I’m sitting here waiting, like a lot of Cub fans, to see if the North Siders actually sign Jim Edmonds today and send Pie down to Iowa. Obviously there’s been a big backlash, on our show and many other places, but in some ways it’s like a fake backlash. You know what I mean? The kind of knee-jerk reaction that is involuntary when you see a dog going #2. Disgusting and always out of place, but then you stare at the dog’s owner until you’re satisfied that the owner is going to clean up the mess. And the owner does and life moves on.

We have to admit that Edmonds could help this team in a big way. If he flashes some glove and hits .270 or above, the move would be lauded as the deal that helped the Cubs reach the playoffs, or even the Series for the first time in bazillion years. It’s a shame that Felix Pie hasn’t had more of a chance to get right at the plate this season, but when a young player starts slow out of the gate it should be expected. What Pie doesn’t have is a working knowledge of the Cardinals organization.

That part of the deal is the most intriguing to me. The rumor is that Edmonds has an axe to grind against the team that is starting a former pitcher in his position. I don’t know if that holds water or not, it could be that Edmonds simply enjoys playing at Wrigley Field. His career numbers support that theory (18 HRs at the confines). Any advantage he can give us over the Cardinals, though, is at least as valuable as his pro-rated salary would be. So those are the plusses.

The only minus I can see is that if Edmonds doesn’t play well, his Cubs career shouldn’t linger. Put him back on waivers, bring Pie back into the fold after he does a Soto and figures out how to clobber major league pitching, and watch helplessly as Edmonds returns to the Cardinals and divulges all of our team secrets. It’ll be great. Back to you, metaphor…

In the end we all realize that it’s necessary and a good thing that the dog does its business, as long as the owner is hovering over the situation with plastic gloves and a scooper.

In the spirit of today’s Mail Sack episode, I have to admit that I was completely wrong when I said that Jerry Hairston Jr. and Scott Hairston weren’t related. That, as pointed out below, was untrue, they are brothers.

To: hosts@cubscast.com
From: Chris W.
Subject: Scott and Jerry Hairston

Scott and Jerry Hairston ARE brothers. Death to Jim Edmonds!

C-Dub

I have no idea why I thought they weren’t related, other than thinking that I’d heard that they weren’t years ago. However, now that the truth is known (to me), this doubles the number of authentic Hairstons in the majors, so today is a good day. Fans in the left field stands, beware.

After their awesome start to the season and record-setting April, the Cubs are now mired in an awkward slump. Awkward because the offense that is generating the most runs per game in the National League isn’t supposed to lose 8 out of 11 games. But we’ve found a way. But as inexplicable as the losses have been, the wins are just as difficult to account for. Ronny Cedeno taking walks? What kind of twilight zone episode is this?

Maybe we should just admit that this is the team we expected to see when the season started on March 31st: A team that loses too many close games and occasionally beats the heck out of the competition. That was the 2007 Cubs. Or more correctly that was the 2007 Central Division Champion Chicago Cubs. Our formula last season was to tread water until the pitching staffs for the rest of the division broke down, and then we rode the bouncing coattails of Alfonso Soriano in September. It worked then, and it will work again this year.

In a way it’s just sad that we’ve already seen what this 2008 Cubs team is capable of so early in the season. It makes seeing it every third or fourth game its own form of slow burning pain. But take solace, Cubs fans, because as much as the Cubs haven’t perfected their potion, neither have the White Sox. Their struggles are so bad that they put all their bats next to a bunch of blow-up dolls in the clubhouse as a joke. That just proves that nobody in this city has perfected anything except silliness, and we can expect plenty of that from both sides of town throughout the summer.

Considering the dolls and the Cubs tough losses at St. Louis and Cincinnati just goes to show that a fluke in baseball is still the norm. A broken-bat flare off of Ryan Dempster scored 2 runs on Monday night, the runs that ended up making the difference in the game. A few blown calls on sliding plays at home plate effected the outcomes both Sunday and Monday.

How should the Cubs answer? Two things: get out an airpump, and start Ronny Cedeno. You never know, it might work.

UPDATE: Congrats to David W., this week’s winner!

As announced on today’s episode, the Cubscast Photo Caption Contest is back! To submit an entry, simply click on the photo below and enter your caption as a comment. Everyone is welcome to participate (even fans of our Central Division rivals). First prize this week is a Cubscast Prize Pack which includes a Cubs-related DVD. Official Photo Caption Contest Rules.

Contest ended on Sunday April 27th at 8 p.m. CST. This week’s photo was provided by JoeSportsFan.

Thanks again to everyone for participating!

Part of what makes a play-by-play announcer serviceable is the ability to distinguish between typical and atypical on the baseball diamond. It’s something that can’t be taught, and the most endearing announcers are just plain honest, never faking their surprise or non-surprise at what happens over the course of a game. For that reason it makes no sense that Reds broadcaster Marty Brennaman would launch the verbal barrage that he did after Adam Dunn’s HR. He called atypical “typical,” and he got it wrong.

Brennaman’s misplaced, insert-a-quarter-to-begin anger combined with his partner Jeff Brantley’s goat fantasies hasn’t only elicited an angry response from Cubs fans, it’s also put pen to paper for Jay Mariotti, who in his latest column lumps ThrowbackGate in with other embarrassing Wrigley moments, calls for reform, and calls it a day. I don’t know his motivation or his publisher’s, and I didn’t appreciate certain references in the article but on the point of reform Mariotti is dead on. The line between the typical and atypical Cub fan has to be drawn, to keep real Cubs fans sane and broadcasters out of more trouble.

I’d like to suggest that we come up with a basic Cubs fan manifesto. It won’t fit every fan perfectly, but here are some basic things I’ll put out there:

• We the Cub fans take every pitch, every inning, and every game (but not ourselves) too seriously. How else would we have survived World Series victories by the Cardinals and White Sox in consecutive years?




• We the Cub fans acknowledge that our fandom is expressed in various and divergent ways — some of us prefer Steve Goodman’s “Go Cubs Go” and some prefer “A Dying Cub Fan’s Last Request”




• We the Cub fans heckle in good fun, and with the knowledge that your team’s slugger or ace is several years older than his listed age.




• We the Cub fans don’t drink ourselves stupid at Wrigley — we have more respect for the current team, former players, and each other than that.




• We the Cub fans hope you get kicked out if you drink yourself stupid at Wrigley, and may choose to not reach for any foul balls hurtling towards you.




• We the Cub fans outnumber you, sometimes at your ballpark.




• We the Cub fans are proud to be represented by the best fan of any sports or team, Ernie Banks.

What would you add to the manifesto? Leave a comment and let us know.