Bruiser Chong

Facing Barry Zito and the A's pen doesn't hurt things, either. Anyway, Prior came out and looked great in the second and the Cubs scored twice, cutting the lead in have. Though they did leave two on.

Mark Prior isn't gonna make it out of the first at this rate. Almost 30 pitches, four runs; he's looked awful. This rookie's not helping matters, by committing an error on the second play of the game. Still eight innings to go, but the Cubs have looked just horrible so far. These Brewers announcers aren't helping things, either. I'm looking for a rake to shove through my head right now.

Jack made most of the points I was going to make in my last post. As great as Rusch has been, there is a reason why he's been around for a long time and yet, was in the Cubs' minor league system earlier this year. I'm hoping that once Wood comes back, he'll be effective like this out of the pen. SS is a fairly weak spot for most teams, so it's not the end of the world that we've got Gonzalez, who's fairly reliable with the glove, aside from the one play that most will remember him for.

That's no reason to deal him away because of that. You can't blame him and to an extent, you can't blame the Cubs' offense. Look at this situation more closely. Because of the injuries that've plagued the Cubs' pitching this season, Clement, who's supposed to be their 4 or 5 starter, has had to go up against the opposition's number one starter. In his last few starts, check out some of the names Clement's been up against: Ben Sheets, Roger Clemens, Chris Carpenter, Mark Redman, and Kelvim Escobar. So it's not like they're not trying to score for the guy. It's just that Clement's had the bad luck of going up against these guys in his last several starts. Even at their worst, it's tough to get more than a couple of runs off of them.

Penny has really been struggling as of late and Alex Gonzalez in your lineup is death because of his offensive offense. I don't care how good his glove is, he's nothing short of an automatic out most of the time. As for the Astros, I doubt they'll trade off Beltran, even if they continue to fall back. They've still got a few series with the Cards, so if they win the majority of those games, they'll be back in the thick of things.

Rob, if it makes you feel any better, the Astros haven't gained any ground in the NL Central since the Beltran trade. In fact, they've lost ground and are now eight games behind the Cards. I gotta believe that if it gets much more spread out, it's going to take a major collapse of the Cards and a true surge from the Stros to put them back into the race. And how bout them Pirates? Winners of 10 straight and they're still comfortably in last place. Were it not for that streak where they were losing almost everyday, they'd be in the thick of the race right now.

Clement comes out on the short end of a true pitching dual in Milwaukee today, as Craig Counsell's second homer of the year in the first inning was the only offense of note in the game. Sheets struck out 11, as Clement struck out 10. The Cubs had a couple of minor chances to tie things up, but couldn't cash either in. With Ramirez already out of the lineup, I don't think you can possibly give Alou a day off, short turnaround or not. His presence was sorely missed today and while it may have not made a difference in the end, he needed to be in there with Sheets on the mound and the Cubs' biggest RBI guy on the bench. I never thought I'd gleefully await the return of Alex Gonzalez, but Rey Ordonez in there is just death.

But never mind that they got the sweep in the end, I guess.

Blow me. This is a baseball discussion thread, so you may wanna take your closet homosexual advances elsewhere. That's all well and fine, but there were over two pages of discussion on the damn call, so go find that thread if you wanna talk about it. And you registered here on the 20th of June. Most of the talk went down that night and the next day, so yeah, you were posting here at the time. Oooo *does wavy scared Scott Hall fingers gesture* Color me scared. I like how you can respond without breaking out the childish name-calling garbage.

And a guy who pees on his hands does? Well, Alou has gained a huge cult following over the last year in Chicago. Not to mention that he was a huge player in keeping the Cubs afloat while Sammy was on the DL. I'm not surprised to see him there with the sort of season he's having.

Good god. Rangers with ANOTHER grand slam, to make it 18-3 against the Astros. Who would've thought we'd see that score with Pettitte on the mound?

Basically Posada just made a bad base-running move and ended up getting hit by a ball on his way to second, which obviously meant he was out. Had he avoided it, the Yanks would've had two runners on because the ball hit was a base hit. Torre argued something along the lines that Piazza got a glove on it before it hit Posada and played the game under protest. The Mets have since gone on to take another lead on another Ty Wiggenton homer (second of the game) and they're two outs from sweeping the Yanks. EDIT: And A-Rod grounds out to end the game and leave the tying run on. Great game and what a difference a week makes. This Hidalgo trade is looking like a huge steal for the Mets, as he's hit seven homers with the team in two weeks with them, after hitting only four with the Astros all season. Speaking of homers, Morgan Ensberg hit another one today, making that three on the season and his third in as many days. The big goose egg in the homer column for him has been big talk all season, so I'm sure Stros fans are happy to see him coming alive like this.

Manny got a break on what should have been called strike three and was called a ball instead, so I think the actual strike three call was to make up for it. The Reds turned it into a game, scoring three in the 8th to tie things up. They get a leadoff double in the 9th, followed by a walk with Griffey, Dunn and Larkin due up. And they don't score. Awesome. This Yanks and Mets game is pretty good, too. Looked like the Mets wouldn't have much trouble sweeping the Yanks, but now we're in a see-saw game with some 8th inning controversy going down at the moment.

And the wheels have completely fallen off for the Red Sox, as the Braves put nine across, breaking the game open. I've never been a huge Braves fan, but seeing this is fun for some reason. Maybe it's because they're no longer the dominant team they once were and Sox fans have been more annoying than Yanks fans lately.

Roy, please shut the hell up. You're about two weeks late with all the bitching about that strike. Your boy Anglesault already drove the call into the ground enough.

In a situation like that, you use your best reliever. Period. But no, because of the save stat, most managers are convinced you wait to use your closer for the very end. I can see why most feel that way, but why not put out your best pitcher while the game's still happening instead of waiting for a situation that may not even come?

I'm not a huge fan of Farns or Patterson, but you drop them for Nomar and then you've got a big gap in center and the end of the pen. Patterson's been better as of late and unless they're going to go out and grab a centerfielder, trading away Corey would be senseless. Same goes for Farns, who believe it or not, has been one of the more reliable guys in there at times, scary as that may be.

Figures the day after I drop Kaz, he hits two homers and drives in five. Oh well, Jack Wilson is definitely an upgrade.

Well dynamite. Zambrano had 115 pitches going into the 7th, not to mention signs of cramps in the arm / hand the previous inning. So of course, he's still out there to start the inning and can only make it one batter into it before leaving with the cramps. That and Ramirez also left the game after he seemed to hurt himself at third. Hopefully both are okay, but it seems like the injury bug is making a permanent residence in Chicago.

Glad to see that the longball bailed the Cubs out again. I thought their pen did an all right job after Merker's one pitch. The Stros' pen looks pretty banged up too, and I thought it was odd to put Lidge out their in a game that could go on for a while after he had thrown two long innings the day before. Granted, you go with your hot hand against the heart of the opposing lineup when the game's on the line, but considering how much he threw yesterday, I don't think it was a smart move.

I know Beltran's an amazing player, but I can't help but be depressed as hell that with ONE pitch, the Cubs' pen pissed away a gem for Mark Prior. Different faces down there this season, but it looks like it's still the same results. Cubs looked to be on their way to winning two of three from Houston, but Beltran has single-handidly ensured that that's going to be incredibly tough. Cubs better start playing the swaping game soon; a couple things just aren't right.

Didn't see all of the game, but I'll agree that the homeplate ump was crap. He had a very leniant strike zone for both teams, which is fine, I suppose, since he did it for both of them. Still, he came off as an idiot on several occassions throughout the game. While I'm here, how about Hawkins? It's clear he's not closer material, which is okay, since he's a great set-up man. But since Borowski's going to be out for a while, he's the man in line for the job. I still think the Cubs need to go out and make one or two fairly significant trades like they did mid-season last year. Someone in the bullpen, preferably a real closer, and someone offensively. The Nomar for Clement deal is an attractive one, but I'm not sure how quick I'd be to give up Clement at this point since he's pitched so well most of the season. Then still, he's in his walking year and from the sounds of it, it's a crapshoot as to whether they plan on bringing him back next season. And what happened to the Cubs' defense? Perhaps this is the real Cubs' defense, since everyone was so surprised that they were the best defensive team in the NL as recently as a week and a half ago. It's been six or seven games since they didn't make at least one error; an unsettling stat for a team that hopes to not only make it to postseason, but deep into it.

Call me cynical, but the moment Ramon Martinez struck out in the 8th with the bases loaded, I knew the Astros had won this game. With Clemens on the mound, I wasn't expecting a Cubs win, but considering that they had the go-ahead run on second in the 8th with no outs and the heart of their lineup due, they should've scored. But Ramirez failed and Lee got a bad break on a hard-hit ball. Patterson's AB impressed me, as did Martinez', but it doesn't make up for the fact that the Cubs could've gained a game in the Central today, not to mention, hand the Stros another loss, but that's not how it went. Hopefully this won't be the turning point for the Astros; I guess this game makes up for last night's.

I'd like to add that from the small portion of today's Cubs game I've seen, the homeplate ump's strikezone is crazy. Derrek Lee just got called out on a ball that wasn't even up to his knees.

I haven't been able to watch much baseball lately, but from the look of the score sheets, the Cubs' defense over the past few games has been awful, making it no surprise they're on the verge of losing their fourth out of their last five. The Sox are already a great-hitting team; giving them extra outs to work with just fucks you over even worse. Meanwhile, the Cards are starting to pull away from the division, as the Cubs will probably be five out after today, as will the Reds, while the Stros will still be seven out.