So, late last week Chicago Cubs manager Lou Piniella threw out his thoughts on the lineup for this season in response to the rampant interest in Alfonso Soriano’s spot.
His response was, um, not awesome.
On Thursday, Piniella said the lineup he’s leaning toward is Soriano, Aaron Miles, Derrek Lee, Milton Bradley, Aramis Ramirez, Kosuke Fukudome, Geovany Soto and Ryan Theriot.
In case you can’t tell what part of that response has made me quite lugubrious, using technology, we can subtly emphasize it for you, after the jump.
On Thursday, Piniella said the lineup he’s leaning toward is Soriano, ***Aaron Miles***, Derrek Lee, Milton Bradley, Aramis Ramirez, Kosuke Fukudome, Geovany Soto and Ryan Theriot.
In the words of Ralphie Parker, ooooooh ffffffffffuuuuuuuuuuuudge.
I don’t know Lou’s reason for saying Miles instead of Mike Fontenot. It may have been a slip, some motivational tool, or simply a nod of respect to the veteran. And who knows, maybe Miles will win the job in spring training.
But I know one thing. If Aaron Miles somehow does manage to beat out Mike Fontenot, and starts at second base, there is no way in hell he should be hitting second in the lineup with his career .329 OBP. If someone like, say, Geovany Soto bats 6th or 7th, that means over the course of the season, Miles would see nearly 100 more at bats than Soto. In what universe does that make sense?
The answer is Galacticor, and it’s the opposite universe. People wear hats on their feet and hamburgers eat people. Oh, and Aaron Miles is a wicked awesome hitter.
Ace, who who’s article are you using for the quote? The reason that I ask is simply because I saw something very similar to this and the only part that Lou was quoted as saying went along the lines of “yeah, that looks like a pretty good lineup.” It was not Lou saying that it was going to be his regular starting lineup.
It’s the link in the post from MLB.com.