Hire Jim Essian

If last week's rant didn't angry you up about Fauxpening Day, this morning Pre pointed out to me that the Oakland A's and Seattle Mariners are both back in Spring Training this week. One week after they played games against one another which counted in their season standings. As if that's not stupid enough, the Mariners are opening up the 2012 season in stateside fashion Friday against...the A's.

Bud Selig is the dumbest commissioner in professional sports. And there are some legitimate nitwits in his company, so it's impressive that Bud is the nitwittiest. Instead of fixing the many things about baseball that need fixing, Bud is content to add a stupid one-game playoff, force interleague play down our throats every day of the season, and move baseball all the way across the planet for Opening Day. I hate Bud Selig, yet I fear that Andy MacPhail will eventually replace him, and I'll hate him even more.

Travel back in time with me, if you will, to a time before the Cubs' "Cajun Connection" of former Louisiana State University players Ryan Theriot and Mike Fontenot. Years before that cute moniker was first used to describe the diminutive middle infielders, the Cubs had a GRITTY second baseman with beard stubble and a Tiger pedigree of his own. ... Read More

Mike Jorgensen was from a simpler baseball era. A time when hitting .243 bought you 17 seasons in Major League Baseball. A time when it was okay to hit only 95 home runs and drive in 426 RBIs in a career. A time when maybe people only watched his games against the Chicago Cubs, against whom he ... Read More

If the entry on the 35th biggest Cub killer of my time were printed out, there's a very good chance that Dave Parker would roll it up and snort the foul lines through it. Throughout the course of his 19-year MLB career, Parker killed almost as many Cub pitchers as brain cells. Though Parker was never seriously a ... Read More

I need to get a quick confession off my chest right up front here. When I was a kid, I loved Mark McGwire. I don't know if it was because he was a first baseman like me, because his team had actually won a World Series in my lifetime, or because I felt bad that he was a ... Read More

Before Angel Guzman was around to tempt Cubs fans with his seemingly-limitless potential and seemingly-glass musculoskeletal structure, a skinny kid from the Dominican Republic rocketed through the Cubs' minor league system. By the time he was 21 years old, Juan Cruz looked and pitched like an old wise man. Cruz teased Cubs fans in the spring with his ... Read More

(Ed. Note: This post was all set to go up on Wednesday. And then Milton, in one of the most appropriately-timed tantrums of all time, decided to throw the good people of Chicago under the bus AGAIN. Thanks, Milton, for being the rule that proves that there is absolutely nothing exceptional about you.) The three-year anniversary of HJE ... Read More

In case you haven't noticed, David Kaplan has gradually been changing color from pasty white to Oompa Loompa. I can only imagine the change is for one of the following reasons: The Caucasian race has officially kicked him out. He's so dumb, his skin doesn't even realize he's white. He's going on a hunting trip with the Monsters in the Morning this ... Read More

You finally get a Godfather quote and it's from Godfather III. How does THAT feel? Anyhow, I saw the Muskbag was back, and I couldn't let that aggression go unchecked. I noticed that Ryan Dempster is eligible to become a free agent this offseason. Are the Cubs going to re-sign him? Who else is eligible for free agency? -- Steve ... Read More