In Paul Maholm’s first two starts of the season, he gave up six runs in each game. In his last four starts, he’s given up a total of three runs. How do you feel when heading out to the mound to start for the Cubs, Mr. Maholm?
“Whenever I take the ball I’m going to expect to go deep into the game and let the defense pick me up and win games,” Maholm said. “Whether you’re the No. 1 or the No. 5, the day you pitch is your day. You’re the No. 1 guy and you have to get the job done. I think the last four games I’ve pitched well.”
We also think the last four games you’ve pitched well. Should we expect you to keep up this Sandy Koufax streak all year?
“I’m going to have another rough outing at some point; it’s part of baseball,” Maholm said. “But I’m going to ride this as long as I possibly can and hopefully for a good while. I’ll keep getting after it and expect to win games.”
I think that’s a perfectly reasonable attitude. And Dale Sveum, what do you have to say about the starting rotation so far this season?
“Going into the season we knew that it’d be one of our strong suits and up to this point it’s been probably as good as anybody’s in baseball for the most part,” Sveum said. “We’ve had 30 games, whatever we’ve played, we’ve had a lot of quality starts and guys going six, seven, seven-plus consistently. Even some of the tough outings we had, the pitchers ended up settling down and getting six innings out of it too. Starting pitching has been great.”
Now we just need someone to get Chris Volstad to start pitching like a real major leaguer…
Remember when Dale Sveum didn’t see Kerry Wood throw his glove and hat into the stands Tuesday night? That doesn’t mean he approves of this behavior. It also doesn’t mean that he really cares.
‘‘Do I care? Of course, I care,’’ Sveum said. ‘‘I don’t condone it or wish it to happen all the time, but we all know in this game there’s frustrations that happen.
‘‘And sometimes we regret things we do, that’s for sure. We’re not perfect human beings.’’
He says he cares, but I have a feeling he really doesn’t. I have a feeling he cares more about Kerry’s inability to pitch effectively.
‘‘We’ve got to get him out there,’’ Sveum said. ‘‘We’ve got to get him built up and comfortable on the mound in game situations, whether it’s every other day for a little while.’’
or, dale, i’d propose the opposite. we’ve got to stop getting him out there. we’ve got to acknowledge that there’s nothing left to build up. wood is done.
Whether Wood is done or not, he really doesn’t add anything to the present or future of this team. That’s why he should never have been re-signed in the first place.
I’d rather he spent the time on Wells or another of the AAA Boys.
If Dale wants Wood to spend more time on the mound, then he should have Wood pitch batting practice…
Throwing that many pitches will probably finish off whatever ligaments he has left in his throwing arm.
I’m still aggravated at all the people who give Kerry pass for crap like that but called Z a “psycho” every time he broke a bat over his own knee.
It’s because Kerry gave out souvenirs.
Kerry hasn’t gone one-on-one with a teammate.
So far.
Carlos went one-on-one with coolers, catchers, bats, first basemen, light fixtures and more.
Even so, I still think he’s all done!
how do we know he hasn’t? are you spending a lot of time in the clubhouse?
Wasn’t it Kerry Wood who smashed Sosa’s boombox?
Having to hear that music on a daily basis would drive any person to want to destroy the source of it.
why do I always think it was Farnsworth?
I’m pretty sure that no one knows for sure who did it…but I’ve that many “inside” people think it was Wood….though Farnsworth did fit the profile a bit. I would have expected Farnsworth to just go after Sammy himself…not just his boombox.
Bring Coleman up and stick him in the pen. He has no future as a starter. Might as well see if he can relieve.
I almost agree with that…but I would have him pitch in relief at AAA for a few months first to see if he can even handle that.
It’s not like he could be much worse than most of this pen. It sounded like they were going to put him in the pen towards the end of spring training, but then they picked up Camp, who has really been the only decent RH reliever in this failpen. I’d probably be happier with him closing over Dolis. I’d even feel better with Coleman over Dolis.
I’m not convinced that Coleman can effectively get out major league hitters at all…I don’t see him having the stuff to make him anything more than a middle reliever.
Overall…I just don’t like him. But I guess he’d be better than Kerry Wood right now…maybe.
And I was not the one that gave a thumbs down to that. (Casey’s mom…I’m telling you…she’s here.)
Why? What’s wrong with Dolis? Until he blows up a couple times he’s no worse than any of the other guys.
GOD please, not Coleman. He’s horrendous.
My analysis of advanced pitching stats still isn’t very good, so I don’t know if this holds true, but my observations have been that Dolis, to this point, has been a very lucky pitcher. He isn’t likely to continue to have the success that we’ve seen so far…and I’m basing this primarily on the fact that he doesn’t seem to have the ability to strike out anyone. I’m not sure if this is true, but he probably has a really bad contact rate right now and I’m assuming his BABIP is ridiculously low right now which is explaining his success to this point.
SABR-geeks? Anything to say about this?
BABIP = .186
K Rate = 2.3 K/9
K/BB = 0.63
Stats, shmats!! If he’s getting saves he’s doing his job. If not, yank him and try the next guy in line.
He’s a contact sinker ball pitchers.
What’s his GB/FB rate?
Stats, shmats!! If he’s getting saves he’s doing his job. If not, yank him and try the next guy in line.
He’s a contact sinker ball pitcher.
What’s his GB/FB rate?
Whoops! How’d I do that??
GB/FB: 1.07 MLB avg: 0.82
I mean, it’s not like 3 or 4 blown saves are going to put us out of playoff contention or anything.
you say that now…
yeah, there are loke 4 teams with worse records that the Cubs
San Diego, Colorado, and Milwaukee is even in the NL Central
heck, Boston and Minnesota are both doing worse, I think we have a shot of seeing the World Series trophy this year
Don’t let his mom hear you say that.
I know she’s lurking.
I need a day off. someone come here and do this for me.
Good news from my job is that no one has quit today…
yet.
bwahahahahahaha.
Still have a few hours.
The good news in general is that the Cubs will not lose today.
We have picketters outside of our building-they’ve been chanting and waving their signs, and in a little while they will march down the street to a branch of Bank of America. They picked a bad day to do this-it’s over 90 degrees right now…
We had picketers outside our building on Monday and Tuesday…but they were bitching about Scott Walker. I’m not sure why they were here…Scott Walker doesn’t work in our building.
I work for a pension fund for LA County employees. The picketts want to make sure that the pension fund does not buy shares in any investment backed by Bank of America. Also they(the picketters) want the fund to switch out of investments like insurance contracts and instead,”invest in the community” by lending funds to create low-income housing. Which is a nice idea but against the Federal Retirement Act of 1938 which governs al public employee pension plans. As for your building-is anyone there who supports Walker? Is related to Walker? Or do you just have a nice building that looks good on tv?