Chicago Cubs’ starter Matt Garza pitched his worst game of the season last week against the Reds, allowing nine runs in five innings. The New York Mets were the cure for what ailed him. After seven innings of shutout baseball, James Russell and Carlos Marmol were the only things standing between Garza and a win. I’ll give you one guess what came between Garza and a win.

Three outs from the sweep and a four-game winning streak, Marmol served up two no-doubt homers, one to ex-Cub Marlon Byrd, and a three-run, walk-off shot that Kirk Nieuwenhuis sent soaring out to right field.

Unfortunately, Kevin Gregg had been trotted out the four previous days and was unavailable Sunday. At least one Cub was thoroughly disheartened by the loss Sunday.

Cubs fandom strangles Carlos Marmol

“That’s unacceptable,” Soriano said. “We’re up 3-nothing and Garza pitched a very good game. It’s hard to take. It’s hard to swallow.”

This was after The Fonz threw his post-game meal plate into the garbage can in what was described as “anger”. But he still believes in Carlos.

“That depends on him,” Soriano said. “He used to be good –- I think he’s good –- but he lost a little bit of his confidence and this game is all about confidence. You can have the talent. You can have the pitches. You can have the arm. But if you’re not confident, you’re not going anywhere.

“That’s his problem now. He lost his confidence, but I hope that he gets it back and (pitches like) the Marmol that I know.”

For his part, Matt Garza just wants to give Marmol a hug.

“It’s tough for anybody,” Garza said. “The guy who it’s toughest on right now is Marmol. He tries really hard and he wants it really bad and it just happens. So you just get ready and come back and do it again tomorrow.”

» Continue reading “Chicago Cubs Monday Headlines: Déjà Vu All Over Again”

It’s about that time of the year, kids. The time when we start obsessively hitting “refresh” on mlbtraderumors.com and hoping against hope that Theo is able to move some of the more craptacular pieces on this team for some actual value. Let’s just hope we get another game when Chicago Cubs start disappearing from the dugout after each inning, because that was fun and also hilarious. Soriano went to to the bathroom or something during the 6th and we got all excited. Oh well.

But anyway, back to selling.

Now that the draft is over, the Cubs (25-37) will shift their attention to the trade deadline, looking at unloading potential short-term assets like Garza, pitcher Scott Feldman, outfielder David DeJesus and closer Kevin Gregg.

“(We’ll) assess where we are and then the needs of the other 29 teams,” Epstein said. “It’s sort of a long process to put it together. You don’t just wake up on July 31 and decide you’re going to make a trade one way or another. There’s a lot of information gathering and strategizing.

“We’re starting those internal discussions of what good fits might be and things like that, even as we watch our club play and hope that we get real hot and change our current position.”

I shudder to think what the rest of this season is going to be like with Kevin Gregg, but I digress. Number one draft pick, here we come!

» Continue reading “With the Draft in the Rearview Mirror, Cubs Look to Sell”

The Chicago Cubs stumbled into their own Red Wedding last night. While the prospect of Matt Garza starting a brawl last night was tantalizing. But rather than bean someone, he gave up nine runs in five innings instead. Those nine runs helped the Cincinnati Reds on their way to a 12-2 win over the Chicago Cubs last night. Three home runs helped lead to the demise of young Mr. Garza.

“With him, it’s all about fastball command and keeping the ball down,” Cubs manager Dale Sveum said. “When he does that, he can throw a really good game. Every pitcher, it’s going to be about his fastball command, and what happens with that will dictate the game.”

Tuesday was no different.

“I don’t think he really had his slider today — he didn’t throw it much,” Sveum said. “It’s still keeping the ball down, and keeping the ball down and away and obviously pitching in. We have to have fastball command down in the strike zone.”

The worst slider of the night came against Xavier Paul in the seventh and knocked Garza out of the game.

The only pitch that really bothered Garza was a hanging slider to Paul in the sixth, which ended up in the seats.

“He made me pay for it,” Garza said. “That’s what good teams do. They take advantage of mistakes.”

The Cubs also committed four errors on their way to their eleventh consecutive loss to the Reds at Wrigley Field.

» Continue reading “Chicago Cubs Wednesday Headlines: No Brawl, Bloodbath Instead”

In case you missed Julie’s earlier post, Ian Stewart had himself another magical odyssey in the land of Twitter last night. Ian’s tweeted about Dale Sveum not liking him, the impossibility of him ever being called up and being happy to sit in Iowa and make two million dollars. As you might expect, those tweets somehow came to the attention of the front office of the Chicago Cubs, and they don’t seem to be amused.

“We spent the entire morning dealing with an issue that doesn’t help us get better as an organization,” Hoyer told the Tribune. “That’s not how we want to spend our time. What he did was really unprofessional and there are going to be consequences. Beyond that, I’m not going to comment.”

Theo Epstein was similarly unimpressed.

President Theo Epstein said Stewart violated the “loyalty clause” of his contract. The Cubs will announced the number of games he’s been suspended later, after settling the legal aspects.

Stewart’s agent called for the player’s release, as Stewart suggested himself during a late night tweet to his followers. Epstein said the Cubs will “negotiate” a settlement in which Stewart will be allowed to be a free agent. But Stewart will have to forfeit the remainder of his $2 million contract if he wants out.

“He had the right to elect free agency and decided not to,” Epstein said. “He decided to become a minor league player with us, which he is.”

(snip)

“I do wish him the best,” Epstein said. “I hope he can turn his career around. I’m rooting for him. But he made a mistake. He apologized for it and we’re taking some disciplinary action.”

For his part, Ian feels super bad:

Poor Ian. But there is a game tonight, about which you’ll find information after the jump.

» Continue reading “Ian Stewart Update & Chicago Cubs Game Thread”

Before we get to all the game stuff, there have been some interesting discussions on all manner of talk radio lately regarding the Chicago Cubs. Ever since the Cubs inexplicably swept the White Sox out of the Crosstown Cup  (and remember, we’re counting that as back-to-back series sweeps), there’s been some surprise, nay, astonishment about the potential of the current roster.

Here’s the dilemma: The current plan is to build the team from the bottom up, heavily investing in youth and completely restocking a terrible farm system. Most of the star prospects selected by the old regime have failed to live up to their hype (Starlin Castro being the notable exception), and there’s a real question about exactly how much time the farm system needs before it starts paying dividends at the major league level. Two years? Three years? Five years? No one can seem to agree.

This led to the sound strategy of signing a bunch of journeymen to short-term deals, and hoping they’d perform well enough that Theo and Jed can flip them for prospects at the trade dealine. Notably, young pitching prospects.

» Continue reading “Chicago Cubs: How do you solve a problem like an unexpectedly good pitching staff?”

We waited ten months to see Matt Garza take the mound for the Chicago Cubs, and he didn’t disappoint in his return. He pitched five shutout innings, didn’t allow a hit until the fifth and struck out five batters. He even had a two-run double in the second inning, which, for awhile, looked like the only runs the Cubs might need all night. What was it like to be back on the mound?

I don’t think Shawn Camp will smile like this in the vicinity of Matt Garza anytime soon.

“I felt great out there,” Garza told reporters. “I had some butterflies and the first couple of innings flew by. I had to kind of stop myself at one point and just slow down, but it was fun. It was a long, long time and it’s nice to not only come back but pitch well. You don’t want to spend that much time working to get back and then pitch poorly.”

Dale Sveum was happy to see such a good performance from Garza as well.

“He was really good,” Cubs manager Dale Sveum said. “He had a really good slider. His command, for it being his first time back, was outstanding. Even when he missed, he didn’t miss by much. His velocity was good, too, consistently at 93-94 (mph). He was just outstanding.”

The only bad thing was that Garza couldn’t stretch his 85-90 pitch count farther into the game. Unfortunately, the bullpen didn’t take long to undo Garza’s good work.

In the sixth inning, Rule 5 pitcher Hector Rondon gave up a leadoff double to Neil Walker, who later scored when lefty James Russell walked Pedro Alvarez with the bases loaded. Moments later, pinch-hitter Travis Snider crushed Shawn Camp’s changeup for a grand slam.

» Continue reading “Chicago Cubs Wednesday Headlines: Garza Great, Bullpen, Not So Much”

You may have heard a little something about Matt Garza’s return to the mound tonight. It will be his first start since July 21 of last year. What you haven’t heard is that was my birthday, so you folks have two months left to buy my birthday present. But back to Matt Garza for now. He’d like you to know that he’s excited about tonight‘s hopefully triumphant return.

“This actually means something, and I can’t wait,” he said. “It’s been 10 months in the making, so I’m excited to get back out there.”

How did he make it through 10 months without playing baseball?

“It was tough, but I had my family and my wife and kids the whole time to help me through it,” Garza said. “It was a grind, mentally. Physically, I could do anything, but the mental part was the tough part. It was one setback after another, and it was, ‘Keep going, keep going, keep going.’ I’m just happy I’m here at the end of it and can’t wait ’til Tuesday.”

If nothing else, it will be great to see him on the top step pulling for the rest of the team. Garza will be on an 85-90 pitch limit, so I’m thinking we’ll get five or six innings out of him. What are the chances we’ll get to see him make a wild throw to first in that time?

Evil Cubs nemesis Wandy Rodriguez will take the mound for the Pirates tonight. He’s 4-2 on the year with a 3.25 ERA. Lineup after the jump.

» Continue reading “Chicago Cubs Game Thread: Return Of The Matt”

I’ve been dealing with migraine headaches the last few days, so I’ve been decidedly out of the loop on Cubs news. From what I can tell, all I missed was Dale calling the Cubs “old“ and a redneck beer fight in the bleachers. Sounds about right.

So hey, Matt Garza returns today, and he’s eager, NOT NERVOUS:

Tell me this doesn’t look like Matt Garza. It totally does.

Garza may be talking down any tenseness about the start, but his manager, Dale Sveum, knows the challenges of returning to pitch on the game’s biggest stage. He’s worried — as he always is with players returning from injury — that Garza might try to do too much.

“You always worry about that with anybody, because I don’t care what you say, it’s different when 40,000 people are in the stands and you have third decks on the stadiums,” Sveum said. “But he’s been around long enough to understand how to control it if he’s starting to feel that, so you hope you’re able to control that in the first inning and get through that.”

Sveum plans to limit Garza to 85 to 90 pitches against the Pirates, who are 8-2 in their last 10 games and have only lost one game this season when leading after seven innings.

I have to admit, the thing I’m most looking forward to in Garza’s return is his penchant for yelling at Dale from the mound. It’s been a long time since we’ve had a good manager-player fight, and I feel like our chances just got a lot better. Welcome back, Matt!

» Continue reading “Cubs Tuesday Headlines: Matt Garza and I return”

Last night was unarguably a great night for Chicago Sports. Bulls season? Mercifully over, but not until one of the biggest comebacks in playoff history was achieved. Blackhawks? Killed the Red Wings made it look easy. Chicago Cubs? Took the second series in a row AND leapfrogged the hated Brewers in the process. No, I’m not kidding. The Cubs are in 4th place.

I’ve often spoken of my complete and total disdain for the Milwaukee Brewers. I realize that, as a Cubs fan, I’m supposed to reserve most of my hate for the St. Louis Cardinals, with a small amount left over for the White Sox. And, after all, I grew up halfway in-between Chicago and Milwukee, and the Brewers were my AL team.

However, all that has changed since the Brewers moved to the NL Central. And while my hatred for the Cardinals is tinged with a begrudging respect that they always seem to be in the running when the post-season rolls around, I can’t say the same for the Brewers. For them, my hatred is only tinged with disgust. Accordingly, the above standings have brought me great joy.

» Continue reading “Chicago Cubs Thursday Headlines: Suck on that, Cheeseheads”

Raise your hand if you saw that coming. Now put your hand down if you’re a dirty liar. I thought so:

Scott Feldman’s performance was worthy of a standing ovation Monday night.

But when the right-hander came to the plate in the fifth inning of the Cubs’ 9-2 victory over the Rangers, the roar from the Wrigley Field crowd was in response to the Bulls’ upset win over the Heat in Game 1 of the NBA playoffs.

“I thought I was getting a standing (ovation),” Feldman said with a laugh. “I came in the clubhouse and Otis (Hellmann, the clubhouse manager) had to burst my bubble. He said it was because the Bulls won. I thought it was because I was raking or something.”

Indeed, Feldman had been raking, delivering a key RBI single in the Cubs’ five-run fourth inning.

“I was looking to see the ball and put a good swing on it,” Feldman said.

On the mound, Feldman (3-3) threw seven innings of shutout ball, allowing just two hits. He left the game after warming up for the eighth inning because of a cramp in his right hand.

I don’t want to jinx anything, but (knock on wood) Scott Feldman is looking like the off-season acquisition of the year these days.

» Continue reading “Scott Feldman (from across the hall) Leads Bizarro Cubs to Victory”