Still Gotta Come Through Chicago
Back with the full newsletter on a Friday. Let's get you updated and jazzed up for the weekend, Chicagoans.
Happy Friday SGCTCHIIIIIIIIIICAAAAGGGOOOOOOans. Sorry for the short and shitty newsletter on Tuesday, I was battling an incoming fever that may or may not have been caused by writing about Gar Forman and John Paxson for the fifth straight week.
So, as promised, we’re pumping out a bit more comprehensive newsletter today — hitting all of the teams and making sure you’re locked and loaded with Chicago sports takes this weekend.
If you didn’t get to Tuesday’s letter, still check it out here. A good trivia question is paired with my All-Star weekend and GarPax job security thoughts.
For those of you that miss the thread topics, we’re bringing back a thread-esque topic back in the intro today. If you haven’t commented before, we’d love to hear from you. Remember, it’s easier now. At the bottom of the post, you’ll see the below buttons. Hit the one on the right to comment:
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Let’s get into it…
Trivia:
ESPN recently released its “Real Plus-Minus” rankings, which are essentially a way to find out the average net point differential a player provides to his team while he is on the court. It’s rated on a per 100 possessions basis (after poring through thousands of possessions) and is thus more accurate than the more simplistic plus-minus statistic. When it was first released years ago, Tom Thibodeau’s assertion that Taj Gibson deserved Sixth Man of the Year due to his defense was validated. Gibson had a much better RPM than that year’s winner, Jamal Crawford. The majority of that was based on what he prevented on the defensive end.
So, who do you think are the Bulls top-5 players in RPM?
(Answer is at the bottom of the newsletter, with some additional analysis)
Intro:
The Cubs have yet to strike a deal with Comcast to get their new exclusive network — the Marquee Network — onto its airwaves. If you’re a Comcast subscriber and love Spring Training, you may be out of luck. Having said that, they announced that they made a deal with Hulu + to stream Marquee content and Cubs games on there. That’ll cost you a cool $55 per month. Essentially, it’s only a viable option if you’re a cord-cutter that’s looking for some live television alongside whatever else is on Hulu. I don’t know which streaming platform has what. I spend my time watching Bulls and Blackhawks games. My life outside of work has been an absolute blast lately.
Anyway, one of the perks of the network will be increased access to the players, including a Hard Knocks style show dubbed “Cubs 162,” according to the Sun-Times.
Now, I doubt the production value will be up to par with HBO’s Hard Knocks. Also, because the Cubs will have full autonomy over the content, it won’t be nearly as juicy. Like, when something bad happens, I doubt we’re going to get full access to it.
Having said that, this got me thinking about which Chicago sports teams in the past you’d want to have all-access to, Hard Knocks style.
For entertainment value, I’d love to get a look in at some of those Trestman-led Bears teams, particularly the second one. Having Robbie Gould stand up to yell at the team about leadership and having Brandon Marshall telling him to shut the fuck up all while Marcy Marc Trestman is sitting in the corner thinking how the hell he’s going to ease the tension would be worth $55 dollars.
I’d love to get a sneak peak at the Sox teams in Chris Sale’s latter years, when he was cutting up jerseys and Adam Eaton was crying over the fact that they wouldn’t let Adam LaRoche’s little kid into the dugout 24/7.
Or what about when Sammy Sosa corked his bat? Or when Carlos Zambrano tried to punched Michael Barrett in the clubhouse? Those moments alone would’ve been beautiful for that type of show.
I would say the current-day Bulls just to see Boylen clapping and yelling random shit to no one in particular, but I watch enough depressing content as is.
There’s obviously ones you’d want to watch because you love the teams: Pretty much any Blackhawks team from 2010-on would be awesome (hockey guys make for good television just based on how they talk), the 2016 Cubs, the 2005 White Sox, and especially the 2010-2012 Bulls.
If you listened to the Pardon My Take podcast’s interview with Joakim Noah, you got a trip down memory lane as a Bulls fan. I damn near started crying. Noah thinks the Bulls would’ve won the title if him and Rose didn’t get hurt in that first-round series against the 76ers in 2012. I believe him. They were the best team in the league that year, had the best point differential, and had the Heat’s number all year long.
Sigh.
So which team would you pick if you had to choose one? Post a comment at the bottom and let’s try to come to a consensus by 5 P.M. today. I’ll post some of the best entries on Twitter at @stillgottaChi and on Monday’s newsletter.
Bulls:
This will be quick, I promise.
See Tuesday’s newsletter for my thoughts on the fan effort to drive #FireGarPax and why I don’t believe that anything real will change this offseason.
Since I posted that, I’ve seen a similar sentiment from some good writers in Chicago. We don’t want Gar Forman to be transitioned to a lesser role and for John Paxson to still call the shots from behind the scenes. We want them gone and for someone actually capable to take over the whole show. Until then, have fun with the stadium looking like this, Michael Reinsdorf:
My friend Fernando, who covers the NBA for a Chinese outlet and puts things politely, said it best:
“Mr. Boylen knows nothing.”
The language of a buffoon is universally recognizable.
By the way, he’s moved on from calling egregious timeouts down 20 with less than a minute left.
Kris Dunn is reportedly going to miss the whole year now with his sprained MCL. Saw that one coming. Chandler Hutchinson is hurt again, re-aggravating the shoulder he previously injured. Otto Porter says he’s not coming back until he’s “100 percent.” That means he’ll probably play a few more games and then collect his nearly $30 million player option that’s owed to him next year.
Things are looking up!
After LeBron, Giannis, James Harden, and Kawhi squared off at the UC on Sunday, the Bulls treated us with this starting line-up, three years into a rebuild:
Zach LaVine/ Ryan Arcidiacano/ Luke Kornet/ Thaddeus Young/ Thomas Satoransky
#RunWithUs!
(P.S. Scottie Pippen, while on The Jump as “Fire GarPax” chants were belting out from the live audience, said he doesn’t even know half the players on the Bulls team. Scottie Pippen is on the Bulls payroll.)
Bulls record: 19-37, 11th in the Eastern Conference
Blackhawks:
The Blackhawks playoff chances are slipping away after some bad luck, bad power plays, and eventually just bad play.
In what was basically a must-win home game against the Rangers on Wednesday, the Hawks laid a dud and lost 6-3 at the United Center.
That put them 8 points out of the Wild Card with just 22 games to play. They’re also squarely positioned in dead last in the Central Division.
It’s particularly disappointing because they outplayed their opponents in multiple games during this 1-6 stretch they’ve gone through over the last two weeks or so. They finished their road trip 1-4 despite leading in 4 of those games.
In Vancouver, they lost 3-0. The shots totals? Blackhawks 49, Canucks 20. That’s the most shots the Hawks had in a loss since 2015, according to NBC’s Christopher Kamka.
The Power Play hasn’t been there. The Hawks are 29th in PP goals this season, which is especially odd because their success in that area launched the run last year that almost got them into the playoffs. In 2018-2019, they were 12th in PP goals and scoring them at a near 7% higher clip.
The Hawks latest stretch probably puts them into the sellers (if anything) category ahead of Monday’s trade deadline. The only silver lining may be that this is the last run for the current front office regime. Stan Bowman’s days as GM are probably numbered.
Every missed opportunity for this team stings more than it does for others. The Hawks still have Toews and Kane in the back-half of their primes. And they haven’t been able to do anything with that.
And, to throw salt on the wound of the front office woes:
Sigh.
Blackhawks Record: 26-26-8
Chicago Baseball:
At least baseball is around the corner! Let’s turn the mood around a bit here, shall we? Via Kris Bryant and Tim Anderson, respectively:
I’m so excited that baseball is basically back. It could be because that means that somewhere, down the road, somewhere, really far, like way down the road, summer is coming. It could be that the Bulls are the bane of my existence and the Hawks failed at their job, which was to give us all something to root for that mattered come springtime.
Either way, everyone is at Spring Training either trashing the Astros like our guy Tim Anderson or making us realize why former coaches needed to go, like Joe Maddon.
David Ross’ first big move was to give a speech that must’ve rivaled Jason Heyward’s in the Game 7 rain delay. His second was maybe the easiest way of all time to win Cubs fans over: Common sense.
Kris Bryant and Anthony Rizzo will be hitting 1-2 for the Cubs, and that means that good hitters will be getting the most at-bats. What a novel concept. Even if the Cubs don’t make the playoffs this year (although I think they will), there’s no way it will be as frustrating as last year.
Last year, the Cubs lead off spot collectively had a .294 on-base percentage. That was the worst in the league by a wide margin. Bryant’s lowest OBP with the Cubs? His rookie year at .369.
Ross said he doesn’t think he’ll be messing with the lineup, like, at all. Who would’ve thought that letting professionals know what they’re going to be doing at work that day before they got there would be a good idea?
I’ll always be a Joe Maddon fan. The guy helped bring us to the playoffs in four of five years and won a World Series. But just like a friend that excites you for a few weeks because he’s always down to go grab a drink and have a fun night, eventually, you just want to go home.
David Ross is going to bring us home. Hit some BP when the players want to. Maybe a little less of the bullpen and lineup rocket science. Just *maybe* a tad less fun in the clubhouse — not the worst thing in the world.
Javy Baez, on one of his first days in Mesa, Arizona, said, straight-up, that he wasn’t ready to play at some points last year. He’s ready to move on from that mentality. This is a guy who has been one of the best players in baseball over the last two years, and who — by all accounts — loves the game as much as anyone. Maddon responded that he thought Javy was always ready to play.
Well, that seemed to be part of the problem. There was a clear disconnect towards the end. Will a new clubhouse leader and more accountability mean more wins? I don’t know. But that, paired with smarter in-game decisions, could be the difference between the division title and another 84-win season.
And Ross may still not be a great manager. But Maddon needed to go, that is clear now. It’s also probably — and I’m going out on a limb here — a good thing we didn’t hire Joe Espada, the guy from the Astros that we needed to have to bring us the Astros Way. What a dodged bullet. My hand is up on that one!
Over on the South Side, more specifically Glendale, Arizona, the Sox are beginning to look like the team everyone imagined they may be when they started unloading all of their talent a few years back.
Kopech is back with the team, and as he says, “feeling better than ever.” I’m not totally sure why he clipped those sweet locks he had, however. (Editor’s note: For charity at SoxFest)
In Scottsdale, Rick Hahn told The Athletic that the Sox are positioning themselves to be buyers by this year’s deadline.
“We’re going to send guys out with the expectation that we’re going to be in the position to add come the deadline,” Hahn said. “When guys head out come Opening Day to do their pro coverage, it’s going to be with the expectation of adding in areas where we don’t quite have the depth that we foresee having in the future.”
On last week’s ESPN Daily podcast episode titled “How Baseball Chaos Will Impact 2020,” Jeff Passan was asked who was the dark horse team that he was excited about heading into the year.
“The clear answer to this is the Chicago White Sox,” Passan said. “Finally, this offseason they finally spent some money… you look at the White Sox right now and there’s a five-year window where you think they can compete. Considering they’re in the AL Central, where Cleveland is either going to need to trade Fransisco Lindor or going to lose him to free agency in 2021 and a Minnesota Twins team, that while built really well in the short-term, may not have the same long-term prospects as the White Sox… the future looks really good for them right now.”
That’s not Chi Sox Fan Mike talking there either, that’s ESPN’s lead baseball reporter.
Baseball, please come and save us Chicagoans.
Bears:
The Bears may have some hope. They signed former Browns tight end Demetrius Harris, who played under Matt Nagy when he was with the Chiefs. If they can somehow grab Alex Smith, they’ll have made almost a complete transformation to the shitty version of Kansas City, before they ever made a Super Bowl and were accustomed to first-round exits.
That’s not the reason to be hopeful, nor is the potential rule change that would put seven — one more than the previous six — teams in the playoffs from each conference moving forward.
Having said that, the 2012 Bears, a very good team, would have made the playoffs under that structure. What would the last decade looked like had they made the playoffs that year? Would Lovie Smith have been fired? Would we have had the Marc Trestman years? The John Fox ones?
No, the real reason for hope is that there is an unprecedented amount of potentially available quarterbacks this offseason.
The Raiders are reportedly looking to move Derek Carr. The Saints are sticking with Drew Brees, and that means Teddy Bridgewater will most likely be available, albeit at a steep price. Alex Smith and Andy Dalton may sneak out of Washington and Cincinnati. Cam Newton is available. Is Tom Brady really available? Apparently so. Depending on where Brady goes, other QBs could become available, like Ryan Tannehill. The Titans want nothing to do with Marcus Mariota, that’s for sure. Phil Rivers and Eli Manning are up for grabs, if old and bad quarterbacks are what you’re into. I’m sure Case Keenum would love another shot, with a receiver like Allen Robinson. What about Nick Foles?
Eh, the Bears will probably sign A.J. McCarron.
The good news, though, is that the Bears won’t have an excuse to not bring in someone competent to at least compete with Mitchell Trubisky.
The Bears, after all, with all of their warts, are not far from being a playoff team. They’re a tight end, a quarterback, and an improved O-Line away from playing in January. That seems pretty far away actually. But this will be the true measurement of Ryan Pace’s creativity and abilities as a GM. This could be his finest hour.
Can he pull it off?
Trivia answer: The top-5 ranked Bulls in real plus-minus league-wide:
Drum roll please…
21. Shaquille Harrison: 3.31 RPM
37. Kris Dunn: 2.7 RPM
85. Denzel Valentine: 1.6 RPM
125. Daniel Gafford: 1.12 RPM
127. Wendell Carter Jr.: 1.08 RPM
Now, Shaquille Harrison and Denzel Valentine should arguably be voided in this exercise because of how little they’ve played. What stands out, however, is how strong Kris Dunn’s number is. It’s thanks to a fantastic defensive RPM. He has the second best in the league at 4.21, while WCJ has the 7th best in the league at 3.43. This does show how dreadful their offense is, but at least WCJ’s can mostly be chalked up to how he is used.
Zach LaVine owns a cool .01 RPM, good for 214th in the NBA.
That’s it for today, SGTChicagoans! Thanks for reading, and have a wonderful weekend. Don’t forget… to comment! and to tell your friends to subscribe! Still Gotta Come Through … CHICAGOOOOO.
I need to see what Lovie smith is like flustered and fired up screaming at the players. Only time we ever saw this guy was his post game press conference where he looked and acted like he just finished smoking a doobie in the locker room, or emotionless on the sidelines.We saw him show emotion one time; when he sprinted down the sideline as hester returned the opening kick. I would have loved for him to be Mic'd up and hear what he had to say. Love the 2nd newsletter of the week, Tuesdays was half assed and quite frankly i was pissed off.
I don't get why people are sleeping on the Cubs. I was really anti Kris Bryant and wanted the Cubs to trade him then I got sad when it almost came true. You don't know what you got til its gone, but thankfully he's here and I love him in the leadoff. Rizzo is good for .290 and 100+ RBIs every year. Javy is an MVP. Billy Contreras is the man. Kyle Schwarber is giving souvenirs to people living on Sheffield and Waveland. Hell Jason Heyward is due for a .280 season. I'm ready to fucking go.
If I could have one moment mic'd up I would love to watch the Mirotic - Bobby Portis argument, it had to be the funniest banter in NBA history,. For a season though I wanna see the '03 Cubs and Moises pissing all over his hands. I'd also be so curious to see what the mood was like after that game 6. If they wanted Bartman's head on a spike or Alex fuckin Gonzalez's. Either way, can't wait for a Cubs 30 for 30 that has to come out some time in the next 10 years, probably when cheap Rickett's keeps over paying for rennovations and not doing anything to help the product on the field.
I'm also a proud Comcast customer and if I don't have Marquee Sports on there by opening day I'm picketing outside of Wrigley until I do.