Dale Sveum Confirms Some Kind of Roster Shakeup is Coming and Other Bullets

Apr 20, 2013

The Cubs really know how to lose frustrating Friday night games in Milwaukee. Here’s one of the most frustrating games I’ve ever watched, from a Friday last year in Milwaukee. If you watched the game, you remember.

After last night’s 0-7 performance, the Cubs are now batting just .144 with runners in scoring position, by far the worst in baseball. Their team OPS with runners in scoring position? .485. For the most part, the RISP stats are a bit of an illusion, as “clutchness” has been tough to nail down statistically. Usually, a team’s – or a player’s – stats normalize whether there are runners in scoring position or not. That said, it hasn’t all been a fluke or bad luck for the Cubs: their 35 strikeouts in 111 RISP at bats makes for the second worst strikeout rate in baseball in such situations (behind only the White Sox). In other words, the Cubs have probably had some bad luck with RISP, but they’ve also sucked.

Dale Sveum on the surprising Julio Borbon addition yesterday, per Patrick Mooney: “It’s another way of getting the organization stronger. It probably won’t be the same roster a week from now. But whatever happens from here on out, it’s just getting a young guy in that’s had big-league success already. And then we’ll see where we go.” I’d say that sums it up. See talented player, grab talented player, sort out consequences later. When Ian Stewart comes back in a week or so, an outfielder will go – either Dave Sappelt sent back to Iowa, Borbon waived as an attempted stash, or a trade. Indeed, something could come up even before Stewart comes back. Cody Ransom is currently the only backup infielder on the roster.

So, that crazy Jean Segura sequence where he: (1) legitimately stole second; (2) later was picked off second; (3) got in a rundown between second and third; (4) while Ryan Braun ran from first to second; (4) the two players both wound up on second at the same time; (5) Braun was tagged out, and Segura was tagged while still safely on second; (6) Segura thought he was out and started walking toward his dugout; (7) Segura realized he wasn’t out and had to run away from the ball, and the safe location was first base, which he “stole”; and (8) Segura was subsequently thrown out trying to steal second again later in the inning. Here’s the middle portion of that for those who didn’t see, it’s a gif that’s been floating around Twitter and I don’t know to whom to attribute it:

Like Hisanori Takahashi before him, Brent Lillibridge ended up clearing waivers and was outrighted to Iowa.

Jeff Samardzija on Dale Sveum sticking up for him last night, which ultimately led to Sveum being tossed.

Alfonso Soriano on his lighter bat, and Gordon Wittenmyer on Crane Kenney personally tacking two years onto Soriano’s original contract offer.

written by

Brett Taylor

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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