"He has the Latin fire."
Who? As if you couldn't guess, this guy:
JT may be responsible for the always entertaining "This Week in Dusty" posts but I couldn't resist posting a gem from this article about the Cubs' decision to stick with the human torch and his combustible temper. Here's the quote: "Oh yeah. I've seen an evolution in some ways and the same in other ways. But let's not forget this guy's only 24 years old. They talk about the Latin fire. He has the Latin fire." Laugh amongst yourselves...
En fuego is on the hill tonight and I didn't feel the need to give him a pep talk, unlike Greggy. I'm confident he'll do extremely well tonight. Unfortunately, my trip to Dodger stadium has been postponed until tomorrow night...at least I'll get to see Marshall battle the somewhat intimidating Penny.
posted by DS @ 7:49 PM
7 comments
7 Comments:
Okay, we complain about Dusty's lineups a lot, and sometimes it isn't warranted. The main exception to this so far is the Walker vs. Hairston debate. Here's a possible new debate. Why is Cedeno sitting tonight? It's early in the season, he's young, athletic, and light, hitting well, playing good defense, and we've got an off day on Thursday. Does he really need the break? Is Neifi really hurting that badly for ABs? I hope this is not a new trend.
Neifi had a history of being able to hit this pitcher. Cedeno didn't.
Our 3, 4 and 5 guys let us down in this game. Or the Dodger pitching just got the best of the Cubs, the way Maddux and Dempster got the best of them the previous night.
Agreed Jim, our guys just couldn't figure out any of the Dodger pitchers last night, especially Saito. Who knows what we'll see tonight against Penny...
The next two games could be rough. Marshall vs. Penny and Williams (I think, or maybe Rusch) vs. Mulder. The offense had better bring their big bats. Pretty much everyone was shut down by Lowe last night. Z, on the other hand, got more fly ball outs than ground ball outs, which is not exactly what you're looking for from him. It would be nice if he would start working more efficiently too. I don't think anyone is going to argue that giving up 2 runs in 9 innings is bad, but Z had over 100 pitches in 6 innings. As a team, we walked too many. I like that we held down the other teams offense pretty much, but I'm not thrilled about the walks. Lofton got on base via a BB and scored the winning run.
Efficiency has been Zambrano's problem all season so far. Well, one of his problems. He has had trouble hitting the strike zone in general, but even last night, that led to him throwing 23 pitches in the first inning. Not exactly how you want to start a game off. I think it might have been more luck on the Cubs part that he didn't give up more than 2 runs. Who knows though? He'll come around though... at least I hope.
He isn't exactly a ground ball pitcher though, he's a power pitcher looking to blow the ball by you or get you swinging at his change-up. So I don't know if I see the fly-ball thing as the issue here. I think it is more that he is having trouble throwing strikes.
Fly balls at night in LA have traditionally led to outs. That ball field is a graveyard for power hitters after the sun goes down.
Dave Kingman hit three out one Sunday afternoon when he played for the Cubs, but homers are far and few between when the lights are on. Nobody has ever been able to provide a really good explanation, but I'm going out on a limb and saying it has to do with the lack of fan support. People in LA show up around the third inning and leave after the sixth. There just isn't enough wind coming across the field.
Okay, I'm kidding. But sometimes at the beginning of a game and at the end there are more Cub fans in the stands than Dodger fans.
I admit that Z is more of a power pitcher than, say, Maddux. But he's always been a "sinker baller." Sometimes the ball has sunk harder than others, but getting ground outs has been his #1 weapon, and the strikeout has been #2. I haven't really seen the ball sinking this year though. I also didn't see him throwing that nasty slider, or the 69 MPH curve he broke out about 10 times all of last year. Of course, I didn't see the radar gun light up the way it did at times last year either, so maybe it's all just an issue of it being April. I'd like to see that sinker dropping a little more heavilly though.
Post a Comment
<< Home