strawberry has a line of .267/11/32 w/22 steals.

One slugger who is continuing to perform at a high level is Tom Brunansky. The average is not great, but .245/20/46 speaks for itself.

Dan Driessen of the Reds will miss three weeks with a calf injury.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 12:57 PM

A look at the top 20 ERAs in the league reveals zero Cubs. I sure hope that changes between now and the end of the year. Starting pitching has been the rock that I've built our franchise upon and we need to do a little better in this area. Great starting pitching covers up an awful lot of sins ...

The league leader is Jose DeLeon of the Reds who is having an impressive sophomore campaign. He is 6-4 with a 1.50 ERA and a whopping 100:29 K/BB ratio. All of his other secondary stats are great as well; he must have "Viola disease" to only have six wins.

The Reds actually have three starters in the top 20 ERA - DeLeon, Liebrandt (5th, 2.02), and Soto (12th, 2.26).

Time for me to gush about a Milwaukee player again. Your AL ROTY is going to be Eric Davis. His numbers are .270/15/50 with 26 steals. And he is going to win Gold Gloves just about every year. 100 range, 100 arm, 87 hands. Unreal.

Our least favorite American League player, Dwayne Murphy, may be headed for his first All Star game. .263/14/44 w/20 steals.

Back on the road against a division foe, and it is Pittsburgh. The Pirates have fallen out of contention after a nine game losing streak last month. Well, they would be out of contention in a good division but they are only 7.5 behind us. We give them the opener, 5-4. Wynegar had three RBIs to help us rally from an early 4-0 hole but we just could not muster offense against their pen. Witt gets the win the next day as Barfield slugs his 10th homer. Burroughs also homered and had four RBIs. He has played better since getting into the lineup after the Hall demotion. We roughed up Candelaria in that game. The last game of the series is not good, as we go down meekly 4-2.

We host the Cardinals next, hoping to grow our 1.5 game edge. Gullickson helps us accomplish that mission with a 5-1 decision that featured a bunch of solo homers: Barfield, Burroughs, Carter, and Yount. That was the 2nd straight loss for Gooden, who had earlier reeled off nine straight wins. Viola loses a one run game, 3-2. This is a broken record. But we solve Vukovich in the finale, winning 7-1. Barfield was 3-3 with his 12th homer.

Pittsburgh comes to town and beats us 7-5 to start the series. We rallied back from 5-5 (early deficit again) only to give up a pair of runs in the top of the 9th. Morgan handcuffs the Pirates the next day in a 9-1 win that included a Yount homer and three more Barfield RBIs. And we beat Robinson in the final game of the series 5-3. One more Barfield homer; here is hoping that he is starting a hot streak.

OK, now that we are starting to win more series I'm getting greedy. I want to see us sweep a few of these rather than always leaving one on the table. I'm not expecting that to start in our next one, however. We will be heading to LA to take on the 46-32 Dodgers.

Division updates:
AL East - Detroit has won five straight to move to 43-33. They are just 1.5 behind the Blue Jays now. The Brewers have also gained ground, moving to within 2.5.

AL West - KC is a half game ahead of the White Sox with a 43-34 mark. Oakland has won three straight and has moved within 2.5 games.

NL East - We are one in front of Montreal with our 41-34 record. The Cards are 2.5 back and the Mets have lost 4 straight to fall 4.5 behind.

NL West - Both the Dodgers and Braves have won four straight. LA is 2.5 in front of Atlanta and Cincinnait.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 01:14 PM

One run losses - they are just haunting us. 1-0 in the opener at LA, this one took 11 innings. Viola is rumored to be crafting a voodoo doll in the form of our hitting coach. Romanick took the loss and he is 4-7 on the season. I'm going to give him a smaller role as I'm sick of seeing his name on the wrong side of the ledger. Another day, another one run loss with the losing pitcher coming out of the pen. 2-1, Pena with the loss this time. LA has great starting pitching, but we need something from this offense. We are leaving way too many men on base (19 hits, 1 run over two games). And three straight one run losses in LA, 4-3 this time despite two Barfield homers. One more game, this time they send out Valenzuela. Not the guy that I want to face when on a losing streak, but our guys show some pride in a 9-2 win. Gaetti had a pair of homers and five RBIs.

San Diego is next. Their 42-40 mark would normally be competitive in the AL West but they are trailing three pretty decent teams this year. We finally win a one run game, 4-3 in 10 innings. Orosco blew the save in the 9th but gets the win in the 10th. The Padres pay us back the next day, 4-1 final. We could not get anything going against Mike Boddicker. Langston wins us the finale, 6-4, with Jorge Orta knocking in all six runs. The victory set a good tone for the trip up to San Francisco.

5-1 in the opener, with Barfield going yard again. He is up to 60 RBIs now. He homers again in the next game but we are blasted 10-4. Sixto Lezcano has homered in both games and Mickey Tettleton had four hits and 4 RBIs in this one. Gullickson gets his 8th win and Carter hits his 10th homer in the third game of the four game set. We won 7-5 on a pinch hit double by Burroughs in the top of the 9th. Lezcano again homered for the Giants. And we head into the All Star break on a two game winning streak thanks to a 3-1 win for Viola.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 01:36 PM

Here are your American League All Stars:

AL Starters (in order of votes):
1B Greg Walker (Mil) - .314/12/51 w/10 steals
2B Paul Molitor (Tex) - .328/12/48 w/19 steals
C Lance Parrish (Det) - .283/16/47. 3rd AS game, was reserve last year.
3B George Brett (KC) - .319/9/36. Four time AS starter, only missed in 1982 (went on to win batting title that year)
LF Gary Ward (Min) - .336/10/41
SS Cal Ripken (Tex) - .326/11/57. Three time repeat AS starter.
CF Fred Lynn (Bos) - .313/11/39. Fourth straight AS game, appears to have come back 100% from injury.
RF Harold Baines (CHW) - .315/14/54. Third straight AS game, first as starter.

AL Reserves
1B Ken Phelps (KC) - .284/20/50
1B Willie Upshaw (Cle) - .307/14/58

For some reason the AL went with a 20 man roster for the AS game? Huh???

AL Pitchers
CL Keith Atherton (Det) - 2-3 3.19 ERA, 31 saves, 6 blown, 1 hold, 18:11 K/BB, .269 BAA, 1.36 WHIP
Starter Mark Gubicza (Tor) - 16-3 2.63 ERA, 2 CG, 2 SO, 107:39 K/BB, .215 BAA, 1.07 WHIP.
Starter Richard Dotson (CHW) - 13-3 2.27 ERA, 4 CG, 93:61 K/BB, .215 BAA, 1.18 WHIP. 2nd straight AS game.
Starter Bob Knepper (KC) - 11-3 2.07 ERA, 4 CG, 89:41 K/BB, .228 BAA, 1.14 WHIP. 2nd AS team.
Starter Jack Morris (Det) - 13-4 2.88 ERA, 3 CG, 1 SO, 93:50 K/BB, .233 BAA, 1.23 WHIP. 2nd AS team.
Starter Len Barker (Cle) - 10-6 2.35 ERA, 5 CG, 1 SO, 119:33 K/BB, .206 BAA, 0.98 WHIP.
MR Frank Dipino (Cal) - 2-0 1.65 ERA, 2 holds, 34:14 K/BB, .175 BAA, 0.94 WIHP
MR Tom Neidenfuer (KC) - 5-1 1.72 ERA, 1 save, 3 blown, 8 holds, 53:13 K/BB, .212 BAA, 1.01 WHIP. Repeat AS selection.
MR Tom Waddell (NYY) - 4-4 2.05 ERA, 3 blown, 4 holds, 34:25 K/BB, .198 BAA, 1.22 WHIP.
MR Darrell Jackson (Min) - 7-2 2.61 ERA, 1 save, 1 blown, 6 holds, 54:30 K/BB, .245 BAA, 1.29 WHIP

Wow, Gubicza has been awesome this year. This last draft was really deep in starting pitchers. He is only 22 with 100 potential, so he should only get better although it is hard to see his results improving from this half season.

Knepper's first AS game was back in 1980 when he was pitching for the Giants in the NL. He has been both really good and really bad (17 losses in 1981 and 1982) in his career.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 02:03 PM

And the NL All Stars:

NL Starters (in order of votes):
3B Len Matuszek (Cin) - .300/14/43
RF Leon Durham (StL) - .285/11/49. 3rd AS team, 2nd as starter.
C Gary Carter (Mon) - .258/12/53. 2nd AS start.
LF Tim Wallach (Mon) - .290/13/44
1B Don Mattingly (SF) - .303/12/33. Repeat selection, 1st year starter, has not played a single game at 1B this year.
CF Sixto Lezcano (SF) - .286/15/39
SS Robin Yount (Chi) - .282/8/34 w/12 steals. Repeat starter, 3 time AS. At least has 25 games at the position ...
2B Glenn Hubbard (Atl) - .280/5/33

NL Reserves
RF Jesse Barfield (Chi) - .287/17/61. 2nd AS game.
1B Alvin Davis (LA) - .264/14/42
3B Nick Esasky (Cin) - .276/11/48. Repeat AS selection.
LF Jeffrey Leonard (StL) - .292/9/29 w/17 steals. Repeat AS selection.
CF Dale Murphy (Atl) - .280/7/40 w/33 steals. 2nd AS team.
C Chris Bando (Atl) - .242/11/33

NL Pitchers
Starter Orel Hershiser (Atl) - 10-5 2.52 ERA, 98:24 K/BB, .208 BAA, 0.99 WHIP
Starter Dwight Gooden (StL) - 11-3 2.40 ERA, 2 CG, 146:40 K/BB, .194 BAA, 1.02 WHIP
Closer Ken Howell (StL) - 1-2 3.61 ERA, 27 saves, 3 blown, 37:7 K/BB, .276 BAA, 1.30 WHIP.
Starter Bill Laskey (LA) - 10-2 2.15 ERA, 3 CG, 2 SO, 70:34 K/BB, .215 BAA, 1.05 WHIP.
Starter Fernando Valenzuela (LA) - 9-6 2.17 ERA, 100:31 K/BB, .200 BAA, 0.98 WHIP.
MR Bill Caudill (Chi) - 3-0 0.46 ERA, 3 saves, 8 holds, 33:10 K/BB, .165 BAA, 0.84 WHIP.
MR Jeff Lahti (SD) - 4-1 1.86 ERA, 1 blown, 6 holds, 34;21 K/BB, .208 BAA, 1.10 WHIP.
"MR" Don Robinson (Pit) - 8-5 2.43 ERA, 1 CG, 1 SO, 74:33 K/BB, .218 BAA, 1.10 WHIP.
MR Steve Howe (LA) - 6-2 1.67 ERA, 27 saves, 5 blown, 1 hold, 39:16 K/BB, .234 BAA, 1.22 WHIP. 2nd AS appearance.

I'm sure there is some reason that Durham was voted the starter over Barfield, but I have no idea what it could be.

Horner's streak of 4 straight AS games comes to an end. No player has made the AS game every year since the start of the dynasty.

Caudill has not gotten enough mention in this dynasty. He has been flat amazing this year.

Robinson is clearly not a reliever; all 18 of his appearances this year have been starts. Similarly, Mattingly is not a 1B. I have no idea why stuff is getting slotted this way (see Hall playing despite me rooting him on bench) this year when I have not seen it in previous seasons. But it is annoying.

rjolley · 09-12-2009, 02:08 PM

What happened to Strawberry?

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 03:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rjolley

What happened to Strawberry?

Here are his current numbers - .265/14/40 w/30 steals. He is kind of in the same boat as Barfield in that they are still having real good seasons but not matching 1983.

His Brewers team is winning more right now, but they will have their work cut out for them beating Toronto and Detroit down the stretch.

I would love to trade for him but I do not see any way that I get my hands on him without a 2:1 deal, which I'm pretty sure I've disallowed in the current house rules.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 04:30 PM

The Dodgers come to town and are scheduled to start 34 year old J.R. Richard. He has been stuck in the minors (along with his 14 million salary) all season long until today. Richard makes it 2/3 of an inning before having to leave with an injury and we tee off on the pen in an 8-3 victory. Langston jacked a three run homer to help his own cause. But All Star Bill Laskey does not leave with injury and he beats us 5-2. Alvin Davis hit two homers and drove in all five. Game 3 goes to us 2-1 behind a strong performance by Morgan. His only mistake was allowing Davis to hit a solo shot. But LA earns the split with a strong 8-2 win. Nine of those runs, including seven by LA, came in the 9th inning. Gullickson is growing to hate the bullpen, who have collectively done him zero favors this year.

Viola starts off the San Diego series with a 5-2 win. Orosco gets his 20th save in that game. We bring up Mel Hall and sent Orta down to the minors, hoping that our manager is mature enough to handle our recommended platoon. Hall does not bring good vibes, as the offense is shut down in a 7-0 loss. The immortal Juan Eichelberger held us to three hits. Hall homers the following day in a 10-1 win to wrap up the series.

The homestand continues against the Giants. We get a good 5-4 win (any one run win is good at this point), overcoming an early 3-0 hole. A Yount homer in the 7th was the gamewinner. Another one run win (7-6) the next day, as Barfield puts one over the fence for the first time since the break. Hall also had a three run homer in the win. The offense remembers that Viola is on the mound and, not surprisingly, only score one run in a 3-1 loss. We take 3 of 4 from the series when Hall and Barfield again homer in a 9-5 finale.

Boston's Chili Davis has a 15 game hitting streak. He is having a really good year: .328/15/52 w/14 steals.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 05:29 PM

Off to Philadelphia to see if we can improve on our dismal showing last time. Witt gets us off to a fine start, pitching us to a 5-0 win. Hall had a homer and 2 RBIs. He has hits in all six games since being called up and has homered in four of those games. We add a 6-5 win the next evening, with the game running 11 innings. Oberkfell had four RBIs in the win and we scored two each in the 8th and 9th to force the extra innings. The Phillies are dying for a closer. Gullickson wins his 10th, pushing us to a 57-43 mark after 100 games.

PSPN shows a graphic of the home run leaders.
29 Tom Brunansky (Sea)
26 Ken Phelps (KC)
21 Darryl Strawberry (Mil)
21 Dwayne Murphy (Oak)
20 Ron Kittle (KC)

Barfield and Alvin Davis are tied for the NL lead with 19.

Former Cub Von Hayes is hitting .246/10/48 for the Yankees this year. He recently had a four hit game against the Rangers.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 05:39 PM

The road trip continues in New York, where the Mets have falled 5.5 games back. We extend our winning streak to five games with a 10-3 victory. Viola is stunned by the offensive outburst, as he normally does not get that many runs in a month. Boggs, Smalley, and Wynegar each had three hits. Smalley is now up to .278 on the year. Win #6 follows, a 3-1 decision that moves Caudill to 5-0 on the year. Gaetti had a two run single in the 9th, when we scored all of our runs. We split a double header on the 29th, losing the nightcap (in 11 innings) to break our winning streak at 7.

With August upon us, it is time to look again at the division races.

AL East - The Tigers have taken control, running their record to twenty above .500. Milwaukee is hanging with them, just two back, but the Blue Jays are now 5.5 off the pace.

AL West - The White Sox have reeled off eight straight wins and now lead the division by two games with a 61-43 mark. KC, who has lost three in a row, is two games back. Oakland has stayed in contention with their own five game winning streak but remain five back.

NL East - The Expos have won six in a row to stay right with us. At 60-44, we enjoy a two game lead. St. Louis and New York are fading fast, sitting 7 and 7.5 games back, respectively.

NL West - The Dodgers 60-46 mark is 2.5 better than San Diego, although the Padres are the hottest team in the division. Cincinnati is four back and the Reds 4.5.

hoopsguy · 09-12-2009, 05:58 PM

More notes from our division: the Pirates have lost 10 straight and the Phillies 6 straight. Philadelphia is now 20 games back, which was familiar territory for them last season.

The Phillies are not pleased by my mocking and come into Wrigley to give us a one run loss, 6-5. In TWENTY innings. Pena's arm basically fell off at the end, as he finally surrendered a run after 5.1 innings. It was 2-2 after 9 and Philly scored two in the top of the 10th. We answered with two in the bottom of the inning but wasted a great chance to win the game with 1st and 3rd, no outs and the manager left Boyd in to hit. He drove in the run with a groundout, but the next two batters made outs. The Phillies scored one in the top of the 15th and we answered but could not win it because Oberkfell got thrown out at home. God awful loss, and Montreal makes up a game to cut the lead to one.

Viola wins his tenth in a 3-1 win the next afternoon. Brutal quick turnaround, but afternoon games is how we roll at Wrigley. We pick up the final game of the series with a 6-5 win. Orosco blows the save but gets the win in the bottom of the 9th on a Carter hit.

This sets up a big series between us and the Expos. The division lead is two. Both teams have been getting good efforts over the last month. I'm sure that the Expos feel that they need to win this year after really not having a shot last year with the second best record in the NL. We win a really tough 2-1 game to start the series, with Witt getting the decision over Sanderson. Barfield knocked in both runs with a homer. Same type of game the following day, and again we win a one run game. 1-0 this time in 13 innings. Carter again had the game winning RBI. But we can't put them behind the eight ball because Gullickson pitched a clunker against his old team, disappointing the Bleacher Bums in a 9-1 loss. Parrish and Valentine homered for the Expos. We bomb them in the fourth game of the series, 10-4, to send them home trailing by four games. Burroughs was 4-4 with a homer.

hoopsguy · 09-13-2009, 09:12 AM

The Mets come visiting down 10 games and basically need to win the series to even bother thinking about 1984 the rest of the way. But they do not get off to a good start, losing 11-1 in the opener. Langston hit his 2nd homer of the year in this one and Boggs went 5-5 with a homer and 4 RBIs. Wade is hitting .326 now and it feels like just a matter of time before he wins a batting title. Langston went the distance in this one, giving up just three hits and three walks. He is among the league leaders in walks; hopefully he can improve on this in future seasons.

We have more of the same for the Mets the next day, pounding them 10-1. Barfield hits his 21st homer on the season and adds three RBIs. The Mets salvage some pride with a 9-2 win to end our homestand.

Going back to the topic of batting titles, it looks like the Rangers' Tony Gwynn is going to put up numbers that have not been seen in our league. He is hitting .348 right now. Over the last two weeks he has also hit four homers, which is particularly noteworthy since he only has five on the year. Despite the Rangers having Gwynn, Ripken, and Molitor they still stink. Their record on the year is 48-63.

Witt has climbed into the top 10 in WHIP, checking in at #7 with a 1.09. The last two years he finished with 1.27 and 1.28, so this would be quite an improvement for him if he can sustain it. He has won his last five outings, going 7+ innings in each and never allowing more than one run. This has brought his ERA down from 3.58 to 2.83, a huge move in the second half of a year.

Darrell Porter of Kansas City is battling a wrist injury and will miss three weeks. There have been a lot of catcher injuries this year. I noticed this earlier when I was looking for someone to replace Scioscia. Thank goodness for Wynegar; the difference between him and Slaught is night and day.

Our next series is @ Montreal, and they will be without starter Charlie Lea. He has a shoulder injury and won't be back until mid-September.

hoopsguy · 09-13-2009, 09:46 AM

Montreal remains four games back in the standings and hosts us for four games. Obviously this has potential to be a very big series, even if it is only early August. Our strong pitching continues in the opener as we post a 5-2 victory. Gullickson went 8 to pick up his 11th win on the year. We caught a break getting the back end of their rotation to start this series. David Palmer is their 5th starter and Candiotti is substituting for the injured Lea. But Candiotti does his job, beating us 5-2 in the second game to set up their studs for the final two games. We had 12 hits in this one but just did not get clutch hits. Gary Carter had two RBIs for Montreal, bringing his total to 70 on the year. I'm guessing he wins another Silver Slugger.

We win the third game 3-2 with Langston getting the decision over Craig McMurtry. Barfield hit the tie-breaking homer in the top of the 6th and our bullpen gave us three scoreless innings to take home the win. Montreal sends Sanderson to the mound to take on Witt in the finale and the Expos end up with a 3-1 win to split the series. This one went 11 innings and ended when Brian Dayett hit a walkoff two run homer. Darn, missed an opportunity in that one to put them in a serious hole. But with only four hits over 11 innings we got what we deserved.

Next stop, Houston. The Astros have seen their season go to the dogs, as their record has fallen to 51-68. We win the opener 7-3, with Barfield going deep in the Astrodome. Morgan got the win in this one, going all 9 innings but this was not a virtuoso performance. His ERA went down, but still sits at 4.56 and a 9-9 record is certainly not just a by-product of some poor run support. If we open up a lead this month I'm hoping to audition Romanick for the 5th starter job next month.

Gullickson shuts down the Astros for 8 innings before yielding to Orosco for his 30th save. 3-0 final. I notice that Tom Herr is in the Houston lineup. Apparently he was traded from the Cardinals for Joe Sambito at the trade deadline. I wish PSPN published all the trades in their headlines, as this was substantially bigger than the ones that were listed. This makes me wonder what other stuff goes on at the deadline that I miss because I don't check the transactions page but instead rely on the PSPN newsfeed.

We finish off Houston with a 5-4 victory made more interesting by our closer in the 9th. It is nice to see our team actually sweep a series, especially on the road. The win moves us 5.5 in front of Montreal.

Division updates:
AL East: Detroit is 70-51 and up 3.5 on Toronto. The Brewers are going to have to pick it up if they want to play postseason baseball; they are 5 back.

AL West: Kansas City has won four in a row, upping their record to 70-50, to take a one game lead on the White Sox. Oakland is struggling to stay relevant (winning 4 in a row) at 7 games out.

NL East: Our 72-49 record is now the best in baseball. Montreal is 5.5 back and the Cards have sunk to 9 out. I think you can stick a fork in St. Louis.

NL West: Good three team race, with San Diego (go figure) up one on LA thanks to their 69-53 record. The third team, Atlanta, is three games back. The Reds have sunk to 61-61 and are 8 back. They have underachieved this year, in my opinion. They desperately need another bat in that lineup.

hoopsguy · 09-13-2009, 10:25 AM

Time to take another look at contracts and see how I want to juggle the money. Right now we have $7,563,141 left that we can use to extend contracts.

1. Yount. He is still looking for an 8 figure contract. I'm saving my exemption for Barfield, with the assumption I'm going to need it on him next year. I do a quick check on Barfield now to verify that and he is willing to give me one year at 7.6 million. Just out of reach for what we could do, so it might as well be 25 million. Anyway, even if I could I don't think I would use the exemption on Yount. His performance this year has not approached last season. .273/11/45 w/16 steals is pretty good for a middle infielder but honestly it is not that much better than Smalley despite the slow start (.269/6/31 w/0 steals). Certainly not exemption-better.

2. Hall has had a really poor year at exactly the wrong time. His numbers are .222/8/34 w/22 steals over about 300 at-bats. His contract demands are down about 10% from earlier, as he is now looking for something in the 5.5 million range, depending on the length of the deal. Obviously that would severely hinder me from working with other players. I'm fine with that if I view him as a long-term piece.

3. Vande Berg is still looking for his 1.5 million, up from 677K. And he deserves it. He has not been as wildly dominant this year as he was in the past (or as Caudill has been this year) but he is 26 and is a pretty good pitcher with lots of room for development. I'm fine having him around for the next several seasons. We offer him 4 more years at $1,520,651 and he accepts. That puts us $6,042,490 left to spend.

4. Templeton is a pretty finished product at 28 years of age. He is a .250 hitter who plays pretty good defense at SS/3B and can spell someone almost anywhere else on the field. He has enough speed to get you 20 steals if he is playing every day. At best, his OBP is going to be in the .340 range, which is not good enough for the top of the order. This is not a guy I want batting lead off. And he wants about 3 million a year. I've got Samuel in the pipeline who offers better speed and potential to be more than Gary is at this point in his career. And I'm hoping that Smalley and Gaetti prove to be better starting options. So it is good-bye to Gary Templeton, my whipping for for 1981-1982 before I found a role for him that was suitable (bench player).

5. Kurt Kepshire, our 5th round pick from last year, looks like a guy that I might want to keep around for awhile. I don't see him as a front-of-the-rotation starter, but there is an outside chance he could grow into that. We've seen guys like Martinez and Black leave over the last year and Lamp will be going after this year so it makes some sense to invest in guys like this just to keep my options open. He wants a pretty good jump (290K to 1.1 million) but I'll give it to him if there are not much better options available for guys with 2 years on their deals. Of course, this would mean that Hall is gone ...

6. Lamp. I just wrote him off in the last paragraph. I regret not trying to trade him at the deadline this year, as he has more or less rotted in our minors in 1984. Not very good treatment for a guy who was 27-24 with a 2.96 ERA for us, had a pair of All Star appearances, and was a rock in the pen for all of 1982.

7. Jay Pettibone has never made it above AA. His 55 potential is not going to entice me to keep a 27 year old with minimal skills. Even if he is dirt cheap to extend (175K), I've got other guys in the minors who more or less fit the same profile.

8. "Oil Can" Boyd - I forgot that I did not trade him away earlier. He has been the last man in my major league bullpen and has had a terrible season. Still, he has morphed into a guy that belongs on a big league roster. My problem is that he wants 2 million a year and is he 1 million a year better than Kepshire? It is close. I'm going to have to look at the guys who are two years out and base the decision on that. I want one of those two back, no doubt in my mind.

9. Morgan - he is two years out, but is willing to extend for around 2.6 million. He is better than Boyd now with more potential. So Boyd is off my list, and it is now a Morgan vs Kepshire decision. I'll reward performance (Morgan) over potential if the dollars are there. Lets keep looking ...

10. Caudill - he is already making 3 million and will take an extension for 3.8 million. Hmm, do I want to do it now and eat up this years budget? I'm guessing his demands do not go up a ton between now and next season.

11. Wynegar - he is willing to go three years at 932K, which I'm all over. The lack of a backup catcher almost certainly cost us a few games earlier this year. Locking it up at this price is fine by me. It is locked at 932,217, leaving us with $5,110,273.

Good-bye, Mel Hall. Other players to be determined a little later in the season.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 09:56 AM

Time to get this going again. We head to Cincinnati to play the Reds, our foe in the NLCS last season. I do not expect them to repeat; their .500 record is not going to get the job done in a tougher NL West.

Charlie Liebrandt has not been the same pitcher he was last year, but try telling that to our hitters after they were on the wrong end of a 3-0 shutout. Boggs had two hits, bringing his average up to .327. He is also leading the majors in hits with 159. We do not respond the following day either, falling 1-0. Come on, guys! Back to back shutouts is embarrassing. Soto over Witt in the pitchers duel. And we make it three straight shutouts, losing 1-0 on the following day. What a train wreck of a series. The last one went 10 innings and we only had two hits. Caudill took his first loss on the year.

Montreal failed to capitalize, as they also lost three straight games in San Diego.

So it is back to Wrigley, where we have a pre-game meeting before taking on the Astros. The message is to relax at the plate; the Astros suck (51-74) so they represent a nice slump-buster for us. Sort of, as we win but the final of 2-1 does not suggest a hitting resurgence. Smalley hit his 7th homer of the year. We also get word that Mike Scioscia is ready to come off the 60 day DL. Good news, as Wynegar has been struggling as of late. We send Samuel back down to AAA Iowa. The team celebrate's Scioscia's return with a 9-2 pounding of Houston, led by two Barfield homers. We win the finale 5-4, thanks to another Barfield bomb. 26 on the year now. Scioscia knocked in the game winner in the 11th with a triple.

Montreal is now 7.5 back and I'm just about prepared to call "game" on their season.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 10:15 AM

A pretty good (69-58) Braves team comes to town to play us. We've struggled with these guys earlier in the year; time to see if we've raised our game. A 10-1 win featuring two more Barfield homers seems like a good sign. That was Witt's 8th straight quality start; in fact, he has not allowed more than one run in any of them. We eke out an 8-7 win in 10 the following day, rallying back from a 7-3 deficit. And we make it six in a row with a 6-4 win. Carter cranked his 16th homer on the year and Smalley had a pair of hits to bring his average up to .282.

The Reds are the next team to visit and I'm hoping that our guys are fired up to see them. Cincinnati has kept on rolling since steamrolling us in their park, as they are now 7 games over .500. In the opener they fire their 4th straight shutout against us, 3-0. Liebrandt was even better this time than last time we saw him, holding us to two hits over 8 innings. I demand we score a run in our next game!!!

The players respond to the challenge, posting a 7-5 win that features a pair of Barfield homers. That gives him 30 on the year and 100 RBIs. Take that, Mario Soto! We get a split in the two game series and finish our homestand 7-1.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 10:37 AM

Off to the "Launching Pad" in Atlanta, and we live up to the spirit of the ballpark in a 10-5 opening win. Hall gets his 10th homer on the year and Boggs goes 4-6 with two RBIs. He is in a dogfight with Rickey Henderson and Harold Baines for the major lead lead in hits, although he has a comfortable lead in the NL. Atlanta finally breaks through for a win against us, downing us 4-2 to end the month of August. Gullickson dominates them the next evening, leading us to a 2-0 win over Orel Hershiser. But we end up with a split after losing 3-2 in the finale. It should be no surprise to learn that Viola did not get much run support.

I move up a few players from the minors as part of the September call-ups and decide that now is a good time to get a look at what Romanick can do in a starting role. Morgan is 9-10 with a 4.60 ERA and is the obvious choice to move to a bullpen role.

On to Philadelphia, where the Phillies are hoping to avoid a 100 loss season (52-84). We push them in that direction with a 1-0 win in the opener. Langston was terrific, allowing just one hit over six innings (he did walk 3). We pick up another 1-0 win the next night, and while I'm happy to get the wins I think we should hit just a bit better than this against their lousy collection of starters. We do just that in Romanick's first start, surging to a 12-4 win. Gary Templeton, of all people, put two balls over the wall. He must be showcasing himself for next year's team. Ditto Mel Hall, who was 3-6 with a pair of RBIs and his 29th steal.

So we head to Montreal for one game. Given that we are twelve in front of the Expos there is not much drama to be found here. That does not stop Scott Sanderson from just dominating our hitters in a 6-0 ballgame. His complete game brings his mark to 14-6 with a 2.23 ERA in his effort to defend his Cy Young award.

On to New York, where the Mets are running out the string on another uninspiring season. We smash them 11-3 in the first game, with Barfield hitting his 32nd on the year. Viola fainted in the sixth, realizing how many runs the team had scored for him. The offense gave Langston two, which is one more than he needed in a 2-0 win. Smalley knocked in both runs. Orosco walked the bases full in the 9th before closing out his mess for his 38th save. We polish off the Mets 9-2 in the last game of the series. We have really had our way with the weak sisters of the NL over the past two months. Witt went the distance to earn his 15th win, tied for team high with Gullickson.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 10:44 AM

Steve Sax of the Angels is up to a 20 game hitting streak ... very close to the best in league history. That seems kind of odd, given that he is only hitting .255 this year. That is one point above his career average.

George Brett is done for the year with a fibula injury. Ugh - what a tough blow for KC, who is in the middle of a dogfight in their divisional race. More on that in a moment ...

So there are two teams that are 30 games over .500. The Cubs are one of them, thanks to a torrid two month stretch. The AL standard bearer, at 87-56, is the Detroit Tigers. They have an identical record to the Cubs and sit 7.5 in front of Toronto. Better luck next year, Toronto and Milwaukee. The Tigers just are not going to be caught this year.

In the AL West the White Sox have won 6 straight while the Royals have lost five straight since Brett went on the DL to more or less end that division race. The Sox are now up 7.5 games and seem like a lock to make their first playoff appearance. At 84-58, their magic number is 13.

The NL West is down to a two team race. The Dodgers, at 84-60, have built a two game cushion on the San Diego Padres. The Braves have lost five straight to fall out of contention.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 11:03 AM

We return home to face Philadelphia. Romanick does not have a particularly good outing in a 6-3 loss. We follow that up with a 3-2 loss where Roger Clemens picks up his 10th win on the year. And the Phillies finish the sweep at Wrigley the next day with a 4-2 triumph. Puke.

Montreal is now within 11 games and hoping to keep their ultra-faint hope alive by extending our home losing streak. That does not happen, as we pick up a 4-1 win to start the series and push the magic number to 4. Templeton homered and knocked in three. I also see a new face in the lineup for Montreal ... Kent Hrbek?!?!? It turns out that he was traded near the deadline for Andre Dawson. Somehow this was not reported by PSPN? Man, that feature has got to be tightened up!

Another scheduling oddity, as that Montreal series was also only one game. New York comes to town next and Witt shuts them out 8-0. The five hit shutout keeps his faint NL Cy Young hopes alive. Maybe another 2-3 starts like that would be enough ... his ERA is now down to 2.47. Romanick matches Witt's effort the following day, throwing a two hit shutout. Yount homered for the second straight day. Gullickson finishes off the sweep with a 3-1 win. That win clinches the division title with two weeks to play.

Sax ran his hit streak all the way up to 23 games, one better than the old mark held by Andre Thornton of the Royals. All hail Steve Sax!

Strawberry is now leading the majors in slugging percentage. His numbers are up to .288/37/90 with 45 steals. I'm guessing that will be enough to get him his second MVP in a row, with Ripken probably being the leading challenger with his .322/20/101 line. But no steals = likely Strawberry vote.

Oberkfell and Templeton are listed among the hot hitters in the league. So is Tom Brunansky of Seattle who now has 45 homers and 108 RBIs. Monster season. Kittle has 42/102; guess all the power hitters are in the AL right now.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 11:37 AM

The Pirates have tanked again; at 67-83 they have locked in another losing season. They come to Wrigley next and fall 1-0 in the opener. Viola earns a well-deserved win, his 15th on the year. Langston wins his 16th of the year in a 4-1 decision over Blyleven. Save #42 for Orosco. The Pirates starting pitching is pretty decent, but they need help everywhere else. We get the sweep upon completing a 3-2 win. Hall hit a three run homer in the bottom of the 8th to drive in all the runs.

Off to St. Louis, where we get another 3-2 win. For the second day in a row the winner is reliever Bob James. He pitched a pair of scoreless innings to lower his ERA to 1.73. He has been stellar this season; I can't imagine a better 1-2 punch than him and Caudill. Gullickson wins #17 the next day in a 7-3 triumph. The Cardinal's starter, Bill Krueger, fell to 5-20 on the year. Man, you just cannot have a guy like that in the rotation all year. I don't think he has all that much of a future (is 26, still has some potential) so why keep rolling him out there? He was 3-3 on June 2nd, so obviously he has been terrible the last 3.5 months. We lose the final game of the series 8-6 despite homers by Barfield, Carter (20th), and Boggs. Tim Hulett hit a pair for the Deadbirds.

The Pirates again are on our schedule, this time at their place. Langston again stares down Blyleven. Actually, our hitters just roughed him up in an 11-3 win. Two more homers for Barfield, who is up to 36. Carter and Boggs also homered again ... same three guys with homers in back-to-back games. Barfield is up to 118 RBIs. His numbers are down from last year but they are still spectacular. Witt gets his 17th win in a 10-0 shutout. He has locked up the playoff opener in my eyes. Barfield homers for the third straight day and adds 4 RBIs. We just get silly in the finale, dropping a 21-5 can of whoop-ass on Pittsburgh. Here are a couple of lines from the game.
- Hall 4-6, 3 runs, 1 HR, 6 RBIs from leadoff spot.
- Boggs 6-7, 3 runs, 4 RBIs
- Barfield 4-5, 3 runs, 1 HR, 4 RBIs (4th straight game with homer)

Smalley only got one hit; every other starter had at least two hits in this laugher. For some reason our manager left Romanick in to throw 147 pitches in this one before pulling him with two outs in the 9th. Moron. I hate our manager a lot.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 11:52 AM

Back home for the final three games of the season against St. Louis. All the division races are done at this point, with LA finalizing the AL West. The Padres fell apart in the last two weeks, going 1-9 over their last ten and falling to third. The Reds won six in a row but it was too little, too late.

We beat St. Louis 1-0 in the opener to pick up our 100th win. It took 11 innings as Gullickson and Vukovich were both on their games. Boggs had three hits and scored the winning run. He is hitting .338 and has 215 hits on the year. The shutout streak continues the next day with a 2-0 win. Another very good start for Viola, who is battling with Gullickson and Langston for the 2-4 spots in the playoff rotation. Langston makes his case with a 6-0, two hit shutout to end the year. It looks like the Cardinals did not bother to give much effort on this trip. Either that or our pitchers are just that locked in.

Gullickson 17-7 3.05 ERA, 136:54 K/BB, .224 BAA, 1.08 WHIP. 13 straight quality starts. Playoff lion in 1982, struggled in World Series in 1983.

Viola 16-14 3.08 ERA, 140:64 K/BB, .247 BAA, 1.24 WHIP. Looking at game logs he does not match up with Gullickson in terms of consistency, floats a garbage start out there every 5th start or so. Three of last six starts were not quality starts. Great in playoffs in 1982, had two very poor starts in 1983.

Langston 18-6 2.51 ERA, 159:102 K/BB, .213 BAA, 1.24 WHIP. 14 straight quality starts. No postseason record since he is a rookie. The walks drive me nuts, but he is so tough on hitters. Clear #3 ahead of Viola.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 12:50 PM

Regular season roster recap:

RF Jesse Barfield - nice encore after last season, finished at .284/38/126. Near lock for my "exemption" player when it comes time to resign him next year.

1B Wade Boggs - .341/6/78, had 219 hits. OBP of .410 is out of this world as well. I've been impressed with his RBI totals since coming into the league, finishing between 70-80 each year despite never having more than 10 homers. I'm ecstatic about having him signed through 1988.

SP Oil Can Boyd - did not get many opportunities (15) in our pen, but was not great when he appeared, as denoted by his 6.00 ERA. Good K/BB ratio (20:6). Still need to decide if he will be back next season.

RF/CF Jeff Burroughs - .247/6/35 in 251 at bats. Beat out Orta for roster spot on this team, may have opportunity to start next year with Hall departing. Not a long-term roster piece.

LF Joe Carter - .279/22/92 w/22 steals. did a nice job of filling shoes of Jim Rice this year. Still needs a lot of work on his batting eye (39), hope that the 24 year old has enough potential left to realize to shore up this weakness and become a star.

MR Bill Caudill - 6-1 1.11 ERA, 3 saves, 0 blown, 13 holds, 74:24 K/BB, .168 BAA, 0.89 WHIP. Best reliever in baseball this year? I definitely want to resign him next year after this performance.

3B Gary Gaetti - .221/3/14 in only 68 at-bats. Lost season for "The Rat", will almost certainly be starting for us next year. Still has a ton of potential (90) at age 26.

SP Bill Gullickson - 17-7 3.05 ERA. Closed out year with authority, remains one of top starters in the league every season. Hard to believe he is only 25.

CF/RF Mel Hall - .248/13/62 w/31 steals in 416 at-bats. Had a huge last month of the season to get his numbers here. Coulda/woulda/shoulda been a long-term Cub, but early season struggles plus house rules put him on outside looking in. He has been very good in playoffs last two years; hopefully he has one more run left in him this October.

MR Bob James - 7-2 1.68 ERA, 1 save, 2 blown, 7 holds, 67:22 K/BB, .229 BAA, 1.20 WHIP. Spot contributor his first two years in Chicago, he finally took on a major role this year and ran with it.

SP Mark Langston - 18-6 2.51 ERA. Terrific rookie season, if he can address his control issues he has a chance to win a Cy Young award or two. Which would be really impressive given all the quality young arms in the NL right now ...

SP Mike Morgan - 9-10 4.55 ERA, 110:61 K/BB, .278 BAA, 1.48 WHIP. A far cry from his 20-3 season last year. Honestly, there is zero excuse for having a losing record as a starting pitcher for this team. He has worked his way out of our starting rotation. He is still a quality starter but if he remains with the Cubs his role is almost certainly in the pen for the next couple of seasons.

2B Ken Oberkfell - A very steady .274/3/45 w/17 steals in 471 at-bats. I would love to have a prototypical leadoff hitter but can live with him in this role.

CL Jesse Orosco - 2-0 2.05 ERA, 44 saves, 5 blown, 40:22 K/BB, .225 BAA, 1.30 WHIP. Not quite as dominant as closer as he was a set-up man, but our bullpen was better as a whole this year. Better than Smith was in the role last year. He should have plenty of chances to add to his save totals over next three years.

MR Alejandro Pena - 3-3 3.06 ERA, 1 save, 3 holds, 28:7 K/BB, .246 BAA, 1.18 WHIP. Only 23 appearances this year after slow start to year left him behind other relievers. May be maxed out from potential standpoint at 25, no longer an uber-prospect. Just a solid reliever.

2B Wilile Randolph - .251/2/26 in 303 at-bats. Plain and simple, I trust Oberkfell more. Randolph will likely be trade bait with a medium (2.5 million) contract expiring next year as long as Samuel matures in the off-season.

SP Ron Romanick - 7-10 3.31 ERA, 1 save, 4 holds, 49:33 K/BB, .254 BAA, 1.32 WHIP. Began year as our long reliever but kept losing games. Moved to back of bullpen, where he performed well enough to get a shot as a starter in September. I expect a better K/BB ratio from him going forward. Probably #5 starter for us next year.

C Mike Scioscia - .261/2/29 in 226 at-bats. Major injury issues this season, but we were a much, much better team with him in the lineup than we were without him. Locked up through 1988.

SS Roy Smalley - .273/8/46 in 417 at-bats. His early struggles mirrored those of the team, but he was very good in second half of the year. We are hoping to see a little better power numbers from him over next three seasons. However, that might not be realistic given his advancing age (32).

SS Gary Templeton - .285/6/28 w/10 steals in 263 at bats. This was the guy I thought I was signing a couple of seasons ago. I hope we can find a guy next year to give us this kind of bench production.

MR Ed Vande Berg - 0-2 3.34 ERA, 2 holds, 21:19 K/BB, .235 BAA, 1.43 WHIP. Like Pena, struggled early in year and lost ground to other relievers. Need him to have better location, that K/BB ratio has to be better. Signed long term, so we are clearly rooting for him to succeed.

SP Frank Viola - 16-14 3.08 ERA. We still think he has a super-high ceiling (88 potential) that has not been reached. Jokes about his lack of run support cover up for the fact that he was prone to a clunker start about once a month. Still, I do not expect him to ever lose 14 games again.

SP Mike Witt - 17-4 2.29 ERA. Stats are comparable to his rookie year when he won the Cy Young. He is going to cost a mint to resign after 1986. I'm pretty sure I'll use an exemption that season for a pitcher, but not sure it will be him.

C Butch Wynegar - .223/3/42. Better than Slaught, but really did not give us much at the plate over last month he was in lineup. Still, represents a decent backup catcher option in event that Scioscia has continued injury issues.

SS Robin Yount - .264/15/60 w/18 steals. Numbers were way down compared with 1983, but outside of diminished speed were consistent with earlier in his career. We'll miss him, but I do not think that this is a future HOF player.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 01:41 PM

We resign Kepshire and Boyd, leaving Morgan and Caudill for next season.

Starting - 5,110,273
Kepshire - 4 years/1,079,332 = 4,030,941
Boyd - 4 years/2,207,681 = 1,823,260

We're done for the year, as there are not any other players on the roster that I'm willing to commit money to that will take less than that.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 02:03 PM

Playoffs:
NLCS: Chicago Cubs (102-60) @ Los Angeles Dodgers (96-66)
ALCS: Detroit Tigers (101-61) @ Chicago White Sox (95-67)

The city of Chicago is buzzing with two of their teams in the playoffs. That has not happened since the 1908 World Series showdown between these teams.

The Cubs are looking for a third straight title. The last team to complete that feat was the 1972-1974 Oakland A's.

Detroit had a terrific rebound season after missing the postseason a year ago. They ran away from the pack in a strong AL East. The same could be said for Los Angeles, who distanced themselves from the best AL West we have seen over the past five seasons.

Game #1:
ALCS: The Tigers give the ball to Dave Rozema instead of post-season legend Jack Morris. While this may seem controversial, Rozema did post 17 wins and a league-high five shutouts. Also, Morris did have a pair of losses in his last two starts in the 1982 post-season after rattling of six straight wins before that time. Rozema did not disappoint, throwing nine scoreless innings. However, that was matched by White Sox starter Richard Dotson. The game ended in the bottom of the 10th when Harold Baines recorded an RBI double, his third hit of the game. 1-0 final, and the Sox defend their home field advantage in the opener.

NLCS: Cub-killer Bill Laskey takes the bump for the Dodgers, going the hero of last year's World Series, Mike Witt. There are no easy matchups for either side in this contest; starting pitching is extremely deep and talented across the board. But you would not know it on this day, as the score was 6-4 Dodgers after two innings. They went on to win 10-5, with Nick Esasky hitting a pair of homers and driving in five runs. The Cubs also had three errors in the field in a game that they would love to forget. All of the runs were charged to the starters. I may live to regret moving Gullickson out of the starting spot.

Game #2:
ALCS: The Jack Morris vs Britt Burns matchup would have been what I expected for the opener. This game is probably bigger for the Tigers since their #3/#4 starters are not as good as what the White Sox will roll out. Even with homefield advantage, I think the Tigers are cooked if they lose this one. That does not happen, however. 1B Franklin Stubbs hits a homer and collects four RBIs. The Tigers break open a close game with six runs in the top of the 8th to coast to a 10-3 win.

NLCS: It is Gullickson vs Bob Welch, a power pitcher that we have had more success against than the rest of the league. I would put this in almost the same "must win" category as I did the Tigers, because the Dodgers pitching is good enough that it would be extremely hard to sweep three straight against them, even in Wrigley Field. We score a pair of runs in the 2nd against Welch, thanks to RBI singles from Scioscia and Smalley and Gullickson makes that stand up. 2-0 final, with Gullickson only allowing one hit in six innings. James worked in and out of trouble in both the 7th and 8th innings, as did Orosco in the 9th. The net result is a 1-1 series heading back to Chicago.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 02:50 PM

Game #3:
ALCS: The White Sox sent Charles Hudson to the mound in search of a 2-1 series edge. All he did to follow up his 18 win rookie season is put up 19 more wins and help guide the franchise to their first postseason. Meanwhile, Detroit starter Dan Petry earned 15 million dollars for his nine wins. Well, he gave a return on that investment on this afternoon. After surrendering a leadoff single to Baines he proceeded to record 24 straight outs. Petry gave way to closer Keith Atherton to start the 9th and there were no surprises. 3-0 win for the Tigers, thanks to the great effort by Petry and two more RBIs for Stubbs.

NLCS: Time for a trial by fire for rookie Mark Langston. He draws crafty veteran Fernando Valenzuela in the first contest at Wrigley. I would feel a heck of a lot better about this game if we could put up a couple of early runs. That is exactly what we get in the bottom of the second, when four straight two out hits, followed by a bases loaded walk to Yount, provide us with a 3-0 lead. But Langston was putting multiple men on base every innings. Hits, walks, errors - you name it, the Dodgers were doing it to get on. And they finally converted in the 5th when Pedro Guerrero hit a two run homer. The damage continued in the 6th, when they loaded the bases with no outs. Langston walked Julio Franco to tie the game. I was stunned that the manager did not pull him after this, seeing as how he had thrown 100 pitches and was not fooling anyone. But Alvin Davis flied out to left and Joe Carter (not a particularly strong fielder) threw out Houston Jimenez at home plate to stop the bleeding.

Cut to the top of the 8th, with Bill Caudill in for Langston. After a two-out walk to Davis, Caudill served up a gopher ball to Esasky. Ugh, 5-3 Dodgers, as they had come all the way back to take the lead. The Dodgers brought in former Cub J.R. Richard to relieve Valenzuela and it did not work out well for them. Carter singled, Boggs walked, and Jeff Burroughs knocked one over the wall in left! 6-5 Cubs! In the bottom of the 9th the Dodgers inexplicably left pitcher Joe Beckwith in to bat for himself with men on 1st and 2nd and two outs. He grounded out to end the game. A huge win for the Cubs; one more to advance to our third straight World Series.

Game #4:
ALCS - The White Sox season hinges on 7-18 Steve Trout. This is the 5th straight year of double-digit losses for Trout, but in each of those other years he had won 11+ games as well. His 4.05 ERA does not suggest an 18 game loser, but it is still about 1 1/2 runs higher than that of former 20-game winner Dan Schatzeder. The Tigers desperately want to close it out today, knowing what Dotson did against them in the opener and realizing that Morris will not be available.

The White Sox strike first, bringing home the opening run on a Sid Bream double in the 2nd inning. It turns into a big inning when the Sox keep stringing together hits, including a single by SS Tony Fernandez, a star in his second year up at the major league level (.314/6/71 w/18 steals). By the end of the inning the Sox are up 4-0. The score was 6-2 in the bottom of the 7th when Al Cowens flew out to the warning track with two men on. That was the last meaningful Tigers threat. So we are heading to a winner-take-all 5th game in the AL.

NLCS - If we get "good Viola" that should be enough to beat the veteran Dodgers starter Jerry Reuss. But if it is "every 5th start suckwad" Viola then it probably does not matter what our hitters do. Sometimes a game breaks down that easily. We got the former, with Viola only surrendering two hits over seven innings. The problem was that the offense could not bring home runners against Reuss. In the bottom of the 9th Boggs led off with a triple against Beckwith and came home on a double by Oberkfell. Game, set, match and the Cubs are heading to the 1984 World Series.

Game #5:
ALCS - would we have a rematch of the 1982 series or the 1908 series? Cub fans were not sure what to root for ... beating the White Sox would be very special, but it would be agony to actually lose to that team with the three-peat on the line. Overall, less risk/reward with the Tigers.

Bottom of 2nd - The Tigers put together three straight one-out hits, culminating in an RBI single for Reid Nichols. Two more come in on a two out triple by long-time Tiger Tom Brookens.

Top of 3rd - Sid Bream puts the Sox on the board with a short homer to right.

Top of 6th - Sox CF George Wright doubles to left, bringing home Pat Sheridan to cut the margin to 3-2. The Tigers fans are getting antsy ...

Bottom of 7th - Trammell homers to right, giving the Tigers pen a huge insurance run. One more run comes in when CF Wright drops the third out, allowing Brookens to score. 5-2 lead + Tigers bullpen = money. Right?

Top of 9th - Atherton is in to close this one out. The man was an All-Star and had 57 saves on the year. Getting three outs before giving up three runs should be a walk in the park, right?
Leadoff double by Jim Morrison
Single by Tony Fernandez
Single by Carlton Fisk, 5-3 with men on 1st and 2nd, no outs
Bream fly out to shallow left. 1 out.
Single by Todd Cruz, 5-4, men on 1st and 2nd, one out

Up comes Harold Baines, one of the most dangerous hitters in the American League over the last five years. But he pops out to first on the first pitch. The last hope for the Sox is Sheridan. He lifts a lazy fly ball to left, which is gloved by Steve Kemp, and this series is over. Detroit heads to their fourth World Series in five years.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 03:12 PM

World Series:
Game #1 - Rozema (1-1, 1.56 ERA) vs Witt (0-1, 19.29 ERA). Guess which starter has had the better post-season? We are just hoping that Witt can find the form he had the last 2-3 months of the season for this game.

Bottom of 2nd - Hall walks, steals 2nd and 3rd, then comes home on a single by Roy Smalley. Scioscia gets on by an error, charged to Brookens, but we can't convert any more runs. 1-0 Cubs.

Top of 4th - Kemp leads off with a single and scores on a moonshot of a homer to center by Lance Parrish. Al Cowens later goes yard in the inning as well, staking the Tigers to a 3-1 lead. I remind myself never to put Witt in front of Gullickson ever again.

Bottom of 4th - Hall singles but is erased on a double play grounder by Yount. Too bad, because Smalley put one over the wall in center, riding a heavy breeze 395 feet. 3-2 Tigers.

Top of 5th - The Tigers get two on with no outs, but can't punch them home.

Bottom of 6th - Barfield hits his first homer of the postseason, 400' to left. Tie game! We put two on with one out, but Smalley bounces into a 6-4-3 double play.

Top of 8th - In comes Caudill for Witt, who had only thrown 69 pitches. Hmm. Double by Kemp, then a two run homer for Ryne Sandberg to put the Tigers back on top. 417' out to center, on a ball that probably is a deep fly ball most days. The Cub fans feel that something must be deeply wrong with the universe at this moment. Caudill is yanked for Bob James.

Bottom of 8th - back to back one out singles by Barfield and Carter. Hall grounds out to second, but beats the throw to first as the Tigers cannot again turn two. Yount makes them pay with a single to right, bringing home a run and putting men on the corners. But Smalley is retired, after fouling off eight straight pitches, to end the inning. 5-4 Tigers.

Top of 9th - Kirk Gibson hits a two run double to put the game out of reach. He comes home on another double by Kemp. My 1-2 bullpen punch has now surrendered five runs in two innings. Bad mojo.

Bottom of 9th - after retiring the first two men, Jim Winn loads the bases for Carter. But he gets a ground out to short to end the game. 8-3 Tigers win, and they steal home field advantage.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 03:40 PM

Game #2: Morris vs Gullickson, this one looks like a heavyweight fight. These are arguably the two most well-known pitchers in baseball after the past five years. Morris is 90-55 with one Cy Young and two All Star games. Gullickson is 81-47 with a Cy Young and three All Star games. The two have combined for 12 post-season wins (7 for Morris) between them. If the Tigers win this one they would be in phenomenal position to bring the title back to Detroit.

Bottom of 2nd - Hall triples with one out. Yount is walked, then Smalley strikes out with Yount getting thrown out at 2nd. Not exactly good execution. Does any team get thrown out on the basepaths more than us?

Top of 3rd - nine up, nine down for Detroit. Trammell hit one deep to left-center, but not deep enough.

Bottom of 3rd - we waste men on 1st/2nd with one out as the top of our order cannot convert.

Bottom of 4th - again we can't push a man across with two men on. Scioscia flies out to end the threat.

Top of 5th - Franklin Stubbs gets the first Tiger hit, a home run to right. 1-0 Tigers. Cowens and Brookens both double, and the Tigers are up 2-0.

Bottom of 5th - with two outs Boggs draws a walk and moves to second on a single by Barfield. Both come home on a double by Carter. Tie game.

Bottom of 6th - Morris comes out after retiring the leadoff hitter. He threw 121 pitches in 5 1/3 innings. Advantage, Cubs?

Top of 7th - Gullickson has had six perfect innings. Too bad he gave up the runs in the 5th. Templeton pinch-hits for him to lead off the 7th.

Bottom of 7th - Oberkfell hits a triple with one out and comes home on a ground out by Boggs. 3-2 Cubs!

Top of 8th - Caudill is in, and Trammell greets him with a triple. Kemp brings home a run with a single and Parrish gives Detroit the lead back with a two out hit. 4-3 Detroit, and the Chicago fans are extremely distraught by the bullpen woes over the last two days.

Bottom of 8th - Yount singles with two outs. Smalley hits a weak tapper back to pitcher Dave Tobik, but he boots it! Scioscia follows with a single, loading the bases. Willie Randolph walks on four pitches, tying the game. Tobik recovers to fan Oberkfell to end the threat. Man, we have left a ton of runners on base.

Top of 10th - Mike Morgan is in to pitch, and he gives up a hit to Dave Stegman. Stegman steals 2nd and comes home on a single by Gary Pettis. Once again Parrish helps Detroit post a crooked number, singling home Pettis. 6-4 Tigers.

Bottom of 10th - Atherton is in for the save. He gets two quick outs before allowing a double to Smalley. Scioscia is intentionally walked to bring up the pitcher. We send in Jeff Burroughs, who smacks the first pitch to left for a double. Both men score, tie game! Oberkfell walks, but Boggs is unable to be the hero as he strikes out to end the inning.

Top 11th - Alejandro Pena is now in to pitch. Nichols gets a one out single and moves to second on a hit by Trammell. But Stegman grounds into a double play to end the threat.

Top of 12th - Pettis, who may be the fastest man in the game, draws a one out walk on four pitches. He steals both second and third. Sandberg is walked intentionally to try and set up a double play. Who are we kidding? Parrish owns us, and he singles to center. 7-6 Detroit. Cowens doubles to left, scoring Sandberg but the inning ends with Parrish being tagged out at the plate.

Bottom of 12th - no meaningful threat. Tigers win.

So we've had a host of bad performances out of our bullpen and, as a result, have an extremely tough road ahead of us to get the three-peat. We'll need to win 4 of 5 (3 on the road) against a 101 win team with one of the great clutch pitchers of all time getting the ball in one of those starts.

We had better get after Petry, that is all I have to say right now.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 04:03 PM

Game #3:

"Congrats on getting the butterflies out in your first start, rook (Langston). You weren't great, but you kept us in the game and our hitters were able to take care of it. Well, we're in a bit of a spot here ... we're down 2-0 against an American League juggernaut. Their lineup may not look that scary, but they all do their jobs and Parrish is on fire right now. Just don't give them free passes to first and I think you'll do just fine.

Oh, and if you lose ... our season is pretty much over. No pressure."

Top of 1st - Petry works a 1-2-3 inning, but it takes him 30 pitches to do it. We had sixteen foul balls that inning. Bizarre.

Bottom of 2nd - Sandberg walks and, with two outs, steals 2nd. He comes home on a single to left by Stubbs. 1-0 Tigers.

Top of 3rd - Scioscia leads off with a single but is thrown out at third trying to advance on a single by Oberkfell. Man, I need to can our 3rd base coach. He is worse than our manager.

Bottom of 4th - we survive another hit/steal for Sandberg unscathed. Still 1-0 Detroit.

Top of 5th - Nichols lays out to take an extra base hit away from Yount. Petry is rolling, although he is up to 84 pitches.

Bottom of 6th - Trammell starts the inning with a double off the wall. We get two outs before that damn Sandberg knocks him in with a single.

Top of 7th - Barfield singles to lead off the inning and moves to second on a walk to Yount. But Smalley is un-clutch, grounding out to short to end the inning. We're getting into desperate time now ...

Top of 8th - Oberkfell walks on four pitches with two outs. They pull Petry after 117 pitches. Now that is what I can managing, especially when the reliever does his job and gets the final out of the inning.

Bottom of 8th - Cowens hits a leadoff single and advances to third on a double by Sandberg. One run comes in on a bloop single by Nichols, but Sandberg is out at home. 3-0 Detroit.

Top of 9th - in comes Atherton. Barfield greets him with a double. Carter walks, bringing the tying run to home plate. Hall pops out - infield fly rule. Atherton throws a wild pitch, putting men on 2nd and 3rd. Yount flies out, but it is deep enough to bring in Barfield. 3-1. Smalley is once again in the right spot in the lineup for the Tigers, flying out to center to end the game.

To the best of my knowledge, no team has ever come back from a 3-0 deficit in the history of the baseball postseason. We've got a mountain to climb, and I think it is probably too big for this team.

RealDeal · 09-18-2009, 04:28 PM

Quote:

Bottom of 10th - Atherton is in for the save. He gets two quick outs before allowing a double to Smalley. Scioscia is intentionally walked to bring up the pitcher. We send in Jeff Burroughs, who smacks the first pitch to left for a double. Both men score, tie game! Oberkfell walks, but Boggs is unable to be the hero as he strikes out to end the inning.

This is really crappy AI.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 04:34 PM

Game #4 - Chicago's Last Stand? Viola was great in his last outing, but could he find a way to slow down the Tiger's offense? Langston seemed to have the right idea last game - keep the bullpen out of the game - but Viola will likely need some run support. That has not very reliable for him this year ...

Top of 1st - leadoff single for Randolph, who moves to second on a hit by Yount. Barfield jerks one out to right; that ball got out in a hurry! 3-0 Cubs!

Top of 2nd - Barfield strikes out, leaving two men on base.

Bottom of 2nd - Nichols ends a 12 pitch at bat with a single to left. Kemp walks, then Brookens grounds out to Smalley. But our SS throws the ball into left? Two base throwing error, run scores. Viola comes back to fan Gibson. 3-1 Cubs.

Bottom of 3rd - Nichols is retired with two on and two outs to end a threat.

Top of 6th - With one out Boggs and Burroughs record back-to-back hits. Naturally Smalley makes an out, but at least he advances the runners so that Butch Wynegar can bring them both home with a single to left. 5-1 Chicago.

Bottom of 6th - Brookens grounds out to Smalley, who walks over to touch second rather than risk throwing another one away. That ends an inning where the Tigers had two men on.

Top of 7th - Randolph doubles against reliever Jim Winn. Barfield is walked intentionally and Carter makes them pay with a single to load the bases. Boggs hits a sac fly, making the score 6-1.

Bottom of 8th - Viola strikes out Sandberg to record the first out of the inning and is then pulled by our manager in favor of Caudill. Good move, as he had thrown 121 pitches.

No excitement down the stretch. We went with a formula that has served us well over the years - good starting pitching plus three run homer. Earl Weaver would be proud. Now we just have to do it three more times.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 04:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by RealDeal

This is really crappy AI.

Tigers fan?

If not, I think I've listed a ton of worse examples of AI along the way. I really only look at the box scores with this kind of detail in the post-season, which makes me think that someone playing along every game would be driven insane by the AI.

hoopsguy · 09-18-2009, 04:53 PM

Game #5 - "Mike, remember that really great outing that you had last year in Game #7 of the World Series? You know, the elimination game? Well, today is kind of like that ..."

Bottom of 1st - Sandberg singles, steals 2nd, and is thrown out at 3rd trying to tag up. Maybe we should trade for him ... we need another guy who gets thrown out on the bases regularly.

Top of 4th - Oberkfell gets our first hit of the day, but is wiped out by the Tigers second double play. Rozema has faced the minimum through four innings.

Bottom of 4th - Parrish puts one over the wall in left. 1-0 Tigers.

Top of 5th - Carter doubles to lead off the inning and comes home on a single by Yount. He may not have had a great regular season but where would our offense be without him this postseason? Cowens makes a great defensive play on Smalley because it is Smalley's destiny to come up small in big moments. 1-1 tie.

Bottom of 5th - Nichols singles and steals second to start the inning. But he is left to rot there.

Bottom of 6th - Sandberg leads off with a single and steals second. Hmm, they are stealing a ton of bases against Scioscia. Parrish moves him to third with a squib hit. Then Stubbs doubles to left, bringing home one run. A Gibson fly ball is good enough to send Parrish home, and the Tigers are up 3-1.

Top of 7th - Boggs leads off with a single, but is thrown out at home to end the inning.

Bottom of 7th - we actually retired Parrish in a big spot, with two on and two outs. Maybe there is hope yet?

Top of 8th - Smalley doubles with one away, and looks like he will score on a screaming liner by Scioscia. But Stegman robs him blind, and Smalley has to dash back to second to avoid being doubled up. Not that it matters, as Burroughs makes the final out of the inning. Three outs left for the Tigers.

Top of 9th - enter Atherton. Oberkfell doubles, the traditional start of an inning against Atherton. Boggs fails to advance the runner after an 11 pitch at bat concludes with a pop-up to 3rd. Barfield cranks one to deep center, but it is caught. Oberkfell smartly stays at second; getting thrown out advancing to third as a non-tying run would be ground for immediate firing. Carter doubles, cutting the margin to 3-2. In comes Gary Templeton to pinch hit for Mel Hall? Huh? Atherton is a right, Hall is a left, and Hall is hitting .286 for the postseason. I guess you could argue that Templeton, a switch hitter, has better splits against righties but this is a reach. And it does not pay off as Gary ends his Cubs career making the final out in the World Series.

Congratulations to the Tigers on winning their second title. This was the World Series that was supposed to happen in 1984 (damn Padres!) and it is probably the outcome we would have seen in real life as well.

09-11-2009, 09:42 PM	#255
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	PSPN Pre-Season Power Rankings: 1. Chicago 2. San Francisco 3. Detroit 4. Los Angeles - two of top 4 in NL West 5. Pittsburgh 6. Oakland 7. Montreal 8. Toronto 9. St. Louis - 4th NL East team in top 9 10. Kansas City 16. Cincinnati Most Feared Hitters - projections: Eddie Murray (Bal) - .287/27 Dave Winfield (SD) - .325/20 Bob Horner (Atl) - .289/34 Kent Hrbek (Min) - .306/26 Harold Baines (CHW) - .292/27 Cal Ripken (Tex) - .303/24 Tony Armas (Oak) - .253/37 Don Mattingly (SF) - .323/20 Jack Clark (SF) - .293/26 Mike Easler (Pit) - .303/23 OK, no Strawberry or Barfield listed here? Huh? I would also have Brunansky on this list, as he has been a heck of a lot more feared than Easler or Hrbek, to pick on two guys on this list. Finally, I would bet the ranch on the "under" on Winfield hitting .325. Crazy talk. Payrolls are beginning to emerge as have/have not. There are only three teams over 100K and Chicago is #20 out of 26. 1. Los Angeles - $134,251,804 2. Detroit - $117,228,226 3. Montreal $111,905,137 Last edited by hoopsguy : 09-12-2009 at 07:15 AM.

09-12-2009, 07:03 AM	#258
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	A trade is struck: Martinez to Minnesota for Roy Smalley. For now, we'll move Yount to third and give Smalley the SS position. That means that Gaetti will be on the bench, but that should be a short-term (one year, max) deal. Smalley, age 32, is under contract for four years @ 3.9 million a season. I don't think Smalley for Yount is a good deal in the long-term, but this deal should probably help us for this year. If I feel that I need Yount for the three-peat then I can do so and not worry about being stuck going into next year with the house rules on FA spending. It also allows me to keep my "exemption" in place for Barfield for next year. If he produces at 60% of what he did this year I'll probably want to use it on him. Smalley's comments on coming to Chicago - "I'm just happy to be out of the American League. Competing with Cal Ripken was fricking impossible." Yount's comments on moving to third - "For Roy Smalley? Are you remotely serious?" Last edited by hoopsguy : 09-12-2009 at 07:04 AM.

09-18-2009, 10:15 AM	#284
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	A pretty good (69-58) Braves team comes to town to play us. We've struggled with these guys earlier in the year; time to see if we've raised our game. A 10-1 win featuring two more Barfield homers seems like a good sign. That was Witt's 8th straight quality start; in fact, he has not allowed more than one run in any of them. We eke out an 8-7 win in 10 the following day, rallying back from a 7-3 deficit. And we make it six in a row with a 6-4 win. Carter cranked his 16th homer on the year and Smalley had a pair of hits to bring his average up to .282. The Reds are the next team to visit and I'm hoping that our guys are fired up to see them. Cincinnati has kept on rolling since steamrolling us in their park, as they are now 7 games over .500. In the opener they fire their 4th straight shutout against us, 3-0. Liebrandt was even better this time than last time we saw him, holding us to two hits over 8 innings. I demand we score a run in our next game!!! The players respond to the challenge, posting a 7-5 win that features a pair of Barfield homers. That gives him 30 on the year and 100 RBIs. Take that, Mario Soto! We get a split in the two game series and finish our homestand 7-1. Last edited by hoopsguy : 09-18-2009 at 10:15 AM.

09-10-2009, 11:58 PM	#251
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	Retiring players: Jim Bibby: 31-11 2.45 ERA. He killed us in 1981. Ken Forsch: 29-26 2.80 ERA. Tied for league lead in wins one season. Fergie Jenkins Tug McGraw: had 42 saves in 1980. Carl Yastrzemski: out at 45 years young.

09-11-2009, 08:10 PM	#252
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	The most expensive hitter in this draft is Eric Davis, but I think the best is Alvin Davis. He has much more potential than Davis, although both have high skill levels right now. On the pitching side, Dwight Gooden is going to be a stud - bigger impact than DeLeon or Hudson had last year, I'm guessing. Roger Clemens should also be very good. We are hoping that there is a significant contributor still out there for us at the end of the first round. 1. Houston - Kirby Puckett. He is a long way from a finished product right now, with little power and a pretty poor eye. May turn into a good player, but there are guys who are much better right now. 2. Seattle - Terry Pendleton. This is a bad pick, given how much talent is out there. I can only suspect that this is budget driven. 3. Philadelphia - Roger Clemens. This 22 year old is going to be a star for a lot of years. I'm not happy to see him in my division, but with the Phillies picking here I expected them to get a really good player. I just did not think they would have their pick of great players thanks to Houston + Seattle. 4. Milwaukee - Eric Davis will join Strawberry in the outfield. Wow, what a 1-2 punch for power/speed. 5. San Diego - Kevin Mitchell. I think he will be better than Pendleton at same position. But I have a hard time accepting that Alvin Davis is on the board with those two guys getting picked. 6. Yankees - SS Danny Tartabull. Sleeper good pick, excluding Davis I like him better than any of the previous hitters. 7. Los Angeles - Alvin Davis. Big shot in the arm for a team that has some horses already on the pitching staff. Definitely helped themselves more than division rival Houston. 8. Cleveland - Bret Saberhagen. Only 20 years old, I expect he will be great. 9. St. Louis - Dwight Gooden. This draft has been a nightmare for your Chicago Cubs. Best pitcher in draft, probably best I've seen in any of the first four drafts. 10. Atlanta - Glenn Davis. Will have a tremendous base of hitting talent by pairing him with Horner + Murphy. I imagine they were bummed to see Saberhagen + Gooden go with last two picks. 11. Mets - Jimmy Key. May turn into a good pitcher, but won't have impact this year. Huge drop-off from first three guys to Key. 12. Baltimore - Jim Presley. Decent pick, but not a lot of value picking in this spot as difference between guys available now and when we pick does not appear that large. 13. Pittsburgh - Mike Pagliarulo. Looks like a young Barfield, but most guys with those type of attributes do not turn into 48/154 players. Most of them become Ron Kittle. 14. Boston - Tom Browning. Can't break a window with his fastball, but has good potential if you can overlook this. 15. Minnesota - Jose Rijo. This 19 year old is all potential right now. 16. California - Jim Deshaies. He comes cheap at 180K. Bottom of rotation talent next year, perhaps? 17. San Francisco - Mickey Tettleton. Not a bad pick considering he is a catcher and most of the guys playing that position can't hit their weight. 18. Kansas City - Kelly Gruber. Decidedly average player right now, may grow into being a good one. 19. Texas - Ivan Calderon. Good pick, is better player with more potential than guys like Gruber picked before him. 20. White Sox - Larry Sheets. Basically Kelly Gruber, but plays RF instead of 3B. 21. Detroit - Franklin Stubbs. A little better version of Tettleton, but plays 1B instead of catcher. Still, he has a chance to be a contributor to a winning team by next year if things break right. 22. Cincinnati - Mark Bailey. Really good looking C prospect. Wish he had fallen to us. 23. Toronto - Mark Gubicza. Very nice young pitcher, would have loved to grab him with our pick. Toronto adds him to an already impressive stable of starters. SP is definitely where the value is right now in this draft. 24. Oakland - Barbaro Garbey. I really don't like this pick, as he is 28 years old. I think there are better hitters out there right now and a ton of better pitchers. 25. Montreal - Darryl Boston. This is the hitter I would have taken if I was looking at hitters. But the pitching prospects are so much better right now. Still, Montreal has a bunch of good starters so this pick probably was what was best for them. 26. We've got several really strong pitching prospects to choose from, with Mark Langston and Ron Romanick being the top two. Closer John Franco would be very welcome in the second round if he sticks around. The decision between the starters comes down to liking Langston's power more than Romanick's control. Five year deal, just over 2 million per year. I'll be interested to see where the computer slots him versus our current guys. This pick also pretty much spells the end of the road for Dennis Martinez, despite his 21 wins last year. Round #2: - San Diego snags Franco early in the second round. Damn. - The Cardinals add another pitching weapon, reliever Ken Howell. They have gotten tons better in this draft. - California gets a good starter in Joe Hesketh. I like this pick better than their 1st rounder. - Romanick lasts until our 2nd round pick. Looks like we are going to be leveraging our pitchers for position players next season. We sign him for 4 years @ 1.7 million. 3rd - MR Freddie Tolliver, 3 years @ 200K. Fringe prospect. 4th - SP Ken Dixon, 2 years @ 300K. Better prospect than Tolliver, but probably not making our roster in next two seasons. 5th - SP Kurt Kepshire, 1 year @ 300K. More less same thoughts as Dixon above.

09-11-2009, 09:25 PM	#253
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	FA asking for the most money - Cliff Johnson (dude, you are 37 and suck), Mike Schmidt, Chet Lemon, and Jim Rice. All are looking for 15+ million. The next tier, looking for about half that amount, includes Gorman Thomas, John Wockenfuss, Darrell Evans, and Greg Luzinski. Pitchers asking for 10-15 million = Floyd Bannister, Mike Norris, J.R. Richard, Ron Guidry, and Lee Smith. These guys are outside of our price range. We do have two spots to fill, and I would prefer not to just add min-sal guys so time to find some value options. #1 - 27 RF Clint Hurdle looks like he can hit. I would like to bring him in with the goal of being a 4th outfielder. He could potentially be a starter if Joe Carter is not ready or if we cannot swing a deal for a player we like later in the year. He is asking for 2.7 million initially. We'll probably offer about 3.1 million and see if that gets us our guy. #2 - SP Andy Hawkins. 24 year old with a lot of potential. This guy should not have made it to the market. I'm going to see if I can grab him as a marketable asset for later. I'm guessing he'll cost 3 million as well. LA is offering Hurdle about 3.4 million. We pop our offer up to 3 years @ 3.75 million to avoid him instantly signing with them. Early FA signings: - Phillies signed Doug Corbett to a one year deal for 4.6 million. He was probably among the five best MR/CL on the market but was asking a little more than what I wanted to pay. - LA signed J.R. Richard to a one year deal for 14.5 million. Hawkins spurns us for the Yankees, taking 500K less per year. 4 years @ 2.6 million per season. And in other not-so-good news, Hurdle gets big money from Boston, 5 years @ 4.5 million a year. He just priced himself out of Chicago. Jorge Orta, at 34, falls just under our age limit. He is asking for just over 2 million per year. Let's see if we can sign him for the contract we tried to give Hurdle. We'll also pursue 33 year old RF Jeff Burroughs. He might be had for less than 2 million a year. Both of those guys sign on with us. So our FA spending was about 4 million this season as we have now filled our roster. I'm sure I'll be doing a lot more tinkering this season to figure out playing time and contracts, but we've got our 35 heading into spring training. -

09-11-2009, 09:37 PM	#254
rjolley College Starter Join Date: Dec 2000 Location: Roseville, CA	That draft looks a lot better than the earlier ones in the dynasty. That's 2 in a row. Good to see.

09-11-2009, 09:53 PM	#256
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	So the manager rankings are pretty interesting. Here is how they project our starting five: 1. Romanick 2. Viola 3. Langston 4. Gullickson 5. Witt The next three are Morgan, Black, and Martinez. So two rookies are #1/#3, Witt is #5, and a 21 game winner is #8. I'm going to have to make some adjustments here. Barfield is not included in the starting lineup, instead we see Orta. Um, no. They list Orosco as our closer. I'm willing to give him a shot at this, but he'll have a short leash. Time to see what I can get for Martinez and maybe another starter as well ... we've got moves to make before the start of this year.

09-12-2009, 07:11 AM	#259
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	We demote Samuel down to the minors again. Right now he is not good enough to beat out Randolph or Oberkfell. Those two guys will platoon at 2B for us. We'll also have a platoon in LF, where Carter gets the nod against lefties and Orta against righties. I'm still scratching my head about Gullickson as the #4 starter, but a review of his ratings tells the story. Back when we had initially acquired him he had some heat, with his Velocity ranking north of 80. But now, at the age of 25, it has sunk down to 58. He still has elite control and strong stuff, but the velocity is mediocre. Still, it is better than Romanick so I flip-flop those guys in our rotation. I also am struggling with Morgan, who is 33-9 in 1.5 seasons in the majors, as our long reliever/spot starter. With all due respect to Langston and Romanick, I'm not going to let that happen to start the year. Morgan is in our starting five and one of those guys can take a spot if someone falters. I decide that I want the lefty Langston over the right-handed Romanick, so Romanick has just moved from opening day starter to long relief man. OK, time to play some actual games.

09-12-2009, 07:31 AM	#260
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	We start the season visiting San Francisco, in a matchup of the top two teams in the game according to PSPN. But I find it hard to believe that the second best team is starting Ed Whitson on opening day. We take the opener 4-1 behind a Scioscia three run homer, 8 strong innings by Gullickson, and the first save for new closer Jesse Orosco. Smalley was 0-4 in his debut. The Giants turn the tables in game 2, winning 5-1 to split the series. Viola allowed all the runs early, bringing back memories of his uneven postseason. San Diego is the next stop, and they are off to a 2-0 start. Langston throws six scoreless innings in his debut but we lose 1-0. Second straight game where we have gotten plenty of hits but meager run scoring. What makes this one especially galling is that the Padres lost their starter in the first inning, so we were shut out by a "bullpen by committee". Witt, like Viola, is in postseason form but this is a good thing. He threw eight shutout innings, striking out 8. Hall and Barfield each hit their first homers of the year in a 3-0 win. The bats are active on our final day in San Diego, providing Morgan with plenty of run support in a 10-7 win. Randolph had three RBIs and Barfield was 4-5 with 2 RBIs. Dave Winfield, who is supposed to hit .320 this year, is batting .045 after five games. On to LA, continuing a long west coast trip to start the year. Oh well, the weather is better here than it is in Chicago in early April. The Dodgers have started 4-1 to jump to an early lead in their division. We go 12 innings for a 4-3 victory in the opener. That was required after Orosco blew his first save of the year to waste a gem by Gullickson. Viola bounces back with a great outing, and we needed it to beat Fernando Valenzuela 1-0. The Brewers have started off red hot, winning their first six games.

09-12-2009, 08:02 AM	#261
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	Our home opener is against the Mets. Langston is ridiculous, going eight innings and only surrendering a 4th inning single to Bob Brenly. Barfield hit a solo shot in the 7th that turned out to be the only run scored this game. Jim Gott fanned 13 in the loss. Witt is sharp again during a 9-1 win that takes us to six straight wins. Carter was 3-5 with a pair of RBIs and is hitting .393 on the year. The Mets win the last game of our series 6-1, the second straight lackluster start for Morgan. Kirby Puckett has started his major league career with an eleven game hitting streak for Houston. Pete Vukovich of the Cards has a strain in his elbow ligament. Although that sounds serious, he is only expected to miss three weeks. Vance Law, an All Star last year in Montreal, has a more serious version of the same injury and is expected to be out until June. We welcome the Vukovich-less Cardinals to Wrigley with a 13-1 beatdown. Smalley hits his first homer and Carter continues to give us Jim Rice style production with 3 RBIs. But all the runs must have been used up in the opener, because we lose 2-0 the following day. I'll give some of the credit to Dwight Gooden, who picked up his first major league win by allowing only one hit over seven innings. But our rookie, Langston, nearly matches him in a 2-0 win to give us the series victory. Our homestand continues the next day against the Pirates and we pick up a 7-3 win. Carter hits his first homer on the season; he is doing a great job in the middle of the order along with Barfield. Both of those guys are hitting over .380, although the home run production is not there quite yet. Morgan gets his first quality start (6 IP, 3 ER) but his second loss in a 4-3 contest. We win the third game of the set to cap a 6-3 homestand. 8-2 final, with Yount hitting his first homer on the year.

09-12-2009, 08:31 AM	#262
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	The Blue Jays have won seven in a row, bumping their record to 13-3, to assume a two game lead in the competitive AL East. The Tigers, at 7-8, are already 5.5 games out. KC, at 10-6, is the only team above .500 in the AL West. Traditional laughingstock Seattle is 8-8, while California has an MLB worst 5-13 record. We are 11-5, two games up on the Mets in the NL East. All of the other teams in the division that were projected "top 10" teams by PSPN are currently below .500. Only two games separates first/worst in the NL West, with all teams between 9-7 and 7-9. Atlanta is one of the 9-7 teams and has a +30 run discrepancy that gives an early indicator that they may be positioned to win the division. Or maybe it just means they were on the right end of one blowout win Off to St. Louis to get our second look at Gooden. It is only marginally better than the first, as we lose 3-2. Gooden had 13 strikeouts in 6 innings. Ron Darling also stymies us, as we fall 2-1 in extra innings the next day. We've wasted a couple of pretty good pitching performances so far. Witt moves to 4-0 with a 8-4 win where we scored four in the 8th to salvage one game from the series. The top of the order got it done, with Boggs and Yount combining for five hits, 3 runs, and 3 RBIs. Next stop - Pittsburgh. Don Robinson is a guy who has given us trouble over the years and does so again in a 3-0 loss. We are shut out again the following day, 2-0, as this road trip is turning morbid. Sid Fernandez struck out 10; we seem to be swinging and missing quite a bit this year. Viola responds by pitching us to a 7-0 shutout win. He is just happy to get some run support, as he lost twice against Gooden already this month. Boggs had three hits to raise his average up to .330. Some guys putting up big numbers in April: Tom Brunansky (Sea): .330/11/23 Ken Phelps (KC): .341/8/19 Paul Molitor (Tex): .333/4/17, leading league in runs with 23 Jack Clark of the Giants is out three weeks with a back injury.

09-12-2009, 08:51 AM	#263
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	We head north to New York, with the Mets looming just one game back in the standings. Langston goes to 3-0 with a microscopic 0.49 ERA after winning 4-1 in the first game. Barfield hit a two run homer, his 3rd on the year. Smalley is not adjusting the NL pitching, as he is mired at .181. Witt did not allow a single hit in six innings but was lifted for a pinch hitter, paving the way for Romanick to get his first big league win in a 2-0 pitchers duel. Orosco registered his 7th save in 8 tries. That wraps up a two game series at Shea and a 4-4 road trip. The Padres come calling at Wrigley, and the first game is a close affair. We get a 3-2 win thanks in part to a two run homer by Carter. Our four game winning streak comes to a screeching halt when Bud Black wets the bed in a relief appearance. You know it is bad when you give up a three run homer to Jose Oquendo. 7-3 final in a game where Smalley hit a solo shot. We also fall in the finale, 3-1. Viola is now 2-4 on the year; he has pitched better than that. The Giants are the next team to visit. At 13-16 they are struggling to keep up with the Reds (18-12) in the West. But they solve Langston in a 4-0 win. Don Mattingly hits a homer and is having a fine season: .336/5/14. Witt stops the skid by picking up his 5th win, 6-2 final. The Dodgers and their huge payroll are next up, and Bill Laskey is up to the task of silencing our bats. 5-0 final and I'm getting antsy about our lack of production. Alvin Davis hit his 7th homer on the year. The bats wake up against the tough Bob Welch, as we post 10 runs in a 10-6 win. Yount had a pair of homers and 5 RBIs. 3-3 homestand. Oakland rookie 1B Barbaro Garbey is giving me the Dan Driessen treatment, posting .339/4/18 and leading the majors in doubles. Milwaukee's George Bell has a 15 game hitting streak. Man, what an outfield! Bell, Strawberry, and Eric Davis! Those guys are off to a good start this year at 19-12 but trail Toronto by 3.5. In other divisions, KC (18-14) is a half game up on Minnesota and one up on the White Sox. The Angels stink; at 9-25 they are a world removed from the playoff team of just two seasons ago. We are percentage points ahead of Montreal (18-13 to 19-14), with St. Louis (1.5 back) and New York (2) looming. The Reds have an NL best 21-13 record and are three in front of Atlanta.

09-12-2009, 10:00 AM	#264
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	We hit the road hoping to change a few trends: 1.) Score runs more consistently - too many guys shutting us out 2.) Hit the ball over the fence a little more often - this applied to all three of our starting outfielders, who have 7 between them 3.) Get more wins out of Viola and Morgan Smalley is knicked up right now so we put Templeton in the lineup against right handers. Gary is hitting .313 against them on the year so far, so it seems worth a shot. I also shuffle our bullpen around, as Romanick and Black were getting the lions share of appearances without matching results. Pena only had one (!) appearance so far this year. That is just wrong. After all the changes Viola falls to 2-5 with a 3-2 loss at Houston. He has not given up more than three runs in a start since the opener but the run support just is not there. The runs are there the following day, but the pitching lets us down in a 9-7 loss. Pena celebrates his promotion by just handing over a 7-4 lead in the bottom of the 8th. We waste the first Cubs homer for Jeff Burroughs. And it is a clean sweep for the Astros when they win 6-3 the following day. Just in case I'm feeling too bad about our plight (2.5 out of first as Montreal keeps winning) - the Phillies have dropped 9 straight and are now 10-25. We slink into Cincinnati trying to find some respectability on the road. It does not come easily, but we get a 6-3 win in 11 innings. Randolph, who somehow wound up at catcher for a few innings, had two RBIs in the victory. But Gullickson got pounded the next day in an 8-6 loss. But we pick up a hard fought 4-3 win in the finale, with Viola beating DeLeon. Barfield homered for the second straight game. Good end to a lousy 2-4 trip. We get a chance to pay back the Astros at Wrigley but for some reason do not seem that interested in doing so. The April dominance of Langston has morphed into May vulnerability. Three RBIs by Barfield (up to 28) are wasted in a 7-5 loss. But he is back at it again the following day, driving in four and adding his 7th homer in a 6-0 victory. And we end the series with a 9-5 victory. Unfortunately, Scioscia sustains a neck injury. We are pretty thin at catcher so this is not good at all. He'll miss two weeks and we'll rush him back after that time. Don Slaught, who is having an off-year at AAA Iowa, is going to see some time.

09-12-2009, 10:28 AM	#265
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	So what has gone right for the Angels this year? Well, how about 1B Mike Ivie having a 17 game hitting streak? If that does not do it for the Angels fans then, well, I've got nothing. We host the 24-17 Braves. It is odd seeing teams playing against us with better records. I guess I've gotten pretty spoiled the last couple of years. They widen the gap with a 6-5 win in the opener in 10 innings. Boggs was 3-5 in the loss to bring his average up to .354. But we are not getting anything at all out of the bottom of the order. And I'm this close to platooning Hall as his batting average is now .206. Not the way to perform in a contract year, buddy. Viola moves to 4-5 with a 3-2 win against Doyle Alexander (6-1, 2.04 ERA), who left after 3 innings with an injury. Even in his wins, Viola is not getting run support. Then Orel Hershiser slams the door on us 2-0 to wrap up another blah series. Meanwhile, we have fallen to third in the division race as the Cardinals have ripped off six straight wins. We lose another close game, 5-4 in 10 innings, to the Reds. Barfield knocks in three runs to help us find a 5-2 win. And the bullpen comes through in a 5-4 win (again in 10 innings) the next night by posting four scoreless frames. Oberkfell had three hits to raise his average to .244. It was refreshing to see our comes come back from an early 4-0 deficit. The series concludes with a 1-0 win with Gaetti driving home the winning run in the bottom of the 9th. More impressive run support for Viola (sigh). So, we are just about at the end of May and here is how the divisions look: AL East - Toronto has cooled off a bit, but still has the best record in baseball at 31-18. That is three better than Milwaukee. AL West - The White Sox have taken over the lead (27-22) by a half game over KC. Minnesota is 1.5 back. The White Sox? Wow, just two years ago these guys were a joke. NL East - Montreal is 28-21, which is .5 ahead of the Cardinals and one in front of us. New York is .500 and still in the race. The Phillies have another losing streak going; up to 8 and counting. They are 12-35 and are by far the worst team in baseball. NL West - Atlanta is 28-20, putting them one in front of LA and two up on San Diego. The Reds are three back and the Astros trail by four.

09-12-2009, 10:45 AM	#266
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	Off to Atlanta to see if we can do any better against these guys. Not in the first game, as we take another one run loss. 4-3, as Bob James blows a 3-2 lead in the 8th. Different guys, same results. That is followed with another loss, 7-5 this time. Witt was bad in this outing and has seen his ERA balloon up to 3.18. That is a big jump considering how good his ERA was in April. That mercifully ends our visit to Atlanta. Maybe we can bully the Phillies around? Nope, Dickie Noles was 1-8 coming into the game but we lose 2-1. Meanwhile, my manager seems to have completely ignored my idea of placing Orta in the starting lineup ahead of Hall. This is forcing my hand to make a move. I put Hall on the market. Only to find that no one in baseball wants him. Very well, Hall is going to the minors for the month of June while we see if we can get something going. We lose 7-0 to the Phillies the next day, as the Phillies now have 14% of their wins on the season against us. That percentage goes up the next day as 1-8 Dave Dravecky beats us 2-1. So, we've scored 2 runs in three games against a team wining 30% of their games. God, we are such a steaming pile of suck right now. We've also lost five in a row and are .500 on the year. We salvage one game in Philadelphia, beating their best pitcher - rookie Roger Clemens, who fell to 3-7. Don't give any credit to our offense, however. It was a 2-0 game that was won almost solely by Langston.

09-12-2009, 11:30 AM	#267
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	Slaught batted .056 in his time with the Cubs with 1 RBI. He is shipped back to Iowa and will never see our roster again. Backup catcher just shot up our priority list going forward. We are off to Montreal to see if Scioscia's return can help spark a resurgence. Right now we are three back of the Expos and facing Cy Young winner Sanderson in the opener. Tough assignment. Too tough, as we find another one run loss, 4-3. Our old closer Lee Smith blew a 3-2 lead in the 9th but picked up a win when Mike Morgan (what the hell was he doing in relief?) gave up a run. Clearly my manager is just trying to screw with me right now ... first Hall and now this. God, I wish there was an option to can the manager when playing in GM mode. Gullickson keeps us above .500 with a 6-0 shutout win that featured homers by Barfield and Smalley. That looks great, but it was a 1-0 game heading into the 9th. The offense still has issues that cannot be easily masked, but getting Smalley going would certainly help. A 15-9 win the next day helps with the healing process. We had five players homer, while Montreal got two from Gary Carter. Smalley and Scioscia each had four hits. OK, two out of three in Montreal is nice but how about keeping it up in St. Louis against the division leading Cardinals? We are 2.5 back heading into the opener against their longtime ace Vukovich. Well, we get a 3-1 win but Scioscia is hurt again. I can not deal with Don fricking Slaught again so something will have to happen on the trade front. Bud Black is moved to Minnesota for 28 year old Butch Wynegar. Wynegar has two years remaining on his deal @ 1.192 million. He looks like a guy that should be able to make consistent contact and is a positive defender (1982 Gold Glove). He is hitting .254/1/16 this year and is a career .247 hitter as a four year starter for the Twins. Minnesota is "thrilled with this trade" as they are getting a starting pitcher with pretty good stuff and reasonable salary demands. Wynegar will be the starter for at least the next two months while Scioscia recovers. We bring up Boyd to take a spot in the bullpen and once again demote Samuel. Next year should be your time, Juan. Keep working hard at Iowa. The first game of the Wynegar era ends in a 4-3 loss. We tie it in the 9th against their closer Ken Howell but Vande Berg surrenders his first run of the season to give the game back to St. Louis. Jeffrey Leonard was 4-5 for the Cards with 2 RBIs. We win the finale 9-2, with Barfield going deep for the 9th time. Morgan helped his own cause with a grand slam. Although Barfield is not putting up crazy numbers right now, he is definitely not the problem with this team. He is at .293/9/44. The black holes at C and SS have definitely hampered our offensive production and we have not been very clutch as a staff, despite the bullpen having good stats. Still, a 4-2 roadtrip against the teams ahead of us in the division seems like a good sign. We're heading home for some more games against Montreal next.

09-12-2009, 12:24 PM	#269
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	Back home, we fall to 8-13 in one run games with a 3-2 loss to the Expos. Ellis Valentine hit a go-ahead homer in the 8th to give them the win. Viola moves his record on the year back to .500 (6-6) with a 4-2 decision. Valentine again went deep, but it was in the 9th and was more or less meaningless. The meaningful homer was the three run job by Boggs in the first. And we again take 2 of 3 from Montreal thanks to a 10-6 win in the finale. Smalley hit his 2nd homer of the series and is up to 6 on the year. He also had five RBIs, bringing his line on the season up to .229/6/21. Not very good, but a world better than where he was a month ago. Willie Randolph hit a pinch three run homer to ice the game in the 8th. It is with a sense of relief that I report that we beat the Phillies at Wrigley, 3-2 in 10 innings. It seems like almost all of our extra inning games (7 on the year) have been 10 innings. Three more hits for Smalley. The next day we win our fourth in a row, this time by a 5-3 margin. Gaetti hits his first homer on the year, a huge 3 run walk-off number that sent a buzz through the crowd. He has really struggled off the bench up to this point, but that one was huge. But the buzz dies the next day as we lose 1-0. Dickie Noles apparently owns us, but not anyone else in baseball. A Boggs single in the third was our only hit. We win the finale, 4-3 in 12 innings. Romanick pitched four scoreless innings for the win. That was enough to put us back in first in the NL Central, at 36-30. There are three teams within 2.5, but this has not been a particularly good division this year and we have played well against our division foes over the last two weeks. Rudy Law is a pretty good bet to break the triples record (14), given that he already has 10 on the year. Run, Rudy, run. So I've talked about the Milwaukee outfield before, but they have another player putting up big numbers this year. 1B Greg Walker is at .326/10/43. This third year player has improved every season for the Brew Crew. Barfield is not the only MVP struggling to match his numbers from a year ago. Darryl Strawberry has a line of .267/11/32 w/22 steals. One slugger who is continuing to perform at a high level is Tom Brunansky. The average is not great, but .245/20/46 speaks for itself. Dan Driessen of the Reds will miss three weeks with a calf injury.

09-12-2009, 12:57 PM	#270
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	A look at the top 20 ERAs in the league reveals zero Cubs. I sure hope that changes between now and the end of the year. Starting pitching has been the rock that I've built our franchise upon and we need to do a little better in this area. Great starting pitching covers up an awful lot of sins ... The league leader is Jose DeLeon of the Reds who is having an impressive sophomore campaign. He is 6-4 with a 1.50 ERA and a whopping 100:29 K/BB ratio. All of his other secondary stats are great as well; he must have "Viola disease" to only have six wins. The Reds actually have three starters in the top 20 ERA - DeLeon, Liebrandt (5th, 2.02), and Soto (12th, 2.26). Time for me to gush about a Milwaukee player again. Your AL ROTY is going to be Eric Davis. His numbers are .270/15/50 with 26 steals. And he is going to win Gold Gloves just about every year. 100 range, 100 arm, 87 hands. Unreal. Our least favorite American League player, Dwayne Murphy, may be headed for his first All Star game. .263/14/44 w/20 steals. Back on the road against a division foe, and it is Pittsburgh. The Pirates have fallen out of contention after a nine game losing streak last month. Well, they would be out of contention in a good division but they are only 7.5 behind us. We give them the opener, 5-4. Wynegar had three RBIs to help us rally from an early 4-0 hole but we just could not muster offense against their pen. Witt gets the win the next day as Barfield slugs his 10th homer. Burroughs also homered and had four RBIs. He has played better since getting into the lineup after the Hall demotion. We roughed up Candelaria in that game. The last game of the series is not good, as we go down meekly 4-2. We host the Cardinals next, hoping to grow our 1.5 game edge. Gullickson helps us accomplish that mission with a 5-1 decision that featured a bunch of solo homers: Barfield, Burroughs, Carter, and Yount. That was the 2nd straight loss for Gooden, who had earlier reeled off nine straight wins. Viola loses a one run game, 3-2. This is a broken record. But we solve Vukovich in the finale, winning 7-1. Barfield was 3-3 with his 12th homer. Pittsburgh comes to town and beats us 7-5 to start the series. We rallied back from 5-5 (early deficit again) only to give up a pair of runs in the top of the 9th. Morgan handcuffs the Pirates the next day in a 9-1 win that included a Yount homer and three more Barfield RBIs. And we beat Robinson in the final game of the series 5-3. One more Barfield homer; here is hoping that he is starting a hot streak. OK, now that we are starting to win more series I'm getting greedy. I want to see us sweep a few of these rather than always leaving one on the table. I'm not expecting that to start in our next one, however. We will be heading to LA to take on the 46-32 Dodgers. Division updates: AL East - Detroit has won five straight to move to 43-33. They are just 1.5 behind the Blue Jays now. The Brewers have also gained ground, moving to within 2.5. AL West - KC is a half game ahead of the White Sox with a 43-34 mark. Oakland has won three straight and has moved within 2.5 games. NL East - We are one in front of Montreal with our 41-34 record. The Cards are 2.5 back and the Mets have lost 4 straight to fall 4.5 behind. NL West - Both the Dodgers and Braves have won four straight. LA is 2.5 in front of Atlanta and Cincinnait.

09-12-2009, 01:14 PM	#271
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	One run losses - they are just haunting us. 1-0 in the opener at LA, this one took 11 innings. Viola is rumored to be crafting a voodoo doll in the form of our hitting coach. Romanick took the loss and he is 4-7 on the season. I'm going to give him a smaller role as I'm sick of seeing his name on the wrong side of the ledger. Another day, another one run loss with the losing pitcher coming out of the pen. 2-1, Pena with the loss this time. LA has great starting pitching, but we need something from this offense. We are leaving way too many men on base (19 hits, 1 run over two games). And three straight one run losses in LA, 4-3 this time despite two Barfield homers. One more game, this time they send out Valenzuela. Not the guy that I want to face when on a losing streak, but our guys show some pride in a 9-2 win. Gaetti had a pair of homers and five RBIs. San Diego is next. Their 42-40 mark would normally be competitive in the AL West but they are trailing three pretty decent teams this year. We finally win a one run game, 4-3 in 10 innings. Orosco blew the save in the 9th but gets the win in the 10th. The Padres pay us back the next day, 4-1 final. We could not get anything going against Mike Boddicker. Langston wins us the finale, 6-4, with Jorge Orta knocking in all six runs. The victory set a good tone for the trip up to San Francisco. 5-1 in the opener, with Barfield going yard again. He is up to 60 RBIs now. He homers again in the next game but we are blasted 10-4. Sixto Lezcano has homered in both games and Mickey Tettleton had four hits and 4 RBIs in this one. Gullickson gets his 8th win and Carter hits his 10th homer in the third game of the four game set. We won 7-5 on a pinch hit double by Burroughs in the top of the 9th. Lezcano again homered for the Giants. And we head into the All Star break on a two game winning streak thanks to a 3-1 win for Viola.

09-12-2009, 01:36 PM	#272
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	Here are your American League All Stars: AL Starters (in order of votes): 1B Greg Walker (Mil) - .314/12/51 w/10 steals 2B Paul Molitor (Tex) - .328/12/48 w/19 steals C Lance Parrish (Det) - .283/16/47. 3rd AS game, was reserve last year. 3B George Brett (KC) - .319/9/36. Four time AS starter, only missed in 1982 (went on to win batting title that year) LF Gary Ward (Min) - .336/10/41 SS Cal Ripken (Tex) - .326/11/57. Three time repeat AS starter. CF Fred Lynn (Bos) - .313/11/39. Fourth straight AS game, appears to have come back 100% from injury. RF Harold Baines (CHW) - .315/14/54. Third straight AS game, first as starter. AL Reserves 1B Ken Phelps (KC) - .284/20/50 1B Willie Upshaw (Cle) - .307/14/58 For some reason the AL went with a 20 man roster for the AS game? Huh??? AL Pitchers CL Keith Atherton (Det) - 2-3 3.19 ERA, 31 saves, 6 blown, 1 hold, 18:11 K/BB, .269 BAA, 1.36 WHIP Starter Mark Gubicza (Tor) - 16-3 2.63 ERA, 2 CG, 2 SO, 107:39 K/BB, .215 BAA, 1.07 WHIP. Starter Richard Dotson (CHW) - 13-3 2.27 ERA, 4 CG, 93:61 K/BB, .215 BAA, 1.18 WHIP. 2nd straight AS game. Starter Bob Knepper (KC) - 11-3 2.07 ERA, 4 CG, 89:41 K/BB, .228 BAA, 1.14 WHIP. 2nd AS team. Starter Jack Morris (Det) - 13-4 2.88 ERA, 3 CG, 1 SO, 93:50 K/BB, .233 BAA, 1.23 WHIP. 2nd AS team. Starter Len Barker (Cle) - 10-6 2.35 ERA, 5 CG, 1 SO, 119:33 K/BB, .206 BAA, 0.98 WHIP. MR Frank Dipino (Cal) - 2-0 1.65 ERA, 2 holds, 34:14 K/BB, .175 BAA, 0.94 WIHP MR Tom Neidenfuer (KC) - 5-1 1.72 ERA, 1 save, 3 blown, 8 holds, 53:13 K/BB, .212 BAA, 1.01 WHIP. Repeat AS selection. MR Tom Waddell (NYY) - 4-4 2.05 ERA, 3 blown, 4 holds, 34:25 K/BB, .198 BAA, 1.22 WHIP. MR Darrell Jackson (Min) - 7-2 2.61 ERA, 1 save, 1 blown, 6 holds, 54:30 K/BB, .245 BAA, 1.29 WHIP Wow, Gubicza has been awesome this year. This last draft was really deep in starting pitchers. He is only 22 with 100 potential, so he should only get better although it is hard to see his results improving from this half season. Knepper's first AS game was back in 1980 when he was pitching for the Giants in the NL. He has been both really good and really bad (17 losses in 1981 and 1982) in his career.

09-12-2009, 02:03 PM	#273
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	And the NL All Stars: NL Starters (in order of votes): 3B Len Matuszek (Cin) - .300/14/43 RF Leon Durham (StL) - .285/11/49. 3rd AS team, 2nd as starter. C Gary Carter (Mon) - .258/12/53. 2nd AS start. LF Tim Wallach (Mon) - .290/13/44 1B Don Mattingly (SF) - .303/12/33. Repeat selection, 1st year starter, has not played a single game at 1B this year. CF Sixto Lezcano (SF) - .286/15/39 SS Robin Yount (Chi) - .282/8/34 w/12 steals. Repeat starter, 3 time AS. At least has 25 games at the position ... 2B Glenn Hubbard (Atl) - .280/5/33 NL Reserves RF Jesse Barfield (Chi) - .287/17/61. 2nd AS game. 1B Alvin Davis (LA) - .264/14/42 3B Nick Esasky (Cin) - .276/11/48. Repeat AS selection. LF Jeffrey Leonard (StL) - .292/9/29 w/17 steals. Repeat AS selection. CF Dale Murphy (Atl) - .280/7/40 w/33 steals. 2nd AS team. C Chris Bando (Atl) - .242/11/33 NL Pitchers Starter Orel Hershiser (Atl) - 10-5 2.52 ERA, 98:24 K/BB, .208 BAA, 0.99 WHIP Starter Dwight Gooden (StL) - 11-3 2.40 ERA, 2 CG, 146:40 K/BB, .194 BAA, 1.02 WHIP Closer Ken Howell (StL) - 1-2 3.61 ERA, 27 saves, 3 blown, 37:7 K/BB, .276 BAA, 1.30 WHIP. Starter Bill Laskey (LA) - 10-2 2.15 ERA, 3 CG, 2 SO, 70:34 K/BB, .215 BAA, 1.05 WHIP. Starter Fernando Valenzuela (LA) - 9-6 2.17 ERA, 100:31 K/BB, .200 BAA, 0.98 WHIP. MR Bill Caudill (Chi) - 3-0 0.46 ERA, 3 saves, 8 holds, 33:10 K/BB, .165 BAA, 0.84 WHIP. MR Jeff Lahti (SD) - 4-1 1.86 ERA, 1 blown, 6 holds, 34;21 K/BB, .208 BAA, 1.10 WHIP. "MR" Don Robinson (Pit) - 8-5 2.43 ERA, 1 CG, 1 SO, 74:33 K/BB, .218 BAA, 1.10 WHIP. MR Steve Howe (LA) - 6-2 1.67 ERA, 27 saves, 5 blown, 1 hold, 39:16 K/BB, .234 BAA, 1.22 WHIP. 2nd AS appearance. I'm sure there is some reason that Durham was voted the starter over Barfield, but I have no idea what it could be. Horner's streak of 4 straight AS games comes to an end. No player has made the AS game every year since the start of the dynasty. Caudill has not gotten enough mention in this dynasty. He has been flat amazing this year. Robinson is clearly not a reliever; all 18 of his appearances this year have been starts. Similarly, Mattingly is not a 1B. I have no idea why stuff is getting slotted this way (see Hall playing despite me rooting him on bench) this year when I have not seen it in previous seasons. But it is annoying.

09-12-2009, 02:08 PM	#274
rjolley College Starter Join Date: Dec 2000 Location: Roseville, CA	What happened to Strawberry?

09-12-2009, 04:30 PM	#276
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	The Dodgers come to town and are scheduled to start 34 year old J.R. Richard. He has been stuck in the minors (along with his 14 million salary) all season long until today. Richard makes it 2/3 of an inning before having to leave with an injury and we tee off on the pen in an 8-3 victory. Langston jacked a three run homer to help his own cause. But All Star Bill Laskey does not leave with injury and he beats us 5-2. Alvin Davis hit two homers and drove in all five. Game 3 goes to us 2-1 behind a strong performance by Morgan. His only mistake was allowing Davis to hit a solo shot. But LA earns the split with a strong 8-2 win. Nine of those runs, including seven by LA, came in the 9th inning. Gullickson is growing to hate the bullpen, who have collectively done him zero favors this year. Viola starts off the San Diego series with a 5-2 win. Orosco gets his 20th save in that game. We bring up Mel Hall and sent Orta down to the minors, hoping that our manager is mature enough to handle our recommended platoon. Hall does not bring good vibes, as the offense is shut down in a 7-0 loss. The immortal Juan Eichelberger held us to three hits. Hall homers the following day in a 10-1 win to wrap up the series. The homestand continues against the Giants. We get a good 5-4 win (any one run win is good at this point), overcoming an early 3-0 hole. A Yount homer in the 7th was the gamewinner. Another one run win (7-6) the next day, as Barfield puts one over the fence for the first time since the break. Hall also had a three run homer in the win. The offense remembers that Viola is on the mound and, not surprisingly, only score one run in a 3-1 loss. We take 3 of 4 from the series when Hall and Barfield again homer in a 9-5 finale. Boston's Chili Davis has a 15 game hitting streak. He is having a really good year: .328/15/52 w/14 steals.

09-12-2009, 05:29 PM	#277
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	Off to Philadelphia to see if we can improve on our dismal showing last time. Witt gets us off to a fine start, pitching us to a 5-0 win. Hall had a homer and 2 RBIs. He has hits in all six games since being called up and has homered in four of those games. We add a 6-5 win the next evening, with the game running 11 innings. Oberkfell had four RBIs in the win and we scored two each in the 8th and 9th to force the extra innings. The Phillies are dying for a closer. Gullickson wins his 10th, pushing us to a 57-43 mark after 100 games. PSPN shows a graphic of the home run leaders. 29 Tom Brunansky (Sea) 26 Ken Phelps (KC) 21 Darryl Strawberry (Mil) 21 Dwayne Murphy (Oak) 20 Ron Kittle (KC) Barfield and Alvin Davis are tied for the NL lead with 19. Former Cub Von Hayes is hitting .246/10/48 for the Yankees this year. He recently had a four hit game against the Rangers.

09-12-2009, 05:39 PM	#278
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	The road trip continues in New York, where the Mets have falled 5.5 games back. We extend our winning streak to five games with a 10-3 victory. Viola is stunned by the offensive outburst, as he normally does not get that many runs in a month. Boggs, Smalley, and Wynegar each had three hits. Smalley is now up to .278 on the year. Win #6 follows, a 3-1 decision that moves Caudill to 5-0 on the year. Gaetti had a two run single in the 9th, when we scored all of our runs. We split a double header on the 29th, losing the nightcap (in 11 innings) to break our winning streak at 7. With August upon us, it is time to look again at the division races. AL East - The Tigers have taken control, running their record to twenty above .500. Milwaukee is hanging with them, just two back, but the Blue Jays are now 5.5 off the pace. AL West - The White Sox have reeled off eight straight wins and now lead the division by two games with a 61-43 mark. KC, who has lost three in a row, is two games back. Oakland has stayed in contention with their own five game winning streak but remain five back. NL East - The Expos have won six in a row to stay right with us. At 60-44, we enjoy a two game lead. St. Louis and New York are fading fast, sitting 7 and 7.5 games back, respectively. NL West - The Dodgers 60-46 mark is 2.5 better than San Diego, although the Padres are the hottest team in the division. Cincinnati is four back and the Reds 4.5.

09-12-2009, 05:58 PM	#279
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	More notes from our division: the Pirates have lost 10 straight and the Phillies 6 straight. Philadelphia is now 20 games back, which was familiar territory for them last season. The Phillies are not pleased by my mocking and come into Wrigley to give us a one run loss, 6-5. In TWENTY innings. Pena's arm basically fell off at the end, as he finally surrendered a run after 5.1 innings. It was 2-2 after 9 and Philly scored two in the top of the 10th. We answered with two in the bottom of the inning but wasted a great chance to win the game with 1st and 3rd, no outs and the manager left Boyd in to hit. He drove in the run with a groundout, but the next two batters made outs. The Phillies scored one in the top of the 15th and we answered but could not win it because Oberkfell got thrown out at home. God awful loss, and Montreal makes up a game to cut the lead to one. Viola wins his tenth in a 3-1 win the next afternoon. Brutal quick turnaround, but afternoon games is how we roll at Wrigley. We pick up the final game of the series with a 6-5 win. Orosco blows the save but gets the win in the bottom of the 9th on a Carter hit. This sets up a big series between us and the Expos. The division lead is two. Both teams have been getting good efforts over the last month. I'm sure that the Expos feel that they need to win this year after really not having a shot last year with the second best record in the NL. We win a really tough 2-1 game to start the series, with Witt getting the decision over Sanderson. Barfield knocked in both runs with a homer. Same type of game the following day, and again we win a one run game. 1-0 this time in 13 innings. Carter again had the game winning RBI. But we can't put them behind the eight ball because Gullickson pitched a clunker against his old team, disappointing the Bleacher Bums in a 9-1 loss. Parrish and Valentine homered for the Expos. We bomb them in the fourth game of the series, 10-4, to send them home trailing by four games. Burroughs was 4-4 with a homer.

09-13-2009, 09:12 AM	#280
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	The Mets come visiting down 10 games and basically need to win the series to even bother thinking about 1984 the rest of the way. But they do not get off to a good start, losing 11-1 in the opener. Langston hit his 2nd homer of the year in this one and Boggs went 5-5 with a homer and 4 RBIs. Wade is hitting .326 now and it feels like just a matter of time before he wins a batting title. Langston went the distance in this one, giving up just three hits and three walks. He is among the league leaders in walks; hopefully he can improve on this in future seasons. We have more of the same for the Mets the next day, pounding them 10-1. Barfield hits his 21st homer on the season and adds three RBIs. The Mets salvage some pride with a 9-2 win to end our homestand. Going back to the topic of batting titles, it looks like the Rangers' Tony Gwynn is going to put up numbers that have not been seen in our league. He is hitting .348 right now. Over the last two weeks he has also hit four homers, which is particularly noteworthy since he only has five on the year. Despite the Rangers having Gwynn, Ripken, and Molitor they still stink. Their record on the year is 48-63. Witt has climbed into the top 10 in WHIP, checking in at #7 with a 1.09. The last two years he finished with 1.27 and 1.28, so this would be quite an improvement for him if he can sustain it. He has won his last five outings, going 7+ innings in each and never allowing more than one run. This has brought his ERA down from 3.58 to 2.83, a huge move in the second half of a year. Darrell Porter of Kansas City is battling a wrist injury and will miss three weeks. There have been a lot of catcher injuries this year. I noticed this earlier when I was looking for someone to replace Scioscia. Thank goodness for Wynegar; the difference between him and Slaught is night and day. Our next series is @ Montreal, and they will be without starter Charlie Lea. He has a shoulder injury and won't be back until mid-September.

09-13-2009, 09:46 AM	#281
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	Montreal remains four games back in the standings and hosts us for four games. Obviously this has potential to be a very big series, even if it is only early August. Our strong pitching continues in the opener as we post a 5-2 victory. Gullickson went 8 to pick up his 11th win on the year. We caught a break getting the back end of their rotation to start this series. David Palmer is their 5th starter and Candiotti is substituting for the injured Lea. But Candiotti does his job, beating us 5-2 in the second game to set up their studs for the final two games. We had 12 hits in this one but just did not get clutch hits. Gary Carter had two RBIs for Montreal, bringing his total to 70 on the year. I'm guessing he wins another Silver Slugger. We win the third game 3-2 with Langston getting the decision over Craig McMurtry. Barfield hit the tie-breaking homer in the top of the 6th and our bullpen gave us three scoreless innings to take home the win. Montreal sends Sanderson to the mound to take on Witt in the finale and the Expos end up with a 3-1 win to split the series. This one went 11 innings and ended when Brian Dayett hit a walkoff two run homer. Darn, missed an opportunity in that one to put them in a serious hole. But with only four hits over 11 innings we got what we deserved. Next stop, Houston. The Astros have seen their season go to the dogs, as their record has fallen to 51-68. We win the opener 7-3, with Barfield going deep in the Astrodome. Morgan got the win in this one, going all 9 innings but this was not a virtuoso performance. His ERA went down, but still sits at 4.56 and a 9-9 record is certainly not just a by-product of some poor run support. If we open up a lead this month I'm hoping to audition Romanick for the 5th starter job next month. Gullickson shuts down the Astros for 8 innings before yielding to Orosco for his 30th save. 3-0 final. I notice that Tom Herr is in the Houston lineup. Apparently he was traded from the Cardinals for Joe Sambito at the trade deadline. I wish PSPN published all the trades in their headlines, as this was substantially bigger than the ones that were listed. This makes me wonder what other stuff goes on at the deadline that I miss because I don't check the transactions page but instead rely on the PSPN newsfeed. We finish off Houston with a 5-4 victory made more interesting by our closer in the 9th. It is nice to see our team actually sweep a series, especially on the road. The win moves us 5.5 in front of Montreal. Division updates: AL East: Detroit is 70-51 and up 3.5 on Toronto. The Brewers are going to have to pick it up if they want to play postseason baseball; they are 5 back. AL West: Kansas City has won four in a row, upping their record to 70-50, to take a one game lead on the White Sox. Oakland is struggling to stay relevant (winning 4 in a row) at 7 games out. NL East: Our 72-49 record is now the best in baseball. Montreal is 5.5 back and the Cards have sunk to 9 out. I think you can stick a fork in St. Louis. NL West: Good three team race, with San Diego (go figure) up one on LA thanks to their 69-53 record. The third team, Atlanta, is three games back. The Reds have sunk to 61-61 and are 8 back. They have underachieved this year, in my opinion. They desperately need another bat in that lineup.

09-13-2009, 10:25 AM	#282
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	Time to take another look at contracts and see how I want to juggle the money. Right now we have $7,563,141 left that we can use to extend contracts. 1. Yount. He is still looking for an 8 figure contract. I'm saving my exemption for Barfield, with the assumption I'm going to need it on him next year. I do a quick check on Barfield now to verify that and he is willing to give me one year at 7.6 million. Just out of reach for what we could do, so it might as well be 25 million. Anyway, even if I could I don't think I would use the exemption on Yount. His performance this year has not approached last season. .273/11/45 w/16 steals is pretty good for a middle infielder but honestly it is not that much better than Smalley despite the slow start (.269/6/31 w/0 steals). Certainly not exemption-better. 2. Hall has had a really poor year at exactly the wrong time. His numbers are .222/8/34 w/22 steals over about 300 at-bats. His contract demands are down about 10% from earlier, as he is now looking for something in the 5.5 million range, depending on the length of the deal. Obviously that would severely hinder me from working with other players. I'm fine with that if I view him as a long-term piece. 3. Vande Berg is still looking for his 1.5 million, up from 677K. And he deserves it. He has not been as wildly dominant this year as he was in the past (or as Caudill has been this year) but he is 26 and is a pretty good pitcher with lots of room for development. I'm fine having him around for the next several seasons. We offer him 4 more years at $1,520,651 and he accepts. That puts us $6,042,490 left to spend. 4. Templeton is a pretty finished product at 28 years of age. He is a .250 hitter who plays pretty good defense at SS/3B and can spell someone almost anywhere else on the field. He has enough speed to get you 20 steals if he is playing every day. At best, his OBP is going to be in the .340 range, which is not good enough for the top of the order. This is not a guy I want batting lead off. And he wants about 3 million a year. I've got Samuel in the pipeline who offers better speed and potential to be more than Gary is at this point in his career. And I'm hoping that Smalley and Gaetti prove to be better starting options. So it is good-bye to Gary Templeton, my whipping for for 1981-1982 before I found a role for him that was suitable (bench player). 5. Kurt Kepshire, our 5th round pick from last year, looks like a guy that I might want to keep around for awhile. I don't see him as a front-of-the-rotation starter, but there is an outside chance he could grow into that. We've seen guys like Martinez and Black leave over the last year and Lamp will be going after this year so it makes some sense to invest in guys like this just to keep my options open. He wants a pretty good jump (290K to 1.1 million) but I'll give it to him if there are not much better options available for guys with 2 years on their deals. Of course, this would mean that Hall is gone ... 6. Lamp. I just wrote him off in the last paragraph. I regret not trying to trade him at the deadline this year, as he has more or less rotted in our minors in 1984. Not very good treatment for a guy who was 27-24 with a 2.96 ERA for us, had a pair of All Star appearances, and was a rock in the pen for all of 1982. 7. Jay Pettibone has never made it above AA. His 55 potential is not going to entice me to keep a 27 year old with minimal skills. Even if he is dirt cheap to extend (175K), I've got other guys in the minors who more or less fit the same profile. 8. "Oil Can" Boyd - I forgot that I did not trade him away earlier. He has been the last man in my major league bullpen and has had a terrible season. Still, he has morphed into a guy that belongs on a big league roster. My problem is that he wants 2 million a year and is he 1 million a year better than Kepshire? It is close. I'm going to have to look at the guys who are two years out and base the decision on that. I want one of those two back, no doubt in my mind. 9. Morgan - he is two years out, but is willing to extend for around 2.6 million. He is better than Boyd now with more potential. So Boyd is off my list, and it is now a Morgan vs Kepshire decision. I'll reward performance (Morgan) over potential if the dollars are there. Lets keep looking ... 10. Caudill - he is already making 3 million and will take an extension for 3.8 million. Hmm, do I want to do it now and eat up this years budget? I'm guessing his demands do not go up a ton between now and next season. 11. Wynegar - he is willing to go three years at 932K, which I'm all over. The lack of a backup catcher almost certainly cost us a few games earlier this year. Locking it up at this price is fine by me. It is locked at 932,217, leaving us with $5,110,273. Good-bye, Mel Hall. Other players to be determined a little later in the season.

09-18-2009, 09:56 AM	#283
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	Time to get this going again. We head to Cincinnati to play the Reds, our foe in the NLCS last season. I do not expect them to repeat; their .500 record is not going to get the job done in a tougher NL West. Charlie Liebrandt has not been the same pitcher he was last year, but try telling that to our hitters after they were on the wrong end of a 3-0 shutout. Boggs had two hits, bringing his average up to .327. He is also leading the majors in hits with 159. We do not respond the following day either, falling 1-0. Come on, guys! Back to back shutouts is embarrassing. Soto over Witt in the pitchers duel. And we make it three straight shutouts, losing 1-0 on the following day. What a train wreck of a series. The last one went 10 innings and we only had two hits. Caudill took his first loss on the year. Montreal failed to capitalize, as they also lost three straight games in San Diego. So it is back to Wrigley, where we have a pre-game meeting before taking on the Astros. The message is to relax at the plate; the Astros suck (51-74) so they represent a nice slump-buster for us. Sort of, as we win but the final of 2-1 does not suggest a hitting resurgence. Smalley hit his 7th homer of the year. We also get word that Mike Scioscia is ready to come off the 60 day DL. Good news, as Wynegar has been struggling as of late. We send Samuel back down to AAA Iowa. The team celebrate's Scioscia's return with a 9-2 pounding of Houston, led by two Barfield homers. We win the finale 5-4, thanks to another Barfield bomb. 26 on the year now. Scioscia knocked in the game winner in the 11th with a triple. Montreal is now 7.5 back and I'm just about prepared to call "game" on their season.

09-18-2009, 10:37 AM	#285
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	Off to the "Launching Pad" in Atlanta, and we live up to the spirit of the ballpark in a 10-5 opening win. Hall gets his 10th homer on the year and Boggs goes 4-6 with two RBIs. He is in a dogfight with Rickey Henderson and Harold Baines for the major lead lead in hits, although he has a comfortable lead in the NL. Atlanta finally breaks through for a win against us, downing us 4-2 to end the month of August. Gullickson dominates them the next evening, leading us to a 2-0 win over Orel Hershiser. But we end up with a split after losing 3-2 in the finale. It should be no surprise to learn that Viola did not get much run support. I move up a few players from the minors as part of the September call-ups and decide that now is a good time to get a look at what Romanick can do in a starting role. Morgan is 9-10 with a 4.60 ERA and is the obvious choice to move to a bullpen role. On to Philadelphia, where the Phillies are hoping to avoid a 100 loss season (52-84). We push them in that direction with a 1-0 win in the opener. Langston was terrific, allowing just one hit over six innings (he did walk 3). We pick up another 1-0 win the next night, and while I'm happy to get the wins I think we should hit just a bit better than this against their lousy collection of starters. We do just that in Romanick's first start, surging to a 12-4 win. Gary Templeton, of all people, put two balls over the wall. He must be showcasing himself for next year's team. Ditto Mel Hall, who was 3-6 with a pair of RBIs and his 29th steal. So we head to Montreal for one game. Given that we are twelve in front of the Expos there is not much drama to be found here. That does not stop Scott Sanderson from just dominating our hitters in a 6-0 ballgame. His complete game brings his mark to 14-6 with a 2.23 ERA in his effort to defend his Cy Young award. On to New York, where the Mets are running out the string on another uninspiring season. We smash them 11-3 in the first game, with Barfield hitting his 32nd on the year. Viola fainted in the sixth, realizing how many runs the team had scored for him. The offense gave Langston two, which is one more than he needed in a 2-0 win. Smalley knocked in both runs. Orosco walked the bases full in the 9th before closing out his mess for his 38th save. We polish off the Mets 9-2 in the last game of the series. We have really had our way with the weak sisters of the NL over the past two months. Witt went the distance to earn his 15th win, tied for team high with Gullickson.

09-18-2009, 10:44 AM	#286
hoopsguy General Manager Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Chicago	Steve Sax of the Angels is up to a 20 game hitting streak ... very close to the best in league history. That seems kind of odd, given that he is only hitting .255 this year. That is one point above his career average. George Brett is done for the year with a fibula injury. Ugh - what a tough blow for KC, who is in the middle of a dogfight in their divisional race. More on that in a moment ... So there are two teams that are 30 games over .500. The Cubs are one of them, thanks to a torrid two month stretch. The AL standard bearer, at 87-56, is the Detroit Tigers. They have an identical record to the Cubs and sit 7.5 in front of Toronto. Better luck next year, Toronto and Milwaukee. The Tigers just are not going to be caught this year. In the AL West the White Sox have won 6 straight while the Royals have lost five straight since Brett went on the DL to more or less end that division race. The Sox are now up 7.5 games and seem like a lock to make their first playoff appearance. At 84-58, their magic number is 13. The NL West is down to a two team race. The Dodgers, at 84-60, have built a two game cushion on the San Diego Padres. The Braves have lost five straight to fall out of contention.