The Cubs open their first homestand against a team that is in even worse shape than they are. The Brewers are already missing first basemen Corey Hart and Mat Gamel due to injuries suffered before the season, and in the past week 3B Aramis Ramirez, LF Ryan Braun, and SS Jean Segura have all been banged up. None of the injuries …
Series Preview: Chicago Cubs (18-36) at Milwaukee General Hospital (24-30)
I don't have much time today, so this will be a short preview. The Brewers are in bad shape, with several players (Chris Narveson, Mat Gamel, Marco Estrada, Alex Gonzalez, various catchers) out, Aramis Ramirez and Ryan Braun banged up, and others (Weeks) underperforming. The Cubs might be looking ahead to their next series with the Twins, who are in …
Game thread: Cubs at Brewers (4/11)
The Brewers are resting a bunch of players today, so this could be the best chance to avoid a sweep. This is a year! Cubs lineup RF David DeJesus 2B Darwin Barney SS Starlin Castro LF Adolfo Soriano 1B Bryan Lahair 3B Ian Stewart C Geovany Soto CF Marlon Byrd P Ryan Dempster Brewers lineup LF Norichika Aoki RF …
Daily Facepalm 4.11.12
1000 word recap of Paul Maholm's Cubs debut last night Other comments on last night's game You'd think that conditions like last night's (freezing, wind howling in) would be conducive to pitching, But when you can't locate multiple pitches, you're going to get hammered. Maholm walked two and hit two batters in the first inning, as well as a double, …
Series Preview: Milwaukee Brewers (1-2) at Chicago Cubs (1-2)
The Brewers dropped their opening series to the Cardinals, losing to Jaime Garcia and Lance Lynn in three relatively high-scoring games. The Cubs, meanwhile, did their best to try to have the bullpen/defense blow late leads in all three games against the Washington Nationals. This will be Aramis Ramirez's first appearance in Wrigley not wearing a Cubs or Pirates uniform. …
Series Preview: Arizona Diamondbacks (94-68) vs Milwaukee Brewers (96-66)
Milwaukee is already up 1-0 in this series but these things take too damn long for me to write to have this up before that happened (laughing). It’s hard to believe that there are two teams from the NL Central in the playoffs this year. Team overviews Team stats, with NL rank in parentheses DBacks Brewers wOBA .321 (4th) .327 …
Congratulations to the Milwaukee Brewers
With the Cubs 5-1 win over the Cardinals yesterday, the Milwaukee Brewers won their first division title since the days of Harvey’s Wallbangers. Kudos to the Brewers front office for going all in for this season when it was clear their window was closing. Congratulations to everyone on that team. Except Ryan Braun. Hopefully Prince Fielder will bring a World …
OV Pic of the Day: Is It Friday Friday Yet?
It’s two Pics of the Day in a row for Blake Dewitt. I’m sure he would be honored if he had any idea this part of the interwebz existed. Anyway, the Cubs lost and Prince Fielder inched closer to Mike Schmidt as all-time Cubs killer extraordinaire. But Blakey has even more problems. (Photo by Scott Boehm/Getty Images) We-we-we such a …
OV Pic of the Day: Thus Endeth the Winning Streak
So that was fun. The Cubs won three games in a row just when nobody thought they could. But then they played an actual major league team. They had a chance in the ninth inning, but Blake DeWitt struck out on what would have been ball four. OV, using advanced technology that we have developed in our secret underground labs, …
Series Preview: Iowa Cubs of Chicago (42-60) at Milwaukee Brewers (54-49)
Team Matchups NL ranks in parens Cubs Brewers wOBA .316 (7th) .322 (6th) UBR -11.6 (16th) -3.6 (13th) UZR -17.7 (13th) 4.7 (5th) SP FIP 4.07 (10th) 3.71 (7th) RP FIP 4.05 (14th) 3.65 (5th) It’s almost comical how bad the Cubs are at baserunning. There’s almost a win’s difference separating them from the Brewers, who are the 4th worst …