Deal (Blackhawks) or No Deal (Cubs, White Sox)

July 1, 2013 @ admin → No Comments

Monday meanderings: And you probably thought the fast pace of hockey came on the ice. Who knew it came after a Stanley Cup championship and in the executive offices? That’s the way it seems with the Chicago Blackhawks trading away Dave Bolland (who had the Cup-clinching goal in Game 6 vs. the Boston Bruins) to Toronto and Michael Frolik to Winnipeg. The real surprise is the Hawks would be dumping players/salary sooner than the Chicago White Sox.

There’s always room for a pboto of April Rose (left) and her friend Kelly Marie Campbell.

* Speaking of the Sox (who lost their fourth consecutive contest Sunday as Cleveland swept the weekend series at U.S. Cellular Field), left-hander Chris Sale will be happy to know June is over. He was 0-5 with a 3.19 earned-run average for the month with the Six scoring nine runs total in his six starts. His last victory came May 17 against the Los Angeles Angels. In case Sox fans are wondering how Sale — Sunday’s loser who struck out 10 — possibly might be left off the American League All-Star Game roster.

* Speaking of the Indians’ sweep, it was their first four-game sweep in Chicago since 1948. That was the last season Cleveland won the World Series. And three years after the last Cubs appearance in the Fall Classic.

* Speaking of World Series droughts and historical precedence and those sorts of things, the Pittsburgh Pirates (51-30) have the best record in baseball? Yes. Which should serve as good news for the Cubs. All this means is it’s 1909 (when the Pirates went 110-42-2) and the Cubs are a mere year removed from a World Series title. Or maybe it’s 1991, when Pittsburgh last had the best record in baseball. For long-suffering Cubs fans, consider this: THe Pirates have not had a winning season since 1992. Even the Cubs haven’t been that bad. Of course, the view that the Cubs soon could be do as well as the present Pirates are is not necessarily based in historical precedent or logic or anything like that. I believe the what it is based on is something much closer to what could be termed “wishful thinking.”

* The ever-calculating types at elliottharris.com have figured out that if the Pirates go 30-51 (which would be performing even worse than the Cubs and Sox have been) the rest of the season, they would finish at .500. And the mathematical wizards around here were able to do that without using a calculator. Impressive, I know.

* Speaking of figuring things out, the folks at coolstandings.com calculate the Sox with a 0.4 percent chance of making the postseason and have the Cubs at 4.1. In case either team’s general manager needs further evidence of making deals for the future, thereby helping fans look to the future and away from the present.

* Compare and contrast: Which is more surprising — the White Sox four games behind the Minnesota Twins in the AL Central or the Cubs 15.5 games behind the Pirates?

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Here is where we go for a daily dose of non-gratuitous video (a byproduct of the diligence of the editorial and video departments at elliottharris.com and their generous definition of “gratuitous”). And, yes, today we do have more of the Sports Illustrated videos of the top swimsuit models of all time (their rankings):