Cubby-Blue

Carlos Marmol: To WBC, or not to WBC?

It's all baseball, right?
I mean, he'd be getting his practice in if he's in Arizona or Puerto Rico.
So, why not?
Well, back on Jan 24th, Peter Gammons weighed in on Carlos Marmol pitching in the World Baseball Classic.
So did the Sun Times.
Neither thinks it's a good idea.
Arms are touchy.
Plus, there's Lou over there joking that he'll be getting a good look at Kevin Gregg's 98 mph fastball while you're playing in another country.
Uh, I don't think Lou's really joking there, Carlos.
I read the Vine Line's blog today, and Mike Huang's got a little story in there about Derrek Lee standing in the batting cage when suddenly Carlos Marmol came out to throw.
Derrek said, "Aw, hell no."
That's the kind of joke I like to hear about now, Carlos.
It's your decision.
Use your head.

I Like The Way Lou Piniella Talks. I Really Do.

"It's a small clubhouse, too," Piniella said of that fire catching on with other players. "There's nothing wrong with that, there really isn't. I like competitive people, I really do. The more competitive, the better."
Lou Piniella really said that, just a little bit ago.
He's got this way of emphasizing things by summing up what he just said by re-phrasing it with, "_______ really _______".
It cracks me up every time I hear it, it really does.
I would imagine he said it on a famous road trip he took with Matt Sinatro last year.
Something like, "You should look at a map, Matt, you really should."
Just recently, he probably said something like, "Alfonso, we might have to move you down in the line-up, we really might."
Then, after thinking about it awhile he seems to have reconsidered, "Nah, we really shouldn't."
We don't really know how that one will end, but probably with Fonzie leading off.
It would be hilarious if we found out that, in the famous dirt kicking incident that got the team sort of stoked in his first year here, that he said to the ump, "YOU'D BETTER TOSS ME RIGHT NOW, YOU REALLY BETTER!"
It would also be funny if others picked up on it, because distinctive language usually rubs off.
So at some Phoenix area steakhouse we could have maybe heard Jim Hendry and Lou talking.
Jim: I tried to get Peavy. I really did.
Lou: Golly, that would have been sweet, it really would.
Jim: Well, I'm not done yet, I'm really not.
Lou: That's good, it really is. And these pina coladas are awesome. They really are.
Maybe they said that.
Who really knows?
But I guess what I want to hear more than anything might come some time in the future.
It would be in the locker room, and the players would all be spraying champagne on each other, most wearing goggles because they're prepared for it and know that their eyes will sting.
But not Lou.
He's old-school that way, and would welcome the sting.
And a reporter would ask Lou the most obvious question, "What does it feel like to be world champions, Lou?"
And he'd say, "It feels good. It really does."

Sorry, Can't Help It: Another "What If"

What can I say - things come up.
You look at this team right now and man, it's pretty damned good.
But lately I've been doing the "what if" thing in my head, and there are a couple thoughts I can't help what iffing.
This is one.
I don't know Aaron Miles yet, and I'm totally prepared to like the guy, but when you compare his bat to Aramis Ramirez' bat, there's kind of a difference in bat personality - one swings for fences and one swings for singles.
Not that Aramis wasn't totally reliable last year - he looked to me to be in his best shape since becoming a Cub - but... he's got those big legs with those big hamstrings and I worry about injury.
I noticed that at Cubs.com, they updated the depth chart so that Aramis now has Aaron Miles as his first back-up, and Mike Fontenot as the back-up back-up (even though he's never played a game at third).
You know, probably nothing major happens to Aramis over the course of 162 games, Lou rests him plenty and Fontenot, Miles and Theriot all have lots of opportunity to keep sharp and contribute to lots of W's.
And there's this from Cubs.com:
"By carrying 12 pitchers, the Cubs are limited to 13 position players. Do the math. You have the eight regulars plus a backup catcher. That's nine. Micah Hoffpauir, who can play first and the corner outfield spots, will likely get one spot, outfielders Reed Johnson and Joey Gathright each get a position and you can slot either Aaron Miles or Fontenot into the last spot."

So, should they get a beefier guy to backup Ramirez, that guy would either A) have to beat out Fontenot or Miles B) be an emergency trade or pickup if Aramis should go down or C) be playing in Iowa.
I've given myself a headache, and I'm sorry if it spread to you.
This isn't the biggest worry in the world.
But still, what if...

Cubs Spring Training And The Hohokam Park Sign

This is what happens when there's a perfect storm of "clients" demanding their logo be present and some guy who can't design.
I'm certain there are many fine designers and lots of talent in the Phoenix area, but my first exposure to bad design came there.
I did my internship at a small advertising and design shop - their biggest client was the Park Central Mall.
The first thing I learned was how to cheat.
The owner had a giant airplane hangar-sized space in the back of his offices, and he purchased a gigantic broken printer machine (this was way before everybody had computers with their own printers - you used to have to go to a special place to have ink put on paper).
He would bring clients back into this space, talk to them about his printing services and then when he got a printing job, he'd job it out to a real printer, mark it up 20% and poof: a boat payment.
The quality of work wasn't much better.
One day he came in my cube and literally said this, "I need an illustration of a horse and don't spend longer than fifteen minutes on it or we'll lose money."
Finally one day I said, "Will we ever have a client who wants, you know, something cool more than he wants it for cheap?"
Loud, sustained laughter.
I decided to move.
Anyway, this Hohokam sign is probably the work of a sign maker rather than a designer, and he spent all his creative energy on that ahh, shape.
If you took away that shape, it's literally a list typed out in the most basic font: name, sub-name, explanation of name, and then 4 logos all jammed together in the bottom (which are probably all the people who kicked in some cash for the sign).
All placed in what looks like bricks and plants bought at Home Depot.
Hid. E. Usss.
And it's just a shame - it ought to be at least charming.
I think this painting makes it look better than it really is.

You've seen the wonderful work done for the Cubs - the new print campaign featuring the Wrigley sign?
Go to Bleed Cubbie Blue and check it out if you haven't.
I really laughed at the "home of the reason you put up with the winters" because it's SO TRUE.
And just like the Obama poster or the Mastercard "priceless" idea, I'm sure that everybody's gonna make up their own Wrigley signs.

Position players came to camp yesterday, and even though it's supposed to snow this afternoon, I could care less.
Derrek Lee, Aramis, Soriano... it's just fabulous.
I'm gonna probably have a couple more "concerned" posts coming up, but take a step back and think about where the Cubs are right now.
The pre-season top dog king monster sensations of the central.
I am in a pret-ty good mood.

Lou On Predictions: No.

So Lou put the kibosh on players making predictions.
I'm glad, personally.
Although I liked it at the time when Ryan Dempster made the WS prediction last year, in retrospect it came off as sort of too planned, or thought out.
Then, we talked about it all year.
And then, that ending...
Predictions are better when they're about tomorrow's game or the next match, rather than a whole season.
There's more instant gratification.
Muhammad Ali wouldn't have been as interesting without telling us what he was gonna do to Joe Frazier.
Plaxico Burress' Superbowl prediction last year certainly got your attention, right?
They make movies more interesting.
Like in "Cool Hand Luke" when Paul Newman says out of nowhere, "I can eat fifty eggs."
And then he did.
Or sometimes predictions make movies less interesting.
Like in "Taken" when the first time we see Liam Neeson's old spy friend who's now with the French government and I predicted to my wife, "I promise you he's now a bad guy and this movie will suck."
And it did!

Here's what Lou said (lifted from the Trib).
"I told the players: 'No predictions', let's just go play on the field. What we need is good performance. You don't have to be great. You have to be really good consistently at what you do, and that's going to be one of the themes of our camp this year.
Last year we won 97 baseball games, so we don't have to get better from that standpoint. We just need to stay longer."

If I were to make a prediction, it would be that we'll see a Cubs T-shirt with the line, "We just need to stay longer".