Cubs Take Division Lead

With today's exciting win, the Cubs have finally taken the NL Central Division lead for what I believe is the first time all season. So I might have been off with my prediction by 3 days, but I say that's close enough to be right. And I'm sure many of you out there are looking at the standings and thinking hold the phone, we're still tied with Milwaukee. NOT.

Yes, technically the Cubs and Brewers are both 8 games over .500 at this point, but we've played two less games. This gives us an all important .001 lead in winning percentage, which places us squarely at the top of the standings.

The team had a lot of help getting there tonight, with Thunder Matt's heads-up baserunning and Brett Myers control problems at the end helping secure the W and the Mets taking care of the Brewers for us. I don't need to spell it out for you though: this team is hot. I think I'm perfectly justified in getting overly excited about today considering this is the best position we've been in since 2004.



And in case you were wondering, Minnesota was hot and dry this past week, contrary to popular belief that there is always snow on the ground. It's nice to be back to a place where I can watch the Cubbies every day. Here's hoping Marshall can lock it up for tomorrow and we can start to increase this lead.

Awesomest. Game. Ever.

Wow. Just wow. This was probably the greatest game of the season so far. The offense held their own, with Soriano hitting his third solo home run in this three-game series. The defense was stellar, with Izturis and Fontenot both making diving catches, Derrek Lee pulling off a ridiculous play at first, Pagan diving on the warning track to make a catch, and Soriano nailing the runner at home. The pitching was equally phenomenal, as Sean Marshall, Carlos Marmol, Will Ohman, and Bob Howry combined to shut out the White Sox. Combine that with the confusion surrounding the interference play and Ozzie getting tossed, and this game cannot be matched for fun and excitement. Unless you're my White Sox fan brother, that is. He likes to yell angry words when things don't go his way. My house hasn't been very quiet for the past month.

Oh yeah, and we SWEPT the White Sox. At the Cell. Booyah.

We've got Jason Marquis up against the Rockies tomorrow. Let's see if we can keep some momentum going for once.

Cubs Take the Season Series

Today's close game clinched this series for the Cubs, along with the season series. Once again both starters performed very well, and once again all it took was two runs to beat the White Sox. I almost felt bad while listening to their announcers on WGN today, as they spent most of the time discussing how bad the Sox are and why they are having the worst month or two in baseball. They've now lost 21 of their last 26 I believe. They even went so far as to try and find a statistic that the team is doing well in, to try and look on the bright side of things. Sadly, no such statistic exists.

The dominance that is Sean Marshall takes the mound tomorrow against Jose Contreras. Given the White Sox's dismal record against lefties this should get interesting. I'm refusing to say the 'S' word though, because a jinx is the last thing this team needs.

Today Was a Good Day

Tonight the Cubs won a one-run game, Sean Marshall pitched extremely well, Ryan Dempster didn't blow a save, and Michael Barrett didn't get into a fight with a pitcher. I am pleasantly surprised. Keep it up boys.

Koyie Hill? Really?

The Cubs just lost in the 13th inning. This doesn't surprise me. What surprises me is that Lou used Koyie Hill as a pinch hitter with the bases loaded and the game on the line. I understand that it was a long game and we had already gone through 19 players, but this was a poor decision. We still had Sean Marshall, Ted Lilly, Scott Eyre, Michael Wuertz, and Jason Marquis available to hit. Of those 5, Lilly is batting .115 and Marquis is hitting an impressive .188. You may not think that is impressive, but you will once you consider that Koyie Hill was batting .067 before today. Now it's down to .063. Lou, come on, using your grandma would be a better choice than using Koyie. Marquis would have gotten the job done.

You Stay Classy, San Diego

San Diego is a pretty good team. Much better than we are at this point. This is why we dropped two out of three against them, which wasn't much of a surprise. On Wednesday night, Sean Marshall was absolutely stellar. Pitched 6 scoreless innings, and had one bad pitch in the 7th for a two run homer. Sadly, that was all the Padres needed as the Cubs decided that Marshall apparently doesn't deserve any run support. After all, that's the way it has always been, right? Len mentioned a statistic late in the game that I can't remember exactly, but I think it was that in Marshall's 10 major league losses, he has only received 10 runs of support from the offense. If he can hold the Padres to only two runs, we should win this game. No question.

Jason Marquis on Thursday gave up one run over 7 innings and still didn't get a win, though at least the Cubs did. This was due to a 9th inning rally that was started by DLee, and ended with the Cubs scoring 2 runs. Which is more than they scored all of the previous game. Sad. Howry was credited with the win in that one and Dempster received his 10th save of the season.

Tonight is a late late game, starting at 9:40 PM Central Time against the Dodgers. Ted Lilly is taking the mound for the Cubs, so we should have a decent shot at this. Just one question for everyone on the West Coast. Is it this bad for you when we have a 12:20 PM day game against a team like the Dodgers? Do you realize how hard it is to stay up until almost 1 in the AM to watch a baseball game. This one had better be exciting.

Rich Hill is Starting to Look Like, Well, Rich Hill

The Cubs are playing on the West Coast this week, meaning that their games will be ending somewhere in the vicinity of midnight, and I can do a write-up when I'm normally sitting at the computer anyways. Joy. Speaking of write-ups, there will be no more official Game Summary outline as their has been in the past. It was nice at first, but I got bored with it quickly and coming up with some of the items were a stretch. So I'm making an executive decision, the after game posts shall have no order at all. And I might even miss a few of them. Awesome.

So anyways, about the game. Rich Hill in May has posted a 5.87 ERA with a 1-3 record. In May of last year he had a 9.31 ERA with a 0-4 record. At least he's improving. As for tonight, he gave up 5 earned runs in 6 innings, including 4 homers. Not a pretty game. The Cubs played ugly baseball on the offensive side as well, as a Cliff Floyd RBI in the first was all they had in them.

On the upside though, Angel Guzman and Ryan Dempster both pitched, and neither gave up a run! Exciting! Even more so when you realize that Dempster is grooming Guzman to be his replacement. Dempster seems to think this will happen when he is moved to the rotation. I'm thinking it will be when Lou throws him out the door. We'll see who's right fairly soon I imagine.

Tomorrow is another late one at 9:05 PM, when Sean Marshall will make his 2007 debut. He shouldn't have too rough of a time, as the opposing pitcher is David Wells, who is but a shell of his former self. Marshall is the 7th starting pitcher the Cubs have used this year, compared to 8 they had used last year at this point. These uncanny similarities are not a good thing. Do us all a favor Sean, and keep the starting job this time around. And whatever you do, just keep Wade Miller away. Please.

Marshall Law

Yahoo Sports is reporting that the Cubs have brought up Marshall to pitch tomorrow, moving Guzman to the pen.

Neal Cotts...SEE YA. Go down to Iowa and un-break yourself.

And Go Cubs.