My love affair with Chick-Fil-A’s seasonal Peppermint Chip milkshake is no secret. My only regret is that I’m not able to feel its cooling, delicious love coursing through my system for most of the year. Enter the Shamrock Shake from McDonald’s. Also seasonal, the Hulk-green beverage promised the same kind of minty affection at a time when I couldn’t get it from Chick-Fil-A. I had one for the first time last night, and, sadly, it was only so-so. Tasty, worth having, but probably not a repeat dessert. I knew the Peppermint Chip Shake, the Peppermint Chip Shake was a friend of mine. Shamrock Shake, you’re no Peppermint Chip Shake. November feels so far away…
Alfonso Soriano will not be batting leadoff when the season rolls around, Dale Sveum confirmed yesterday. David DeJesus is the primary leadoff man, and Soriano will hit somewhere in the middle of the order. Sveum admits that he had a little fun with us: “I know I scared you guys a little bit, putting him in the leadoff spot, but that was goofing around with lineups and getting guys at-bats real quick.” It wasn’t just that, Dale – you offered some scary justifications for batting Soriano leadoff, too. All is well now.
Ryan Dempster says his first pitch up and in to former teammate Aramis Ramirez yesterday was nothing more than an attempt to pitch inside, despite Ramirez’s comment before the game that he planned to bunt on Dempster. The Cubs’ pitcher joked that it “would have been a hard pitch to bunt,” and said that he wasn’t sending a message to Ramirez. “It just got away. I’ve seen him too many times to leave it out over the plate …. I was just trying to go inside. In the back of your mind, you don’t want to hit him, so you end up letting go a little early.”
Sveum explains why he stayed on with the Brewers despite being passed over for the managerial job more than once. “I was disappointed,” Sveum said. “I wanted to manage, but it wasn’t to the point that I wanted to leave. One, I know how precious these jobs are at the big league level. When I was notified they wanted me back in some capacity, I wasn’t going to jump ship because I didn’t get the managing job.” I like that answer.
Jed Hoyer may have escaped a sticky situation in San Diego, where part-owner and CEO Jeff Moorad is having trouble getting finally confirmed as a majority owner (thanks in large part to the opposition of Jerry Reinsdorf).
The State of Arizona has a whole mess of bills coming due on its efforts to expand the Cactus League (the $84 million needed for the Cubs’ new facility is being footed by the city of Mesa), and various cities owe big bucks if they want to keep teams Springing within their limits. One such possible move involves the Oakland A’s ditching Phoenix Municipal Stadium in favor of Hohokam Park in Mesa, once the Cubs leave the park in 2014.
Brett Taylor is the Lead Cubs Writer at Bleacher Nation, and you can find him on Twitter at @BleacherNation and on LinkedIn here.
Brett is also the founder of Bleacher Nation, which opened up shop in 2008 as an independent blog about the Chicago Cubs. Later growing to incorporate coverage of other Chicago sports, Bleacher Nation is now one of the largest regional sports blogs on the web.
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NEWSLETTER
My love affair with Chick-Fil-A’s seasonal Peppermint Chip milkshake is no secret. My only regret is that I’m not able to feel its cooling, delicious love coursing through my system for most of the year. Enter the Shamrock Shake from McDonald’s. Also seasonal, the Hulk-green beverage promised the same kind of minty affection at a time when I couldn’t get it from Chick-Fil-A. I had one for the first time last night, and, sadly, it was only so-so. Tasty, worth having, but probably not a repeat dessert. I knew the Peppermint Chip Shake, the Peppermint Chip Shake was a friend of mine. Shamrock Shake, you’re no Peppermint Chip Shake. November feels so far away…
