Another entry into the idiot columnist sweepstakes is Jay Mariotti’s facile piece on how the Cubs’ not blowing wads of money on a slugger on the down side of his career when they’ve got a great young slugger at that same position and plenty of other holes to fill indicates their supposed unwillingness to win.

Yes, Jim Thome would be a great addition to the Cubs. It would be wonderful to have him back up Sammy in the clean-up spot. But even at the discounted rate he supposedly offered the Cubs (somewhere between $11 and $15 million annually for four years), the Cubs could get a good third baseman and two solid relievers. People seem to forget that the name of the game in baseball is the best team.

For all the money, Thome would still only bat four times a game. And he’s already 32. Certainly, such a deal would make a lot more sense if the jewel of the organization, Hee Sop Choi, didn’t already play that position. It is not a cheap-out to stick with the talent your organization has scouted and developed over an extremely costly free agent.

Phil Rogers offers up a bevy of options for signing Thome and trading Choi. At least he’s thinking, something Mariotti seems allergic to. And if the Cubs could pull off one of these deals, it might be worth it.

But I don’t blame the Cubs or general manager Jim Hendry for not rushing out there to take a chance on another organization’s hot prospect. It doesn’t matter how many home runs your first baseman hits if your bullpen blows the game in relief anyway. And good relievers come at a premium these days. Period.

Think Troy Percival. Think Robb Nen. Think Mariano Rivera. And, finally, think Byung-Hyun Kim, the only reason the D-Backs had to go seven games in 2001.

I guess this means they’re not going after I-Rod.

In Berwyn, before the Buddy & Julie Miller show at Fitzgerald’s: Don’s Old Time DVD Videos and Gift Baskets.

It was shut down. I wonder why.

Such is the consensus opinion about P.T. Anderson’s “Punch-Drunk Love,” according to this Tribune story by Barbara Brotman, citing as her source postings to the Yahoo! movies message board.

Yet it merits an 8.1 out of 10 rating from users of the Internet Movie Database, which is about as precise an instrument. Over at Epinions.com, “PDL” has received an average of four out of five stars from 21 reviewers. That said, Brotman’s explanation of why critical and popular opinion often diverge is on the money:

Critics tend to be deeply appreciative of movies that are unusual, said Lester Friedman, a film professor at Northwestern University.

“Reviewers see an awful lot of bad films,” he said. “I think something which shows a spark of creativity or a willingness to invest genres with new insights and twists will certainly get their attention.”

Columbia film & video professor Reid Schultz also makes a good point in the story:

“The reviews were awful,” he said. “Basically, what they talked about was that this is a different Adam Sandler movie. ‘Look, Adam Sandler can act.’ But they don’t talk about what all those abstract colors are doing in this movie. … The analysis hasn’t been there.

“Of course people are walking out, because there’s nobody to help them understand it.”

But part of why the reviews did such a poor job of capturing the spirit of the movie and conveying it to their readers is because it does such an excellent job of defying genre conventions. My impressionistic reaction would probably have done most readers as well as most reviews from the nation’s best critics.

For a good example of a columnist who just doesn’t get it, read this entry by the Tribune’s Rick Morrissey. He writes:

“The problem wasn’t Sammy,” Baker said of the Cubs’ 67-95 record last season. “The problem was losing.”

Yes but, fair or not to Sammy, the two are entwined. When the Cubs are winning, Sosa’s loud clubhouse music doesn’t matter. When they’re losing, as they were last season, the music grates on teammates.

Aaargh! Morrissey also complains about Sosa’s defense, his running game, his strikeouts, and his failure to advance runners. Which is all very interesting, but totally off the mark. Sosa, while not the perfect player, is not a liability on this team. He is their best position player by far and one of the best in Cubs’ history. Sammy Sosa, as Baker so rightly put it, is not the problem. The roblems are too many to list here, but they have nothing to do with the guy who feel one home run short of hitting 50 or more five seasons in a row.

Moises Alou didn’t hit a lick for the first two and a half months of the season, Corey Patterson struck out 142 times, the bullpen blew so many saves I lost count. But who does Morrissey choose to write about? Sosa. Why? Because people love to bitch about Sosa. I’m not crazy about the guy, but he’s the best we got and the best we’re going to have for a long, long time to come.

It’s not like basketball where a player’s selfishness can cost the team points. Sosa’s job is to do well for himself by hitting the ball hard. That just oh so happens to help out the team too. When you can slug the ball like Sosa, there is no conflict between selfishness and “team play.” I just think these sportswriters hate salsa music. If he started blasting the Rolling Stones I bet they’d love the guy.

The good news is that Baker knows how to handle a self-involved superstar like Sosa. He did it for years with Barry Bonds in San Francisco. As I understand it, Baker’s atittude basically was, “Hey, this guy’s the best player the rest of you will probably ever play with it. So deal with it.” Sounds about right to me.

Not. Please, I hope not. I hope the Cubs are just being nice to meet with first baseman free-agent Jim Thome and his agent for lunch.

Aside from Mark Prior, first baseman Hee Sop Choi is about as sure a thing as the Cubs have had come out of their farm system in a long time. He hit great in triple-A last season and is tearing it up in the fall league right now. And it would be ashame to throw that away on a guy who, no matter what, will be much more expensive and one way or the other be gone much sooner.

Yes, Thome is probably the second best first baseman in baseball right now (after Jason Giambi), but the Cubs need to resist their temptation to go after the quick, big score. Wood, Prior, Clement; Hill, Patterson, Choi. Those are the guys the Cubs should be building around. This is the only time you’ll hear me say I wish there was a DH in the National League. Then you could have both Choi’s and Thome’s left-handed bats in the lineup. Ah, well.

Update: Hendry is really downplaying his meeting with Thome, which means that he probably told him in no uncertain terms that they weren’t going to budge Choi. So either Thome learns to play third base or it’s a no-go.

I’m not sure, but whatever it is, it inspired three Bartlett, Ill., teen-agers to steal 57 of them over the last six months and stashed them in a garage. It’s possibly the most bizarre prank I’ve heard of.

“We were just flabbergasted that anyone would take them,” said one victim of the teen gnome-goodniks. Which is why it’s the perfect crime, except that you have to put the damn things someplace. My question is whose garage it was and how did the owner overlook 57 gnomes? Did the parents just think, “Aw, Bobby’s collecting gnomes. That’s nice,” and not give it a second thought?

Those words, or something close to it, are uttered in every episode of the great little A&E show, “City Confidential.”

This show’s spin on the murder-in-an-hour format is to focus on the communities in which a well-known murder took place, showing how the deed and its aftermath affected the life of the place. The show is filled with wonderful little narrative touches. In describing the heat of a particular summer day in Chatanooga, Tenn., home of the MoonPie, the narrator says, “It was hotter than a melted MoonPie on a car’s dashboard.”

And the narrator! Black actor Paul Winfield, most well known for his role in the miniseries, “King,” has the most soothing, soporific voice. The corny cliches just roll right off his mellifluous tongue. Judging by the running times, this show was made to put people to sleep.

It’s definitely a lot more soothing than some noisy, annoying talk show. Murder as a lullaby. What an age we live in!