the case for RJ

Now that Ryan’s resigned, the chances of this happening go down quite a lot. I still think it’s worth pursuing, because…

* Randy Johnson was actually pretty good last year. Look past the record, and you see a 44 year old start who managed 30 starts, 2 complete games, and a 117 ERA+. Those are better numbers than Lilly and Z last year.
* The Cubs lead the league in Ks in 2008. The Cubs lead the league in Ks every year. Unit would help keep this gong.
* No one likes to remember this, but Jason Marquis is still a member of the Cubs. They’re paying him NINE MILLION DOLLARS for 09. This must be fixed.
* Everyone says Randy Johnson is a miserable person. Either being a Cub all year will cheer him up, or the pressure of the fans will cause him to have 4-7 “Don’t talk back when I’m talking to you!” incidents. Excitement either way.
* Until something happens to distract, the 2009 season is going to be miserable. If they’re bad or average, it’ll be a downer after where they were last year. If they’re good, everyone complains about how little being good means if you don’t do it in the playoffs. I’m sure Z will do something wacky or everyone will get obsessed with every pitch thrown on the outside to Kosuke, but why not have an extra amusing event built into the season?

Johnson is at 295 and is really only coming back to get 300 to boost his HOF chances. This alone is funny, because at no time can he ever really admit this publicly even if everyone knows it to be true (it ruins the image), but because he’s inevitably going to get 300 with a team he’s only won 5 games with. I would really enjoy a countdown to 300, the look back at all his memorable Cub wins when he gets there, the absurd debate about what cap he’ll wear in the HOF (absurd because who cares what cap they’re wearing) and all the other pomp & circumstances that come with reaching an established but arbitrary round number.

Plus, five wins means it’s going to happen right around my birthday, when I hit a very similar round number, and the symmetry would be fantastic. And it’d be far better than just waiting for October.