The Race to the Bottom

• Juan Pierre makes good on his promise for one night at least, hitting a bases-loaded triple to help put the Cubs over the Cards, 6-5. Offense was the key, as Chicago hits for the cycle and sends eleven batters to the plate during a dismal fourth for St. Louis pitcher Scott Rolen. Despite walking, um, seven, Carlos Marmol still gets the win (the first Cub to achieve this dubious record since 1992.) Dusty Baker, enlivened by a vote of confidence, gets in a spat with the umpire over Ronny Cedeno getting hit and is tossed from the game for the first time this season.

• Kansas City has a five-run second inning with a Teahen home run, capitalizes on several errors by Texas, and wins 11-3, despite Carlos Lee's police-escorted arrival.

• Kip Wells earns his first win, and perhaps his last as a Pirate, as the Pirates stave off the Giants 3-0. Barry Bonds goes 0-4; someone didn't get his growth hormone yesterday, I guess.

• The Royals' 58th-round draft pick from 1987 comes back to haunt them as Baltimore's Jeff Conine gets four hits and a home run in a 4-3 squeaker.


• The Pirates take their second victory in a row against Milwaukee, 8-4, by applying fundamentals to their play. "These things that I've been talking about that we did a very good job of here in this series, picking up a base hit at the right time, it changes the perspective on a lot of things," manager Jim Tracy said. I think a little part of baseball died after he said that.


• The Cubs ... see below. It's too sad to retype.

Well, that didn't take long. Fresh off his triumph of acting like he was a manager of a professional baseball team, Dusty Baker pulled Mark Prior in the middle of the sixth, as the young buck was on his way to a nohitter.

Naturally, the Cubs went onto lose 1-0. "We won the series. It's some consolation," Baker said later.

(Okay, honestly, take every Dusty Baker quote about every loss and substitute "'Shit happens,' Baker said, then shrugged"and tell me if it changes what's actually being said.)

Everybody wins! What the hell?

• Carlos Zambrano stayed off the computer, hit a home run, and thanks to some actual managing by Dusty Baker (WTF?), went home with his eighth straight win. Cubs beating the Mets? A pitcher hitting his fourth home run? Dusty Baker pulling a poorly performing closer in the ninth inning with bases loaded and two outs to put in someone who could seal the win? What is going on here?


• The Royals, apparently invigorated by their trade deadline-inspired fire sale, come back from a 4-o deficit to go 7-5 over Baltimore. Mark Teahen hits two home runs and drives in five RBIs, Angel Berroa goes 3 for 3, and Matt Stairs and Shane Costa both double.
  
  
• Ian Snell and Ben Sheets (in his return from three months on the DL, no less) engage in a seven-inning pitchers duel that goes all to hell for Milwaukee when their reliever allows five runs in the eighth. Jeromy Burnitz hits two runs, on top of a bunch of hits. This was the Pirates fourth road victory out of nineteen.
  

Okay, this isn't really about this year's dismal team, but there's a doozy of an interview in the Chicago Tribune today. Sammy Sosa conveniently remembered how to speak English this week upon the announcement that he is not one of the Cubs' five "Hometown Heroes," the latest lame promotion from Bud Selig. Please note the selection criteria, according to MLB: "on-field performance, leadership quality and character value." Apparently, Sosa just saw the part about statistics.

Here are some choice quotes from the erstwhile slugger, who's chilling in Miami while planning his, um, steroid-free comeback.

"This is supposed to be the five best players?"

"I am not a bad player—no way, Jose."

"When I heard that I was not on the list, I said, 'Oh, my God.' I was shocked and surprised. The five best players? You have to calculate my numbers."

"But you have to understand, no matter what happened outside the field doesn't mean people are going to forget what happened on the field."

And my favorite:

"You see people do more things that are worse. I did nothing criminal. People made that a big problem."

He then went on to note that he's a "mature guy" and that he's now making better decisions. (Like not putting cork in his bat or shooting testosterone into his ass?)

Today, Deadspin notes the Royals' transformation into a minor league team neared completion when they brought out the last living munchkin to throw out the first pitch, and then he later won a backpack in a dance contest.

Now, because I am a geek for everything and I've already admitted this, I spent the weekend at the world's largest comic book convention.* There, I passed up several opportunities to get a signature from a real, live munchkin, who I seem to remember billing himself as the last living munchkin.

There are two munchkins who are still alive and they're competing with each other? Shouldn't the Royals' PR staff have figured that out already?

Kansas City is even a failure at embarrasing itself. That takes some doing.

*I was in costume as "relatively normal girl in jeans who obviously spends too much time on her hair."

Everybody loves a pitcher's duel. There wasn't one in Milwaukee tonight, though. The Pirates opened the first inning with a two-run homer by Jason Bay, and then everything went downhill as the Brewers got nine men up to bat in the bottom of the inning. By the fifth, the score was 12-3, and Bernie Brewer had gone down the slide three times, powered by two, two-run homers from Bill Hall (and another two-run homer courtesy Carlos Lee). Being Milwaukee, the final score was 12-8, but still. Not a good night for Pittsburgh. Don't take my word for it; long-suffering Pat at Where Have You Gone, Andy Van Slyke? says it best:

IN GAME MUSING (10:16)- I have never seen a team play as badly as the Brewers have and still have a 6 run lead in the 6th inning. I know I'm prone to exaggeration and hyperbole from time to time, but I'm being dead serious right now. If I watch much more of this I think my eyes will start bleeding.

Why does the NL Central even exist?

Derek Lee was put on the 15-day DL today for a wrist inflammation, which means that the Cubs better start force-feeding vitamins to Carlos Zambrano and use a filter to block Myspace on his computer, given that the DL is also home to Kerry Wood and Sean Marshall. (Expect Mark Prior to join them any day now.)

Baker's quote can essentially be boiled down to a shrug and "shit happens," but Lee's comment describes what's wrong with the Cubs right now.

"I was kind of just playing for the sake of playing. I wasn't helping anybody. So if you're not helping the team, you're not helping yourself."

That's the biggest problem they've got. The whole team is playing for the sake of playing, like being a professional baseball player is a day job. This isn't Dunder Mifflin; this is the major leagues and these guys spend every day at Wrigley Field. Now, I know that the Cubs' main claim to their fame is that historically, they suck, but playing for a bunch of cursed losers is no reason to act as if their occupation is one of drudgery.

• Jeff Weaver throws seventh win as a rookie as LA beats the Royals 3-1; Kansas City's Mark Teahan tells ESPN that "he's not throwing anything up there we haven't seen. Not great stuff." Mark, you've been playing on this team all year. A tee-ball stand might give the Royals some trouble, much less the hottest pitcher in baseball right now.
  

• Nationals sweep Cubs. Harry Carey's zombiefied corpse rises from its final resting place, mutters "Fuck this shit," and finds the nearest bar serving Falstaff. Say, did you know Dusty Baker makes just under $25,000 a game? Don't you feel better about your job now?

• The Pirates learn the hard way not to pick up a discarded Cubs closer as Joe Borowski misses a save and the Marlins win 5-4.

RttB did not become suicidally depressed and disappear because of the latest scores; rather, I stayed awake for nearly 24 hours on Wednesday (and was forced to set foot in LA unexpectedly) to fly to San Diego to enjoy a weekend filled with the opposite of sports: comic and cult-entertainment geekery. But this weekend is another story for another blog. Luckily, not much has changed while I ignored baseball this week.

Mark Prior's return the Cubs, who have rocketed to 37 wins, was every bit the disappointment his last three or four returns from the DL have been. Now 0-8 with an 8.14 ERA, Prior started last night's game with a bold move: hitting the first batter in last night's loss against the Nationals. That's one way to announce your comeback.

The Royals were almost swept by Detroit, then decidedly swept by Boston. But for the last two days, Kansas City has been playing an actual baseball team, beating the LA Angels by lopsided scores—perhaps they've been replaced by alien dopplegangers? David DeJesus and Mark Grudzielanek both hit three-run homers in the 8-3 victory. But because anything good that happens to KC must be accompanied by something bad, Reggie Sanders went on the DL.

Pittsburgh's month of glory—for them—seems to have faded, as they lose to the Marlins 4-1 last night. "Unfortunately, we had to take a loss," explained pitcher Paul Maholm at the end of the game. Understatement of the year, dude.

Picture it: A blistering hot day, the kind of day that makes the average Chicago resident wake up and ask, "Why the hell do I live here?" Forget frying eggs on the sidewalk; you could probably bake a quiche in about ten minutes on your porch. The sun is brutal and unforgiving, and you're Dusty Baker, and your team is playing the much-hated New York Mets on national television.

You have to put on a baseball uniform, made of long pants and a heavy shirt, you have to go outside for hours, literally hours, and just sit there, taking in the heat. And you watch your pitcher hit a home run and traipse around the bases, and you can't blame him, because it's really fucking hot. And you're just sitting there thinking, "Why did I leave San Francisco with its year-round temperate climate? What was I thinking," and then your second baseman starts missing basic ground balls, and then your pitcher throws a grand slam, and well, this isn't going anywhere good, so you pull him after he walks a guy. And then your second pitcher of the inning, aided by your crack infield, throws another fucking grand slam.

Eleven runs are scored before the innings over, and you think, "Well, what's done is done, and Christ in a Camry is it hot out here, at least this will be over soon."

And then you realize that you still have THREE INNINGS TO GO.

So the Royals nearly went down with the ship. Literally. Their charter plane went into a nose dive en route to late last week, lost cabin pressure, and made an emergency landing back in Kansas City. Obviously, I do not wish the Royals physical injury or death in any way ... but their plane nearly crashing en route to Detroit (where they went a blistering 1-3 in the series)? Yeah, that's a sign that's hard to ignore.

Poor Royals. As if they didn't suffer enough this season.

Editor's Note: I live on the north side of Chicago, about two miles from Wrigley Field. I will confess to a certain fondness for the Cubs...but I wouldn't consider myself a fanatic by any means.

Mediocrity, thy name is Cubs. It's been harder to love the lovable losers the last few years because no one really seems to be trying or taking any responsibility for their suckitude.

Ask Dusty Baker why the team is playing so badly this year and what he could do, and he'll tell you he can only do so much when he has so many injuries. So is that what happened to Maddux? How about Aramis Ramirez? It seems to me that both of them have been healthy all season and just not playing up to potential. When he players have the ass, big time, he just lets them roll with it. OK, so AJ Pyerzinski is a jackass, but that doesn't mean that it's fine for Michael Barrett to just sucker-punch him. It was an ugly move that deserved a longer suspension, an apology, and some tough talk from Dusty.

Baker hasn't had control of his team since 2003, and it seems more and more as if that year was a fluke. In 2004, Baker & company blamed the media for their troubles. I forget what 2005's miserable excuse was. This year, it's injuries. The man earns $4 mil, and he tells the local media that if he had a team of quality players who were all injury-free, then he could do something. Cripes, I could do something in that situation! Hire me—I'm a hell of a deal in comparison!

The front office ain't no great shakes either. GM Jim Hendry goes for a few big names (Derek Lee, Nomar) and then picks up a bunch of scrubs (Hello, Neifi Perez and nonsavior Corey Patterson!) to fill in the rest of the field. The farm system is a joke. It seems to function more as a rehab facility for Kerry Wood and Mark Prior than a place to develop future Cubs.

And then there's Andy McPhail, the president. Earlier this summer, McPhail called in the Tribune's beat reporter for the Cubs and chewed him out. He felt the coverage was too critical and expressed that since the Cubs and the Tribune have the same owner, the paper should be more of a "house organ." So look for that Jacque Jones for MVP campaign in the sports pages soon!

Who's fault is it? There's plenty of blame to share. The players are frustrated, they're not giving the game their all, and they have a distressing lack of fundamentals; Dusty Baker is lazy and complacent; the front office is a bunch of fools who don't have a plan. They should just fire everyone except Derek Lee and start over again.

Will they outdo the 1962 Mets? No, but to quote a favorite Wrigley phrase, there's always next year.

Push comes to shove, will they be in the basement? You know, at the break, I was convinced the Cubs were going to get their shit together and finish in third or something and that I was just being unfair. And Derek Lee is back, so that'll help. Then, yesterday, they gave up two grand slams in one inning. So even though I have a six pack of beer riding on them winning 55 games before the Royals get to 50 and I seriously doubt the Cubs are going to finish out worse than the Pirates ... I'm not ruling it out.

Oh, Kansas City Royals. Glory days, how they've passed you by. The 1980s saw the Royals finish first or second in their division nearly every year, appear at two World Series (one of which they even won), and take home a number of batting titles due to the excellent George Brett. Also, in a move that seems quaint, they got rid of most of the players involved in a 1983 cocaine-buying scandal. They played well, and the management was led by a pharmaceutical kingpin turned philanthropist who stipulated in his will that the proceeds from the sale of his baseball team should go to charity. Now they're best known for two drunks attacking their third-base coach in Chicago a few years ago. So what the hell happened?

Much like in the rest of the Midwest, the trouble started when Wal-Mart came to town. In 1993, original owner Ewing Kauffman died and Wal-Mart executive David "You and I Might Define Children Differently, Dateline Sweatshop Investigators" Glass bought the team and began a policy of selling high-quality players for whatever they could get. Now, you can make your arguments here about small-market teams and the difficulty in them paying for stars and the perils of free agency, but still. Throughout the years, this team released Jermaine Dye, Johnny Damon, and Carlos Beltran. Because they didn't want to spend money. On a team owned by a guy who became a billionaire through Wal-Mart and seated all his children on his board. Yeah.

Since the Glass era began, things haven't gone so well. The Royals have only had three seasons in the last 13 in which they were over .500. They've had three seasons with more than 100 losses. Attendance has plummeted from an average around 2 million in the late '80s and early '90s to about 1.3 million or so, based on last year. Last year, they finished an astonishing 57.5 games out.

Now, to be fair, Kansas City is in a division with some very, very good baseball teams. Historically good baseball teams. So that does make their plight a little more sympathetic than, say, that of the Chicago Cubs. But still—of their three winning seasons since David Glass took over, one of them was 1994. Enough said.

Who's fault is it? Upper management, no doubt. You gotta pay a little to get some players, and you need to develop your farm system. And the management revoked credentials of two journalists for asking difficult, pointed questions about decisions made by Glass involving the front office. The front office responded to the firestorm of criticism by opening a blog. The first post? Defending the front office's decision to revoke the credentials.

Will they outdo the 1962 Mets? No. OK, fine, they had two losing streaks this year (11 and 13, respectively), but the Royals have been on what, for them, is a tear. They had a four-game winning streak right before the break and have improved to 31-56. They'll probably finish with 100-102 losses. Which will still be their fourth 100+ loss year in the past five, but hey, anything's better than 120 right? Right?

Push comes to shove, will they be in the basement? At this point, I'm inclined to say no. I'm picking Pittsburgh to be the biggest loser of them all. They've got David DeJesus back and Grudzielanek's a good, solid utility player. They have a new manager who seems to care (at least until he asks Glass for money, and then it's all over). Then again, this is the team that went on two separate 10+ losing streaks. So I guess anything is possible.

We'll begin with the worst of the bunch, the Pittsburgh Pirates. Only recently have they outdone the Royals (who the Cubs lead by a mere three games, and the Royals are in a league/division where others actually play baseball) and they are at the magic number: 30-60. If things continue apace, they will be a glorious 54-108.

Last night's game showed off the team's gorgeous new stadium, with enthusiastic cheers greeting Jason Bay, the first Pirate outfielder to start since 1993, when he went out onto the field. For one night, Pittsburgh fans could feel as if the Pirates weren't the sad, woeful team that they became this year. Or at least, that's how we outsiders see it, as that's not entirely accurate.

To a casual observer, it may seem as if the Pirates have come out of nowhere to move into the basement, but really, team history has been leading to this moment. For the past fourteen seasons—since that unpleasant, soon-to-be-indicted steroid machine left—the Pirates have posted a losing record. This, in fact, is their second 100+ losing season in five years. I think this is the year that everyone else has just given up expecting anything from them.

Whose fault is it? This is probably a perfect storm of bad upper management, bad management, and players not reaching potential, but I'll go with upper management on this one. I mean, they gave Jeromy Burnitz how much this year?

Will they outdo the 1962 Mets? Most likely not. They'd have to lose 60 of their next 72 games to tie them for the record, and that's unlikely. But hey, never say never. They could lose 62 and set a new standard for suckitude.

Push comes to shove, will they win the basement award? Oh hell yes. The Royals are playing what qualifies for Kansas City as "good "baseball," and for whatever reason, the second half tends to be better for the Cubs, who face the back half with a rehabbed Derek Lee. It's gonna be the Pirates in the sump-pump room.

Welcome to Race to the Bottom. While most people actually prefer to watch and think about winning baseball teams, we here at RttB far prefer to follow the three-way race for the title of Worst Team in Baseball that's currently going on. When the 1962 Mets cruised to their 120 losses, they had no rivals. When the 2003 Detroit Tigers stopped one game short of equaling the Mets' pathetic record, the Tigers' closest rival, if you will, won 23 more games than they did.

While we're sure that there have been three equally bad teams vying for the bottom at once before, we're not sure there have ever been three equally bad teams that are this bad. Could any of these three 2006 teams—the Chicago Cubs, the Kansas City Royals, and the Pittsburgh Pirates—outdo the 1962 Mets? It probably won't come to that. But we could have three teams with 100+ losses and maybe not quite 60 wins. This is their story: the other race to 60.