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Cubs Minor League Wrap: June 19

2013-06-20T03:50:25Z

Iowa Cubs

The Iowa Cubs split a doubleheader with the Nashville Sounds (Brewers), losing game one 5-4 and winning the second game 1-0.

In the first game, Brooks Raley got into trouble early, allowing two runs in the first and three in the third. He stayed in and pitched well after that, but the Cubs never caught up. Raley lasted six innings, allowing the five runs on six hits. He walked four and struck out five.

Most of the Cubs offense came from second baseman Logan Watkins, who had two triples in a 3 for 4 game. He scored after both triples.

In game two, three pitchers combined for a one-hit shutout. Starter Barret Loux gave up a single with two out in the second for the only hit. Loux went five innings and struck out five and walked only one.

Hisanori Takahashi got the win and Brian Schlitter the save. Each threw a shutout inning. Neither walked anyone and Schlitter struck out one.

The only run of this game was scored by Watkins, who singled and eventually came around to score on a two-out wild pitch. Watkins was 2 for 3 in this game.

Tennessee Smokies

The Tennessee Smokies won their first game of the second half with a 7-2 blinding of the Chattanooga Lookouts (Dodgers).

Another strong start for Alberto Cabrera, who allowed one run on six hits over six innings for his sixth win. Cabrera walked three and fanned six.

Justin Bour returned to the Smokies lineup for the first time since April 19 and hit his third home run of the year. It came with the bases empty in the fifth inning. Bour was 1 for 5.

Earlier, third baseman Christian Villanueva broke a 1-1 tie in the fourth inning when he connected off Zach Lee for his sixth home run this season. It also was a solo home run. Villanueva was 2 for 4.

Second baseman Ronald Torreyes went 3 for 4 with a double. He knocked two runs in and scored once.

Catcher Rafael Lopez doubled twice in a 2 for 4 game. He scored after both doubles in the third and fourth innings.

Right fielder Jae-Hoon Ha played his first game since May 1. He was 1 for 5.

Daytona Cubs

The Daytona Cubs finished out the first half of the season with a 4-3 win over the Clearwater Threshers (Phillies).

P.J. Francescon started and got his fifth win. He allowed three runs on eight hits over six innings. Francescon struck out four and didn't walk anyone.

Eduardo Figueroa entered the game in the bottom of the ninth and allowed a single to the first batter he faced. But he stranded him there as he retired the next three batters for his second save. Figueroa had one strikeout.

DH Ben Carhart hit his third home run this season with the bases empty in the sixth inning. Carhart was 3 for 3 and was hit by a pitch. He also stole a base.

Center fielder Pin-Chieh Chen was demoted from Tennessee to make room for Ha, but that's still one level above where he was when he started the season in Kane County. Chen was 2 for 4 with an RBI and a run scored.

Kane County Cougars

Still on the All-Star Break

Boise Hawks

The Boise Hawks capped the Salem-Keizer Volcanoes (Giants), 5-1, for their 1st home win of the year.

It was a second great start by James Pugliese, who allowed only one run on three hits over five innings. The one run scored on an inside-the-park home run that got past center fielder Shawon Dunston that all three outfielders seemed to think the other two would get after it passed Dunston. Pugliese walked two and struck out four.

Corbin Hoffner pitched three innings without allowing a hit and Michael Hamman pitched the ninth without allowing a hit to close out the game. Hoffner walked one and struck out four whereas Hamman struck out one.

Left fielder Jose Dore was 1 for 3 with an RBI double and a sacrifice fly. Dunston was 1 for 3 with a walk and a run scored.

Overflow Thread 3: Cubs vs. Cardinals, Wednesday 6/19, 7:15 CT

2013-06-20T03:00:07Z

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Overflow Thread 2: Cubs vs. Cardinals, Wednesday 6/19, 7:15 CT

2013-06-20T02:15:01Z

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Overflow Thread 1: Cubs vs. Cardinals, Wednesday 6/19, 7:15 CT

2013-06-20T01:15:02Z

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Cubs Face Cardinals Again In St. Louis

2013-06-19T22:01:03Z

Looking for Wednesday's game threads? Here's the place.

Cubs lineup:

xxxx

Cardinals lineup:

xxxx

Today's Starting Pitchers

Edwin Jackson

Cubs

vs.

Jake Westbrook

Cardinals

vs. StL

vs. Cubs

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2013 - Edwin Jackson	3-8	13	13	0	0	0	0	71.2	82	50	43	5	29	71	5.40	1.55

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2013 - Jake Westbrook	2-2	7	7	1	1	0	0	44.0	47	14	10	0	19	19	2.05	1.50

Today's game is on CSN Chicago.

Here is the complete MLB.com Mediacenter for today.

MLB.com Gameday

Baseball-reference.com game preview

SB Nation game preview

Please visit our SB Nation Cardinals site Viva el Birdos.

Here's the scoop on game threads for 2013. You'll find the game preview -- like this one -- posting as the first link in the StoryStream™, which will then contain all the overflow threads and the recap. The recap will also be on the front page as a separate post; once I post a game recap, the stream for each game will be retitled "Cubs vs. (Team) (Day of Week) Game Threads" so you can go back and find every thread related to that particular game.

In general, game previews will post two hours before game time. Exception: for day games after night games, that will usually be 90 minutes.

You will also be able to find the First Pitch Thread and all the overflow threads in the box marked "Chicago Cubs Game Threads" at the bottom of the front page (you can also find them in this section link). They will also appear in this StoryStream™. As I've done for each regular-season game for several years now, we'll have the First Pitch thread at five minutes before game time (moved up from actual game time per your requests), then an overflow one hour, two hours and 2:45 after game time.

Discuss amongst yourselves.

Cubs vs. Cardinals Preview, Wednesday 6/19, 7:15 CT: The Game You Won't Be Watching

2013-06-19T22:00:08Z

Based on the poll in this article posted earlier today, a little more than two-thirds of you aren't going to be watching this game, while about one-quarter will be (with the rest making a different choice).

So I could post cat pictures here and it probably wouldn't make any difference. Here's a Cubs-related cat picture from this 2009 game at Wrigley Field.

If you don't think that's real, here's another photo of it and here's an article with some video.

All right, I'm done with cat pictures. On to baseball!

Cubs lineup:

Valbuena 3B, Castro SS, Schierholtz RF, Soriano LF, Rizzo 1B, Sweeney CF, Castillo C, Barney 2B, Jackson P

Anthony Rizzo is back in the lineup. Starlin Castro is still not getting a day off. Status quo.

Cardinals lineup:

Carpenter 2B, Beltran RF, Holliday LF, Craig 1B, Molina C, Jay CF, Descalso 3B, Kozma SS, Westbrook P

Today's Starting Pitchers

Edwin Jackson

Cubs

vs.

Jake Westbrook

Cardinals

vs. StL

vs. Cubs

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2013 - Edwin Jackson	3-8	13	13	0	0	0	0	71.2	82	50	43	5	29	71	5.40	1.55

	W-L	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	BS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
2013 - Jake Westbrook	2-2	7	7	1	1	0	0	44.0	47	14	10	0	19	19	2.05	1.50

Much is said every time Edwin Jackson faces one of his former teams. Which is a lot, because he has eight of them. Tonight is one of those nights; Jackson faced the Cardinals twice last year. One of those starts was really good. The other one -- well, you really don't want to know (don't say I didn't warn you). Jackson has been very good in his last two outings, pitching like the guy we thought we had when that four-year deal was signed. It would be nice to see that continue.

Jake Westbrook faced the Cubs May 8 at Wrigley Field; the Cubs hit him pretty well, with nine hits and four runs in less than six innings. When Westbrook left the game, the Cubs were winning. As has happened so often this year, bad bullpen work lost that game. Nate Schierholtz singled and doubled off Westbrook that day.

Today's game is on CSN Chicago.

Here is the complete MLB.com Mediacenter for today.

MLB.com Gameday

Baseball-reference.com game preview

SB Nation game preview

Please visit our SB Nation Cardinals site Viva el Birdos.

In general, game previews will post two hours before game time. Exception: for day games after night games, that will usually be 90 minutes.

Discuss amongst yourselves.

Ticket Exchanges: July 5-14 Homestand

2013-06-19T20:28:26Z

This nine-game homestand will take us up to the All-Star break; it's kind of an odd combination of teams, with two divisional rivals and an interleague set in between. Not included here is the makeup game at the Cell vs. the White Sox on July 8, which was to have been an off day.

Dates and times:

Pirates: July 5 (3:05), July 6 (3:05), July 7 (1:20)

Angels: July 9 (7:05), July 10 (7:05)

Cardinals: July 11 (7:05), July 12 (3:05), July 13 (6:15), July 14 (7:05)

As always, face value only for tickets. If comments to this post are closed, email me and I'll reopen them.

On The A's And San Jose

2013-06-19T18:30:08Z

In this morning's MLB Bullets, Josh posted this link to the story that the city of San Jose has filed suit against Major League Baseball for preventing the Athletics' proposed move to that city. (Yes, I know it's a bit more complicated than that; I'm trying to provide a quick summary and introduction.)

He also posted this Craig Calcaterra article from Hardball Talk and this Wendy Thurm article from FanGraphs dissecting and discussing the lawsuit. Both Calcaterra and Thurm, in addition to being widely-respected baseball writers, used to be lawyers, and Thurm practiced in California, where the suit has been filed. If you haven't read all of those, please do; as a non-lawyer I defer to both of them for the legal knowledge necessary to analyze the chances of this lawsuit going forward.

This passage from Thurm's piece seems particularly relevant:

California has its own antitrust statute, known as the Cartwright Act. It operates independent of federal antitrust laws; that is, federal law does not preempt the operation of the California statute. And that’s where things get tricky and — frankly — a bit hazy to me. Sure, I practiced law in California for 18 years but handled very few matters involving the Cartwright Act. I just don’t have enough knowledge and experience to say at this point whether this claim carries any weight even if the federal antitrust claims are blocked by baseball’s antitrust exemption.

The Cartwright Act claim is the key to all of the state law claims. San Jose alleges that MLB interfered with its option agreement with the A’s. In November, 2O11, San Jose granted an option to the A’s to purchase a five-acre tract of public land for $6.9 million. The option contains two conditions: (1) no public funds shall be used in the design, construction or operation of the new ballpark; and (2) city voters must still approve the construction of the new ballpark. The option cost the A’s $25,OOO per year.

That sounds pretty nebulous — how can a party interfere with an option to do something in the future? — but California law does allow plaintiffs to sue claiming that another party interfered with an expected contractual interest if the defendant engaged in otherwise illegal contract. In other words, if MLB’s conduct violated the Cartwright Act, that could be a sufficiently wrongful act on which to base a claim for interference with prospective economic advantage.

Again, I don't know enough about these things to say one way or the other whether this part of California law would be enough to get this issue before a court. What I do know is that MLB will go until the ends of the Earth and the end of time defending its antitrust exemption, which in my view is a curious legacy of the Federal League and its aftermath, nearly 100 years old, and not really in any way, legal or common sense, defensible. Yes, it's been upheld twice (in 1953 and 1972), and in 1998, writes Thurm:

Congress specifically overturned the antitrust exemption as it applies to labor relations; by federal statute, major league baseball players have the right to be free of collusive and monopolistic conduct by the owners and the league.

But Congress left the remainder of baseball’s antitrust exemption intact. Or did it?

There’s a good deal of debate about how to interpret what Congress did and didn’t do when it debated and enacted the Curt Flood Act. This law review article analyzes the issues quite well. The question the judge in San Jose v. MLB will have to decide is whether baseball’s federal antitrust exemption as it applies to the location and relocation of franchises survived passage of the Curt Flood Act. If the exemption applies, then the two claims against MLB charging violations of the Sherman Act (one of the federal antitrust statutes) will be dismissed.

Well, that's a very good question, and again, something Major League Baseball certainly doesn't want decided against them.

The questions, then, are:

Does San Jose have standing to bring this lawsuit in the first place? and
Are they doing this more to bring this issue into the open, get the court of public opinion on their side, and force MLB to let the A's move there?

It would seem the second is more likely to be true. As I have written numerous times, the Giants' claim on San Jose as their "territory", 20-plus years after they asked for it because they were considering moving there themselves and 13 years after they built a new stadium in San Francisco, seems petty and punitive. It would be good for the A's, the Giants and baseball in general if Oakland's team were to be allowed to go ahead and build in San Jose.

While, again, I am no legal expert, I do know this: all the city of San Jose needs is one sympathetic federal judge to rule in its favor and MLB is going to have a giant headache on its hands, one it might just want to settle by letting the A's move, thus keeping their antitrust exemption intact. Because if this thing ever goes to trial, all bets are off. Consider that in 1995, a federal judge ruled in favor of the Players' Association, ending the 1994-95 labor dispute, and, some said, saving the sport. (In case you don't recall, that judge now sits on the United States Supreme Court.) I know we have several lawyers as regular posters here, including at least one who practices in California; if any of you have a lawyer's view of this, feel free to post.

Major League Baseball would be wise to give the city of San Jose and the A's what they want, particularly in light of the shit almost literally hitting the fan last Sunday in Oakland. It's way past time to get this thing done.