The Other Fifteen

Let's take a look at the accumulated press reports and see if we can't divine what Lou's plans are for the day, shall we?

• Henry Blanco will start. Soto's a young guy, but he hardly leads the team in days off at this point, and it's a long season. I'd prefer it to be J.D. Closser as the backup, but what do I know, right?
• Hill is going to pitch in relief today. I imagine this will change if Marquis is having a complete-game no hitter or something, but other than that the idea is to get a few innings out of Hill and hopefully see an improvement in his ability to pitch in the zone.
• Gordon Wittenmeyer hints that last night's odd arrangement (putting Fukudome in left center and DeRosa in right) might become more common, as the Cubs try to work Mike Fontenot into the lineup so that we can have two lefties. (May I suggest Eric Patterson?) [Sorry about the mixup - I typed left and meant center for Fukudome. -CW]
• Expect to see either Johnson or Cedeno or both today; both have hit Moyers very well in their careers. (Which is something I don't care about but Lou does.) Johnson was probably a given anyways. The other Cubs who have hit Moyers well are D-Lee and Rich Hill. (Maybe that's why he's starting today.)

Labels: Baseball, Chicago Cubs, Felix Pie, Geovanny Soto, Henry Blanco, Jason Marquis, Reed Johnson, Rich Hill, Ronny Cedeno, Ryan Theriot

It starts off well:

Spring training doesn’t predict anything.

Everything after that is pretty much an utter vortex of suck. Mostly because he ignores those five words, and goes on to talk about how he isn't convinced about Rich Hill.

The best part:

Rich Hill could be a problem for the Cubs this year, not because he’s bad but because he’s being counted on as a legit No. 3 starter. Are we sure he’s that good?

The Cubs have left themselves one front-end-of-the-rotation starter short. They’re counting on Hill developing into that starter, and he might. But at this point, why has he been guaranteed a spot in the rotation at all?

Ohboy. "[W]hy has he been guaranteed a spot in the rotation at all?" Because he was one of the top-ten strikeout pitchers in the National League last season!

I keep telling myself that I shouldn't let myself get so excited about these things; after all, these guys have to write something about spring training, and I'm sure that you don't sell a lot of newspapers by referring to everything as "meaningless" for over a month straight. But sometimes I can't help it.

Labels: Baseball, Chicago Cubs, Greg Couch, Media, Pitching, Rich Hill