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By Thomas Chambers
It was one of those weekends when it all came together.
Following the game all year. Knowledge of local weather patterns. Quality horses in quality races. And a decent chunk of luck.
And perhaps most importantly, the time needed to spend studying and handicapping the races. That’s how you win at the track.
Posted on August 14, 2009
By Dan O’Shea
Did you give up on Troy Tulowitzki like I did?
Then we’re both sorry.
The Colorado shortstop who was skirting the Mendoza line just a couple of months ago (come to think of it, that was right about when his team’s winning percentage wasn’t much better) has hit over .440 during the last couple weeks and hit for the cycle Monday night against the Cubs.
I gave up on Tulo in early June when he sunk to .216, but he’s now hitting .276 with 21 Hrs and 60 RBIs. He also has 15 stolen bases and six triples. He leads all MLB shortstops in home runs, and that final fact is why he tops our Fantasy Fix Action Ratings this week. Here’s more FFAR talk:
Posted on August 12, 2009
By The Beachwood Spotlight Affairs Desk
1. From FunnyHockeyShow
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Posted on August 11, 2009
By Jim Coffman
Are you enjoying this baseball season?
Me, not so much. The team I compel myself to follow has been in contention but is just about impossible to love.
The Cubs have guys who can club the ball when they get hot and they have pitchers who pitch well more often than not. But they only have one, true all-around ballplayer, don’t have any baserunners who can consistently cause opposing discomfort (although the one all-around guy, Derrek Lee, is capable of a surprise first-to-third or some other clever bit of legwork every other week or so) and don’t have any of the sort of special defensive players who make good games great. And even Lee simply doesn’t send the pulse racing with enough regularity. His averages (on-base and batting) aren’t high enough to earn star billing, he doesn’t have enough power and his defense, while very good, doesn’t make a difference very often.
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Another irritating thing about this Cubs team is that the promising young guys aren’t on the field enough. Heck, they just sent Micah Hoffpauir back down to the minors. Some posited that he had slumped lately but the primary problem was he wasn’t getting nearly enough at-bats. And while Hoffpauir is clearly a first baseman first, he also is clearly as good in the corner outfield spots as either Alfonso Soriano or Milt Bradley. Anyone would have slumped during a last month-plus of the season during which time he was lucky to get two starts in a given week. As for Jake Fox, anything less than every day is less than he should be playing. And it sure would be nice if the Cubs would let Sam Fuld play, I don’t know, three games in a row in center?
Posted on August 10, 2009
By Marty Gangler
There are certain points in the season that make you say to yourself, “Self, remember when . . . ” Like, remember when we thought Mike Fontenot was going to play second base everyday? And remember when we thought Milton Bradley might be a nutcase, but he’d at least put up some numbers? And let’s not forget, remember when Big Z was just a few mental issues away from a Cy Young run? Well, we here at The Cub Factor are remembering something else these days: Remember when we all kinda thought Derrek Lee sucked? Suddenly, Mr. Lee is not just putting together one of his best years in a while, he’s putting together one of his best years in his life. So, what happened? What got into D Lee? We here at The Cub Factor have a few ideas that may explain why this guy is so good again:
Posted on August 9, 2009
By Andrew Reilly
Why can’t the Sox beat bad teams?
Are they no match for the inherent craziness and allowable recklessness of a club with nothing to lose?
Do they suffer from some form of El Duque Syndrome, needing the most insane, high-pressure circumstances to surround them before they can channel their inner excellence?
Are they really that scared of the people of Cleveland, perhaps fearing a thrashing of the Indians would drive the good people of the Sixth City to do to the Chicago River what they did to the Cuyahoga?
Posted on August 9, 2009
By Thomas Chambers
This is my favorite time of the year for Thoroughbred horse racing.
In the spring, you have the inscrutable three-year-olds making their runs toward the Triple Crown series. In November and December, the Breeders Cup is over and it’s difficult to get too excited about the two-year-olds trying to get their feet under them. The Breeders Cup is what it is, but waits for its own intense 10-days of handicapping.
But here in mid- to late-summer, all is well as Saratoga, with stakes races throughout the meet, and Del Mar run their top-quality meets and Arlington gets into the mix with its turf-niche program, the Arlington Million, part of the International Festival of Racing (Aug. 8).
On the simulcasting side, you get exotic locales such as Finger Lakes in upstate New York, the California fairs at Santa Rosa and Fairplex, Emerald Downs in Washington State, the Jersey Shore’s Monmouth meet, Minnesota’s Canterbury Park with its Claiming Crown, and the beautiful turf course at Colonial Downs.
Posted on August 7, 2009
By Dan O’Shea
There’s a lot to get to this week, so let’s start with a Fantasy Baseball Round-Up and our awards for best performances during July:
MVP of the Month for July: Matt Holliday, OF. His performance was improving when he started the month as an Oakland A, but after being traded to the St Louis Cardinals, things really took off. He had a .477 batting average for the month with 4 hrs, 22 RBIs. He’s now rewarding owners who drafted him early and stuck with him through a sleepy first 75 games.
Cy Young of the Month for July: I’m going to throw a curve ball here, a Cliff Lee curve ball. Wandy Rodiguez was almost unhittable, Mark Buehrle actually was unhittable and both John Lackey and Jorge De La Rosa had 5-win months, but Lee was 4-2 in July with a 2.11 ERA and 3 CG, all of his outings but the last one coming for the second worst team in the majors. He is looking more like the Cy Young winner he actually was in 2008.
Posted on August 5, 2009
By Jim Coffman
People – repeat after me: Training camp is meaningless. Of course the Bears have to get their work in, but in terms of people watching the practices or media talking to players and coaches and determining anything definitive about the team? Does not happen.
Over the weekend, the news out of Bourbonnais was that the second-year man out of Nebraska, Zack Bowman, who had that one great game last year (a special teams TD and defensive interception) before tearing his biceps and sitting down for the season, looks like the hottest thing since sliced olive loaf out at cornerback (which is especially important now that veteran Peanut Tillman has been sidelined for most of camp by a back injury).
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Let’s see what Bowman does in exhibitions – and even those barely matter because of the dumbed down schemes teams run to avoid giving away anything about what they really plan to do when the games start to matter.
Posted on August 3, 2009
By Andrew Reilly
Talk about an uncharacteristic maneuver.
Even if the Jake Peavy deal had already been explored, it always seemed like such a non-event, one of those could’ve-been-sweet things right up there with the Maggs-for-Nomar trade and the phantom acquisition of Alex Rodriguez. Of course we just sort of assumed Peavy would never go along with playing for the White Sox anyway, but that stemmed less from what any of knew about Peavy and more from what we know about the White Sox. Because the White Sox, as you may be aware, do not make splashy moves.
Surprise moves, yes.
Risky moves, absolutely.
High upside shots in the dark, without question.
But the Peavy deal suddenly makes the Sox look like a real organization, one which a legitimately good pitcher looked at and said “I will hand over my power in this situation to be a part of what’s going on over there.” Five years ago we were hearing how Randy Johnson didn’t think the Sox could ever win anything and Kenny Williams himself calling the club a 50-cent operation in a dollar-demanding world. Now we have a marquee player (and not one past his prime this time, either!) and a legitimate shot at . . . something. Peavy doesn’t bring a guarantee of anything, but he absolutely brings the possibility of so much more.
Posted on August 3, 2009
