Sunday, July 6, 2014

So Long, Spellcheck

The annual purging of the starting rotation began late Friday night.  For the past three years now, the Cubs have traded away their number one starter.  In 2012 Ryan Dempster was sent to the Rangers.  The Rangers also took Matt Garza from the Cubs last year.  And on Friday, Jeff Samardzija (and Jason Hammel) went west to Oakland.

With each deal the Cubs got several prospects in return.  And with each deal, the big league team losses what little pitching they have and the season is over.  I'm getting tired of it.

The Cubs have been playing pretty decent ball lately with the starting pitching being a big reason.  I was actually starting to feel a little optimistic.  But now the top and bottom of the rotation are gone and the replacements aren't very good.  The optimism has been sucked away.

The Cubs system is loaded with prospects, top prospects, but most are position players.  Where is the pitching?  Is the plan to win games by 9-8 scores?

The worst part of the Samardzija trade?  After seven years of practice, I can now type his name without even thinking.  All that practice is now down the drain.  I wish any Oakland bloggers good luck as they learn to type out S-A-M-A-R-D-Z-I-J-A.

Spellcheck was not in my player collection, but I did end up with 62 of his cards.  There will probably be a couple more in sets already in production but not yet released.  For now, here is my farewell tile with the 62 cards.


4 comments:

  1. I'm with you on the optimism. The pitching staff was performing well and they just needed an infusion of offense, which they have at AAA. I was really looking forward to a .500 team or better in 2015. I, too, am worried about the pitching. But, on the bright side Theo & Jed have proven they can rope in mediocre looking pitchers and have them pitch better than expected (Maholm, Feldman, & Hammel).

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  2. I'm not as worried. Despite playing at around .500 we've still been stuck in last place. Position players can be traded for pitching and when the time comes money may be made available for free agents. Would I like to see some top pitching prospects as well as shortstops. Of course. But loading up with talent ain't a bad thing either.

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  3. I would've liked to have seen the Cubs get at least a mid-level pitching prospect in return for Samardzija/Hammel, but I'm not that worried. The way I see it, the Cubs can go out and sign big-name free agent pitchers when guys like Bryant and Baez start to come up to the bigs with team-friendly contracts.

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  4. This year's AAA team is doing surprisingly well here in Des Moines. Kris Bryant is getting some nice starts, the bullpen looks sharp, but the starters look a bit susceptible. Manny appears to be a big draw.

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