Cubby-Blue

Andre Dawson Hashtag Blitz from Cubscast

Andre Dawson was, and still is, a total God.

When I was as close to a bleacher bum as I'd ever get, I used to sit in right field.

Behind Zonk, Andre, and a little Sammy.

All of these guys were absolute, total studs, but Andre was something else.

He came to the Cubs with a blank contract saying he'd play for whatever the Cubs wanted to pay. Think about that. He then took over right field and I will never see a more accurate, terrifying arm in the outfield at Wrigley, or a more potent bat. He won the MVP when the Cubs came in last. He was a giant presence, and he should be in the Hall Of Fame.

Here's a quote I took way back in Jan '08 from from Cubbie Julie over at LOHO. 

You all know Joe Morgan and the way he belittles uh, everybody, right?  Well, Julie can be pretty funny and persuasive at the same time:

"And yes, I realize that Joe Morgan was an infielder, but this is still fun to do:

Career: Morgan 22 season, Dawson 21 seasons 
Game played: Morgan 2649, Dawson 2627 
Hits: Dawson 2774, Morgan 2517 
RBIs: Dawson 1591, Morgan 1133 
HRs: Dawson 438, Morgan 268

So Joe, you probably don't have to worry about "lowering the standards" of the HOF if Andre gets in."

I LOVE that quote.

Anyway, the guys over at Cubscast are doing a "hashtag blitz" to get some publicity for Andre's HOF bid. Here's what we're supposed to do (and please tell all your Cub Fan friends to do it, too): Starting on Tuesday Dec. 8th, whenever we send tweets we're to add the #DAWSON4TheHall hashtag. (Please go to Cubscast to get real instructions and see what it's all about, because to be honest I never heard of a hashtag until Lou over at Cubscast told me about it.) 

And if it can possibly help at all, I'm all for it.

I happily did a logo for them, which you see at the top of the page.

GO ANDRE!

Cubs Winning Hot Stove League Game

 
 
 
UPDATED WITH MILES TRADE!

I was trying to figure out a way to make the winter go faster, how to hurry up and get to the day pitchers and catchers report.

There are 20 weeks from when the Cubs stopped playing (on October 4th) until February 18th, the first day pitchers and catchers can report (according to MLB.com). So if you just think of each 2 week period as one inning, well then you've got a baseball game that goes one extra inning. (So, maybe Kevin Gregg pitched the 9th or something.)

Anyway...

When things are slow I Google stuff for the hell of it.

I looked up "Hot Stove", thinking I could get inspired. Wikipedia says it's really just the time in the winter when you hang around a "hot stove" to stay warm and talk baseball. Makes sense.

When it's modified with "League" to "Hot Stove League" it refers to the competition between owners and general managers doing trades and stuff in the winter. Now, that's inspiring...why not make it a game? 

Something to pass the time?

So this illustration is the first scoreboard for the "Hot Stove League Game", of course the Cubs' version.

Depending on what the Cubs do vs. Everybody Else, we can kinda keep score. And since this is my game I'll start out by doling out how many runs each "move" is worth. 

For instance, it's really not good that the Cubs have to get rid of Milton Bradley, so the Cubs score 0 in the 1st. But it's worse for whoever gets him, so that's minus 17 for Everybody Else.

Each year the Cubs don't win the WS will be the number of runs scored by Everybody Else.

Cub Fan Tom Ricketts becoming the new Cubs owner is arguably the most important thing to happen to our favorite team in decades, so that's 122 runs in one inning for the good guys.

As the Hot Stove League moves along, we can re-visit this scoreboard, and it would be AWESOME if you guys would suggest what the score should be based on what happens around the league.

Also, Cub Fans are special. We get points for stuff that has nothing to do with the team, really. Like...say Tom Ricketts announces that the cost of a frosty cold Budweiser will remain the same as it was last year...I figure that's worth about 15 runs.

Right now, the Cubs are up 128 to Everybody Else's 127, so it's a pretty close game.

And even better, you can see we're already in the 5th inning! So my little plan of making winter go faster is already working.

WOOOOOOOO HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! GO CUBS!