The Wolf Report looks at previous Japanese players who have come over to MLB and surmises, from that history, that Kosuke Fukudome will have somewhere between a 740 and 780 OPS in 2008 for the Cubs. (Hat tip: The Cub Reporter.) See also here for tempered expectations.

Given the following information, who do you bat second in the lineup?

Baseball Prospectus' Marc Normandin profiles former Cubs and top flight prospect and current fourth outfielder type Corey Patterson. (Sub. req'd.) "Patterson's inability to make changes in his game has kept him from improving from the player he was in his earlier years, and his tendency to pull the ball with the power he doesn't have is part of this discussion." ... more

Joe Aiello of View from the Bleachers looks at whether the Cubs were cost effective in 2007. Rich Hill, at least, was cost effective.

Rich Lederer of Baseball Analysts lists Carlos Marmol among his players who "have been among the most valuable players on their respective teams while earning at or near the minimum salary."

Entering play Friday, the Cubs are on pace to win 84 games this season, which would be an 18 game improvement over 2006. A big reason for that improvement has been the stability and effectiveness of the starting rotation. The Cubs are currently 2nd in the National League in runs allowed per game, at 4.17. Last year, they were 15th, at 5.15. That is a remarkable one year jump. There are a number of reasons for that jump; the starting rotation is a big one.

We were treated to a trio of articles this morning in the Chicago dailies on Derrek Lee's month-long home run drought, and the fact that he has just six on the season. (D-H; S-T; Trib.) Not that the power drought has hurt his overall production much. Lee is sixth in the National League in Batting Runs Above Average.

Lee blames his relative lack of power on a lack of fly balls: "Overall I haven't hit a lot of fly balls. Sometimes you get on that streak where you hit a lot of fly balls, and some of them you hit well enough to go out of the ballpark. This year I just haven't hit fly balls in general. That's the main reason my home runs are down."

It is true that Lee's fly ball rate has fallen from previous seasons, but only slightly:

The Cubs don't have a home run out of their outfield or their first baseman yet, and as a result, they have an ISO of .101, which is now 15th in the National League, ahead of only the San Francisco Giants, who sit at .094. The league average is .137. Florida leads the NL at .199.

A few other numbers after 11 games:

BP's Nate Silver gives us an idea of how rare Michael Wuertz's performance against the Cincinnati Reds was on April 13, when Wuertz entered the game with no one out and the bases loaded and struck out the next three hitters: "This trifecta has happened only 27 times since 1960, making it about four times rarer than a no-hitter (there have been 117 no-nos since 1960), or hitting for the cycle (124)." Only Stan Belinda has accomplished the feat twice since 1960.

The Hardball Times' David Gassko looks at the best hitting pitchers in baseball. Last season, Carlos Zambrano was the third best hitter, effectively reducing his ERA by a quarter of a run. Number 4 on the list was Jason Marquis. As Gassko writes, "Maybe that might start to explain Jason Marquis’ contract."

Jason Marquis made almost $5.2M for the St. Louis Cardinals last year and was, going away, the worst full-time starting pitcher in the National League. His 74 ERA+ was worse than any other pitcher who qualified for the ERA title in the NL. The Chicago Cubs, naturally, signed him to a three-year contract that averages $7M per season.

Marquis entered his age-27 season last year having just come off two years in which he had posted ERA's 13% and 3% above average, respectively, while throwing a total of 408.1 innings. So what happened? Well, there were a couple of disturbing trends.

Trend one:

SI.com's Tom Verducci provides his list of 10 potential breakout players in 2007. Coming in at #4 is the Cubs' Rich Hill:

Chicago pushed Hill to 199 1/3 innings between Triple-A and the majors last season -- way beyond his pro high -- so a potential breakdown looms. But if Hill stays healthy and gets a regular turn in the crowded Chicago rotation, he has the stuff to win 15 games.

Baseball's Secret Formula
Baseball teams use sabermetrics to build their franchises.

http://science.discovery.com/convergence...

Mon 10/2
7:00 PM and 10:00 PM
Discovery SCIENCE Channel
Duration: 1 hour
Rated: TV-G
Documentary, Science and Nature, Science, Special

Re-airs October 3 at 02:00 AM. 08:00 AM and 12:00 PM

Oct 7 03:00 PM

Source: Tivo listings

Dan writes about this program here:
http://danagonistes.blogspot.com/2006/07...

Photos from Ryne Sandberg Day at Wrigley Field

Meet Ronnie the Collie

More tv listings

We know during the Dusty Baker regime that Cubs hitters have had trouble taking walks and that Cubs pitchers have had trouble preventing walks, but ESPN.com's Rob Neyer (in an "Insider" column) shows us just how bad the problem has been. As Neyer writes, from 2003-06, seven National League teams have drawn more walks than they have allowed. The Phillies lead the league with a +476 differential, followed by the Cardinals, Padres, Reds, and Astros.

"Nine teams have negative walk differentials, and two of them really, really stand out ...": The Pirates and the Cubs. And the Cubs are much worse than the Pirates.