The Cubs placed their $136MM man, LF Alphonso Soriano, on the DL yesterday. What better time for manager Lou Piniela to make the best of this bad turn by setting a line-up to maximize the run production of his 3rd and 4th batters.
To do so, Japanese import Kosuke Fukudome would move into the two-hole with Ryan Theriot leading-off. This would place two .350+ OBP hitters in front of 1B Derrek Lee and 3B Aramis Ramirez. A line-up change like this would automatically make Derrek Lee a dark horse NL MVP candidate as he would amass the RBIs necessary to impress the voters. A nice fantasy side effect would be a top-ranked 1B.
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Cleveland Indians ace, C.C. Sabathia, made his fourth consectutive awful start of the 2008 season. It was the worst of the lot!
Against the Detroit Tigers, C.C. allowed nine earned runs in four innings of work. While he allowed the same number of runs in his last start against the Oakland A's in 2/3s of an inning less, he walked five versus the Tigers while striking out just one.
With 14 walks in 18 innings for 2008, is there something negative going on with Sabathia's health?
From the Akron Beacon Journal:
Is there a problem with his delivery?
''I don't think it's anything mechanical,'' Sabathia said. ''Last year I did a really good job of commanding both sides of the plate. I'm not doing that this year.
''I'm not commanding the inside part of the plate against right-handed hitters. That makes my change-up not effective. They're just leaning over the plate, because they're not worried about anything inside.''