Uh Oh, Jay Made A Stupid....

Multiple stupids, in fact. Before reading, be careful. You're about to enter a zone with a very unhealthy concentration of WRONG.

As the most tortured and masochistic fans in sports, you demand love and tenderness in Cubdom. You want hope, optimism, faith. You want 100-year amnesia. You want a combination of Ron Santo, a Wrigley Granny and Eddie Vedder in the bleachers.

They're fans. ZOMG! THEY WANT TO HOPE FOR A TEAM THAT WINS IT ALL!

You want me to say 98-64,

No one cares what you predict, because it's probably more based on Piniella's post-game speeches than baseball.

a sweep of the Rockies

Rockies?

a Game 7 victory over Johan Santana and a Game 7 win over the Red Sox, after which you can die peacefully.

For such goo (woo!), please call Ronnie Wickers. I cannot help you.

Mentions of Ronnie Woo Woo in Jay's columns are reaching July 2, 2006ish annoyingness levels.

But what I can do is this: You tell me what you want to hear, and I'll follow with what you SHOULD hear. It's called telling the truth, assuming you can handle it.

Jay is about to do this many, many times. We're going to see how often he actually says something truth-related.

You say Kerry Wood will become the toast of Clark Street. I say Huston Street is available on the trade market.

There are two very good reasons to not trade for Huston Street

1) Billy Beane will probably rip you off.
2) Wood, Marmol, and Howry are good enough between them to handle the late innings.

Jay literally thinks teams can just trade for awesome players all the time, and if they don't, then they're fucking up.

You say Wood will be pain-free all season, save 40 games and uphold the confidence of enabler Jim Hendry, who said this after the general manager's pet rock was named the closer: ``For his sake and ours, I hope he stays healthy because that's world-class stuff.'' I say Wood symbolizes All Things Cub in the 21st century and, sadly, will have arm soreness to accompany his world-class stuff by May 1, which is May Day, prompting the electric Carlos Marmol to inherit the role he deserved all along.

Marmol had a very good 2007, but middle relievers tend to be wildly inconsistent from year to year. He's bound to see some regression. Saying that he deserved the role all along is crazy. Cliff Politte had a great 2005 for the White Sox, should he be a closer?

I apologize....not enough "angry" out of me yet. I know, I know. Read on.

You say Sam Zell, in his detached role as temporary Cubs owner, will provide a refreshing change after 27 years of ineptness from previous Tribune Co. chiefs.

I basically live in Cubsville. No one is saying that. What's your "truth", Jay?

I say Zell looks like the billy goat,

Maybe.

actually might be the billy goat

What?

and already is plotting to eliminate the jobs of at least a dozen Cubs players through voluntary separation programs, involuntary layoffs and attrition.

Jay Mariotti: ::closes dictionary:: I have no idea what I am writing.

`Who needs relief pitchers? Let the starting pitcher finish every game,'' Zell will declare. ``And if you're paying eight players to be in the field, all others are superfluous.''

I'm sorry...my eyes must be going. I could have sworn you said at the top of this column you were going to tell me something called the "truth".

::checks again::

Yes, yes, that's what you wrote. It clearly says "truth", not "wildly stupid and un-funny exaggerations." Stop deceiving me!

You say the rotation is loaded with a Cy Young Award candidate in prediction-free Carlos Zambrano, a potential 18-game winner in Ted Lilly and a potential 15-game winner in Rich Hill.

Zam's chances of winning the Cy Young this year are probably something close to 1%, especially low due to the Santana trade. But other than that, there really isn't anything crazy about this sort of optimism.

I say you're right about Zambrano and Lilly,

All of last year, you slammed Zambrano for not being a true ace, now you think he's a Cy Young Award candidate?

but that you deserve to be conked in the head by an errant pitch from Hill, who last was seen walking six of 11 Colorado batters and has a 7.50 ERA in his last four Cactus League starts.

Rich Hill winning 15 games this year is definitely very possible. Spring starts from an established starting pitcher couldn't be less indicative of regular season performance. Please, PLEASE win 15 games this year, Rich Hill.

I'll never forget how this newspaper splashed Hill across the front page last October, wondering if he could save the Cubs. After he allowed three runs and six hits and was yanked after three innings, the Diamondbacks supplied the musical answer amid much Wrigley angst: ``We found our thrill, on Boo-berry Hill.''

Damn you Rich Hill! You pitched poorly in your first postseason start! You'll never win 15 games this year!

You say the Cubs have an awesome lineup.

Jay's right, this actually is a serious problem among Cub fans. Their lineup is severely overrated, mostly because of Soriano and the disease sweeping Chicago that
causes people to think Ryan Theriot is good at baseball.

I say they do as long as Derrek Lee doesn't remain a doubles hitter,

Derrek Lee posted the 2nd highest slugging percentage of his career last year. He also got on base at a .400 clip. You wouldn't take a doubles hitter with a .400 OBP?

Alfonso Soriano rips fastballs instead of muscles

::chirp::

and Aramis Ramirez is kept away from secret cockfighting arenas.

These are such stupid substitutes for actually analyzing these three hitters. For once, will you do your fucking job?

You say it's a sign of special camaraderie when several Cubs pitchers maul a '95 Nissan Sentra belonging to Tim Buss, the team's strength and conditioning coach, and his wife. You say it's very cool that they purchased him a 2008 Nissan Xterra.

How can you possibly argue that it wasn't?

I say it's a metaphor for certain pitchers who will be destroyed accordingly this season and require new replacements.

What the fuck??? This makes no sense.

Among them is a starter, Jason Marquis, who somehow won a rotation job after telling management that he, the great Jason Marquis -- who was left off postseason rosters the last two years -- would request a trade if he was moved to the bullpen. I say trade Marquis to Boston for Coco Crisp, center-field insurance for Felix Pie, while his ERA is still under 5.00.

Jim Hendry: Theo, what do you think of Marquis for Crisp?

Theo Epstein: Umm....gee Jim, ::snicker::, I'm going to have to think about that one. I have 6 starting pitchers, all better than Jason. I have an awesome bullpen. But yeah, I totally have a higher need on my team for a bad pitcher than one of the best defensive outfielders in baseball.

Jim Hendry: You don't have to be so mean...it wasn't my idea, anyway.....Chicago Sun-Times columnist Jay Mariotti totally came up with that idea. It seems that I care so much about what he thinks that I just had to pitch that one to you.

Theo Epstein: HA! Jay Mariotti!?!? That guy's a moron! There's this wicked sweet blog on the internet that constantly says he should be fired. I read it all the time!

You say I'm being mean to Wood. I say I'm rooting harder for him than anyone but family, friends and Hendry.

You are not rooting for him, because you're rooting for you to be wrong, which everyone on the fucking planet knows isn't the case. How did you sneak this lie in there? You're supposed to be telling me the truth!

I'm now about to copy and paste the most worthless paragraph of all-time, and won't comment on it. Read at your own risk.

You say Piniella, in introducing ``Cubbie occurrence'' to the lexicon, has coined a phrase for eternity. I say you're right. Pie's twisted testicle -- has it untwisted yet? -- is a Cubbie occurrence. Zell is a Cubbie occurrence. Blaming the Evil Stoney in '04 was a Cubbie occurrence. Trading Lou Brock and not keeping Greg Maddux in 1992 were Cubbie occurences. All the various animals associated with a century of futility are Cubbie occurrences. Thanks, Lou, for new material. Unless Piniella, too, is a Cubbie occurrence.

Moving right along....

You say Kosuke Fukudome will have no problem acclimating to Cubdom. I say he runs for cover the first time trash is thrown from the bleachers. You say you'll be very cordial to him out there. I say some of you become filled with rage when the mood strikes and will treat anyone like Jacque Jones. I also say you don't want any international incidents when we're trying to land the 2016 Olympics.

You might find this paragraph shocking, as Jay just did something he's never done before. He took an incident that happened awhile ago that has nothing to do with the situation at hand and used it to argue a point which also has freakishly little to do with the situation at hand.

You might find my last paragraph there shocking, as I used something called "sarcasm", which is completely new to my writing style.

He does that shit all the time. In case you guys wanted a recap of that paragraph, filled with things that have so little to do with each other, here it is.

"You say Kosuke Fukudome will blah blah blah, I say blah blah blah run for cover blah blah filled with rage blah blah international incidents blah blah 2016 Olympics".

You say the Milwaukee Brewers are frauds. I say slugger Prince Fielder, who last year became the youngest major-league player to hit 50 home runs, is now a vegetarian after reading his wife's book, ``Skinny Bitch: A No-nonsense, Tough-love Guide for Savvy Girls who Want to Stop Eating Crap and Start Looking Fabulous.''

See? They're not frauds! Prince Fielder is gonna lose weight!

You say I'm making this up. I say it's impossible to make up something this weird

Last year, you said that there was black magic associated with a baseball that rolled in from the bullpen towards third base because "baseball" starts with the letter 'b'. You also said that Torii Hunter is better than Nick Swisher, a statement that I consider equally weird.

You say the Sun-Times got Punk'd when a Tribune intern, Katie Hamilton, won this newspaper's video contest condemning Zell's attempt to sell Wrigley's naming rights. I say Hamilton is more clever than most writers at the sleepy broadsheet. I also say the Tribune is too cheap to give her a raise, and that Zell is contemplating laying her off because she has had her day in the Sun(-Times).

Oh yeah Jay, I forgot to tell you. Irrelevance called, it wants its nonsense back.

You say the Cubs are winning it all. I say they'll repeat as division champs, their first back-to-back claiming of cloth since 1907-08, but lose in the playoffs. You say I'm being negative. I say you need to get a life one of these centuries.


Jay seems to think that winning a playoff series is an impossibility for a given team that makes the playoffs. Why, Jay, can the Cubs win their division and then have a 0% chance at beating another baseball team in a best-of-five series? There's a shit-ton of luck involved....it's not like the NBA, you can't say things like, "oh, the Cubs, they're only an NLDS team, nothing more." One day I want you to wake up and realize that.

On a side note, I saw the comments left on this article. Everyone really, really dislikes you, Jay! And I mean we're talking threats of physical violence!