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I know we all already understand that Carlos Zambrano isn't an ace, but today proved it. In typical Zambrano fashion he couldn't keep his cool and managed to make a big jam worse. His meltdown occurred in the third inning of today's game when he allowed Pablo Sandoval to hit a grand slam. Not an ace.

Wait, you mean this was just the second start of Spring Training? I bet it will be hard to tell when you pick up your morning Sun-Times.

The Cubs lost to the Giants 5-1 today, that five run third innings being the obvious difference in the game. The Cubs did have a few highlights themselves though. First Xavier Nady made his first appearance of spring playing DH and going 1-2 with a single and a walk. Nady said he felt good, but he might not be able to play the outfield until June 1st.

Other hitting stars today were Ryan Theriot (3-3), Starlin Castro (2-2), and Aramis Ramirez (2-3 with RBI double). After Zambrano (remember NOT AN ACE) the Cubs pitchers only allowed one hit. John Grabow, Andrew Cashner, Thomas Diamond, Justin Berg, and John Gaub all had scoreless innings (Gaub and Cashner each walked one guy). Mike Parisi allowed one hit, but nothing else.

Finally a bit of bad news, Derrek Lee had to leave the game after fouling a ball off his foot. For those that care the Cubs are 3-3 now in ST games.

The Cards, Astros and Cubs make it into this post, and I'll cover the other half of the division next.

Astros: Jason Castro, C

Last year: 243 PA's in A+: .309/.399/.517/.916, 268 PA's in AA: .293/.362/.385/.747

The Astros farm system is barren right now after years of trading prospects for veterans and signing stop-gap free agents that have cost them draft picks. I wanted to pick Bud Norris for this spot, but he threw too many innings last year to qualify as a rookie in 2010. That leaves Castro, the Astros top prospect and Baseball America's #53 prospect. J.R. Towles was a hot ticket prior to 2008, but he has struggled in the majors.

Castro is a non-roster invitee in Astros' camp, but the other catching options aren't great in Humberto Quintero and Kevin Cash. Castro's power ran away when he made the jump to the AA last season as his ISO dropped from .208 to .092. It doesn't seem he was overmatched completely because he struck out a lot less even though he walked a little bit less too. It doesn't take a genius to figure out he needs more time in the minors, but rookies and the Astros don't mix well this year.

In a perfect world, for the Astros, they'd have a power-armed rookie ready to join the bullpen. Losing Valverde not only helped my sanity by not having to hear that B.I.G. song, but it really hurt them. They added Brandon Lyon and Matt Lindstrom, but they still have a need there. Castro is what they have in the way of rookies, and if the team tanks he should get an opportunity to adjust to the majors and build for their future.

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Any time Bud Selig has something to do with anything it is bound to be stupid. He is going to be gone pretty soon, and it seems like he wants to leave us with one last bad thing before his reign of stupid is over. Selig and his "special committee for on-field matters" have begun investigating a MLB realignment strategy that you have to see to believe.

The proposal involves teams no longer being tied down to divisions, meaning they can change each season based on a number of factors. Those factors include geography, payroll, and interest in competing. That's right interest in competing. Basically if a team like the Royals has no interest in actually winning games in a given season they can elect to move to the AL East where extra games against the Red Sox and Yankees would boost income while losing just as many games.

The article I linked to there uses the Indians as the example of doing the same thing. They know they aren't winning anything this season, why not go to a division with more profitable and popular opponents. On the other side (again this example comes from the article) a team like the Rays can leave the AL East and dominate the AL Central.

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Today former Cubs and mostly former Red Sox Nomar Garciaparra is announcing his retirement from baseball. He's signing a one day contract with the Red Sox so that he can retire with the team he played his best baseball with. Nomar will be remembered of course for his time with the Red Sox when he was one of the best shortstops in baseball. Cubs fans will remember him as one of the bigger disappointments of the last decade.

The thing I will remember most about Nomar is how happy I was the day the Cubs were able to trade for him in 2004. He was still one of the best shortstops in the game and he was bringing his act to Chicago. That deal was supposed to but the Cubs lineup over the top and be the final piece in our championship run. Nomar also happened to be pretty injured when he got here, and his wrist was a constant problem down the stretch in 2004.

He was brought back for the 2005 season and hardly made it on the field. An ill fated step out of the batters box in St. Louis tore his groin muscle and more or less ended his Cubs career. In a way his time here is just about as typical of a Cub as you would expect- tons of hype and potential that never really panned out.

Nomar leaves baseball as one of the better players during his era, now of course odds are he was a bit aided, but still he was a great shortstop that was once considered in the same class as Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez. He retires with a career OPS+ of 124 and .313 batting average, and 42.6 career WAR. Not too bad if you ask me.

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It seems like the Cubs are just addicted to making bad decisions. This time they are predictably overreacting to the Angel Guzman injury by looking at trading for veteran relief pitcher Jason Frasor. He's a name that has been floating around for a few weeks, but with Guzman getting hurt the rumors have started to get more frequent.

Last season Frasor had a bit of a career season with a 2.50 ERA, 1.4 WAR, and a 2.99 FIP all career bests. On one hand somebody doing that in the AL East is very impressive, on the other hand it is a classic Cub move to over pay for a relief pitcher coming off a career season.

I said yesterday I think it would be best to leave Frasor alone. The Cubs are bleeding out of their ears with replacement level type guys who aren't going to cost $2.8 million. Not to mention it probably costs a somewhat decent prospect to get Frasor back (I don't know if that means Kyler Burke or Chris Carpenter or something less). I'd rather not bother, not when so many other things are already going to go wrong.

I've seen the future, and it is all based on small sample sizes in meaningless spring baseball.

Randy Wells is going to be the best pitcher in baseball this season. His 5 innings of 1 hit ball in two starts this spring show he's a star in the making. The NL Cy Young is all but a given at this point.

The same can be said for Carlos Zambrano and Ryan Dempster who won't have a blemish on their pitching lines this season.

Aramis Ramirez is probably done being good. His .143 average this spring has to concern fans that he might never even see the Mendoza line again. Add that with the fact that top prospect Josh Vitters is hitting a cool .500 and you know Ramirez's days are numbered.

The Cardinals need to be concerned about their starting rotation. Adam Wainwright's 18.00 ERA shows that he's probably going to struggle this season, same can be said for Chris Carpenter who has a 4.50 ERA.

Look for the Brewers to be major players in the Central again this season. The combined 0.00 ERA for Manny Parra and Chris Capuano show that they have easily caught the Cubs talent-wise already and are poised to battle the Cardinals for second place in the division for a long time.

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Hey Jim Hendry I have to ask you to do something that might be a painful to your baseball sensibilities. Perhaps not, still I need you to not freak out about the Cubs current bullpen situation. I know Angel Guzman's injury makes things look bad. Right now the Cubs best right handed set-up man throws left handed. Your closer can't throw strikes. The rest of the bullpen reads like a list of bad veterans and unproven rookies.

To that is fine, and I really hope that you just leave things how they are. This Cubs team isn't going anywhere to begin with, so let's just get that out of the way. A team that is entertaining the idea of using Mike Fontenot as a backup shortstop is a team that isn't good at baseball. Right now the Cubs minor league system is stock full of potentially useful arms, its time to see what they have.

Rather than trading two of these random names for a "proven" guy like Jason Frasor why not use 2010 to see what we have. Build your bullpen from the inside. Esmilian Caridad is obviously going to get every chance to be a setup guy. He provides all the tools to get the job done and I fully support giving him the eighth inning job against right handed batters. Sean Marshall has shown some things coming out of the bullpen and has shown he really can't do much as a starter. Suddenly four slots are filled.

The AAA team is full of guys who have the ability to get guys out at an acceptable rate. John Gaub, Justin Berg, Jeff Gray, Blake Parker, Jeff Stevens, and Mike Parisi all possess the ability to succeed (they all also possess the ability to be turds). The only way to find out what you have is to let these guys go out there and pitch. 2010 is a lost season already in my book, you don't have a roster capable of winning a World Series. There is no need to move players from your system for a more experienced bullpen arm when there are 15 guys who can do the same job for cheaper.

On a related note I know you and Lou are tempted to use two other young guys in the bullpen this season. Those guys are Jeff Samardzija and Andrew Cashner. Using them in the bullpen puts two of your best young arms on the major league club in an effort to contend. The problem is (again) YOU ARE NOT A CONTENDOR FOR ANYTHING. Samardzija and Cashner represent two future starting pitchers who need more time to develop themselves as starters. If Samardzija doesn't make this team as a starter, please let him start in AAA. Let him develop all four of his pitches instead of wasting a year in the bullpen throwing nothing but fastballs.

The same goes for Cashner. Odds are he could be the best setup guy on the team, his stuff is awesome and probably major league ready. The thing is this guy also has the potential to be a good major league starting pitcher. Last season you made the commitment to try him out as a starter, things worked out okay. No need to stop the progress of that this season just because you want to psuedo-contend.

Jim I know you and Lou are fighting for your jobs this season, but the chance to make the 2010 Cubs a team that can win it all has come and gone. Instead we have what we have, and no Jason Frasor is going to change that. Let the young guys get the hell beaten out of them, or maybe they will succeed. Let the Shark and Cashner develop as starters, let the AAA blob rotate in and out of the bullpen, and just accept this team as the .500 psuedo contendor of crap that they are.

The most important thing that came out of yesterday was that Ted is progressing. After it came out that an illness had set him back, it's nice to see he is supposedly back on track. Bruce Levine said that Ted threw 30 pitches off a mound and Rothschild liked what he saw. Even though some time has passed since Prior, I'm skeptical everytime I hear a Cub pitcher is doing well in his rehab.

The Cubs beat the A's again, winning 10-3. Theriot reached base three times and Fontenot had a couple of hits to lead the hitting. The best performance came from Demp though, who pitched two perfect innings. He didn't strike anybody out but didn't walk anyone either. Josh Donaldson, who it appears was the key to the Harden deal, homered for the A's and Jake Fox went 0-2 (in case you were wondering).

Ken Rosenthal quoted a "major league source" as saying the Cubs would be interested in John Smoltz or Pedro Martinez "down the line." I thought the Cubs were pretty confident in the four-headed monster of Shark/Gorzelanny/Silva/Marshall in being the five starter and Ted's replacement. This could mean they aren't as comfortable with how Ted is coming along but that contradicts what was reported above.

Teams are always looking for pitching help and I'm sure this is what that is. After his disastrous stint in Boston, Smoltz turned in a pretty nice year (3.87 FIP, 8.42 K/9). Pedro wasn't terrible either (4.28, 7.46), and each would clearly be welcome to the rotation. I'd rather see Gorzelanny get a crack for the majority of the year and see if he can become anything because the Cubs rotation isn't exactly oozing with youth.

ESPN reported that the Cubs are looking into Jason Frasor again in the wake of Angel Guzman's shoulder injury. I wrote back in February that getting Frasor wouldn't be a bad idea.

Xavier Nady is getting closer to game action, and Lou said that he may make his Cactus League debut on Thursday. He's not ready to play in the field yet and will DH.

The Cubs bullpen race is going to be that much more interesting now that Guzman is out. The Trib profiles two of the guys that could make the team, John Gaub and James Russell. Lou name dropped Russell the other day as a possible replacement for Guzman along with Casey Coleman. Gaub is another TCB favorite, and Justin wrote about him in detail in this post. If he or Jeff Stevens make the team and produce, then we will have officially gotten something for DeRosa. The most intriguing guy in all of this is Andrew Cashner, who seems to the most ready to contribute but who the Cubs seem to see as a starter down the line.

How you you feel if I were to tell you that I think Scott Linebrink's performance this season may influence the White Sox record up to 10 games?

Personally I'd be a little concerned.  He wasn't very good last season, and his few appearances in Spring Training have not blown anyone away either.  But his importance to this team is something that's going to prove itself time and time again.  This is a team that has a great starting rotation and a pretty strong back end of the bullpen.  But it's that middle part that bullpen that has to bridge the gap.  With Putz, Pena, Williams, and Linebrink expected to be that unit, the Sox will be relying heavily on Linebrink to get the ball from the starter to Thornton and Jenks.

I expect Putz to have a solid season.  He's coming back in the AL where he's had success, he should be a lot healthier than last season, and he's not going to be in a heavy pressure situation like he was as a late reliever in New York.  As far as Pena and Williams, they are not expected to do much.  Lot's of mop-up appearances, and eating up innings in low pressure games.

So the most important role lies in the right arm of Scott Linebrink.  The Sox are not going to be a team who's going to go out there and score 6-7 runs a game.  They are probably not going be the kind of team that's going to be able to comeback from late deficits either.  But they should be a team that can get leads.  They should be able to score a few runs to help out the starter and get the ball to the relievers to try and nail it down.

So Scott Linebrink's position is one of critical importance.  He's going to be the go to guy when the starter goes out in the 6th or 7th, and the Sox need to get to the 8th.  If he struggles, it all lies on Putz.  The Sox bullpen would instantly become incredibly short, and Ozzie would have to go to some unreliable guys in key situations time and time again.  But if he's good, the team will be a force.  If you can have 3 good relievers to go along with a starting rotation that is among the best in the league, you have it made.

Linebrink was not good last season.  And if he's not good this year it could be a major problem.  It could cost game after game because there's no way to bridge the gap.  Even if it's not him who's blowing the games, it's ths fact that it should be his spot.  He should be the guy getting the ball from starter to late relievers.  If he's not, then it has to be someone else, and I really don't see a name on this roster that is capable of stepping up and filling that void.

So Scott Linebrink holds a giant key in the White Sox success.  If he's good they'll be good.  If he's bad, they'll be bad.  If he's great, this team could be something really special.

Lou name dropped him the other day when talking about the ramifications of Andres Blanco getting hurt.  I went on a wild goose chase on Google to answer that very question. Problem is I was typing in 'Rex Barney,' because I swore that is what the Trib's article quoted Lou as saying. Rex Barney turned out to be a pitcher for the Dodgers during the '40s. Baffled that I couldn't find absolutely anything on a 'Rex Barney' in Cubs camp, I let the thought drift away. Today, however, Cubs.com has a bunch of propaganda on Darwin Barney, who is indeed a shortstop in camp with the Cubs.

I went back to the Trib article I read in the first place, and this is what I found:

"This will give me a chance to play (Mike) Fontenot at shortstop, which I said I needed to do," Piniella said. "We've got (prospect Darwin) Barney in camp. We've got enough."

So...am I crazy? Did I have a Moonlight Graham-type experience and just have the name of an old major leaguer pop mysteriously into my head? Did Sullivan mistype a quote the first time and then it got fixed? What I really hope happened is that Lou really called him Rex Barney, and the parentheses (I swear they weren't there the first time) and fact that there actually was a baseball player by that name in the past, indicates Lou might have gotten mixed up. That or I am indeed losing it.

Either way, who exactly is Darwin Barney? He's got some significance because Lou is aware him. The Cubs picked Barney out of Oregon State with the 127th pick in the 2007 draft. Barney has seemingly been a "winner" his whole career having won championships at every level: high school in 2002 and college in 2006 and 2007. He's the type of player that John Paxson would salivate over. But the Cubs already have their good luck charm in Kevin Millar, so too bad for Barney on that front.

Barney has played games in Rookie ball, A, high A, AA and AAA for the Cubs, splitting time with the Smokies and I-Cubs last year. The best numbers he's put up in his minor league career were with the Smokies last year, where he went .317/.368/.401/.769 and had a .353 wOBA. He doesn't have much power having hit only 8 home runs over his career and his baserunning seems to be lacking as well with only 22 career stolen bases.

Fangraphs doesn't have any fielding metrics numbers on him but with the lack of eye-popping hitting stats, I'd assume he isn't terrible defensively. His value does have to come from somewhere. Barney is 24 and should be commended for being able to stick around; someone in the organization must like him because he was in camp last year as well.

With Castro already being treated like a rockstar and Hak-Ju Lee, Ryan Flaherty and D.J. MeHahieu all projected as having the ability to play shortstop, Barney's future with the Cubs doesn't look all that great. But Blanco is already banged up and you never know how careful the Cubs will be with Castro. So if Barney does somehow find his way onto the 25-man in 2010, you'll know something about him.

Image courtesy baseballinwartime.com.