Dan Haren Gets Bored On Exercise Bike, Tweets Random Facts About His Career

Dan Haren wasn't a Cub for very long... just 11 starts in the last two months of 2015. Most of them weren't very good and he was left off the Cubs' playoff roster. I will, though, always remember the seven shutout innings he threw against the Cardinals in St. Louis September 7, a great coda to his career when the Cubs needed it most.

Haren announced his retirement at the end of the 2015 season. He's still trying to keep in shape, though, and Monday he was on an exercise bike. How do I know this? Because he sent out a hilarious sequence of tweets with random facts about his career. Here they are (with some added commentary by me):

I'm on an exercise bike, bored, so here are some things about my baseball career that come to mind......

— dan haren (@ithrow88) January 4, 2016

I went into almost every start the last few years thinking... How the hell am I gonna get these guys out

— dan haren (@ithrow88) January 4, 2016

There's was atleast 3-4 times I thought the team plane was gonna crash.

— dan haren (@ithrow88) January 4, 2016

I would count out the days about a month in advance to see if I was gonna pitch in Coors field.

— dan haren (@ithrow88) January 4, 2016

One of my favorite moment ever was hitting a homer off Chris carpenter. I took my time running the bases.

— dan haren (@ithrow88) January 4, 2016

Haren was actually a pretty good hitter -- he hit .200 for his career, good for a pitcher, with 26 doubles and two home runs in 414 at-bats. The homer off Carpenter was hit while Haren was with the Diamondbacks, June 28, 2010, in St. Louis. Several other players connected to the Cubs in one way or another played in that game.

I gave up 11 runs in Toronto and got the win one time.

— dan haren (@ithrow88) January 4, 2016

Close, Dan, but not quite, as I pointed out in a reply:

.@ithrow88 9 runs, actually. But you did get the win: https://t.co/6olI99311u

— Al Yellon (@bleedcubbieblue) January 4, 2016

I had to take Imodium most days I pitched to plug myself up.

— dan haren (@ithrow88) January 4, 2016

I gave up so many homers cause I didn't wanna walk people. That and cause I threw 85 mph meatballs sometimes.

— dan haren (@ithrow88) January 4, 2016

Why the hell did Bj Upton hit so many homers off me..... This probably ties into the last tweet as well. I did much better facing Melvin

— dan haren (@ithrow88) January 4, 2016

Upton, whether known as B.J. or Melvin, hit six career homers off Haren, more than anyone else. No one else hit more than four.

I only hit like 5-7 people on purpose.

— dan haren (@ithrow88) January 4, 2016

That's about 10 percent of his career total of 67 hit batters.

My threat to retire didn't quite work last offseason

— dan haren (@ithrow88) January 4, 2016

Sometimes when the count was 3-1, I would just throw it down the middle and hope for the best. People pop up in batting practice right

— dan haren (@ithrow88) January 4, 2016

Ok I'm done with the bike, time to go lift Bi's and tri's. #retiredlife

— dan haren (@ithrow88) January 4, 2016

These are awesome. Haren, regardless of his talent level when he came to the Cubs, was for a time a very good pitcher, a three-time All-Star who finished in the top seven in Cy Young voting twice, and posted 32.9 career bWAR, which is pretty good. He also had a great sense of humor, particularly about himself. I'd love to see him get into broadcasting -- he'd be fantastic at it.

Hope you enjoyed these. I did.