A Few Thoughts On Boise Fucking State

I'm coming out of hibernation for a minute to burn on something that seems blatantly obvious to me, but I haven't heard anybody else bring it up, so here we are...

Boise State is fucking cheating. Now, I'm not so naive as to think that every college football program isn't doing everything they can to cheat and connive and lie and manipulate to get good recruits in, but I mean come on... you guys know Boise State is in Idaho, right? That's the most boring state ever invented. Isn't it a little weird that a steady stream of bad ass, talented players has been flowing into the middle of Idaho for the last ten years? Like, why is nobody asking any questions about this? I get everybody wants to root for an "underdog" but come on. Also did you know that turf rhymes with smurf????!! Good thing that joke hasn't gotten old...

In conclusion, fuck that team, I hope they lose every game and their star running back gets charged with a sex crime. Never mind, that only happens to teams I like.

Anyway, enjoy your day.



Also, What's up to the people who have been randomly commenting on this blog in a foreign language. Thanks for keeping the party going while I was gone.

Season Preview: SS

At short, the Cubs look to be in good shape with Theriot... at least offensively. He's a lock for somewhere around .290 with 20 steals and an OBP around .370. Lou already has him penciled in at leadoff, although in a perfect world he'd hit second (and be playing second). But to be honest, I'm not really all that interested in Theriot. Sure he's a scrappy white guy who tries really hard and gets dirt on his jersey on a regular basis-- and who doesn't love that?-- but honestly, I'm much more interested in Baseball America top 20 prospects gaining comparisons to Hanley Ramirez.

I'm really trying hard not to get overly hyped about Starlin Castro, but I can't help it. He's already being hailed as some type of messianic figure who will lead the charfe for this new era of the Ricketts Cubs, but yes, this still is the Cubs, and yes, they haven't brought a decent position player up through their system since Ernie Banks, and yes, Corey Patterson, Felix Pie. Hee Sop Choi, Kevin Orie, etc all had similar labels to those being bestowed on Castro now, but as Cubs fans, we have been manipulateing ourselves for centuries telling ourselves something great is about to happen, so why change now?

Anyway, the contingency plan in place at short (Theriot starts all 2010, Castro plays at AAA for the first half of the season, comes up around mid-season as a back up/spot starter, and starts in 2011 with Theriot moving to 2B) seems to make sense, and I'm as interested in seeing how Castro develops as any other story line in the 2010 season. However, if Castro looks good after a month or so in AAA, why wait til 2011 to make him the starter? The tallest midget contest for second base is going to be a disaster, and by May a pitchfork-toting mob will most likely be gathering to run Jeff Baker and/or Mike Fontenot back to AA where they belong, so the combination of a developing Castro at short with Theriot at 2b where he's best suited worse than the Baker/Fontenot ar second with Theriot playing a mediocre short? Add to that the Cubs have this weird idea when it comes to "developing" their prospects (See: every prospect they've brought up the pasr 10 years), so I say let Castro get his at bats in the bigs, with major league coaches to help him if/when he struggles.

Season Preview: 3B

Leading up to Opening Day, I'm going to break down the situation at all 8 positions plus starters, the bench, the bullpen, and whatever else I get around to "breaking down" (read: complaining about). Since I'm mostly pessimistic about the 2010 team as it stands right now, I'm starting with a position most likely to make me feel all warm and fuzzy when I write about it...

More than any other position on the Cubs roster, third base is solidified for this season. Ramirez, when healthy has been the Cub's most consistent player the past six years and, if healthy, should be good to put up .300/30/135 this season, if healthy. Did I mention he needs to stay healthy. When he went down for 50 games in the middle of the season last year, the Cubs offense (except D Lee) collectively wet themselves, and it didn't help that Lou's rallying cry during those 50 games was "Eh, Eh, well we'll just have to wait and see, how uh... wait what was the question? Oh yeah... eh we'll just have to see how things go when Ramirez gets back." What wasn't talked about enough is what happened when he did come back. Despite putting up decent numbers after his return at the beginning of August, the Cubs continued to play mediocre baseball the rest of the season. What this means is that a shitty Cubs lineup with Ramirez hitting 4th is still a pretty shitty... and this will be essentially the same lineup that couldn't produce runs in 2009, so, despite the small sample size, I think it's fair to ask how much value Ramirez truly has for the Cubs.

As it stands, Ramirez is the team's third-highest paid player at $15.75 mil this season. He has a player option for 2011 at around $14 mil, and a mutual option for $16 mil in 2012, and there is no way the Cubs will want in on that, as Ramirez will be 34 by then (which in Dominican years translates to somewhere around 49). Those are some large numbers for an injury-prone player on a team that, if things go south, may be looking to unload money either at the trade deadline, or after the season, and Ramirez probably has the highest value of any player on the roster. Like pretty much every other player Jim Hendry has ever signed to a deal, Ramirez does hold a no trade, so that may complicate any potential deal, but I'd guess that at age 32 and playing for a team probably looking to rebuild, he might be willing to approve a deal to a contender in the hopes of winning a ring before the end of his career.

Another thing to follow is the development of Josh Vitters,the former 3rd overall pick. Reports have him at a year or two away from being major league ready, and teams tend to make room for 3rd overall draft picks. When Ricketts gets sick of watching Hendry's overpaid roster play .500 ball and axes him at the end of the season, I expect a fire sale/youth movement, with a guy like Vitters getting a chance to start in 2011. Furthermore, if said fire sale were to occur, Ramirez would likely bring some decent talent in return

Do I think Ramirez will really be dealt during the 2010 season? Almost definitely not... at least not as long as Pinella is managing the team. Injury free, I think Ramirez will put up all star caliber numbers, and if Soriano, Soto and Byrd can provide some legitimate protection behind him in the lineup, he could have a huge season. My prediction for Ramirez: .290/34/117

Cubs Spring Training Stream of Conscious Part 1

I'm just going to go SOC on this one because I need to get some things off my chest about my favorite professional sports team.

• I have this growing sense of dread that my summer of sports viewing is going to be agonizing, and there's really nothing I can do about it except start really getting into the Chicago Fire. Less than a week into spring training Theodore Roosevelt Lily has somehow done something to himself that required getting an MRI on his knee, Soriano has announced that his knee still isn't 100%, the guy they traded for Milton Bradley looks like was plucked out of the nacho bar line at Golden Corral, and Ryan Theoriot and his 14 career HRs lost an arbitration case and is still making more money this year than I will in my lifetime.

Cubs new relief pitcher and buffet crasher, Carlos Silva.

• All of this really wouldn't be so bad if there were some kind of light at the end of the tunnel, but this year for the Cubs looks like it may be the worst type of professional sports season -- the "everybody on the team is old and bad, the only young guys we have aren't that good, and almost all of the contracts are untradeable so this thing can't even be blown up at the end of the season" season. I honestly can't think of anything worse than watching Soriano strike out four times and make two errors in left in the same game and knowing that there are still five more seasons of this.

• I'm still undecided on Tom Ricketts. I liked his comments in his first press conference about spending more resources on shoring up the farm system, and I'm hoping his unwillingness to spend money this off season is in the hopes that things will get ugly enough for him to fire Hendry so he can bring in somebody he can trust to spend his money.

• I'm also not excited about another year of Pinella falling asleep in the dugout and waiting two weeks too long to make obvious decisions (i.e. moving Soriano down in the batting order). He mailed it in after the second game of the Dodgers series in '08, and he's just cashing checks at this point. I mean, have you seen this guy's press conferences? In every one he looks like he either just woke up from a nap and doesn't know what's going on, or is really cranky and wants to take a nap.

More thoughts on this Cubs season to come in the coming weeks.

The Bulls

One of FPTT's regular readers and I were in attendance at last night's Bulls game, a 20 point Magic beatdown that saw D Rose take on Dwight Howard in the paint two minutes in, resulting in a trip to the hospital for Rose and 46 minutes of NBDL quality hoops for everybody else on the Bulls. A few notes from the game:

• Unbeknownst to me, something called Chris Richards has become a fan favorite in the absence of Joakim Noah's hair.
• Much discussion between blog reader and I centered on how much the Bulls cheerleaders get paid. While I don't feel like researching this, I did find out that the Luvabulls have their own blog for some reason. While none of them openly acknowledge being strippers, I think we all know what "PhD student" or "Marketing job" really mean in NBA cheerleader speak.
• Blog reader admitted ignorance to the title of this blog. While I feel this has been clearly laid out at some point, this should clear up any more ambiguity. Brace yourself for some cringing.
• I came across a good Bulls blog today, in case this blog doesn't satisfy your Bulls fix.
  

Back at It

After having my sports chub destroyed be Chicago’s professional football team and a dearth of sports stories to tell shitty jokes about, things are starting to look up.

• The Cubs are projected to win 77 games and finish 3rd in the Central behind the Cardinals and the Reds (but this projection was before they signed Chad Tracy).

• Xavier Nady passed his physical yesterday and will now be half of one of the weirdest platoon name combinations in baseball history.

• D. Rose has officially arrived as the best athlete in Chicago.

• Time for some rumor mongering… I’m starting to let myself believe the Bulls are going to land Bosh and Lebron. Bill Simmons tweets this morning: “Why Chicago's sudden willingness to move Hinrich/Salmons? They're getting LeBron & Bosh! I keep telling you.” And that’s like the forth person I’ve read that from (here's another one). I’ve also heard a Ty Thomas/Hinrich/pick for Bosh could be coming before the trade deadline, which would a) give the Bulls a legitimate shot a run at the Eastern Conference finals b) give them more time to free up the cap space (i.e. unload Salmons for an expiring deal) necessary to land Lebron or a second tier guy like Joe Johnson.

• While this Bulls stuff will probably be the most interesting story line in Chicago sports for the next six months (at least for everybody who isn’t going to hop on the Hawks bandwagon), the most intriguing sports story in the coming months is going to be Tim Tebow. This guy is poised for one of the most anticlimactic professional careers in the history of sports, and the next few months may become painful as his draft stock will likely plummet once everybody realizes he’s a fullback who’s been playing quarterback in a gimmicky college offense. It’s already starting.

Weekend Picks

I'm a little late, so I'm going to take all the early college games off the board to avoid any controversy. So far I'm .500 with these, but I press on...

College:
Texas A&M (+20) at Oklahoma
Utah (+20) at TCU
Idaho (+32) at Boise State
Texas Tech (-4.5) at Oklahoma State
South Carolina (+17.5) vs Florida

...terrible slate of games this week

NFL:
New Orleans (-13.5) at St Louis [LOCK OF THE WEEK]
Minnesota (-16.5) vs Detroit
Tennessee (-7) vs Buffalo

I've contemplated doing a lock of the week every time I've made picks, and I think I would have lost all of those, so now I'll just make that shame public.

Also, I'm still working on those Bears articles I teased earlier in the week. They'll be here before you know it.