As we inch closer and closer to the Cubs breaking camp, there’s a quiet development happening in Mesa, nearly as quiet as the mime who led team warm-ups on Tuesday. According to ESPN’s Doug Glanville, Cubs bench coach Dave Martinez has been fielding a certain request from a number of young players: “Teach me another position.” […]
Category: Articles
Cactus Catchup: Blisters, Olmos Puns, and Mimes
Opening Day is suddenly less than two weeks away, and the Cubs seem to be slowly but surely honing in on regular season readiness. We’re seeing starters throw more and more pitches, lineups that look deeper and filled with more regulars, and a slightly increased focus on players settling into their roles. As always, you can […]
Cubbie Encores: How Top Cubs Followed Up Their Rookie Seasons
Last April 17th, BP Wrigleyville, then in its infancy, commemorated Kris Bryant Day by looking back at the debuts of some of the franchise’s most iconic players. Despite our initial wariness about celebrating yet another holiday manufactured by the greeting card companies, we came together to celebrate and put the heralded prospect’s arrival in historical context. Following […]
Weathering a Storm: The Mental Strength of Jon Lester
I heard someone I respect and admire say recently that life is largely about the storms that come our way and how we handle them when they do. We are always either in a storm, coming out of one, or one is coming. It’s a harsh and inevitable reality that adversity will come, and we […]
A Fantasy Baseball Guide to the Chicago Cubs
Here at BP, the local sites have decided to band together to help provide you with some fantasy insights into the players from your favorite teams. You can find links to all the other fantasy previews here. Nobody is underrating the Cubs this year. That’s as true from a fantasy perspective as it is on the […]
Reinventing the Neil: Ramirez Looking to Overcome Velocity and Shoulder Issues
The Cubs have a Neil Ramirez problem. After crushing the competition in 2014, to the tune of 43 2/3 innings pitched, a 1.44 ERA, 2.61 FIP, and 10.9 K/9 with 3.5 BB/9, Ramirez fell off in 2015 due to problems with his throwing shoulder. His average fastball velocity, which was 95.4 MPH in 2014, dropped […]
Winter Is Leaving: Chicago Cubs
Over at the main site, Wrigleyville’s Editor-in-Chief, Rian Watt, previewed the Cubs’ 2016 season as part of the “Winter Is Leaving” series. We thought you’d enjoy this selection from that piece. You know the Cubs are young. I mean, everybody has spent all offseason telling you that. But do you fully appreciate just how young they […]
Getting to Know Kyle Hendricks Through Google
Editor’s Note: Usually, we try to stick to hard-hitting analysis of baseball here on the site. Given the incredible tedium of Spring Training, though, we’ve decided to shift gears slightly to some hard-hitting analysis of Google search results. We hope you enjoy. Here’s Carlos Portocarrero … Kyle Hendricks is having a great spring. All those rumblings […]
Simply The Best: How the 2016 Cubs Stack Up Against 1984 and Company
Imagine, just for a moment, that you’re a New York Yankees fan. You feel pride every time you put on that iconic hat, the same one worn by Ruth, DiMaggio, Mantle, Rivera, and countless other current (or future) Cooperstown residents. The same type of hat that has been drenched by post–World Series champagne some 27 times. […]
Hammel, Cubs Banking On Familiarity With Schwarber To Drive Results
It now appears that Kyle Schwarber will be Jason Hammel’s personal catcher for some portion of the 2016 season, and possibly all of it. That’s the plan, anyway, according to (variously) the Chicago Tribune and Comcast SportsNet. Why? Let’s think about this first from Schwarber’s perspective. For one thing, the Cubs want to give Miguel […]