Chris Volstad’s season of wonder for the Chicago Cubs continued Tuesday night. He’s now 0-9 with a 6.96 ERA after allowing four runs on nine hits in five innings to the Astros. And the Astros are worse than the Cubs. So Chris, what happened?
‘‘I pretty much hung a curveball to Wallace. Take away one pitch, and it’s 1-0 instead of 4-0, and the team is still in it. I executed pitches after that, and I feel that’s one of the big strides I made.”
But Dale Sveum begged to differ.
‘‘There was nothing real sharp,’’ Sveum said. ‘‘His off-speed stuff was getting hit pretty hard.’’
Then Rule 5 exile Lendy Castillo came in and gave up five runs in the seventh. But Brett Jackson got a hit!
‘‘There’s a long line of great players, including Hall of Famers Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays, who were 1-for-55 their first years in the big leagues,’’ team president Theo Epstein said. ‘‘We almost expect young guys to come up and struggle. It’s part of the growth process. It doesn’t make it any easier for them to go through, but it’s a natural step in a player’s development.
‘‘They come up and get humbled a little bit and make their adjustments, and maybe you have a chance to humble someone else down the line.’’
Thanks for making us feel better, Theo.
If you were hoping to see more of the likes of Volstad and Boo Radley for the rest of the season, you’re in luck. Dale Sveum says we ought not to expect Matt Garza back in 2012.
‘‘It’s going to be unlikely, but it would probably take a lot of hard work and things to happen in the healing process,’’ manager Dale Sveum said Tuesday. ‘‘You run out of time for rehab starts [in the minors]. It would be tough, but some guys heal faster than others.’’
There’s no good reason to rush him back this year other than our sanity.
Theo is so full of crap in his “We almost expect young guys to come up ans struggle” statement.
Earlier this year he said, as a reason that Rizzo and Jackson weren’t on the big league team as being that he wanted these guys to be overly prepared before they were recalled so they can succeed immediately when they were promoted.
So which is it?
Maybe Theo should ask Brian Cashman or anyone in the Yankee organisation if they expect all their young players to struggle when called up to the team; I think the answer from the Yankees would be “no”.
“There’s no good reason to rush him back this year other than our sanity.”
Fuck sanity!
Sanity hasn’t been a strength of the Cubs or Cubs fans in quite some time. Really, is Garza’s 2-3 wins the remainder of the year really worth our shot at raiding Toronto’s farm system this off season?
But Doc, How do you really feel?
UGH.
I’m really starting to feel like Sveum is one of the dumbest humans alive.
Honestly,I feel the front office wants Dale to say the most inane comments to avoid stirring up the team, since anyone with eyes can see how bad they are. The problem with that, is the players then believe that the media/fans are picking on them and say stupid things….
I never wanted him as manager.
The good thing is, in my opinion, the coaching staff around him is pretty good.
Don’t tell me he made even a TANGENTIAL REFERENCE to Mantle and Mays in talking about BJax. No, he didn’t.
When I read that, I thought, “What dumbass said THAT?!” First guess was Svuem, since everything he says is really, really stupid.
I’m just assuming it really was Svuem and the reporter got it wrong. That fits better in my version of reality.
Bruce Miles reporting that Oneri Fleita is out.
is this the Jed/Theo braintrust has finished the evaluation time of current employees?
I would be more surprised if this wasn’t the start of a much larger change over in personnel
The suntimes is reporting that at least 4 other front office types will be dismissed as well.
Can’t wait until they sign Wilken to a 3-year extension then fire him the next day (laughing)
The Fleita and Wilken contracts last year were a big time head scratcher.
That amount of money the Ricketts family has had to waste over the last couple years is disgusting.
At the time, I remember Ricketts saying “Any GM would be thrilled to have Tim Wilkens as his head of scouting.”
Turns out, not so much.
Well…as far as Wilkens is concerned, it seems Theo and Jed have some respect for the guy, even though he isn’t going to be doing as many things he was supposed to be an “expert” at.
Fleita was a Hendry guy. His contract last year was a much bigger head scratcher, thought as I recall, Detroit was trying to bring him in and the Ricketts family felt they had to give the guy a big contract to keep him in Chicago.
yay day game?
yay!
Whoopsie.
Unless someone can get a game thread up in 14 minutes, this is it.
Sorry dude I’m stuck in a meeting.
that dude looks like a lady.
Did you say that in your best Aerosmith voice?
Can’t you tell by the scarves around his microphone?
Didn’t notice the scarves I’m still in shock from the black leather pants he’s wearing.
Let’s not get into another fashion discussion.
Well, I guess Starlin was listening to Dale’s nonsense and it made sense to him.
It appears so
Dejesus hits 2 homeruns
Hey Soriano,
The SF Giants just lost one of the few bats in their lineup that was producing. Any chance you might be willing to rethink that whole “No SF” thing and consider playing for a contender?
Thanks,
J
Why would he want to go somewhere that they actually need him to perform well?
He’ll go and hit 20 more hrs in the last month and a half.
Make 4-5 running,over the shoulder Willie Mays catches.
Steal 10 bases.
Throw out 8 batters at home.
Hit and leg out 6 more triples as his BA and RBI’s climb steadily to .300 and 120.
AND flat out fly to 1st on every contact with the bat.
Where are all the hopeful projections of how good we are going to be in 3-4 years. I thought that was ‘youse guys’ mantra.
AND at least we won today. Another series in the bag.
Now on to the Reds to return a favor that we owe them.
AND saturday has us looking at a doubleheader. Cool
GO CUBS!
Really though, I can imagine how tough it is to answer to the innane questioning e-v-e-r-y day by all our friends in the press.
In today’s world every one of these individuals are just waiting to pouce on any comment that that be twisted and screwed into some comical gaffe.
And one can’t say anything negative about anything or anyone.
So we,re going to hear a lot of “what?” responses.
And right now I can’t think of a harder team and their situation to explain ‘publicly’ than the CUBS.
Well, that sucked.
Oh…
The Cubs actually won.
That’s kinda cool.