Of all the tired baseball tropes, “He’s too young to realize the enormity of the moment,” is perhaps the most irritating, and flat-out wrong to boot. If you (the reader) have ever been between ages 20 and 25, you know the world can seem huge; especially when you’re just starting out in your chosen profession. Kyle […]
Author: Andrew Felper
The 2015 Ballad of Jon Lester: Start No. 32
Date: September 30, 2015 Opponent: Cincinnati Reds Location: Great American Ballpark Introduction Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end Since April, my greatest hope was that one day this feature would be to baseball analysis what Semisonic is to music. Today, with the regular season now complete, I have decided this hope has been realized. […]
Been There Before: Playoff Experience on the 2015 Cubs, Part I
Part II will focus solely on Jon Lester’s postseason resume. Below, Part I will break down the rest of the roster. Youth has served the Cubs well in 2015. Behind the play of Anthony Rizzo, Kris Bryant, Kyle Schwarber, Hector Rondon, Addison Russell, and hell, even Starlin Castro, the team is playoff bound for the […]
The 2015 Ballad of Jon Lester – Start No. 31
Date: September 25, 2015 Opponent: Pittsburgh Pirates Location: Wrigley Field Introduction “If I didn’t have bad luck, I’d have no luck at all.” -Michael Gary Scott Oh, how sweet it would have been. Jon Lester was very good on Friday afternoon, just like he has been for the majority of 2015. It would have been so […]
The 2015 Ballad of Jon Lester: Start No. 30
Date: September 20, 2015 Opponent: St. Louis Cardinals Location: Wrigley Field Introduction Chris Rock followed Bigger & Blacker with Down to Earth. The Office followed its first six seasons with its final three seasons. Pearl Jam followed the 1990s with the first half of the 2000s. This is a convoluted, perhaps unnecessarily snarky way of […]
The 2015 Ballad of Jon Lester: Start No. 29
Date: September 15, 2015 Opponent: Pittsburgh Pirates Location: PNC Park Introduction Jon Lester opened June by surrendering 11 earned runs and 21 baserunners in 9 1/3 innings pitched at the Miami Marlins and Detroit Tigers. Those two teams are now a combined 31 games under .500, and will both probably be looking for new managers […]
The David Ross Effect
*All stats are through September 1, unless otherwise noted The Babe Ruth Impression In recent seasons, a late July swoon on the North Side would hardly be cause for panic, as teams already going nowhere had little else to lose. In 2015, however, the post All-Star break malaise was putting a damper on the most exciting […]
The 2015 Ballad of Jon Lester: Start No. 26
Date: August 29, 2015 Opponent: Los Angeles Dodgers Location: Dodgers Stadium Introduction Unlike Henry Rowengartner’s late season trip to Chavez Ravine, Jon Lester’s time in Dodgers Stadium did not result in a victory or the chanting of “We want a pitcher, not a belly itcher” to a large, mustachioed Dodger on the mound. It was not […]
The 2015 Ballad of Jon Lester: Start No. 25
Introduction Baseball has been described many ways by many people, but bizarre and g**damn frustrating has to be at the top of everybody’s list. On a sunny, late-summer Monday afternoon on the North Side, Jon Lester outdueled reigning American Cy Young winner Corey Kluber of the Cleveland Indians in his most efficient start as a […]
The 2015 Ballad of Jon Lester: Start No. 24
Introduction Well, damnit. As a man wiser and more fictitious than myself once said, “Sometimes you eat the bear…and sometimes the bear eats you.”* On Wednesday night at Wrigley Field, the bear, or Tiger, ate Lester. *Have any of you seen The Big Lebowski? It’s obscure, but I’m a bit of an indy film nerd, […]