Less than 12 months ago, along with most Cubs fans, I could think of two or three dozen things I was more excited to see than Ryan Dempster's return to the starting rotation in 2008. After a season in which he went 17-6, had a career best 2.96 ERA, earned a trip to the All-Star Game, merited the Game One start in the NLDS, and finished 6th in Cy Young balloting, Dempster not only had the last laugh, but also earned the contract of a lifetime as he entered free agency.

Here, by way of baseball-reference.com and Cot's Baseball Contracts, is Dempster's Major League salary history, commencing with his debut as a 22-year-old Florida Marlin and telescoping forward to 2012, the final year of the 4-year/$52MM contract he signed earlier this week with the Cubs.

I sure didn't think this would happen.

Then I saw Ryan Dempster huffing and puffing in between pitches as if it took all of the resolve and concentration he could muster to make a good pitch (even though he was leading 2-0 at the time).

Then the good pitches got fewer and farther between as the number of walks issued to Dodger batters climbed.

And then came the grand slam gopher ball. And then the Cubs really settled into their offensive feebleness. And then I turned the channel in search of previews of tomorrow night's Vice Presidential Debate, which I am planning to watch instead of Game Two, because I don't expect Carlos Zambrano to be the guy who will get us back on track so the Cubs can head out to L.A. with the series tied, and I just can't handle that much more disappointment.

I sure didn't think this would happen.

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You'll find a more thoughtful, detailed analysis of tonight's humiliation at The Cub Reporter. Transmission proved to me what a strong stomach he has by recounting all of the grisly details.

My stomach isn't strong enough to even allow me to read the recounting of all of the grisly details.

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Update: The Cubs, who were given a 52% likelihood of winning this first-round series yesterday, according to The Hardball Times' statistical analysis, are now given a 32.8% likelihood of reaching the NLCS.

I figured you probably weren't already depressed enough this morning and so, decided to pass that on.

Daryle Ward has started in 497 Major League games and has never had a five-hit game. (For that matter, Aramis Ramirez has started in 1,291 Major League games and has never had a five-hit game.)

But last night, in just his 11th Major League start, Micah Hoffpauir banged out five hits—two home runs, a double, and two singles—in the Cubs' 7-6 loss to the Mets.

Hoffpauir is in a fight with the 33-year-old Ward, among others, for one of the precious spots on the Cubs playoff roster. If this team was managed by veteran-loving Dusty Baker, we could be sure who would capture that spot, but the current Cubs manager is at least suggesting there's a possibility he would give the 28-year-old Hoffpauir the nod.

"You know, we're looking for a couple spots, we're looking for some offense," Cubs manager Lou Piniella said. "Put it this way, he'll be in the lineup [Friday] against Milwaukee..."

...The Cubs have three games remaining to finalize the playoff roster. The Cubs still don't know who they'll be playing, and Piniella said that could determine who he picks.

"We have to know who our opponent is first," Piniella said. "Hoffpauir's not hurting himself."

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On the subject of hurting yourself relative to a post-season position...

Carlos Zambrano, who has been awful recently outside of his no-hit game against the Astros, has lost out to Ryan Dempster, who has been mostly brilliant this year at Wrigley Field, in a bid to win the starting assignment for Game 1 of the NLDS.

Once or twice or maybe eight times during the off-season, I lamented the Cubs' decision to all but count on having Ryan Dempster in the starting rotation for 2008.

Turns out that Dempster has been the team's steadiest starter so far this season next to Carlos Zambrano. Through Monday's victory over the Dodgers, Dempster is 6-2, 2.56, his strikeout and groundball rates are up, and his walk and line drive rates are down.

Monday afternoon's win, in which Dempster allowed Los Angeles just one run over seven innings, was especially fortuitous, coming after the back-to-back, extra-inning, bullpen-sapping losses to the Pirates over the weekend.

Though the Cub offense was mostly quiet Monday, that hasn't generally been the case when Dempster has been on hill: through 11 starts, the Cubs are averaging 6.82 Runs/Game per Dempster start. That's slightly more offense than they're providing for Zambrano (6.45 R/G) and much more than they're delivering for Ted Lilly (5.0 R/G).

One other way to gauge the starters' contributions to the Cub cause is to look at the team's won-loss records in games pitched by the respective starters:

Dempster, 8-3
Zambrano, 7-4
Lilly, 6-5
Marquis, 4-5
Others, 5-4

There's no doubt that Dempster has benfitted thus far from an artificially low Batting Average Against on Balls In Play (.216) and the Cub defense has been sterling behind him (.785 DER before today's game), but even discounting Dempster's numbers based on those factors, the veteran has more than earned his keep as a starter, and the Cubs would definitely be in a much less advantageous position right now in the NL Central without him.

Looking at the live box score of today's Padres/Cubs game, I was struck by how many elements in it looked completely preposterous.

Play along, and decide which of the following is the freakiest of all, because I can't:

• Ryan Theriot hitting over .300
• Ronny Cedeño hitting over .300
• Henry Blanco hitting over .300
• Theriot, Cedeño, and Blanco all hitting over .300
• Ryan Dempster delivering an 8 1/3-inning start
• And striking out 12
• And walking 1
• And lowering his ERA to 2.35
• And improving his record to 5-1
• The Cubs starting a centerfielder named Jim Edmonds
• And yeah, it's that Jim Edmonds

With this afternoon's 4-0 shutout, the Cubs are 25-16, which is the second-best record in baseball.

Compared to the other items in this post, that seems positively mundane.

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."

With Lou Piniella planning to announce his five-man starting rotation by the end of this week, the three contenders for the two open slots have gone out of their way to make the boss's choice difficult.

On Tuesday, Jason Marquis allowed the Royals one run over five innings to lower his Cactus League ERA to 1.93 (in 14 innings pitched).

On Wednesday afternoon, Ryan Dempster bounced back from a nasty outing over the weekend to fan seven Oakland A's while allowing one hit in 5 1/3 shutout innings.

Finally, on Wednesday night in a split squad game, Jon Lieber gave up just one earned run in five innings against the Giants, lowering his spring ERA to 1.80 (with just 2 walks in 15 IP).

We all know the candidates' shortcomings--Marquis is a terrible second-half pitcher, Lieber is battling age while trying to come back from a significant injury, Dempster is hoping to recast himself as a starting pitcher after years in the bullpen and before that, years as a poor starting pitcher--but at the very least, the three have presented themselves to their manager in the best possible light.

I like Lieber and question his ability to contribute out of the bullpen; I don't much like Marquis and question his ability to contribute out of the bullpen; and I suppose I could live with seeing Dempster as the fifth guy (whether they call him #3 or #5, who cares?). A trade (of Marquis to Boston?) would simplify everything, but it doesn't seem likely that will happen before Lou's self-imposed announcement deadline on Friday.

Day One of Cactus League 2008 is in the books, Ryan Theriot is hitting 1.000, Kosuke Fukudome has a 1.000 OBP, and who needs Brian Roberts when we have homer-hittin' Mike Fontenot?

The Cubs tatooed the Giants, 12-6, in Scottsdale Thursday on the strength of 15 hits and a five-run third inning. Theriot had three singles and a stolen base batting out of the leadoff spot--Alfonso Soriano had the day off, but is expected to play on Friday when the Cubs meet the Giants in Mesa--while Fukudome, who batted third, was hit by the first Major League pitch he saw from Giants starter Noah Lowry. Fukudome later walked and singled.

Fontenot had a homer and a triple, good for 3 RBI in four at-bats, though he didn't even start the game at second base. New Cub Alex Cintron received that honor, with Mark DeRosa recovering at home following his minor heart procedure. (Can any heart procedure be considered "minor"?)

On the mound, starter Ryan Dempster gave up a first-inning homer to Randy Winn and a single to new Giant Aaron Rowand. But he also struck out two in his two innings of work and I guess on balance, you would have to say this was a positive first step for Dempster in his quest to join the rotation.

Finally, Felix Pie took an early lead in the battle for the Cubs center field job, going 2-for-2 with a double, a homer and three runs scored. Sam Fuld, Pie's competition for the position, went hitless in two AB's.

Ryan Dempster will start the Cubs' Cactus League opener on Thursday against the Giants, hoping to take the first step toward securing a position in the team's 2008 starting rotation.

Dempster, as most Cub fans know, is hardly new to the starting role: before he earned his first Major League save, pitching for the Cubs in 2004, Dempster had already started 156 games with the Marlins and Reds. With six more starts under his belt in 2005, Dempster's career numbers as a starter are 51-58, 4.99, with 1031 hits allowed in 988 2/3 IP, hardly anything to inspire excitement in Cubs fans, but certainly worthy of inspiring an Arcane Cubs List Of The Week and maybe a glimpse of what we can expect if Dempster nails down that starting job.

Here, then, are the ten Cub pitchers since 1961 who started at least 15 games in a season and finished with a Dempster-like ERA between 4.89 and 5.09 (ordered by number of wins):

Statistics from Baseball-Reference.com Play Index

(Okay, I'll come clean. I stole that headline from The Sporting News. Back in the early and middle '70s, when I used to read the magazine faithfully, the weekly report on each MLB team would end with a series of notes introduced by a cute, distinctive little subhead, e.g., "Twin-klings" for the Twins notes, "A's Acorns" for Oakland A's notes, "Bruin Briefs" for the Cubs, etc. So yes, I plagiarized the headline. Don't tell the Clinton campaign!)

– The Cubs have complemented Ryan Theriot and Ronny Cedeno by adding a third member to the Light-Hitting Middle Infielders Club.

– For all the talk of Kerry Wood as closer, Lou Piniella says he is not even the leading candidate for the job right now.

– On last night's WGN Sports Central show, David Kaplan was interviewing Ryan Dempster, the Cubs' resident practical joker. Kaplan told Dempster if he needed inspiration before planning his next prank, he should check out this comic triumph from the Land of Phillie.

– There may be a new, mean-spirited, bald-headed guy calling the shots at Tribune Company, but some things remain the same: the Cubbies just can't get enough of that courtroom action.

--Inspired by a question Carrie Muskat of cubs.com posed to herself, I have a post up at The Cub Reporter addressing the question of Ryan Dempster's fitness to make the Cubs starting rotation.

The bottom line on the Dempster-as-starter talk as I see it is that Ryan Dempster had one good season as a starting pitcher, back in 2000 for the Marlins, when he went 14-10 with a 120 ERA+ and made the NL All-Star team. As these numbers show, Dempster's career line as a starter looks a lot like Jason Marquis's...only not quite as good.

In other words, if the Cubs come north from Mesa and Dempster is scheduled to get the ball every fifth day, we have problems.

--On Wednesday afternoon, dedicated AHNY reader California Phil reported that he was only able to view the first part of the Sam Zell video before the video stopped. I checked it out and the piece continued to run for me all the way to its glorious conclusion, leading California Phil and I to assume that some filter in his employer's network had detected Zell's obscenity and frozen the video.

Naturally, I have suggested to California Phil that he get a new job immediately.