Quade Announces Cubs 2011 Opening Day Lineup

March 31, 2011 By 31 Comments

Mike Quade announced the Cubs Opening Day lineup for Friday against the Pittsburgh Pirates. Kosuke Fukudome will hit in the top spot and Darwin Barney will get the nod at second base. Cubs Opening Day lineup

  • Kosuke Fukudome – RF
  • Starlin Castro – SS
  • Marlon Byrd – CF
  • Aramis Ramirez – 3B
  • Carlos Pena – 1B
  • Geovany Soto – C
  • Alfonso Soriano – LF
  • Darwin Barney – 2B
  • Ryan Dempster – P

Darwin Barney is the first rookie to start on Opening Day for the Cubs since Kosuke Fukudome and Geovany Soto in 2008.

First pitch of the Cubs Two Thousand Eleven season is less than 24 hours away …


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  • ripken boy

    Ok, now it’s time to bat Barney lead-off and play Colvin over Fuks.

    • cubtex

      Not a fan of Fuko hitting leadoff either!

      • Ripsnorter1

        We, at least, agree on something.

  • cc002600

    Totally agree, RB and Cubtex

  • http://theboardridersuite.wordpress.com/ Theboardrider

    Agreed I wish Colvin was instead of Fuks, but so glad to see Barney starting! I’m so happy that Soriano and Pena aren’t back to back. Bases loaded strikeouts would haunt my dreams! Now if I could just be off work and watch the game…

    • Dorasaga

      I believe Quade is doing something right. He has Baker and Dewitt on his 25-man, but he went to Barney.

  • JedMosley

    Didn’t some people on here say Barney had no chance to make the roster with Ojeda in camp? Hmm….

    • Tony_Hall

      He had a good spring, stats, that is. If Ojeda wouldn’t have been hurt and Barney has nothing special for his spring stats, he wouldn’t have made the team. These young guys keep making it hard to send them down.

      • JedMosley

        Yes, I’m aware he had good stats for spring. What I’m saying is some people said that he wouldn’t have made it regardless of his spring, whether it was this good or whether it was bad. I realize Ojeda got hurt, but Barney still would have made it.

    • Tom U

      I’ll just add that before Ojeda was hurt, Bruce Levine reported that Ojeda was a “lock” to make the team.

      (new season – new avitar)

  • http://twitter.com/JMattWeaver Matt Weaver

    Hmm. I’d prefer Colvin over Byrd actually, placing Fukudome in center.

    I like Kusuke in April and how can Q not play Colvin after the great strides he made in 2010 and in Spring Training?

    I’m excited to have baseball back, everyone. Good to see everyone again.

  • cubs1967

    just can’t explain the logic of this team…….

    fukunuts is attempted to be traded all winter; hits below .200 in ST; yet colvin hits 20 dingers in 350 at-bats last year, is the future RF (or at least we hope-but he needs to play to know), hit .260s compared to below .200 for fukunuts in ST; BUT NOOOOOOOOOOO,

    we start fukunuts all becuz we don’t have a leadoff hitter; all becuz most likely ONCE in the whole FUC******* game he’ll bat leadoff; SO let’s dictate the starting RF becuz of it………………are U FUK*********** kidding me.

    get colvin’s ass in RF now ………………..

    act like a damn MLB club and not some glorified joliet slammers (formely the jackhammers) wannbe………

    any more questions why this team has ZERO championships since the mail was delivered by pony express!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    • SuzyS

      Oh Boy!!!!, A Slammers Fan !!!! ….Mr. Shultz”s successor will be thrilled they have one.

  • Kojak Osborne Jr.

    I don’t understand why Colvin is not playing I believe he deserved to play every day

    • GaryLeeT

      Maybe to build up Fukudome’s stats so he can be traded in May before his annual swoon.

      • Kojak Osborne Jr.

        No one want Fukodome just like no one wanted Silva.

  • http://twitter.com/JasonPenrod Jason Penrod

    Just give it a chance, I’ve liked all the moves so far this offseason, give Q a chance on his lineup…maybe he likes Colvin’s bat off the bench or to spell Soriano in late game situations.

  • Cheryl

    Colvin will get in there. Like what I see so far, especially with Barney. Like Jason says, give Q a chance.

  • GaryLeeT

    By all forecasts, the weather does not look very promising for tomorrow’s game. I bet if you asked the players, they would rather open on the road where it’s warm, rather than freeze at home. It’s seems like there are enough domes and teams south of the Mason-Dixon, to create a more comfortable start to the season.

  • Demitri

    I like it. Put in Colvin darn it

  • Tony_Hall

    Congratulations to Castro and Barney on their first Opening Day start. Too bad Colvin couldn’t be in there with him.

  • Craig Y

    The forecast for game time is saying light rain changing over to showers. A couple hours before the game is suppose to be the heavier precipitation of rain/snow. I think the game will still be played tomorrow. Well atleast I really hope they play tomorrow.

  • cc002600

    Not sure if any if you noticed this or not, but our ole buddy the Riot made a crucial error in 11th to pave the way for a opening redbird loss.

    Mark my words, the Cardinals won’t win more than 80 games, and that’s being generous. Their pitching is not good, and their defense will be BRUTAL (look at that OF defense + The Riot at SS – REAL BAD !!)….

    their lineup is centered around 2 guys, and the rest is VERY medicore.

    book it.

    • GaryLeeT

      I mean, Franklin as your closer? Kiss at least 12 wins (including today’s blown save) goodbye right there.

    • RickinMSP

      I agree with you completely. The Cardinals’ defense is even worse than the Cubs, probably the worst in the league.

    • cubtex

      Theriot is a brutal shortstop and what is almost as bad….he is hittling leadoff for them! As bad as Fuko is at leadoff, I would take him over Theriot. Cardinals will finish behind Cubs this year.

  • Aaron

    curious move by the Cubs today….They released Aaron Shafer, a 2008 2nd round pick, who actually has fared pretty well in the system. He’s 6’5″, and was tried as a starter his first 2 seasons before finding a home in the pen, and had some success:
    2008: 2-2, 3.00 ERA, 9 games, 7 starts
    2009: 11-8, 4.49 ERA, 25 games, 24 starts
    2010: 4-3, 2.68 ERA, 49 games

    Sometimes attitude, injuries play into moves like this, but I just thought it was curious.

    Also of note, Chris Huseby, who was trying to reinvent himself as an OF, was also released.

    ……

    Back to the big league team…The lineup that was posted is actually fine with me given the cards they’re dealt with in the first place.

    I would obviously have Colvin in the lineup, but the fact that Fukudome has started the season hot in early months. His best month by far is April, followed by May, then August:
    April: .335/.446/.558, 78 hits, 18 doubles, 2 triples, 10 hr, 41 RBI and 48 walks vs 44 K’s
    May: .276/.383/.395, 67 hits, 13 doubles, 2 triples, 4 hr, 23 RBI, and 43 walks vs 45 K’s
    August: .275/.379/.455, 64 hits, 15 doubles, 0 triples, 9 hr, 38 RBI, and 41 walks vs 46 K’s

    So….while I’m certainly not pro-Fukudome by any means, I do think Quade needs to ride him as much as possible (that’s what she said….sorry, I had to do it), at least in April. However, given his awful showing in Spring Training, I’m not too sure that Fukudome will be able to replicate his career numbers. Yeah, I know it’s just Spring Training, but it was his worst Spring Training yet, so….hopefully Quade recognizes when he starts declining, and replaces him immediately with Colvin.

    Once Fukudome tanks, as he usually does after May, I would expect Quade to replace him with Barney….though, as was discussed on here during the offseason, the best move might be to put Byrd there, where he hit .500/.522/.727 in 5 games and 22 ABs in the lead-off spot

    But overall, the lineup is good. He finally figured out something I thought he’d never be smart enough to do (as I don’t believe he did it all spring), and that was to split up Pena and Soriano in the lineup. He hit them back-to-back very often in Spring Training, and I thought for sure he never learned his lesson, but having 2 guys that strike out that often was never a good move. At least Soto can take pitches in between them and work a count. I’d rather have him in the 3 hole in place of Byrd, as I think Soto is the superior run producer, but I guess you can’t have it all.

  • Jonas

    In all seriousness guys… are the Cubs gonna play tomorrow or get delayed???? I will freak out if theyre delayed ha i have been waiting for too long to just sit at work and watch the gameday on MLB.com for them not to play

    • Aaron

      80% chance of rain during game time. It goes down to 30% chance thereafter…but they might just decide to cancel altogether. Problem is, there’s rain in the forecast for Sunday and Monday as well…40% and 60% chance respectively. But, the main problem is NOT the rain, but the fact usually off-days are built in right away to start the season in the event something like this happens. The Cubs have the next 3 Thursdays off. They don’t play the Pirates at home again til the 27th-29th of May. But they game might not be made up until the 1st of September, when they play the Pirates at home, and there’s an off-day on that date, when both teams happen to share that off-day.

  • Scapogro

    I too, would like to see Colvin in the line up, but we have limited power off the bench, early in the year games tend to be low scoring as pitchers have a slight advantage, because of the cooler temps. But if Colvin isn’t a regular by May then there is a strategic plan that we as fans are not privy too. At least not me.

  • jmwcubfan

    Fukodome starting over Colvin???