9
Number of games the Cubs won during Alfonso Soriano's 14-game stay on the Disabled List

7
Runs per game scored by the Cubs during Soriano's absence

5.2
Runs per game scored by the Cubs before Soriano's absence

2
Number of home runs hit by Alfonso Soriano in 2008

1
Number of home runs hit by Cub leftfielders not named Alfonso Soriano in 2008

30
Number of bases Alfonso Soriano says he is capable of stealing by the end of the season

23
Number of bases Alfonso Soriano will steal in 2008 at his current pace, assuming he plays each of the remaining 137 games

001
Difference so far this season between the cumulative OPS generated by Cub leadoff men (538) and the Cubs' ninth-place hitters (537)

0
Likelihood that Matt Murton will be in the Cub dugout Thursday afternoon instead of on his way back to the Pacific Coast League

On a night when Ben Sheets, the best pitcher on the Cubs' chief NL Central rival, struggles to get through five innings, walks a career-high seven hitters, and allows more runs than he has in all of his other starts this season combined, it looks like the Cubs are going to fall to the Brewers.

Jason Marquis seemed to have little command of his pitches tonight, which simply set the stage for relievers Hart and Wuertz, who had no more command than the starter.

What a rough night for James Van Der Beek to sing "Take Me Out To The Ballgame."

— Cubs.com reports that "(Alfonso) Soriano appeared to pass all tests during a strenuous workout on Sunday." Soriano is eligible to come off the Disabled List on Thursday, in time for the conclusion of this week's three-game series against the Brewers at Wrigley.

The Cubs have played 13 games since Soriano went on the DL, winning nine and losing four.



— Former Cub manager Lee Elia is trying to capitalize on the 25th anniversary of his famous Wrigley Field lockerroom rant (see above) to the benefit of Chicago Baseball Cancer Charities. You can read about the commemorative autographed baseball and accompanying audio chip being offered by a Chicago sports memorabilia company here. You can also learn, as I did, that Elia had a longstanding animus for Chicago sportscaster Les Grobstein, who taped Elia's original rant, thus ensuring its place in baseball lore for time immemorial.

— Chris Jaffe of The Hardball Times identifies ten Major League teams which "keep hiring the same sort of skipper again and again." Can you guess which franchise's inability to "find good, new managers" causes Jaffe to characterize it as a "compost heap"?

If you can't, you're reading the wrong blog.

— A Paul Reuschel sighting: In "The All-Time Best Whatever," (subscription required), Bill James lists the three best bullpens of the '70s, based on the James-invented statistic, Win Shares.

Tied for first with the 1970 Minnesota Twins trio of Ron Perranoski, Stan Williams, and Tom Hall is the '70 Cubs threesome of Bruce Sutter, Willie Hernandez and Reuschel the Lesser. The same article identifies the '70 and '71 Cubs starting staffs--Jenkins, Hands, Holtzman, Pappas, et al--as the two best overall rotations of the decade.

Reading this article, it's pretty easy to understand how the Cubs won all those championships in the 1970s.

— I haven't even mentioned yet that Geovany Soto will begin the week having whiffed in eight consecutive plate appearances. Having seen the likes of Chris Cannizzaro, George Mitterwald, Dave Rader, and Barry Foote hold down the catcher's position for the Cubs in my lifetime, I think Geo will have to strike out a whole bunch more before I even take serious notice.

Traveling to Washington, D.C. this weekend to face what is arguably the worst team in the National League, if not in all of MLB, the Cubs would figure to be good to take two or three games.

But as with so many other things surrounding the Cubs, my sense of history leads me to a negative thought, that the team has traditionally struggled to beat the other NL clubs they "should" beat.

The unvarnished truth?

Here's how our heroes have fared against the NL's worst teams over each of the past ten seasons. The last column indicates whether the Cubs beat the league's weak sister more times (+) or fewer times (-) than might have been expected, given how that team played against the rest of baseball.

Yr.	Worst NL Team	Overall Record	Record vs. Cubs	Record vs. Others	Cubs + or -
'07	PITT	68-94 (.420)	7-8 (.467)	61-86 (.415)	-
'06	PITT	67-95 (.414)	9-6 (.600)	58-89 (.395)	-
'05	PITT/COL	67-95 (.414)	8-15 (.348)*	126-175 (.419)*	+
'04	ARIZ	51-111 (.315)	4-2 (.667)	47-109 (.301)	-
'03	SD	64-98 (.395)	2-4 (.333)	62-94 (.397)	+
'02	MILW	56-106 (.346)	10-7 (.588)	46-99 (.317)	-
'01	PITT	62-100 (.383)	6-10 (.375)	56-90 (.384)	+
'00	PHIL	65-97 (.401)	3-6 (.333)	62-91 (.405)	+
'99	FLA	64-98 (.395)	3-6 (.333)	61-92 (.399)	+
'98	FLA	54-108 (.333)	2-7 (.222)	52-101 (.340)	+
*Combined Pittsburgh & Colorado records. (They were tied with NL's worst record.)

All in all, that looks like some decent bottom-feeding: six seasons when the Cubs took advantage of the league's weakest team, four when they came up short. (For some reason, I can actually recall how frustrating some of those games with the Diamondbacks were in '04.)

Time to beat up on the Nats.

As shared with the listening public on Thursday's Mike Murphy Show on WSCR Radio, Ozzie's reasons for hating The Friendly Confines:

• Nowhere around the park for Ozzie to park his car.
• Cramped, crummy clubhouse.
• Clubhouse is a long walk from anywhere else a manager might need to go before a game.
• Rats.
• Lousy playing surface (at least until it was fixed, Ozzie points out, by an employee of the Chicago White Sox).
• Scoreboard stinks.

Also, Ozzie said that while he has respect and affection for many in the Cubs organization, including Cubs GM Jim Hendry, he couldn't see himself ever managing the Cubs, regardless of who asked and how much they wanted to pay him.

Somehow, I don't see anyone testing that conviction.

Since the season began, I've been writing a "Cubs Hits Of The Week" piece each Monday at The Cub Reporter, based on the Win Probability Added resulting from each Cub at-bat during the preceding week.

Last week was interesting because as well as the Cubs played (five wins in six starts between Monday, 4/14, and Sunday, 4/20), there weren't many dramatic, game-altering, high-WPA hits. That's what you get for jumping to early leads then thumping opponents into submission.

Wednesday night's game at Colorado, won 7-6 in thrilling, 10-inning fashion by the Cubs, was another matter entirely. Between the Cubs and the Rockies, from just the sixth inning on, there were four hits with higher WPAs than anything the Cubs delivered all of last week.

(Again, that's not to suggest the Cubs weren't hitting last week. They did, after all, put together back-to-back 13-run games against Pittsburgh after putting 12 runs on the board last Wednesday against the Reds. The point is that the games were mostly one-sided Cub victories, which depressed the WPA of any individual Cub hit.)

As for Wednesday night's win, Aramis Ramirez's ninth-inning homer to put the Cubs up, 6-5, registered a game-high WPA of .638. The fact that Kerry Wood couldn't protect that one-run lead in the last of the ninth simply opened the door for Ryan Theriot's game-winning--and .351 WPA-registering--tenth-inning single.

A fine win and one that was rich in big hits, which was a bonus: those 12-3, 13-1, and 13-6 victories get to be SO tedious.

Nice piece here on New Yorkers who traveled west to take in the Cubs and Mets Tuesday afternoon at Wrigley, then topped off the day by watching the Yankees and White Sox at U.S. Cellular.

32
Combined number of runs by which the Cubs won the last four games of their 7-1 homestand (13-1 and 13-6 vs. the Pirates; 7-1 and 8-1 vs. the Mets).

78
Number of years since the Cubs last won four games in a row by at least 6 runs each.

33
Number of years since the Cubs last went 14-6 in the season's first 20 games.

20
Number of games below .500 the '75 Cubs played following their 14-6 start (finishing 75-87, 5th in the NL East, 17 1/2 games behind the Pirates).

9
Number of days until Alfonso Soriano's expected return to the Cub lineup.

6
Number of games Soriano has missed since straining his right calf muscle.

4
Number of hits by Cub leadoff men since Soriano went on DL (4-for-26, .154).

7
Number of consecutive times Kosuke Fukudome has reached base (5 hits and 2 walks).

0
Number of times Fukudome has hit leadoff this season.

9,999
Number of games the Cubs have won since the inception of the franchise. (Only the New York/San Francisco Giants have won more.)

139
Cubs' magic number to clinch NL Central.

Cubs 7, Mets 1

Winner: Zambrano (7 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 4 K, 2 BB), 3-1
Loser: Maine (6 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 6 K, 2 BB), 1-2

Turning point: Aramis Ramirez's two-run homer in the fourth inning gave the Cubs a 2-0 lead they never gave up, but Jose Reyes's error on a ground ball hit by Derrek Lee, leading off the last of the eighth inning, was also critical. It opened the door to a 5-run Cubs rally—2-run single by Cedeno, 3-run bomb by Pie—that turned a tense, one-run game into a laugher of sorts. Let's call it a Laugher Lite.

Backstory: Zambrano's strong seven-inning effort, in which his newfound control was again in evidence, gave all but Marmol and Wood in the Cubs bullpen a much needed night off. And as much fun as it is to see the Cubs bludgeon the Pittsburgh Pirates, there is something uniquely satisfying about seeing them beat a first-rate team, especially when that team is wearing New York Mets colors. Zambrano now passes the baton to Ted Lilly, who has been miserable in 2008, but with a good effort in his Tuesday afternoon start against the Mets' Nelson Figueroa, could help the Cubs lock down a 7-1 homestand.

Based on a tip from Inside The Ivy, The Cub Reporter has posted the news that Matt Murton is on his way to Chicago, presumably to replace Eric Patterson, who would be sent to Triple-A Iowa, from whence he came earlier this week.

Patterson was hitless in four at-bats in today's 3-2 victory over the Pirates and struck out in three of his five PA's since the recall.

---

Going into Friday's game with the Pirates, here is the Cubs' offensive production by batting order position (stats for each position are AVG/OBP/SLG/OPS):

1. Soriano (11 games), Fontenot (2), Theriot (2) -- .194/.237/.306/543
2. Johnson 6 G, Theriot 5 G, Soriano 2 G -- .225/.267/.352/619
3. Lee (15) -- .379/.432/.742/1174
4. Ramirez (15) -- .224/.352/.431/783
5. Fukudome (13) -- .300/.408/.417/825
6. DeRosa (13), Soto (2) -- .321/.449/.643/1092
7. Sot0 (9), Theriot (3) -- .339/.415/.482/897
8. Pie (6), Theriot (3), Blanco (3) -- .175/.238/.193/431
9. Lilly (4), Zambrano (4), Dempster (3) -- .245/.310/.321/631

The Tribune is reporting that Reed Johnson, who had a career-high four hits on Thursday, two more hits on Friday, and is now hitting .375, will get a shot at the leadoff spot on Saturday, when the Cubs go up against Pittsburgh lefty Tom Gorzelanny.

Stats: Bill James Online

I missed Adam Dunn's long home run Wednesday night and the ensuing reaction from dozens of Cubs fans, who took balls they had apparently corralled during batting practice and threw them onto the field. Veteran Reds broadcaster Marty Brennaman was there and found the whole thing rather quaint:

"This is the kind of thing quite honestly...that makes you want to see the Chicago Cubs team lose. Among all baseball fans--and I can't attest to the Yankees or the Red Sox because we don't see them with any degree of regularity--but far and away the most obnoxious fans in baseball...are those who follow this team right here...You simply root against them. I’ve said all winter, they talk about this team winning the division and my comment is, they won’t win it because at the end of the day, they’re still the Chicago Cubs and they will figure out a way to screw this whole thing up."

I happen to agree that Cub fans are obnoxious, particularly the bleacherites, especially at a night game, when the drinking has gone on for way too long.

But how this feeds Marty's certainty that the Cubs will "screw up" their shot at winning the NL Central--a division which the Cubs managed to win just last season, Mr. Hall of Fame Announcer--I'm not at all clear.

(Longtime Cubs fans will recall that Marty's kid, Thom, called Cubs games in the early '90s, departing for the Fox Network in '94. It always struck me that whenever the subject of Lou Piniella would come up, Brennaman would refer to him--sarcastically, it seemed--as "Uncle Lou." Though I never heard any explanation, I assumed there was bad blood between Piniella and Thom's daddy. I can't help but think that bad blood or some lingering raw feelings between young Brennaman and the Cubs organization is behind Marty's outburst here.)

For now at least, there's a link to the audio clip on this page here. The other voice you'll hear belongs to former Major League reliever and current imbecile Jeff Brantley.

---

Ted Lilly pitched Thursday like he's interested in winning the #5 starter's job, i.e., he pitched like hell, allowing 6 hits, 3 walks, and 5 earned runs in 6 innings. The Cubs were thumped 9-2. Rich Hill, whose own poor performance already earned him the demotion to #5 man, goes Friday against the Pirates.

Some starter other other than Carlos Zambrano and Ryan Dempster needs to begin giving the Cubs some quality innings, and I'll be the first to admit that from the time Dempster was first mentioned as a candidate to join the starting rotation this winter, I never, ever thought I would be saying anything like that.

Having dispatched Aaron Harang and Josh Fogg, the Cubs will try to defeat Reds phenom Edinson Volquez Thursday afternoon at Wrigley Field and complete the sweep of Cincinnati.

Eric Patterson made his 2008 debut in Wednesday night's win and struck out, which he did a lot this year in Iowa (12 K in 36 AB). Patterson has been among the most highly regard Cubs position prospects (Baseball Prospectus 2008: "...sounder fundamental player (than brother Corey) with a very good plate approach and a high baseball IQ..."), but I have this nagging feeling that he is simply going to wind up joining Corey and Felix Pie in the List Of Guys Who We Thought Were Really Going To Be Something But Turned Out To Be Nothing Much.

Mark DeRosa looked utterly helpless last night running after a wind-blown fly ball, and Patterson, an infielder by trade, is hardly accomplished in the outfield. All in all, I wish the Cubs had brought up Matt Murton.

I was going to post over the lunch hour in reaction to the results of Alfonso Soriano's MRI and the Cubs' announced roster move--recall of Matt Murton? Eric Patterson?--assuming Soriano would be placed on the DL. But neither the MRI results nor the roster move have been announced yet. So there.

In the meantime, I will take advantage of this opportunity to celebrate something I saw last night which I deem fully worthy of celebration:

Aramis Ramirez driving the ball deep to left field and hustling out of the batter's box.

Maybe it's because he was positive the ball wouldn't clear the left field wall. Maybe he was trying to look good in front of his former manager. Whatever the reason, it was gratifying to see.

As long as it doesn't cause him to pull a calf muscle.

Update: Soriano goes on the 15-day DL, and Eric Patterson is your newest Chicago Cub. He's not starting tonight, however, as DeRosa continues in left field, and Mike Fontenot holds down second and bats leadoff.

Cub players, as quoted by Paul Sullivan in the Tribune, wish to absolve Dusty Baker of:

1. Overusing, and thus causing the arm problems suffered by, Kerry Wood and Mark Prior
2. Facilitating the Kent Mercker/Steve Stone kerfuffle
3. Responsibility for the Cubs' collapse in 2004
4. Enabling Carlos Zambrano's temper tantrums and generally juvenile behavior
5. Preventing Ryan Theriot's development by playing him behind Neifi Perez
6. Not being Lou Piniella

That's a lot to not be reponsible for. Good thing we got that cleared up.

It was frustrating to see the Cubs lose the first two in Philadelphia and when they went down 1-0 on Sunday, pessimist that I am, I figured they would be swept in Philly, leaving them 6-6 for the year, but just 1-5 against good teams (Milwaukee and the Phillies) and 5-1 against not-so-good teams (Houston and Pittsburgh).

Now we can all agree that 4-2 is a good road trip, especially when three of the games are against a team, who, even without NL MVP Jimmy Rollins on the field, puts together quite a formidable lineup.

The Cubs' starting pitching obviously has to stabilize. Jason Marquis was one big hit from getting knocked out of Sunday's game much earlier than his eventual departure (5 IP, 2 runs). In comparison to Ted Lilly's third straight awful outing on Saturday night (4 1/3 IP, 5 runs), Marquis' effort was not so bad.

Rich Hill was officially banished to the bullpen for the Philadelphia series, though he never pitched in that role, and Sean Marshall, the obvious replacement if Hill were to lose his starting spot, was called upon both Friday and Sunday and looked good.

Marshall has appeared three times since his recall from Iowa and has not been scored upon. But no matter how well Marshall pitches, he is not going to be able to replace the two most struggling pitchers in the rotation, Hill and Lilly.

Maybe we're going to need all of that supposed pitching depth (Marshall, Jon Lieber, Sean Gallagher, etc.) after all.

Update: Gordon Wittenmyer reports that for now, Hill will become the nominal fifth starter and the first four starters will be kept on rotation with the fifth spot being skipped as the schedule dictates.

What you are about to read is true:

• As I write this, the National League's highest batting average (.538) belongs to Jason Kendall.

• Corey Patterson, among the last free agents to find a home this past off-season, is tied for second in the NL with four home runs.

• Dusty Baker is thinking about how he might contribute to the long-term health of his young pitching phenoms.

• Those hateful St. Louis Cardinals, who were finally going to get their due this year and maybe just maybe experience life near the bottom of the NL Central, are sitting on top of it. And Kyle Lohse, who shared membership with Corey Patterson in the Please Won't Somebody Sign Me? Club this winter and early spring, didn't allow a run in his first 12 innings in Cardinal colors.
  

• The Miguel Cabrera-enhanced Tigers, who were going to slug it out with the Indians for the AL Central title, inflict terror on the rest of the American League, and put 1,000 runs on the board this season, are last in the AL in run-scoring, which has a lot to do with the fact that they also have the worst record in Major League Baseball.

• Carlos Zambrano, who was the losing pitcher in the Cubs' 5-3 defeat to the Phillies Friday night, has simply stopped walking people. After walking more men than any other NL pitcher in each of the last two seasons, Z has passed just two hitters in 19 2/3 IP this season. At that rate, assuming he pitches the same number of innings this season as he did in '07, he'll walk 22 men. Last year, he walked 101.

• Former Cub Cliff Floyd, who began life as a Tampa Bay Ray by collecting five hits in his first 15 at-bats including two home runs, has landed on the Disabled List.

If you've followed Cliff Floyd's career, that last item is probably not hard for you to believe.

Whatever.

This is a much less poignant post than it would have been if the Cubs hadn't finally defeated the Pirates, 6-4, in tonight's 15-inning game, and if the subject of Ron Santo's commentary, Felix Pie, hadn't eventually driven in the decisive runs, but so it goes.

From the top of the 11th inning, as the Pirates' Tyler Yates completed an intentional pass to Alfonso Soriano:

HUGHES: ...so Soriano walks and that will bring up Felix Pie.

SANTO: (UNDER HIS BREATH) Oh, boy...

Here is cinematic confirmation that Carlos Zambrano can throw hard and act pretty well, and that HBP's can be terribly funny as long as you're not the guy getting drilled.

Since I last posted, the Cubs have won three games in a row and improved their record to better than .500 for the first time this season; Kerry Wood picked up his second and third saves of the season; and Kosuke Fukudome is well on his way to earning a statue of his very own.

Monday's game, in which Ted Lilly couldn't stick around long enough to earn his first win of the season despite the fact that the Cubs had staked him to an early 7-0 lead, was damned ugly in just about every way a 12-inning victory can be.

What made it all the more challenging was the fact that Lou Piniella had committed to giving Wood and his right arm the day off. That forced Jon Lieber to pitch three innings of relief--it's not often a long relief assignment begins in the ninth inning--but Lieber came through with three scoreless innings. The Cubs then pushed across the winning runs in the top of the 12th, which meant Lieber collected the win and Carlos Marmol, the fill-in closer on this day, picked up his first save.

Deserving ends for Lieber and Marmol, I would say, but it will be nice to know Wood is available for duty once again on Wednesday night, when the Cubs and Pirates resume their three-game series.

---

Carlos Zambrano, who had a 5.77 ERA with 25 K and 19 BB in 34 1/3 innings last April, is having a much better go of it so far in 2008. Z followed up his 6 2/3 shutout innings on Opening Day by giving up two runs in seven innings on Saturday on the way to his first win of the season. Maybe most impressive of all, Zambrano has walked just one man in 13 2/3 IP. For that matter, Kerry Wood, who didn't issue any walks in Arizona this spring, has issued just one BB in four innings.

In other words, between the two of them, Zambrano and Wood have passed two hitters in 17 2/3 innings.

That'll work.

Astros starter Chris Sampson, who came into today's game at Wrigley Field having allowed just one earned run in 15 IP lifetime against the Cubs (0.60 ERA) while letting up 69 earned runs in 140 2/3 IP lifetime against the rest of Major League baseball (4.41 ERA), shut-out the Cubs for the first six innings this afternoon while throwing 56 pitches.

Six innings, 56 pitches:

11 pitches in the first inning.
6 pitches in the second.
8 pitches in the third.
8 pitches in the fourth.
12 pitches in the fifth.
11 pitches in the sixth.

Ryan Theriot saw 8 pitches in his first three at-bats; Aramis Ramirez saw three pitches in his first two at-bats.

That's how a pitcher manages to throw 56 pitches over six full innings.

And that's one good reason the Cubs were able to go six innings today before scratching out a couple runs against Chris Sampson on their way to a 4-3 loss and their third defeat in four games this season.

On Thursday, the Cubs took their first lead in a game this season and went on to win for the first time, 6-3 over the Brewers.

Alfonso Soriano, in his return to the leadoff spot, had his first hit, first stolen base and first two RBIs.

Aramis Ramirez had his first hit and first home run.

Ryan Dempster won in his first starting assignment since 2005.

After 212 Major League appearances, Kerry Wood earned his first career save.

And on Chicago's WSCR radio, serially unfunny afternoon drive-time host Dan Bernstein managed to say something amusing:

Instead of being nicknamed "The Hebrew Hammer," the Brewers' defensively challenged slugger, Ryan Braun, should be known as "The Kosher Butcher."

The Hardball Times flagged this fascinating story by Alan Schwarz in Tuesday's New York Times, a description of the work of Swarthmore College mathematician and avid Yankees fan Steve Wang.

Employing an analytical method called Chernoff faces, in which data are represented by varying heights, widths, and angles in images of human faces, Wang reflects the strategic tendencies of all 30 Major League managers from the 2007 season.

If I understand the explanation of Wang's analysis, the Piniella Chernoff face suggests Lou's relatively frequent use of pinch runners (the upward swoosh of the hair), the disinclination to use the sacrifice bunt (the slit nose and downward-turned mouth), and his tendency to switch starting lineups (the oval face).

Speaking of the lineup-switching, Old Oval Face announced after today's 8-2 loss to the Brewers that he will be re-installing Alfonso Soriano in the leadoff spot. Soriano has contributed to the Cubs 0-2 start by going hitless in nine at-bats, including three strikeouts, out of the second spot. Ryan Theriot, with whom Soriano will be swapping batting order positions, went 2-for-4 Wednesday after an 0-for-5 in Monday's opener.

Baseball Musings pointed me to this entry on the NY Times Freakonomics blog, in which the most excellent Bill James tackled a variety of baseball fan questions, including one around which my entire baseball universe orbits:

Q: Why can’t the Chicago Cubs get into the World Series? Is it the small park? Low salaries? The curse of the billy goat? Does sabermetrics provide any insights?

A: Talking about the origins of it — the Cubs fell into a trench in history in the late 1930’s, when almost all baseball teams built farm systems, but the Cubs for several years refused to do so. This put them behind the curve, crippled them for the 1950’s, and really the organization did not fully overcome that until about 1980.

Since 1980 they have had several teams that could have wandered into a World Series, with better luck. They haven’t had any one overpowering team — like the 1984 Tigers, or the 1992 Blue Jays, or the 1998 Yankees — that was so good that it demanded a seat at the Last Banquet of Fall. And, unless you have a team that good, you’re at the mercy of the fates.

The larger question, of course, remains: who are these fates and why the hell do they have to keep picking on the Cubs?


Below: Watch Bill James' appearance this past Sunday night on "60 Minutes."