"I also find the optimism of children to be completely invalid." - Episode 6.56

Welcome to the 293^rd episode of The Ivy Envy Podcast. Our plan was that this would be an episode with Michael from Galesburg and we were going to talk about baseball cards. Unfortunately, Mother Nature did not work with us and a blizzard shut our plans down. The baseball card episode will be rescheduled, probably later in February.

PECOTA projections are out for the 2015 season. Those projections say the Cubs will end the season with an 82-80 record and miss the playoffs by one game. We talk about those results and the individual player projections to get them to that 82-80 record. Some of the players we discuss are: Jon Lester, Jake Arrieta, Kris Bryant, Javier Baez, Anthony Rizzo, Starlin Castro, Edwin Jackson and more.

In case you didn't know, the Cubs have a highly-touted farm system. I think you've probably heard about this. MLB.com released their Top 100 Prospects list and the Cubs have six players in the top 57. Keith Law also identified the Cubs as the top farm system in baseball. We talk a little about the players on the list and the timing of their impact on the major league team.

Major League Baseball has a new Commissioner and we talk about some of his comments since taking over. This opens up a discussion on the state of the sport of baseball and the issues impacting it's popularity with the youth of today. Do you think the pace and length of games is an issue?

We answer a handful of listener questions and read some Internet Muscle Flexes.

Congrats to Patreon Associate Producer, Matthew Maser for winning the Iowa Cubs Javier Baez t-shirt jersey.
If you'd like to support The Ivy Envy Podcast, check out our Patreon campaign.

General tickets for our 2015 Ivy Envy Cubs Bus Trip go on sale this Friday, February 6th. You can buy tickets here: Ivy Envy Cubs Bus Trip.