A Catch Like No Other

I could not be a Cubs fans, or even remotely justify having even a free, lightly developed, Cubs blog, without taking note of this catch, made by Reed Johnson, one of my favorite surprises so far this season, and he just keeps getting better.



This guy, I'd never heard of him before Spring training, late in spring training, when the Blue Jays cut him and we picked him right up. What a pickup. Apparently, the Blue Jays are loaded, or maybe he just needed a change of scenery, but Reed Johnson is the Ryan Theriot of the outfield, with possibly a little more speed, and the same giddyup that is beginning to signify the Lou Piniella era.

I've come to believe that you can tell a coach not by his stars, but by his peripheral players. Rare is the coach that can really change a star player, especially if they are already successful, but it's the players that a coach keeps around to fill in the other spots that tell his ability, and character. I felt the same way when Dusty came in, because his Neifi Perez's actually were a cut above the guys we'd had previously coming off the bench. His unexplained overuse of them, despite performance, is another story.

Lou Piniella plays the hot hitter, period. Want to play some baseball, Mike Fontenot, take advantage of the AB or two you'll get from sitting on Lou's bench and soon you'll be starting, keep it up when you get an extended chance, and you may start sharing time with a regular starter. Conversely, start playing stupid baseball like I've seen the last two outings and you will lose any tan you may be working on sitting back in the dugout shadows. You too, Henry Blanco. There have been some good points, but you need to start acting like the player that signed that nice fat contract.

Reed Johnson knows Lou's game. And he doesn't rest on his laurels, or bitch about his batting postion, or field position, he doesn't bitch, he doesn't even preen for the cameras after making such an outstanding play. One that might have required a five minute semi-pro dance routine anywhere else. He doesn't even bother to put his cap bill back down and he runs away, holding up the ball.

My love affair with baseball, and the Cubs

As long as I can remember, I have been a Cubs fan. Probably before I even realized that baseball was a game, or what a game was, I have been a Cubs fan.
Blame my mom.

As a little boy, before I can even remember now, she took me to Cubs games. I met, well saw and got autographs from, Ron Santo, Billy Williams, Ernie Banks, and many others. Those were the days where the players hung around the field and the stands before the game, signing autographs and talking to the fans.

No, shit, talking to the fans.
I remember Billy Williams as being the nicest person outside of my family that I had met at that point of my life. I don't have any specific memories of those early Cubs games, when I was 4 and 5 years old, but they set a pleasant tone for the rest of my life, following the Cubs.


I'm not the biggest Cubs fan in the world, not even close, but I'm in the upper ten percentile. I don't have single baseball card left or the statistics of the 1984 lineup logged into my cranium but I did find a way to watch the last game of that playoff series against the Padres, stationed in Europe, before ESPN globalization. Unfortunately, it was the worst game of the season.

Like many, WGN played a huge role in my being able to take the Cubs with me wherever I went. Still, watching a team that bad year after year can turn things the other way, and set someone rooting for them up for ridicule. I never jumped off the bandwagon, though at times I wasn't exactly waving the Cubby flag.

I watched the Boys of Zimmer from Des Moines, Iowa, amongst a crowd of Cub fans nearly ass pervasive as in my hometown, and the Boys of Dusty, in Arizona, with my buddy, a Cubs fan in the 99th percentile, which I will call the Ernie Banks Percentile. They nearly killed me that summer, because the Cubs were all I had.

Things aren't quite like they were in Arizona, more is good in life for mme and the Cubs have more than blind faith leading them into this season. Lou Piniella is the best manager they have in my lifetime and ownership has opened the purse strings a little to get some free agents. Maybe Alfonso Soriano was over priced, and has some issues as a player, but he was the best available, and they ponied up for him. Bottom line, wherever he hits, he makes the team better.

Every season, Spring comes and I gear up for baseball. I read, watch, listen, and breathe Cubby stats and talk, and listen or watch every game I can. There is very little that preempts a Cubs game for me. I won't give up on them, because in some cosmic sense, I think that it comes back around and the world hasn't given up on me.

Brent Kowalkoski - You Are Now a Sox Fan

I almost forgot about this moron, Brent Kowalkoski, but the update in the tribune about him reminded me again. In fact, it took me 3 times to get his name down into the Google search, so any notoriety is fleeting, if existent. And he didn't get his ass kicked by the pitcher he rushed, like the guy with Randy Myers in the 90's, so nobody will talk about him after this.

Still, you gotta wonder what the guy was thinking, and what this judge was thinking by letting him off with probation. He should have at least done a weekend or two in Cook County. He is also banned from Wrigley for two years, but I don't really see how they are going to enforce him, unless all the employees got a real good look at him and will be on the lookout. As they were saying late in the season last year, even Bartman went to more Cubs games and wasn't recognized, none of which were ever substantiated, but I don't doubt he could have gone if he wished.

Bartman is welcome back in my book. He did what anyone would have done, Alou, Prior, and Gonzales are the ones that lost that game for us, and forethought makes us all realize that the city of Chicago may nearly have ruined a man's life over that. So much so that unprompted, I remember Steve Bartman's name, Breat Kerzollooski, he can go to U.S. Cellular Field with the rest of the degenerates.

Ah Ha! Sam Zell, people are figuring you out

Sam Zell, small percentage owner(reportedly less than 6%) of the White Sox, Real Estate pirate, and current interim owner of the Cubs and Tribune corporation, is trying to figure out just how much he can get away with now, as far as the Cubs and Wrigley Field are concerned.

On the radio, former bleacher-bum( as he touts himself) and sporadic radio personality Mike Murphy, is screaming "Real-Estate baron!" as much as he pushes Brown's chicken, but that shouldn't discount what he's pointing out. Sam Zell IS a real-estate baron, in this whole ordeal only to cut and parcel up one of Chicago's greatest assets, as is his right, but the city of Chicago or the state should not be participating in the process.

This guy is Gordon Gecko, and nobody should be supporting his operation, he will pay for it all himself just fine. Well, you say, what if he sells them off to some sleazy businesses, and we are stuck hearing about the Chicago "Trojan Condom" Cubs at "Club Hedonism" Field? Yeah, won't happen, and if he does that, he is a fool, which he is not. Taking too much advantage of Cub fans loyalty will lead the Cubs down the same trail recently taken by the Blackhawks.

Magic Number is Four

Jason Kendall - Just in Time.

I've been watching Jason Kendall throughout his career, mostly when he was with Pittsburgh and owned the Cubs. More than once he beat us all by himself, and for some reason he was always out of the Cub's grasp.

Now, this season, on what hopefully is a still rising wave, he has come to the Cubs. Like many Cub fans, I am wary of good signs. Maybe I shouldn't be, they really HAVE made the playoffs, and even advanced a round, but when things are going good, we all look for a shoe to drop. This isn't the shoe dropping, this is us getting a very good catcher, probably past his prime, but with serviceable stats over the last month, much better than what we've been getting. AND, he can catch the damn ball.

Jim Hendry made the announcement during the game this evening, that Jason Kendall had been acquired from the Oakland A's for Rob Bowen, the catcher we got for Barrett, and Jerry Blevins, a relief pitcher that has spent this season putting up decent stats for the Cubs' A and AA teams.

Losing Michael Barrett was a good addition to this team, for whatever reason you want to believe, witness the won-loss record since he left, now filling the hole he left behind with Kendall starts to put this team on the roll that will take them into the post-season.

I've been quiet this season thus far, observing, but now I am getting the feeling that this is all going to rally happen. The way Lou has taken over the team, weeded out the players not on his program, nurtured some that needed a shot... this is all working. So many things have happened this season that would never have happened with Dusty. Lou notices everything, and acts on it. He also won't have his managing dictated to him. Dusty spent the last three years he was here marching out the lineup he'd been force fed. He steadily sat hot hitters to rest and kept putting firestarting relievers in the thick of games, then shrugged when asked what went wrong, as if saying, "Whatcha gonna do? These are the players they gave me."

That is the main difference this year. Despite his press conference depictions of an Alzheimer patient, Lou doesn't miss anything. For instance, Jacque Jones has been seeing more playing time lately, out of necessity and because he started having better AB's and playing a decent center field. I watched him strike out tonight swinging at a pitch that bounced off home plate. I bet Lou saw that too.

Is Ted Lilly the son/brother of Bill Murray??

I couldn't help myself the other night, watching the Cubs horrible game against Milwaukee. Was it Ted Lilly pitching like a pitcher that has gone around the league once, and his scouting reports are catching up with him? No.

It wasn't even the terrible fielding and baserunning that has plagued the Cubs all season. It was when they put up Ted Lilly's picture and I saw the resemblance between him and Bill Murray, right down to the smirk on his face. Maybe it's just time to enjoy the season. Baseball is in full stride and if the Cubs can just slightly put it together, they can win their division.

So I'm going to just enjoy this season for a while.