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Dreamcast 57: Into the Greg-iverse

In by Rice Cube27 Comments

RC invited the Gregs of North Side Bound to talk prospects in the Cubs system that is markedly improved from the last few sell-offs. You can find a better summary at the Podbean page along with links to their socials and website, but they will have some episodes of their own podcast dropping soon that should be fun to check …

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MLB Rules Tidbits Just Before Spring Training

In Major League Baseball by Rice Cube5 Comments

The World Baseball Classic pitchers are supposed to have reported by today, but many of them are already in camp, so it’s just a formality, I guess. I shared something in the last post’s comments regarding the new rule restricting when a position player can pitch, but now it seems official, along with another not-so-controversial-anymore rule: In all regular-season extra-inning …

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World Baseball Classic 2023

In Major League Baseball, Other Topics by Rice Cube24 Comments

As spring training arrives next week, there will be a few star (and honestly a bunch of non-star) players reporting a bit earlier than usual (including the Cubs’ Seiya Suzuki, who is already in Arizona) because they’re participating in the World Baseball Classic. Marcus Stroman will also play again, this time representing Team Puerto Rico after having pitched the USA …

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Unfinished Business

In Commentary And Analysis by Rice Cube34 Comments

The Cubs had just announced their spring training roster, which includes the non-roster invitees. So that’s 72 total players officially in the dugout, not including the random minor leaguer they pluck from the other camps to complete the game once the roster guys are done for the day, and not including the extra lefty or split-neutral reliever they should probably …

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The New Rules and Player Health?

In aside by Rice Cube37 Comments

Happy February, we’re just a couple weeks away from pitchers and catchers reporting, then shortly after, we will see the MLB players ease into the new rules that include the pitch clock and shift restrictions. AC also spurred some thought with a share of pitchers with weird arm angles in the previous post, which is a fun excuse to use …

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Whither Leadoff?

In Commentary And Analysis by Rice Cube19 Comments

Here we are at the end of January, trying to avoid work while awaiting the coming of Spring Training. We’ve talked at length about the tall mountain the Cubs must climb to not just be plucky underdogs but actually get into the postseason, and a lot of that is because of the barely above average offense they have constructed. There …

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A Winning Pitch (We Hope)

In Commentary And Analysis by Rice Cube52 Comments

We’ve reached the phase right before Spring Training where it’s mostly claims and minor league contracts while the residue of the free agent barrel lingers until teams and agents finally settle on something. For all intents and purposes, the roster is set (very similar to what we did last time, minus some DFAs and outrights and what not) and the …

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The 2023 Hall of Fame Announcement

In Major League Baseball by Rice Cube34 Comments

As per usual, the Baseball Hall of Fame announcement show took two hours to ramp up before they finally announced the balloting results. You can see Ryan Thibodaux’s invaluable public-ish ballot tracker here, but it was unclear whether the leaders, Scott Rolen and Todd Helton, had enough to squeak in. Prior to the ballot announcement, we found out that former …