Why was JPM in Wrigleyville, you ask? Well, he was the token NASCAR publicity head chosen throw out the first pitch and sing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame", in advance of the nearby race. A little cross-promotion, if you will.
Obviously, the best part of that entire clip was the old guy in the stands at 0:44 that covered his ears as JPM led the crowd in singing the baseball anthem, because, well, Montoya isn't exactly Harry Carey.
I'm glad Montoya played along with the promo opportunity -- even though he finished the song like an entire verse ahead of the entire crowd.
Quality effort, Mr. Montoya, that's a Youtube keeper.
Chicago's Wrigley Field has been known to have its fair share of Cubs fans that aren't exactly sober in the stands, so is it at all surprising that a NASCAR Sprint Cup race car sponsored by none other than Jim Beam is lining up to support the effort to save Wrigley's name?
Nah, just a little humorous.
Robby Gordon's No. 7 Jim Beam Dodge is helping out the cause during this Saturday night's LifeLock 400 at Chicagoland Speedway by running the "Save Our Ballpark's Name" web site on his hood. That site, www.saveourname.com, is running a petition of Chicago and otherwise baseball fans who want nothing more than for Wrigley Field to stay Wrigley field.
The baseball gem's name, built in 1916, has come under fire by owner Sam Zell. Zell, who owns Tribune Broadcasting wants to help eliminate the company's debt by selling off the naming rights to the field.
Gordon's hood comes on the heels of Jim Beam placing a new billboard near the stadium advocating the petition and the "Save Our Name" drive.
If nothing else, it's a good way for Gordon -- the other Gordon in NASCAR -- to pick up some fans this weekend as he competes in Chicago, where the NASCAR fan base isn't exactly huge.
The Dugout is all about character growth. From day one we've watched Kyle Farnsworth evolve from a fan-kicking sociopath into the literal onion of psychological human study he has become. We've watched Jim Thome grow from a rosy-cheeked manchild with pee on his hat into a rosy-cheeked manchild with socks on his hat. Dmitri Young has eaten Fruit by the Foot and then forgotten what Fruit by the Foot is. Seasons change, time goes on, and life ebbs and flows.
This year, the Chicago Cubs will be different, at least in the multiverse of The Dugout. Dusty Baker is in Cincinnati. Mark Prior is in San Diego. And unless Kerry Wood walks too close to an unsupervised swimming pool or something the Cubs should be a young, talented, heavy-hitting force to be reckoned with.
After the jump: The Cubbies - positive and ready for action in a world where nothing could possibly go wrong.
Today's revelation that the Cubs' owners are open to selling off their stadium's name isn't unprecedented or terribly surprising, but still pretty sad. People will probably start pointing out that the name "Wrigley Field" is itself a commercial moniker that replaced "Cubs Field" in the 1920s, but...well, a lot of the fans go to Wrigley Field for its purist, traditional nature, and if they're going to start getting rid of that, the Cubs had better find some other reason for them to come. A World Series championship would probably work.
Tonight's Dugout, after the jump, offers some potential new names for the former Weeghman Park.
The Red Sox hit the Trop April 25-27. But every other weekend at home will find the Rays tackling the likes of Kansas City, Florida, Detroit, Baltimore, Toronto, the White Sox and Houston. Notably missing are any weekend series against the Yankees and the Cubs, who'll be bringing along former Rays skipper Lou Piniella.
Rays ownership can thank Major League Baseball for any impact on their finances. But at least they're taking the high road.
"While the timing of particular home series certainly affects attendance, what is of greater importance is the experience we offer at Tropicana Field and the quality of play on the field," team president Matt Silverman said.
Speaking of the Cubs' impending sale, one of the most serious issues any future Cubs owner will have to deal with is the Morass That Is Wrigley Field, one of America's favorite -- and most deteriorated -- ballparks.
Everyone in the Chicago area is weighing in on this topic, and solutions have ranged from moving the Cubs to the suburbs in a new, vintage-style ballpark to keeping things as is and simply budgeting for the likely $100 million needed to fix the current stadium.
Mariotti goes on to say that the grandstand could and should be reconstructed (and I agree), leaving the bleachers, brick walls and ivy, scoreboard, and other things that make Wrigley Field what it is. Elsewhere in the Sun-Times today, writer Neil Hayes says the model for how to do this is what the new Red Sox owners did with Fenway Park.
To be perfectly honest, I agree too. $100 million is too much to pay for simple structural renovations. Much of this will depend on the owner and his willingness to spend -- and maybe this is where Mark Cuban comes in -- but the idea that a new Wrigley could be built in the same spot, and with room for new revenue streams, doesn't seem all that unlikely. Keep the things that make Wrigley great (especially the bleacher fans) and rebuild the rest.
That beats fixing falling concrete forever, or watching games in Schaumburg, Ill.
If you've been following what Bleed Cubbie Blue today calls the "Woodprior monster" for much of spring training, then you're aware Prior and Wood are both having pretty awful preseasons. Prior has been unable to pitch effectively at all, and Wood appears to be injured yet again. Yee-ha.
Into that wake steps Wade Miller, who beat Prior for the Cubs' fifth rotation spot, Lou Piniella confirmed today.
Considering how shaky Prior has been this offseason, this was an obvious move for the Cubs. That said, Miller isn't a huge improvement over the injury-prone Prior; since a 2001-2003 stretch when he averaged around 180 innings a year, Miller pitched a combined 200. He's not exactly a Carlos Zambrano-level workhorse.
On the other hand, the Cubs don't need him to be. If he can keep his ERA under 4, his lifetime average, in that fifth spot ... I think the Cubs will be mighty happy with that.
There are lots of things we count on as baseball fans. Us NL Central fans, we count on Kerry Wood and Mark Prior being hurt. It's not really anything against the Cubs or their fans, it's just kind of like waiting for the sun to come up in the morning. That's why Monday is a very scary day. Cubs.com relays to us the following:
Cubs right-hander Mark Prior will make his first Cactus League start on Monday against the Mariners in Peoria, Ariz., and, in a strange twist, Kerry Wood will pitch in the same game in relief.
Lou Piniella rightly wants to answer the questions about his two righties early in the spring. They've both had encouraging results so far this year, but what else is new? Piniella had this to say:
"Kerry had that spa incident and bruised his rib cage, but neither has missed a scheduled throw day or activity. They've both been nice and healthy. The secret is to keep them nice and healthy all the way through Spring Training and on Opening Day. This is a good start for us."
For about two years now, Mark Cuban has indicated his desire to buy one of two National League Central teams, his hometown Pittsburgh Pirates and the Chicago Cubs. Up until now, it has seemingly been mostly bluster on Cuban's part. It's well known in Pittsburgh that despite the state of baseball operations at PNC Park, the Pirates are actually a rather good business model and the current owners have no intentions of selling whatsoever.
He then moved his focus to the Cubs because, well I don't know. Probably something to do with the semi-creepy John Henry becoming a folk hero in Boston after Sox won the 2004 Series. That all seemed like idle speculation until the Tribune Company began exploring their options in recent months. Now Radar Online brings us this:
Billionaire blogger Mark Cuban is more serious about buying a major league baseball team than he's been letting on. The tech entrepreneur and Dallas Mavericks owner is set to offer $625 million to buy the Chicago Cubs from Tribune Co., according to a source familiar with the matter. "Mark is desperate to buy the Cubs," says the source. "He wants this so bad."
Cuban would be a great baseball owner. He's a good basketball owner not because of his money, but because he thinks differently than most of the other owners in the league. The Cubs spent a ton of money this off-season without much of a plan and still succeeded in making themselves a lot better (if only because they couldn't make themselves worse). Cuban is essentially the perfect "Moneyball" owner, outside the box thinking and lots of money. If this happens, that noise you hear will be the remaining serious Pirate fans jumping off of the Roberto Clemente Bridge like lemmings.
''Don't jump to any conclusions on this,'' manager Lou Piniella said ... ''This is a precaution and nothing more.''
The Cubs said the same thing about Prior last spring, backing him up in increments -- a slow pace designed to avoid the kinds of injury problems he had in the past, they said -- until finally acknowledging more serious problems around mid-March. Then he opened the season on the disabled list with a strained rotator cuff and spent most of the season sidelined.
Right. Why would anyone jump to conclusions when a pitcher who hasn't pitched more than 175 innings since 2003 is being held back in Spring Training? No conclusions to jump too there. Nope, none at all. Then again, if the Cubs were actually counting on any significant contribution from Prior this year, well, Jim Hendry is stupider than we all thought.
Chicago's 
The Dugout is all about character growth. From day one we've watched Kyle Farnsworth evolve from a fan-kicking sociopath into the literal onion of psychological human study he has become. We've watched Jim Thome grow from a rosy-cheeked manchild with pee on his hat into a rosy-cheeked manchild with socks on his hat. Dmitri Young has eaten Fruit by the Foot and then forgotten what Fruit by the Foot is. Seasons change, time goes on, and life ebbs and flows.
At the close of another season in the AL east cellar, the 
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For about two years now, Mark Cuban has indicated his desire to buy one of two National League Central teams, his hometown Pittsburgh Pirates and the Chicago Cubs. Up until now, it has seemingly been mostly bluster on Cuban's part. It's well known in Pittsburgh that despite the state of baseball operations at PNC Park, the Pirates are actually a rather good business model and the current owners have no intentions of selling whatsoever. 
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