People Forget Lou Piniella Used To Go Fucking Ballistic On Umpires
Saw this ejection making the rounds on Twitter earlier tonight and I just couldn't help myself. I think this is the first time I've talked about the Cubs in weeks and I honestly still need more time. My brain is completely lost without my first true love. I need my boys on the field in uniform competing their balls off 6 nights a week for me to feel any sense of normalcy. Compound that with the 2018 September collapse + the 2019 September collapse + David Ross being named the manager/savior of my dreams and you could very easily argue that everything was coming to a head in 2020. And instead, we're left dick-in-hand as 2016 playoff montages litter the collective Cubs' universe for all non-Comcast cable subscribers. There's definitely been worse times to be a Cubs' fan, but arguably never weirder.
That's why it's important to turn your brain off and reflect on the good memories, like Lou Piniella's first ejection as the Cubs' manager. At the time, the Cubs were 9 games below .500 and 7.5 games out of first place after dropping a fuck ton of money on Soriano, Lily, DeRosa and Henry Blanco (just to name a few) in the offseason. Lou was coming off a gap year after a nightmare 3-year run in Tampa. It was his shot at one more legitimate managerial run and needless to say he absolutely hated his fucking team inside and out 2 months onto the job. You would too coming off a sweep at home against the 71-win Marlins leading into 2 more straight losses against the Braves.
And while we go down memory lane, here are the opposing starting pitchers in those 5 straight losses (and their 2007 ERA+) for the Cubs leading up to Lou's ejection:
May 28 - Byung-Hyun Kim, 73
May 29 - Dontrelle Willis, 84
May 30 - Sergio Mitre, 94
June 1 - Chuck James, 103
June 2 - Kyle Davies, 73
In other words, the average starting pitcher over this stretch performed about 16% worse than your normal MLB starter in 2007. And yet despite this downright putrid group, they went 5-0 against over this stretch against the Cubs giving up just 7 runs in 30 innings. Average 2 runs/game against these bums and safe to say Lou's allowed to throw whatever kind of temper tantrum he wants. Sergio Mitre fucking BLOWS.
Reflecting on it only makes me wish we had this kind of fire the last couple years, and now I'm back in the dark place I've been trying to avoid since MLB cancelled postponed the season.
Fucking blows.
Time for a pick me up
Hit it Lou