Cubs Sign Paul Maholm

Paul Maholm, the Cubs' newest starting pitcher

The last four weeks or so must be the most eventful offseason month for the Cubs in a long time.  Theo and Jed's Rizzo-for-Cashner trade immediately gathered critical acclaim, but they weren't done yet.  They still aren't.

Paul Maholm, 29, is a seven-year major league veteran who has spent all of his seasons in Pittsburgh.  He joined the rotation for good in 2006 and has started in all 185 major league appearances.  He was the 8th overall pick in the 2003 draft, so his success was foreseen by many scouts.  He holds a misleading 53-73 career record with a 4.36 ERA and career K/9 innings and BB/9 innings rates of 5.5 and 3.0, respectively.  He doesn't have the typical skill set of an early first-round starter but has been a very reliable innings eater for the Pirates for the last half-decade.  His performance hasn't really given him the 'ace' moniker, but his surrounding staff has.

Maholm is a groundball pitcher; he will rely on his infield defense a whole lot.   Although he'll soon be on the wrong side of 30 and doesn't have any overpowering pitches, this is a terrific signing for the Cubs.  He gives the Cubs a reliable veteran option to contrast the inconsistent tendencies of rotation-mates Randy Wells and Travis Wood, just to name two.  MLBTradeRumors.com ranked Maholm as the ninth-best starting pitcher available in the free agent market.

For fans still skeptical about the results of all these recent moves, I have some good news.  If you think about it, this move makes a Matt Garza trade much more likely.  Garza is a star at this moment and the Cubs front office is working for a deal.  Ironically as soon as I realized that this makes a Garza trade more likely, Jed Hoyer told the media that it isn't a "precursor" to any other deal, implying a Garza trade.  I don't believe that.  When has a GM ever announced that a move they just made was a precursor to another deal - before the second deal has been agreed on?  Hoyer can't say that a Garza trade will follow because then if the deal falls through, the front office will look bad and expectant fans will be disappointed.  A politically correct move by Hoyer and a statement needed to be made, but I don't believe it to be true.

Cubs fans shouldn't expect the world from Maholm.  He'll finish with a record near .500 and an ERA anywhere between 3.50 and 5.00 most likely.  He'll earn his value, however, in inducing ground balls and being a model big league regular for others to learn from.  Although his year-to-year results are inconsistent, he's coming off the second-best season in his career and is a known commodity in the big leagues, which is more than we can say for any of our mediocre options in Iowa at starting pitcher.  Good move.

Cubs Acquire Anthony Rizzo for Andrew Cashner

Anthony Rizzo

Man, Theo and Jed really do like this kid.

More than a month after initially talking to the Padres about Anthony Rizzo, the Cubs finally found the right deal to reel him in.  That deal was Andrew Cashner and Kyung-Min Na for Rizzo and Zack Cates.  A blockbuster deal as far as prospects go, but I like it.

I think this is a really risky move by the Padres.  Cashner was supposed to be the Cubs' #5 starter in 2011 until an injury in his first start caused him to miss nearly the entire season.  Despite the injury risk, San Diego still was aggressive about acquiring the Cubs' first-round pick from 2008.  So far Cashner's career has been defined by his 100 mph fastball and that injury.  His minor league record is impressive with a 2.82 career ERA and only three homers allowed in over 180 innings, but closer study reveals he doesn't have his mechanics down well enough to be considered an elite prospect.  He does strike out about eight batters per nine innings but also walks about four in nine innings.  This means his K/BB ratio is around 2.00, which is not impressive at all.  For comparison, most elite pitchers have around a 4.00 or 5.00 ratio.

Andrew Cashner

Interestingly enough, Cashner became somewhat homer-prone in his midsummer major league trial in 2010.  I said before how he only allowed three homers in 180+ minor league innings.  In just over 50 major league innings, Cashner allowed eight home runs.  His ERA from that trial was 4.80, and that K/BB ratio got even worse to 1.67.  Like most other fans and observers of the game, I assumed these struggles were due to a lack of experience and the typical issues a rookie deals with upon arrival in MLB.  I guess I was never really sold on him, though.  That fastball is amazing and his simple delivery seems to defy physics, but his changeup was not where it needed to be.

Rizzo didn't have much luck in the majors either.  His trial came in 2011 and he batted .141 with just one home run in over 150 plate appearances.  Obviously I don't watch the Padres every day, but from what I can tell it seemed he never got into a rhythm.  That actually helps the Cubs, however, as it dropped his stock to the point where just Cashner could get him.  Rizzo will be worth it, too.  Across three levels of minor league ball, Rizzo has put up back-to-back 25 HR, 100 RBI seasons.  In 2011, however, he did it in much more impressive fashion, as if 100 RBIs in the minors wasn't impressive to begin with.  Rizzo batted .331, got on base at a .404 clip, had a .652 slugging percentage, recorded his first career triple, and did it all in 93 games.  101 RBIs in 93 games?!  Cubs fans, meet Anthony Rizzo.  He's here to stay.

Times a-changing: This Cubs Convention poster, advertising
 the 2011 Convention, is only a year old.  Two of the three
featured players are out of the organization.

Cates, 22, was the Padres' third-round pick in 2010.  This 6'3" righty spent all of 2011 with Fort Wayne in A ball.  His 8.5 K/9, 4.0 BB/9, and 2.09 K/BB are reminiscent of Cashner.  The main difference is Cates is still two or three years from the bigs while the Padres will most definitely throw Cashner into Petco Park for at least part of 2012.  Cates has some nice potential.  Let's give it a year and see where he stands after that.

The outfielder Na was signed out of South Korea and played the 2011 season at age 19, bouncing from rookie ball to even AA.  He gives little offensively with virtually no power at all but has some speed.  His size  (5'10", 170 lbs) is a minus, but apparently his defense is good.  Either that or he paid his way through the Cubs' minor league system.  I can't figure out how he moved up so quickly.  I don't think we lost anything here, though.

Theo Epstein announced after the trade that he expects Rizzo to start 2011 in AAA.  Theo himself must be excited to have Rizzo, a prospect of his own in Boston until he went to San Diego in the Adrian Gonzalez trade.  For now, however, Rizzo is still a prospect.  Personally I'm really excited for this kid to debut, but he needs some time in Iowa first.  We don't want to burn him out before he's ready.  As of right now, Bryan LaHair is our first baseman.  But soon, and hopefully for a long time, Anthony Rizzo will be the man!

Cubs Dump Sean Marshall; Acquire Travis Wood, 2 prospects from Reds

Sean Marshall, traded to Cincinnati, was the Cubs' best reliever

Cincinnati overpays for bullpen depth in the first Cubs rebuilding package

Vacation Note: I just got a look at the Miami Marlins’ new ballpark; pretty sweet.  If you’re in Miami and looking for it, I think it would be more helpful if I told you to look for an alien spaceship though.  The huge retractable roof stadium, named New Marlins (insert corporate sponsor here) Ballpark, is extremely tall and a sleek silver color all the way around with an oval-like curvature.  You can peek inside from behind the outfield (where the walls are open) and see the jumbotron and some of the upper deck seats.  I hope to return to see a game in the near future. 

      

Although it’s old news by now, the trade of Sean Marshall to Cincinnati was probably the most important of the offseason so far.  Its importance should not be overlooked.  Even though it was a trade of a setup man for a back-end, somewhat unproven starter and two prospects unheard of to the everyday fan, it represents the first rebuilding deal the Cubs have completed in, well, a while.  ‘Rebuilding’ has not exactly been the Cubs’ cup of tea over the last decade.  Theo Epstein and Jed Hoyer, however, are believers. 

In this faith, the Cubs will surely execute more rebuilding deals at some point, if not in the next month or so.  MLBTradeRumors.com is reporting interest from the Yankees, Red Sox, Blue Jays, Tigers, and Marlins in Matt Garza, although Detroit and Miami are the front runners at this point.  It may seem like a trade of Garza, especially following Marshall’s, would be the official raising of the white flag on the 2012 Cubs season.  However, the trade with the Rays that brought Garza to the Cubs must have looked the same way to their fans.  They basically dealt their ace for a handful of minor leaguers but made the playoffs anyway.  I’m not saying the Cubs will make the playoffs by any stretch if they make a Garza trade, but it wouldn’t transform them into a 100-loss team either. 

Travis Wood

The trade of Marshall overall certainly makes the current Cubs a worse team, seeing as the bullpen was the team’s lone major strength on the roster.  Marshall was the center piece as one of the best setup men in the game.  A very pressing need, though, in rotation depth was aided by this trade, as 25-year-old Travis Wood joins the roster.  Wood has played in two major league seasons with decent yet inconsistent success.  

Looking at the Cubs rotation right now, though, this includes Ryan Dempster, Matt Garza pending any possibly trade, Andrew Cashner, and Randy Wells, and you can see the Cubs need this depth.  I’d much prefer Wood over any of Rodrigo Lopez, Ramon Ortiz, or Doug Davis.  Wood wasn’t born with blow-away stuff but is almost a solid rotation candidate, and that’s good enough for me.

Now on to the smaller pieces of the deal.  The Cubs only had to give up Marshall to for the deal, but the Reds gave up Wood, the great-hitting outfielder Dave Sappelt and undersized but agile and speedy shortstop Ronald Torreyes.  Sappelt has limited major league experience; Torreyes has none.  But both players have hit well throughout the minor leagues and Torreyes brings major speed.  Sappelt could see some action on the 2012 Cubs as a sixth outfielder/injury replacement.  Torreyes has no chance of appearing at Wrigley next season; he ought to try Double-A first.  He is recorded at 5’9” but in reality is around 5’8” or 5’7” (very similar to Dustin Pedroia).  I like both players and think they both have a decent shot at being major league regulars.  Neither stars, but solid players.  ESPN’s Keith Law agrees, and I concur with Law that the Cubs have won this trade. 

Dave Sappelt

Marshall provides the Reds with bullpen insurance.  I guess he’s the logical closer or back-up closer (which they will need, considering Francisco Cordero’s recent occasional closing issues and that he's unlikely to resign) although he has never been actually been tested as closer before.  When Carlos Marmol lost the job last summer, Marshall got a few chances in the ‘closer-by-committee’ role but that wasn’t enough of a trial to serve judgment.  He’s a loss because he has been the most consistent reliever on the Cubs since 2009 and only he and Marmol have even been a part of the unit since then.

If only counting for the trade’s effect on 2012, I still like the trade.  When early injuries to Wells and Andrew Cashner last season exposed a blatant lack of depth, Jim Hendry was forced to sign Ortiz, Davis, and Lopez in bad veteran signings who had to be signed just to fill the lineup card on a daily basis.  With this move and move forthcoming, the Cubs won’t have to do that.  Wood is young and here to stay while he develops.  It’s safe to say he will improve over the next few years.  Marshall is at his peak right at this moment and at age 29, it's hard to see him getting better over time.  He's elite at the moment but will only go downhill from here.  So in both the long-term and short-term, this deal really does makes sense for the Cubs.

         

Road Trip Analysis: Cincinnati, Florida, Boston

Record: 3-4
Final Record: 20-25

The Cubs made their first trip to Cincinnati this season when they headed there last week for the first of the two scheduled two-game series on the Cubs schedule this season.  I'm not going to sugar coat it; the results of the trip to Cincinnati were catastrophic.  Two winnable games, which had we had won we would now be mere percentage points below .500, were thrown away by lack of effort and the worst defense you will see in the Major Leagues.

The first game was winnable by all means.  The Cubs had a 4-0 lead until the 6th, when Carlos Zambrano began his regularly scheduled blowup inning.  But he remained out there, and the Reds continued to hammer him while the bullpen struggled to get warm.  Zambrano had been carrying a three-hit shutout through five innings.  A walk, five hits, four earned runs with more to come on the bases with just one out later, Zambrano was relieved by Marcos Mateo.  But the damage was already done, as threw a wild pitch to score the go-ahead run and then a two-run homer to Jonny Gomes.  It wasn't just the ill-timed decision making that cost the Cubs this game; it was the lack of effort and the sense that they had given up.  Too many times I see this team sulking and just going down without a fight.  This is exactly what happened here, as if the Reds coming back was inevitable.

Just when it looked like it couldn't get any worse, of course, it did.  The Cubs came out the next night and the pitching staff, led by the starter that night Matt Garza, shut out the Reds.  In earned runs, at least.  The futile Cubs defense allowed the Reds to literally tie and win the game with seven runs, all of which were preventable by not throwing the ball away!  An error in the 4th by Carlos Pena was magnified after Garza hurriedly whipped the ball into the dugout throwing it home to get a runner.  That scored all three runs to tie the game.  Then in the 8th, the Cubs held a 5-3 lead, which Kerry Wood blew when he threw Ryan Hanigan's sacrifice bunt down the left field line trying to aggressively get the force at third.

I've only seen one other play like this one before, and it was in Game 5 of the 2006 World Series when Justin Verlander threw David Eckstein's bunt into left field trying to do the same thing.  But unlike that play, the ball this time got all the way down the line and to the wall.  Two more runs scored and the game was tied again.  Watching this play live, it's hard to describe the frustration that a Cubs fan feels when watching this stuff.  Dominique Wilkins of the Atlanta Hawks was known as 'The Human Highlight Reel' for his stunning ability to light up a highlight reel.  The Cubs as a team basically create the Human Incompetence Reel.

These two games should have been won.  They were key division games early in the season and the weather nullified much of the home field advantage.  This is a series the Cubs needed to win if they are going to get back into the NL Central mix.  They put together wins here and there this season, but they aren't going to win anything if they ever have another game like this (photo, left) or allow seven unearned runs.

After all of this, the Cubs headed to South Beach for their last series ever at Sun Life Stadium in Miami Gardens.  Surprisingly, the Cubs won both games there in efficient fashion.  Not so surprisingly, it was their first sweep of the season, albeit a two-game series.  The Cubs did not commit an error in either game.

This led to the Cubs' first trip to Fenway Park in Boston since the 1918 World Series.  News of this World Series came up recently, when a report stemming from a document released by the Chicago History Museum suggested that the Cubs blew the Series for money, much like the White Sox did a year later.  I don't know the truth to this document, and it very well could just be the Sox player hassling the Cubs indirectly about something else.
 
Marlon Byrd was interviewed by Comcast SportsNet on Thursday night after the win against Florida and, when asked on his outlook for the Boston series, he replied, "Sweep Caroline."  I agree that the whole Sweet Caroline tradition at Fenway is really annoying, but hearing this stuff out of him gets tiring to be honest.  Last season, Byrd guaranteed the playoffs in May when the team was falling out of contention.  Well, you saw how that turned out.

The Cubs seemed overwhelmed by an American League offense in the first round on Friday night.  All three games were on national television, with WGN, FOX, and ESPN handling the games, respectively. After an uneventful 15-5 loss Friday, the Cubs bats woke up in the 8th inning of the game Saturday night, and the Red Sox collapsed which was reminiscent of the Cubs' defense collapses.  In a stunning change of momentum, the Cubs put up eight in the 8th and won 9-3.  As the Cubs closed out the bottom of the 9th, the huge contingent of Cubs fans that had traveled to Boston were chanting 'Let's Go Cubbies' at Fenway Park, an action pretty much unprecedented.  Every game at Fenway Park since April 2003 has been a sellout, so it's always full of Red Sox fans.  But Cubs fans took over Fenway late on Saturday.  Although that was nice, it was the only win in the series loss.

The Cubs were quietly shut down by knuckleballer Tim Wakefield on Sunday night.  Such a loss can be expected from the Cubs, as this is one of those games I notice where they just give up at a certain point.  The indifference of the group makes them less interesting to watch for sure, and this is the primary factor in the Cubs attendance struggles of this season.  But either way, this road trip was very up and down.  Mostly down, though, and the Red Sox-Cubs series generated nothing more than publicity for historical content, not a key turning point like it could have been.

Believe it or not, I have faith in the Cubs coming up in the next few weeks.  A nice, long homestand against three bad teams in the Mets, Pirates, and Astros is the perfect time to get into a groove, especially as the ivy will be grown, the weather will be nice, and the fans will be there.  And they'll need to get into a groove, because they then play 20 straight games against teams who had winning records last year.  But I have faith they will, because this team has hung in there despite slow starts from Aramis Ramirez and Carlos Pena, who are both hitting very well now.  Randy Wells and Andrew Cashner will be huge to this team, as the Cubs will no longer have to deal with immediate five-run deficits by way of James Russell every fifth day.  Hopefully, the Cubs will get lucky for once.
 
  

Treading Water

After the first two and a half weeks of baseball, the Cubs seem to be putting forth about the amount of success as last year's group.  With today's loss to the Rockies, the Cubs fall back under .500 again to 7-8, but now return home for a nice nine-game homestand.  Pitching has not been a great strength of the Cubs, and the rotation especially has underperformed quite a bit.  Carlos Zambrano, Matt Garza, and Ryan Dempster have all not pitched well really at all this season.  The injuries to Randy Wells and Andrew Cashner have hurt as well as James Russell was slammed his first start and Casey Coleman has had mixed results.

The bullpen, not including today's performance by Marcos Mateo, has been very good in general.  Carlos Marmol thankfully hasn't thrown out his shoulder yet (knock on wood), which is a concern I have for him just about every time he throws the baseball.  But the rotation has the Cubs playing more high-scoring games than usual.  The Cubs offense has scored 4.5 runs per game this season, and that should be enough to win with the rotation we have.  But Dempster, Zambrano, and Garza have ERAs of 6.30, 6.11, and 6.27, respectively.  Come on now guys, that's no way to run a railroad.

But the offense cannot go unnoticed.  Although they are averaging 4.5 runs a game which is near league average and only a bit above the 4.2 from last year, the Cubs are fourth in MLB in batting average, and fifth in hits.  We can owe plenty of those hits to a certain Starlin Castro, who as of Sunday night led baseball in hits with 28.  In my wanna-be highly-educated fan opinion, Castro is unbelievable.  Watching him out there is like watching a 12-year-old in park district game.  He just comes to play the game and nothing else, just trying to have fun.  It almost seems like he doesn't even feel the pressures and expectations of playing in the bigs, not to mention with all of the hype around him and the Cubs as a franchise and Chicago as a city.  Today watching the Cubs-Rockies game, I watched him bend over the plate to go get a ball well off the plate and ground it to Todd Helton at first base.  Len Kasper picked up on his anger with himself over becoming overanxious on the broadcast.  And after the inning ended and the camera was on him right before commercial, he swung up his helmet as if he was about to slam it in frustration.  This from a guy with a .418 batting average, four hits just the night before, and Chicago status as a fan favorite.

Although fielding has been an issue with this team so far as well, there's been an improvement over last year's performance and Castro has gotten much better so far, making better plays quicker despite two errors.  Basically, this team is waiting on the starting pitching.  It's not time to sound the alarm on the Garza trade yet, but he should know that that is exactly what will happen unless he starts putting up numbers and soon.  The poor performances from Zambrano and Dempster are surprising, to be honest, despite all the Zambrano haters who may have correctly pegged his successful comeback last season as a fluke.  Dempster's success seemed too easy last season, and it's finally catching up to him.  So far I've seen a whole bunch of - to use a Bob Brenly term here meaning a slider that spins but doesn't move hardly at all - cement mixers in the low 80s left high in the zone, right where hitters can get at them.  Hopefully he'll improve, because we need it.

NOTE: There's been some confusion on the results of the quiz giveaway from a few weeks ago.  I apologize for not making this clearer, but if you did win the free app then they would have replied in an email with the code to get the app free.  If you did not get this email, unfortunately you didn't win.  Thanks to all participants, I have deemed this partnership a success.  There may be future similar opportunities, so stay tuned.

1st Half In Review

For the Chicago Cubs, the first half of the 2010 baseball season has been about as disappointing as a half for any team this season.  Coming into the season with high hopes of regaining form of spectacular play in the regular season of 2008 with new ownership and a new attitude, it became clear early on that the 2010 Cubs would struggle to score runs.  This was quite evident in the entire first half and the 7-0 shutout loss to Vicente Padilla and the Dodgers summed it up frustratingly.

After exciting runs for and in the playoffs in 2003 and 2004, the Cubs changed from being perennial cellar dwellers to a high profile team that looked to win every year no matter what.  The 2008 season was the high point for the Cubs on the field, a team that did so many things right fell to Los Angeles in the playoffs and joined past playoff futility.  The Cubs didn't perform to expectations at all in 2009, and many changes to the bullpen and the controversial signing of Milton Bradley while losing team pieces like Mark DeRosa and Jason Marquis were cited as the problems with the team.  However, as the Cubs have yet again struggled in 2010, they may go back to being baseball's 'Lovable Losers'.

Report Card:

Offense: D+
Defense: C+
Starting Pitching: A-
Bullpen: B
Coaching: B-

Overall Grade: C

The biggest struggle so far has to be scoring runs.  The Cubs have been just terrible scoring runs, ranking 13th in the NL in runs.  The Padres, yes, the Padres who play in enormous Petco Park and have Adrian Gonzalez for their only real home run threat have scored more.  The Cubs are 11th in walks, a category that was praised in 2008 when the Cubs' patience lead to a more efficient offense.  They are also 11th in OBP and BA.  They are tied for the least stolen bases in the NL with 34.  Looking up and down the roster, this is not a team made for smallball.  It is a team to get runners on and get them around using big doubles or homers.  So far, neither the runners nor the bop from the big boppers has arrived.  The defense, long a troubled category for the Cubs, is nothing special thing year except maybe the all out play of Marlon Byrd and the over/under on how many errors Starlin Castro can make in a week.  The pitching has become a real bright spot from the most unlikely places like Carlos Silva, Tom Gorzelanny, and Sean Marshall.  Lou Piniella has literally done all he can and now he just has to wait but you just have to question his ability to get through to the players.

The Cubs are stuffed with huge contracts and are severely overpaying more than a few on the roster.  From now until the Trade Deadline, look for the Cubs to try to unload at least one of these contracts whether they are in contention or not.  I think the first one to go will be Ted Lilly.  Lilly has become a fan favorite at Wrigley Field because of his old school yet effective pitching style.  And okay, his crazy adventures on the basepaths.  Ted has drawn interest from the Mets who would be able to take his salary and are looking for another arm to beef up for the stretch run.  While I don't think the Cubs will be able to get rid of all the big contracts they want to if the Cubs are bad, I wouldn't be surprised if Derrek Lee and/or Kosuke Fukudome go.  Fukudome has a ridiculous $14 million contract when a player with his stats doesn't even deserve a quarter of that.  Lee has been a fixture at first base for many years now on the North Side and had a comeback campaign in 2009 but hasn't recaptured the magic into this year, disappointing fans once again after his MVP-caliber season in 2005.

I think the Cubs will make a run.  Aramis Ramirez is back and healthy as he proved on the West Coast trip before the break.  He will be key in this run and it won't be anything crazy like the White Sox but the Cubs will play good ball on this homestand here and continue it on the road.  The starters can be relied upon for great starts and the bullpen can survive long enough not that they have everything figured out, including the playing time for impressive rookie Andrew Cashner.  The young kids that the Cubs are fielding in the minors and even the majors now like Castro and Cashner should provide reason to be excited.  Attendance at Wrigley Field has taken a surprising downturn but I think it will get higher with the continued weather of summer and a better home record by the Cubs.  With their blowout win Thursday night, I think they're headed in the right direction.

Final Prediction: 80-82