By Marty Gangler

If the Cubs could only play the Pittsburgh Pirates and Washington Generals, er, Nationals, every week they would make their $300 million off-season investment stand up. These teams suck. And the worst team in the league last year – the Cubs – just beat them silly. Well, beat them ugly, in some cases, but beat them just the same, five of six games in all. The Cubs may be on a roll, relatively speaking, but you almost have to feel sorry for their poor, pathetic victims.

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Posted on May 7, 2007

By Marty Gangler

Through the first 23 games of the season it has become painfully obvious that the roster of this Chicago Cub team is ill-equipped to play winning baseball. A 25-man roster filled with too many second basemen, too many outfielders, and second basemen who play outfield has left Uncle Lou putting more lineups together than the Chicago Police Department. Square players being jammed into round holes just doesn’t really work. What’s funny is that this team has a number of nice puzzle pieces; it’s just that the pieces belong to a few different puzzles. Jim Hendry is to blame, of course. How he has kept his job the last few years is perhaps the greatest puzzle of all.
So we here at The Cub Factor thought it would be fun to look at some other life instances that remind us of the 2007 Chicago Cub roster.
* You go camping with a tent that has no center pole but two extra corner poles.
* You show up for your SAT with three pens but no pencil.
* You go to the 7-11 to buy a pack of gum but you only have a $100 bill, so you buy a couple cups of Ramen, an egg salad sandwich, some paper towels and an US Weekly to pad the bill. And once you leave the store you realize you forgot the gum.

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Posted on April 30, 2007

By Marty Gangler

Going back to the middle of last season it was obvious to everyone with half a brain that Dusty Baker had to go. But at The Cub Factor we wondered last week if the Cubs’ record would be any different right now if Baker were still the manager. After a computer analysis including such constants as baserunners oversliding bases given to them for free and early-season cold weather, and such variables as the number of players playing out of position and delegating managerial decision-making to the bench, we say No.
Sure, Uncle Lou is a lot more engaging in press conferences and has only used about half the excuses Baker used (so far), but with the talent on this team, one has to consider that the new “accountability” is playing havoc with the team’s psyche. Let’s break down some players and how the season would probably look if Baker were still the skipper:

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Posted on April 23, 2007

By Marty Gangler

While Mount Lou’s first explosion of the season got everyone’s attention, he also muttered something under his breath far more telling. We could swear we heard something about Lou confessing that he was “deceived” by some players in spring training.
He didn’t name names, but we will.
* Alfonso Soriano. Lou was deceived into thnking Soriano could bat leadoff, play centerfield, and avoid getting picked off more than once per game.
* Carlos Zambrano. Lou was deceived into thinking Zambrano had grown beyond the emotional range of a teenager.
* Michael Barrett. Lou was deceived into thinking Barrett knew how to play catcher.

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Posted on April 15, 2007

By Marty Gangler

In a city of knee-jerk reactions where moods shift with single plays and the prospects for entire seasons are judged on single games, the first week of the Cubs’ 2007 campaign can be summed up like this: Here we go, same old Cubs; Wow, these guys are good; Christ, these guys stink; Damn, we got something here; Hell yes, what’s the magic number; they’ll never put it all together, they suck.
After a week’s worth of games the Cubs are 3-3, can’t steal a base, can’t get consistent relief pitching, are shakier in the field than Michael J. Fox, and can’t decide who to bat second in the lineup. Still, they are just one game back of division leaders Cincinnati and Pittsburgh. In other words, they’re still in it.

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Posted on April 9, 2007

Welcome to The Cub Factor, where the Beachwood Lost Causes Affairs Desk will track the 2007 season of the most ill-fated franchise in the history of professional (and amateur) sports.
Among our reoccuring weekly features this season on The Cubs Factor:
* The Second Basemen Report. The Cubs tend to have a lot of second basemen on their roster at once, most playing out of position. We’ll track their progress and check in with old favorites like Bobby Hill, Todd Walker, and Mickey Morandini.
* Sweet and Sour Lou. Lou opens the season 55 percent sweet, 45 percent sour.
* Mount Lou. Innings until eruption: 36.
* Beachwood Sabermetrics. For example: A heavy statistic analysis indicates that the Cubs tend to lose low-scoring games when the wind is blowing in at Wrigley, and they tend to lose high-scoring games when the wind is blowing out.
* Over/Under. For example, the Over/Under on the number of players used in the two-hole this season is 5.5
* Cubs Blog Review. We’ll bring you best insights from around the Cubsosphere, as best as we can keep up.

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Posted on March 28, 2007