Ted Lilly Fan Club Mailbag: End of Season Edition

Only a few games left before this miserable wretch of a season is over. While we appreciate Ted Lilly purposely throwing yesterday's game to create a sympathy vote for the 2016 bid, it's still been hard to get up every morning and face the prospect of a Cubs-less post-season. It just doesn't seem right that Joe -fing Buck will get to the postseason and we won't. Sigh.

Anyway, to wrap the virtual bow around this blog season, we thought that we'd throw out a final, end-of-season mailbag. Yes--it's the lazy man's way to blog but, right now, we feel like a fat girl stood up on prom night--just want to sit in bed with our pink bunny slippers, eating rocky road ice cream with a big wooden spoon and watch tivo-ed episodes of Ugly Betty. Sigh. Onto the questions...

With 2016 Olympic host city being announced tomorrow, any chance that Ted might be able to fly over to Denmark and help put in a good word with IOC representatives?-P. Ryan, Chicago, IL (via Copenhagen)

Sadly—no. While Ted is BFF with IOC President Jacque Rogge (TL taught his kids how to throw a curve), Chicago wasn’t smart enough to get Ted involved from the word ‘go’ and, thus, will have to deal with secondary spokespeople like Oprah and the Obamas. However, given that the United States and their television contract pretty much bankrolls the Olympics, we feel pretty confident that Chicago will get the nod. Bigger question is whether Ted will receive the deserved honor of lighting the flame at opening ceremonies in 2016? We think yes and that, instead of using the Olympic torch, Ted will simply throw a Lillyhammer into the mix.

Any update on Ted’s nomination for the Roberto Clemente Award? Anything we can do to help him bring home the trophy? -OJ Reebie, Glenview, IL

Great timing! Tomorrow is actually the last day that TedHeads can get out there and vote for Ted. So, please, do yourself and your soul a favor and click on over to http://mlb.mlb.com/sponsors/chevy/clemente/index.jsp to vote for Ted. If it only lets you vote once, clear the cookies on your web browser and vote again. It’s Chicago politics time—vote early, vote often, vote Ted. Ted Lilly. Yes.We.Can.

What does Dr. TLFC proscribe for the Cubs in the off-season? Clearly, only winning 80 or so games will not cut it for a $134 million payroll?-A. Macphail, Baltimore, MD

First thing is we need to shake up the rotation. Clearly, Ted is the rock and the Randy Wells Project has clear promise. After that, it gets a little murky. We should have known better than to pay that sort of coin for a Canuck in Dempster but we're stuck w/ him so there's three. We'll join the masses and agree that Harden needs to go and love the idea of a swap of Not-So-Big Z for Peavy. Second, we need some glue guys so let's overpay for The Rose and give Abreu a two-year deal (which we should have done anyway). Third, we need a closer--do we take a run at Billy Wagner or maybe Soriano? TBD...but this should give Hendry some food for thought.

With the demise of the Saturn brand at General Motors, do you think that Honda Motor Co. needs to be concerned about the potential trademark infringement of their Acura TL with the Ted Lilly "TL" brand?--S. Center, Torrance, CA

Wait....S. Center? Torrance, CA? Is this Steven Center? Is this the same Mr. Steven Center who is Vice President of Advertising and Public Relations for Honda? Tsk tsk tsk, sir. We've tried to play nice with earlier emails asking an official apology from Acura but you continue to virtually thumb your nose at Ted Lilly and his legions of car-owning TedHeads. Mess with the bull, get the horns. Or, in this case, mess with the TL brand, force TedHeads worldwide to buy Toyotas.

Do you hear us, Joe Tetherow, Ming-Jou Chen and Sam Butto (PR contacts for Toyota)? This is PR gold for you...contact us at tedlillyrules@gmail.com. Acura has scorned us--we'd gladly welcome opportunity to test drive any of your new and improved Toyota models and blog about it to Cubs fans and TedHeads alike. Shameless blogging? Absolutely but we are serious and would love to stick it to Acura for using/abusing the TL brand.