Baseball is now irrelevant

At least in Chicago, no one could give a damn about baseball. I have received some complaints about not writing about baseball, so here goes.

In Chicago, with the Bears season started and both teams out of contention, pretty much everyone has tuned out. The White Sox acquisition of Manny Ramirez was big for about a day, and then the White Sox dropped out of the division race.

I support the Cubs, as you would expect, and what else can I say but what a forgetful season. Besides the emergence of Marlon Byrd, Starlin Castro and Tyler Colvin, this team has been dreadful. The pitching completely fell apart, as Zambrano reverted back to his basket case form, Randy Wells completely regressed, Ted Lily was traded after a good start, Silva faded after his great start, and Ryan Dempster couldn't carry the rotation. The offense, besides those three aforementioned players (and sometimes Alfonso Soriano, the most frustrating player in the bigs), has been nothing special since Derek Lee was traded. Aramis Ramirez completely stumped, Theriot is not a Major League lead off hitter, and Kosuke Fukudome is one of the worst personnel decisions the Cubs have made in the 2000s. And of course Sweet Lou just gave up, leading to a big show about who will be the new manager.

All I can say is that the Cubs should a) try and get Joe Torre or Joe Girardi and b) get rid of almost everyone on the team. Keep Marmol, Dempster, Colvin, Castro, DeWitt, Byrd, and Soriano (because of the contract) and try to improve almost every other position. Zambrano will stay until his contract expires, and then he can be jettisoned. A great improvement to the team would be a left handed hitter, a lead off hitter, and some more quality starters. With those pieces, they could contend. And it's a long way till that. Till then, the Cubs will be Chicago afterthoughts heading into October.