It was on this day in 1959 that Cubs right-hander Glen Hobbie, then 23, took a perfect game into the seventh inning against the Cardinals. The great Stan Musial broke up Hobbie's bid for immortality with a two-out double in the seventh — the only hit Hobbie would allow to Chicago's arch-rivals in a complete game gem.
Let's look at some items from both Hobbie's old team and their South Side brethren…
- The Cubs aren't looking to deal Marlon Byrd, reports Bruce Miles of the Daily Herald. Miles also looks at some of the Cubs' top prospects.
- With Sam Fuld off to a hot start in Tampa Bay, some fans are wondering why the Cubbies couldn't have held onto the young outfielder rather than include him in the Matt Garza trade package. As part of a mailbag, MLB.com's Carrie Muskat explains that Fuld was out of options and, had he remained in Chicago, he wouldn't have received much playing time in the crowded Cubs outfield.
- Carlos Zambrano tells CSNChicago.com's David Kaplan that a proposed worldwide amateur draft would favor American-born prospects over Latin American prospects. "I think a worldwide draft would be bad for the kids from the Dominican Republic and Venezuela because we are late developers. We don't have little league or a system of organized baseball to help us learn the game," Zambrano said. "When I was a kid we played maybe once a week, that's it. If kids from my country were drafted and then didn't develop quickly enough they wouldn't be around long."
- Also from Kaplan, up to 65% (roughly $24MM) of Jake Peavy's remaining salary could be covered by an insurance policy. This could give the White Sox some financial room to acquire another pitcher. Barry Axelrod, Peavy's agent, tells Kaplan that it is much more difficult for teams to get insurance on multiyear pitching contracts today than it was for San Diego in 2009. Peavy has yet to pitch in 2011 due to his recovery from offseason shoulder surgery, and is tentatively scheduled to return to the Sox rotation by mid-May.
- Despite his team's seven-game losing streak, White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen isn't worried about being on the hot seat, reports MLB.com's Scott Merkin.