October 6, 200323 yr Even with that quote, the Sportscenter @$$holes laugh...they never learn Eventhough the Cubs are America's darling right now (hopefully the only as the Red Sox get eliminated), I think we have a pretty good chance against the Cubs. Now, I am not going to break down stats, for now, but just take a general look and compare. Marlins offense vs. Cubs offense: Advantage, Marlins. Yes, Marlins. Look at the Cubs IF - Karros, Grudz., (the other) A Gon, Ramirez, and Miller. No comparison necessary, statwise, we are superior in D and O. What about the OF? Cubs have Alou, Lofton, and Sosa. Solid, and probably better in stats than our current crop of Encarnacion, Pierre, and Conine/Cabrera. And their OF is going to be depended on to produce on offense whereas ours is only a catalyst most of the time. But who will be more consistent? Given that Cabrera is hot, Pudge is out of his mind, and you have to latent power of Enc, Lee, Lowell and even our A Gon ar Wrigley, you got to favor us over the Cubs. I would like to chew on stats of our batting at Wrigley, but will have to settle for against the Cubs. Pudge and Lee (.391, .304, respectively) have had success. As a team, we are batting .218. Sosa (.320 3HR), Grudz (.300), and Karros (.455 11ABs) all have had success against us. As a team, they bat .275. Statwise, the Cubs are favored. Marlins pitching vs. Cubs pitching: Advantage, gulp, Cubs. Yeah, yeah. I like our staff a lot and think we are going to rise to the occasion. But we have not faced Prior this year. Woods and Zambrano have great ERAs (.050, .073, resp.) against us whereas the only starter we hit was Clement (4.38). As far as relief, you gotta like Remlinger who gets it done but has a 27.00 ERA against us. Only Borowski and Guthrie (0.00 ERAs) strike statistical fear. Borowski is the closer with 66K in 68IP with a 2.63 ERA and 33 SVs. Power pitcher will smooth right in with Woods and Prior pitching. Makes you wonder if seeing too many fastballs will help our offense. And now for us. Team ERA, 5.02. Redman and Penny have 0s in ERA. So does Urbina, who is the most important pitcher on either team and perhaps, the best at what he does on both teams. Willis? 7.04. Beckett? 9.00. Both are arguably better pitchers now, and Willis at home will be excellent. Still, with all the stats lining up, and this is by no means exhaustive (just trying to stimulate conversation), I like our staff better because we seem to have more depth. I know, I picked the Cubs staff, but that is due to stats and even to Woods and Prior being better than anyone we have (Beckett makes a strong case though, and all of our other pitchers are damn good too). I like our guile. I think we have been playing playoff baseball longer and have been tempered for this moment. We'll see... All in all, I am picking the Marlins in 6. We may need to take Game 1 due to the ability of Prior and the pressure of taking at least one game on the road. I think we dominate at home, eventhough the Cubs could play with us there, they dont have the speed they do and I think their offense is very similar to the Giants. In terms of pitching, they are better than the Giants which means dont expect too much from our offense. It is imperative that we capitalize on EVERY opportunity. Hey, anyone remember the teams matched up in the World Series in Back to the Future II? :shifty
October 6, 200323 yr Remember how everyone at ESPN predicted that the Giants would pound the Marlins? Most of the Country said the same thing! Its time start looking at the Marlins and realizing that they are just as talented, if not more in some areas, than the Cubs. And if they think that this is going to be an easy series for them...well they are going to be the ones to get knocked on their @$$ if it doesn't happen.
October 6, 200323 yr Both these teams underwent significant make-overs as the year went on and were probably the two best teams in the NL at the end of the season. We added Willis, Cabrera, Conine, Urbina and Chad Fox and all are key players. The Cubs added Pittsburgh's Aramis Ramirez, Kenny Lofton, and Randall Simon during the season and probably would've taken The Pirate Parrot if he'd have waived his no-trade clause. They have the starting pitching to dominate but we have the better offense, defense, and closer. But our advantage in those areas is small and their advantage with their top-3 pitchers is large. In a short series, starting pitching is the key. If I was totally neutral, I'd have to pick the Cubs. But we have a pretty good chance.
October 6, 200323 yr People are acting we are going to lose to Prior and Wood everytime we face them... You never know what will happen. Like Wood could have a bad series, While Prior doesnt get Run Support. Samething for the Marlin (Beckett, Redman or Penny)
October 6, 200323 yr Everyone is beatable on any giving day! Even Kerry Woods. All I know is this though: Schmidt played us tough....how will Woods fair against us? :blink:
October 6, 200323 yr Atlanta was dominated by Prior and Wood; possibly because they are a power team. It might be easier to get a few bunts, stolen bases and sac flies, then hitting homers and doubles everytime like the Braves do. What about Chicago's bullpen. IF we can get their starters out of the game, which Atlanta couldn't do, we'll be okay.
October 6, 200323 yr no one is giving us a snowball's chance in hell.... kinda like my Hoosiers in the NCAA Tourney 2 years ago... just gotta prove em wrong
October 6, 200323 yr I dreamed last night that we won the first two games...stay tuned for further dreams.
October 6, 200323 yr crap, i dreamed we won too !!!, we beat the cubs 2-0 in the first game. Anyways, its better that we're underdogs, we'll prove everybody wrong..........ONCE AGAIN!!! :w00t
October 6, 200323 yr The Marlins do tend to struggle against hard-throwing righthanders. But sometimes it just depends. They ate up Kevin Millwood, so you never know what will happen. I'd give the Cubs pitching the edge, but the fact is that the Marlins staff is also very solid. Much like Game 1 or Game 3 against the Giants, the Marlins pitchers can very easily keep the Fish in the game. They say good pitching beats good hitting, but the Marlins could say the same thing to the Giants. And when it comes down to the late innings, it only takes one run to win a game. I give the Marlins bats and defense an edge over the Cubs. What I hate most is Game 6 and 7 are back at Wrigley. The boys just play so well at home. Marlins had a better season, it's too bad they don't give home field advantage according to record...
October 6, 200323 yr We didn't have home field advantage against the Giants in '97. Division winners always get a higher seed than the wildcard winner, regardless of their record. Plus the format used to be different for the best-of-5 series. Used to be first two games at the lower-seeded team's stadium, then the last 3 at the higher-seeded team's stadium. So it would have went: FL, FL, SF, SF, SF They changed the format from 2-3 to 2-2-1 the next year in 1998.
October 6, 200323 yr The Marlins do tend to struggle against hard-throwing righthanders. They ate up Kevin Millwood, so you never know what will happen. um....doesn't kevin millwood throw like 93? Last time i checked Wood pitches 97, Prior 95, and Zambrano's about 93-94.....yikes. :whistle
October 6, 200323 yr The Marlins do tend to struggle against hard-throwing righthanders. They ate up Kevin Millwood, so you never know what will happen. um....doesn't kevin millwood throw like 93? Last time i checked Wood pitches 97, Prior 95, and Zambrano's about 93-94.....yikes. :whistle Prior can throw as hard as Wood, possibly more.
October 6, 200323 yr With nasty control... I don't think I've ever heard the term "nasty control" :blink:
October 6, 200323 yr I don't think I've ever heard the term "nasty control" :blink: Me neither. lol. I just went with the flow...
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