Boys of Spring

Filed under: Catchers | No Comments »

19 year old Starlin Castro is all the rave of Cubs spring training 2010.  It is nearly impossible (in Cub circles) to avoid hearing what a prospect this young shortstop is.   It has already been stated he will start the season in triple A.  I’m convinced however, Jim Hendry is going to have Ryan Theriot whacked to open the position. 

So what kind of potential are we looking at here Cub fans?  Are we talking Felix Pie, Corey Patterson, Eric Patterson, Hee-Sop-Choi, Ben Christensen, or Bobby Hill?  Maybe he is Jerome Walton, Dwight Smith, or Rick Wilkins.  How about the success of Mark Prior, Shawon Dunston, or Steve Trachsel.  Could it be we have Mark Grace, Kerry Wood, or Greg Maddux?

I’m guessing the true Starlin Castro falls in the middle of the above players.  He is going to be a fantastic defensive player at some point.  He has a smooth glove and too much athletic ability not to.  I expect him to develop into an average/above average hitter with a little pop.  If you can handle .275avg 15hr 70rbi, you shouldn’t be disappointed.  Starting next year I expect to see Castro starting at short for many years to come.  Don’t expect Greg Maddux, but lets not settle for Bobby Hill either. 

Filed under: Spring Training | 1 Comment »

It’s got to be Ozzie Guillen on Twitter.  Ozzie’s only been on Twitter a few weeks, but he’s provided me many chuckles while I sit at my desk at work.  There is really not a person in baseball that I would rather see on Twitter. There’s nothing but a text message standing between Ozzie’s brain and the general public.  Today was especially entertaining to me.  Ozzie tweeted 8 times in 17 minutes.  Ozzie was apparently bored in a car, stuck in traffic on the 101 or 202 in the Valley of the Sun.

(All times are Arizona Time)

4:25 pm -I hate the trafic I arizona aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

4:28 pm – This is crazyI thought the gas cost a lot money to many car lord

4:34 pm – I want a corona polar presidente now please this trafic lord

4:35 pm – Big reazon to love my boat no trafic in the ocean

4:36 pm – I want my cabo boat working hard to get my cabo 52 yessssssss

4:37 pm – I wish I have my bike in this moment

4:39 pm – Por que a jose gregorio hernandez lo hacen santo por que? Luchemos por eso un venezolano que le pasa al vaticano ?

4:42 pm – I going to get my chevy help me suv ?

Coming soon to the Ivy Envy Podcast – “The Ozzie Guillen Tweet of the Week”.

Filed under: General Baseball | 1 Comment »

Welcome to Season 2 of the Ivy Envy Podcast. We kick off the new season with a new host – Jeremy. We also have regular guest, Dispatch/Argus sportswriter Matt Veto with us to discuss the Cubs off-season moves. And, we award the first Asshat of the Week in 2010.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (66.7MB)

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Today was the first televised game of the 2010 pre-season and I am very happy that Lou Piniella decided to hold off the Carlos Silva start for a televised game.  What a pitching line:

2IP – 7H – 6ER – 2HR – 27.0 ERA
Was it fried chicken grease on his fingers? Maybe he was just eager to get pulled from the game so he go outside Hohokam to get a pork tenderloin straight from the QC Area’s own Chuck Cox and his Spring Training extension of TC’s Food and Spirits.

* With no cuts to the roster yet, that dugout was mighty crowded this afternoon. I think I saw Doug Dascenso walking around in there.

* Soriano dove for a ball. It wasn’t pretty, but he left his feet in a way that didn’t involve a hop. I’m not getting my hopes up. It just surprised me.

* It’s hilarious that every time Starlin Castro is brought up by someone in the Cubs organization, they hint at a future Theriot injury.  Today it was Jim Hendry on the radio with Pat and Ron.  If you haven’t heard, Ron lost a tooth eating cheese pizza today.

* No Pepsi “Bizzay” commercials this year? Maybe they aired it and I just missed it. For you Quad Cities folks, television isn’t the only place to hear commercials repeated several times in a broadcast. Anyone that listens to Pat and Ron on KJOC 1170am is very familiar with the Lions Den Adult Superstore due to their 15 ads per Cubs game. Anyway, I’m sure you’d like to see this commercial again:

WGN aired this commercial during the broadcast. Will this be the commercial that makes me want to punch people by mid-April?

Filed under: Broadcasters/Networks, Former Cubs, Outfield, Spring Training, Starting Pitching | 3 Comments »

Marlon Byrd has taken it upon himself to assist the Cubs pitching staff this year by pointing it out to them that they are tipping their pitches.  The most eye-catching name in this article is Carlos Marmol.  I have no doubt that pitch tipping happens far more often that we know, but it would ideally be one of those things that the pitching coach is watching.  You typically don’t rely on your Center Fielder to pull pitchers aside to coach them on their mound presence and delivery.

This could be an indication of the quality of Rothschild’s coaching.  I have never liked Rothschild, but I suspect that most of it goes back to the Dusty Baker years.  But let me try to be an optimist here.  I won’t put this on Rothschild, who happens to be the most awkward looking man in a uniform I have ever seen.

I am, instead, going to assume that this is just an indication of the stellar coaching by Rudy Jaramillo that Marlon Byrd has consumed in the last three years in Texas.

Filed under: Management, Relief Pitching, Starting Pitching | No Comments »

I try to give Al-Sor the benefit of the doubt, but when your left fielder says this–

“I have my job — before I had to do my job to make the team. Now I’ve made the team and it’s boring.”

– a Cubs fan just has to cringe. Did I take the quote out of context? Yes. But only slightly. See the whole thing here.

I just don’t get it, man. He knows people think he’s lazy and unmotivated, and he still think it’s funny to make comments about being lazy and unmotivated? Get a fucking clue.  For the kind of money he’s getting paid, I would let people shoot bullets at me. Not rubber bullets. Real bullets. The kind that come out of guns really fast and kill people.

I’m not questioning his decision not to play the first two weeks of Spring Training. I understand that he may have other work to do besides playing exhibition games. I’m really just questioning the words that he uses to justify it.

Filed under: Outfield | 2 Comments »

Corey, Andy and Kurt finally build up the guts to allow our wives and fiance on the podcast to talk about the Cubs with us. We learn how they really feel about the Cubs. The girls also get honest about our obsession with the Cubs and the time to we dedicate to Ivy Envy. They are then subjected to a pop quiz that consist of general baseball and Cubs-specific questions.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (57.0MB)

Filed under: Podcast | 2 Comments »

The 2009 season is something we’d all like to forget. The injuries and dysfunction weighed heavily throughout 2009 and hopes are high that 2010 will be different on both fronts.

I am not a Soriano fan and I was outspoken about this last year. He earned two swipes from me in the “Most Hated Cubs Player of 2009″ contest at our first live event at Twenty Sports Grille. Soriano ended up winning that contest, by the way. I wasn’t the only one ready to express my frustrations with the liability in left field.

But I decided to try to accept Soriano for who he is in 2010. He won’t show the effort we’d like to see. He won’t play with his head in the game. He will be below-average in the field. But if he is healthy and pitchers forgot to throw him sliders in the dirt, his power should return this season.

Soriano reported to Spring Training in Mesa today and started things off by reporting that he’s 75%-80% recovered from his September arthroscopic knee surgery. He also said that he doesn’t want to push things too quickly. That sounds like the Soriano I know.

Fellow Cubs fans, it will be the 2015 season until we see a roster without Alfonso Soriano. He will earn $90 million between now and then. That’s right, he is still owed 2/3 of this contract. And he’ll do it all with a little hop and a grin on his face.

Filed under: Defense, Outfield, Spring Training | 6 Comments »

Is anybody else thinking our team is looking a little rickety at the moment? The celebrated former Penn QB has signed with the Giants, and I would have thought after last year they would put an extra value on someone that can play multiple positions and cover for Aramis’ annual month long hiatus. Not to mention there has never  been a single athlete in Chicago sports history as popular in boys town…I’ll have you know that he was hotjocks.com’s Hot Jock of the Day, April 25, 2008.

Now, this man could care less that you pay $3,000 a month for an industrial loft concept studio in Boystown, or that you know the bartender at Roscoe’s.  But, it’s not a bad idea to cater to your local fan base with your roster,  the White Sox have been doin’ it for years on the South Side.  His wife was voted hottest baseball wife in the world that same year, what a hoax. I bet they didn’t even consider how much tail Randy Johnson gets in an 8 win season.

Randy Johnson is a pretty girl

Moving on, we basically are starting the year with 3 starting pitchers, and thats praying Wells wasn’t a one-hit wonder.  I love the Irish hipster as much as anyone, but I feel the Cubs missed out on an opportunity to have a better deep threat than the Bears here.  The bullpen’s wishy washy at best…I wanna be optimistic but I feel like the Cubs are the overly-confident giant grizzly bear I saw on the Discovery Channel last night,  walking on super thin ice trying to dig up dead frozen fish and make it thru the season.

Filed under: Former Cubs, Offense, Ownership, Starting Pitching | 1 Comment »