4/13/2004 10:45:00 AM by Rob

First some facts, then some truth

There is no more reason right now to believe that Greg Maddux, in the end, will not have produced as promised. I still believe he will be fine. I also believe that Mark Prior will in fact pitch for us this year, and pitch well. I still believe that we got the better of the Lee-for-Choi trade. Hollandsworth and Goodwin have been career bench players for a reason, and as soon as the regular players are over their minor muscle aches, the offense will work a little better. Andy Pratt sucks, and will be replaced by someone better suited to pitch to big league hitters.

So, logically, the Cubs are not in any real trouble.

But, to my finely tuned Cub-o-meter, they are. This just doesn't APPEAR to be a team that is going to shut the rest of the league down. This isn't going to be a team, as comprised, that is going to beat the rest of the league over the head, and use their skin as a rug. As comprised, THIS team isn't winning anything. There is NO spark, NO "higher power", NO reason to believe THIS is a pennant winning entity.

Numbers predict, and numbers memorialize. But numbers in and of themselves never won anything. We seem to have, for the most part, all the right pieces in place. Our catcher doesn't hit that well, but who's does? Otherwise, we seem to have satisfactory components in each slot in the order. But there's no LIFE, no AURA, no chemistry. These guys aren't busting their noggins, or their asses, and refusing to lose.

We aren't scaring nobody. Yesterday, Lloyd McClendon drove his bus up to the back door, unloaded the bunch of hand-me-down shit he was dealt, and them fuckers just lined up and kicked Greg Maddux's ass up and down the block. Somewhere in Chicago today, some knuckledragging fuck named Jack Wilson is lying naked in bed, watching himself on ESPNews over and over while some fleshy dental hygenist is picking her bra and thong panties up off of his floor.

On paper, we look loaded. On the field, we are nothing special. Just the usual inconsistent collection of streak hitters, moody hurlers, and arsonists blowing shit up in the pen. The pen, which was Hendry's top off-season priority, doesn't look any different from last year's collection of genetic freaks, washed-up relics and over-rated buffet barons.

I have been saying all along that the mere presence of Mark Prior adds the sheen of credibility that this team needs to scare people. This may just be wishful thinking on my part, because from where it stands now, he isn't gonna be enough. Hendry is going to have to make another trade to somehow bring in the missing ingredient for this big ol' froot salad.

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