Sobering Thoughts

Here are a couple of quotes from the aftermath of the Cubs 4-3 victory over the Phillies.

From Starlin Castro:

"These first five months, I don't put them in my mind any more," Castro said. "I was thinking too much about too many things. I was thinking about hitting, thinking about defense, thinking about everything. This last month, I put in my mind to finish strong.

"Be me," Castro said. "That's what I want to be. Be me. If I strike out against a bad pitch, so what? Take [care of] it in the next at-bat. That's the feeling I need. In the beginning, if I miss in the first at-bat, I'm gone. That [shouldn't happen]. If you miss the first at-bat, you have three left. Keep positive every at-bat.

"I want to be an aggressive hitter," Castro said. "If I strike out on a bad pitch, so what? [The pitcher] has to throw a strike, no matter what. I can strike out, but the next at-bat, do an adjustment."

Actually, for the record, pitchers rarely if ever need to throw a strike to get Starlin out.  Also, if he is determined to avoid thinking at all, why are the Cubs paying him $5MM this year escalating to $11MM in the final year of his eight-year deal?  Eight years of dumb is hard to take.

From Dale Sveum:

"He's been swinging the bat with a lot more authority lately," Cubs manager Dale Sveum said, "and to see him put that kind of swing on that ball to center field with the wind blowing in, that was nice, especially a game-winner.
It's nice the ball is coming off his bat like it did a couple years ago and last year," Sveum said.

Maybe I'm being hypersensitive, but doesn't it strike you these two are channeling Alfonso Soriano and Mike Quade here?

OK, it's nice to see Castro get a hit every now and then, but he has a .281 OBP so far with 112 K's, so just shut up and play baseball already.  Even when he hit for average, he had no business batting leadoff.  At least Soriano had power and base-stealing speed when he insisted on hitting first.  Castro has neither.

This "I just got to be me attitude" seems to be pervasive among the Cubs players.  Sveum seems to encourage it, perhaps inadvertently with all his talk about recognizing pitches and hitting your pitch hard and so on.  I rather think what the players hear is "blah, blah, blah, wait for your pitch, blah, blah, blah, hit a home run, blah, blah, blah."

Home runs are nice and the Cubs hit a lot of home runs, but they do not score a lot of runs and they lose a lot of ballgames as a result.  Too bad, some of these guys have a little bit of talent that could be developed.

It won't be so long as the Cubs current system is in place.  That's the sad part of watching this team being molded.  Try as I might, I see progress only from Welington Castillo among the young position players.

Based on the quotes I referenced above, I'd say it is time to bid farewell to both Castro and Sveum.