Cubs Interested In Adrian Houser

@Natural: We’ll see. The good thing about sports is that, eventually, something definitive happens. Unlike most areas of life, it finally is pretty clear-cut.

With respect, I don’t really see the point of your response, except to express animosity toward me. I’d prefer that you tell me *how* I am wrong, or *why* I am wrong. Or even which of my comments is wrong. But I suspect you are not a strong enough writer to do so coherently.

@Sean, well, stats can be misleadingly good, in the sense that they are going to regress and are not predictive of future performance. As for the 5 runs they scored in garbage time last night–the fifth coming in on a bases-loaded walk by the indescribable Tucker–if you want to take comfort in that, you have every right to.

Baseball is a combination of the objectively measurable–how many runs a team scores, for instance–and the less countable but still observable–how they score those runs, for instance.

Scoring three runs on two reaches and a home run is good, of course. But scoring three runs on five straight reaches is better–first of all, because you might score those two guys on base too–but also because that bespeaks an offense that is operating with synergy and effectiveness, and is able to respond in the moment to how it is being pitched to. That is what the Brewers have been like for a couple of months now. That is what the White Sox have been like since the break, and is why they are the better team this weekend at Rate Field

For the Cubs, I’m sad to say, runs are things that kind of happen sometimes. The team has certain skills, and I like for instance the base running and base stealing– but for the most part they don’t have that kind of top-flight offensive synergy. They don’t have it because just when things seem to be getting going, Suzuki or PCA will have an uncompetitive strikeout, Swanson will hit a useless grounder to the third baseman, Tucker, swinging in his flat-footed way, will hit a rollover grounder or a lazy fly, Happ will be unable to take advantage of a favorable count…one or more of those things will happen. The Cubs have what might be called an “interrupted” offense. Admittedly, that was less so earlier, but it sure is so now. And they have already fallen into second place.

I am curious: You are so sure they will make the postseason. How? Do you still think they will win the division, or do you think they will get a wild-card spot?

@Natural: I made no racist comments. Alluding to race as a topic is not being racist. And I chose my words carefully: I didn’t say Hoyer was a racist in the KKK sense of the term. I said he seemed to be more comfortable with white players from affluent backgrounds on the Cubs roster, perhaps because he unconsciously identified their way of self-presenting as more professional, steady, “trusting the process,” etc. I believe I suggested that might be a kind of “soft racism” that many white Americans sometimes shared.

If I did not communicate well, I apologize. I write as well as I can. But even if I was misunderstood as calling Hoyer an out-and-out, conscious racist– that is not being a racist. It might be a slanderous or false accusation, but it is not in itself an expression of racism.

Unless you are saying that I’m racist because I’m too friendly toward African Americans– which is a kind of Trumpian twisting around of meanings. Perhaps I have assumed good will here that does not exist.