It was a good night at Wrigley Field on Tuesday night for the Cubs and starting pitcher Randy Wells. Wells pitched 6 2/3 innings and allowed just one run on seven hits while striking out four and walking two. The tenth victory for Wells puts him a little bit of unique territory as he is the first Cubs rookie pitcher to have double digit wins since Kerry Wood did it eleven years ago.

“He’s had a really nice first year,” Piniella said of Wells, a converted catcher. “He needs to finish up strong. We’ve been impressed with him. He’s a serious-minded kid, who goes about his business and competes really well.”

Wells will need to have another quality start in five days as he is the best option they have to take the mound every 5th day. Yes, better than Ryan Dempster, Ted Lilly and Carlos Zambrano at this point in the season.

The Cubs offense took advantage of two Astros errors or ths game would have been a lot closer than the 4-1 final score. In the fifth inning, Koyie Hill knocked in Alfonso Soriano as the inning was extended on a Miguel Tejada error when he attempted to turn two on a Jeff Baker hit up the middle. In the sixth inning it was Hunter Pence dropping a fly ball out in right field that allowed Milton Bradley to score one batter later when Aramis Ramirez singled to center.

Bradley got the Cubs scoring started in the fourth inning when the turned on a inside fastball and hammered it over the fence in right field. Finally Milton seen a ball early enough to put good wood on it and be able to turn through and pull the ball with authority. I really like how Bradley has been hitting the ball.

Kosuke Fukudome added an insurance run in the eighth inning when he doubled and Derrek Lee scored.

The bullpen once again had a nice outing as John Grabow and Kevin Gregg both recorded two outs before Carlos Marmol pitched a scoreless ninth inning to pick up his seventh save of the year. Marmol struckout  three batters and gave up one hit in the final frame.

It will be an afternoon game on Wednesday so hopefully the Cubs can keep on winning and picking up ground in the wildcard!

- Cliff

Rich Harden took the mound on Monday night hoping to help out the club pick up some ground in the wild card as the Rockies and Giants were both off while the Marlins and Braves were playing each other. Things didn’t turn out the way he had hoped however as control issues and the Astros bats knocked him out of the game after just five innings.

All five of the Astros runs were charged to Harden and six walks that he gave up sure didn’t help out his cause. Earlier in the day, Harden was told that he would be staying with the club and not be traded to the Minnesota Twins who had claimed him off waivers late last week. I wonder if that had any affect on his performance Monday night? Harden says no:

“You can’t just ignore [the rumors],” Harden said, “but the whole thing was ridiculous and had nothing to do with my performance today. I won’t make excuses. I still knew I was starting on Monday and I had to prepare myself, and I got prepared and I just didn’t get it done.”

The Cubs bats had their own problem as they couldn’t seem to figure out Roy Oswalt this time around. Oswalt threw seven innings and allowed just six hits and two runs on Monday night. Both of the runs given up by Oswalt came in the fifth inning when Koyie HIll and Ryan Theriot knocked in runs.

Derrek Lee would take LaTroy Hawkins deep in the eighth inning as he smashed a 398 foot home run to center field to draw the Cubs within two runs. That would be as close as they got however as Jose Valverde shut the Cubs down in the ninth inning with a 1-2-3 inning.

The Cubs will now look to Randy Wells to get them back on track against the Astros Tuesday night. Wells did not have a good start his last time out and hopefully he has figured out his mechanical issues and can throw a good game and the team in the win column tonight. Every game is a huge one and the Cubs need as many wins as they can get.

- Cliff

Hope everyone had a good weekend and was able to watch some Cubs baseball as I was unable to. I’m finally done with our water problem in the basement and pouring new cement so hopefully my weekends will be opened back up. It was a decent weekend for the Cubs as they took two out of three games against the Mets.

Despite winnings two out of three games, the Cubs find themselves ten games out in the division as the Cardinals just continue to pile up the wins. In the wild card, the Cubs are 5.5 games back with four teams ahead of them in the standings.

I would not expect to see Alfonso Soriano play a whole lot the remainder of the season. Soriano received a cortisone shot to help out with some inflamation around his knee and has not played the past couple of days. I would rather just see Soriano take it easy and get Jake Fox some more playing time in left field.

Win will Carlos Zambrano have another dominating performance? He has stunk it up since coming back from the disabled list. Eleven hits in 3 1/3 innings simply is not earning your pay check Carlos!

Milton Bradley had a great weekend and has been swinging the bat like Cubs fans had hoped for when he signed a three year free agent contract in the off season. I’ll give Milton some good press even though the media is all over him for what he says in his interview. I’m one fan that would like to see Bradley in a Cubs uniform next season. I think he is still capable of being a very good baseball player and he can do that for the Cubs in my opinion.

- Cliff

Well Cubs fans, things sure didn’t go the way we had all hoped against the Washington Nationals as they Nats took two out of three games against the Cubs. I really thought the Cubs would take the series after a convincing win on Wednesday night but on Thursday afternoon things turned from good to bad as the Nats started strong and won the game by the score of 5-4. Just goes to show you how bad this Cubs team is right now…

Randy Wells got tagged early as the Nationals scored in the first three innings of the game. Three runs in the first inning and then single runs in the second and third innings put the Cubs down 5-0 before Aramis Ramirez tried to get the team back in it with a two run home run. The five early runs were enough to get the win however and give Wells his seventh loss of the season. Randy is now 9-7 in his rookie season.

The Cubs had a good shot to tie the game in the eighth inning however Derrek Lee was called out at home plate when he attempted to scored on a wild pitch. Lee was actually safe because Nationals reliever Sean Burnett did not tag him with the ball and instead his glove which did not have the ball. Blown call that went against the Cubs. It would have been the third run scored of the game for Lee as he also scored on Ramirez’s homerun and also hit a solo home run. Overall a good game for Lee.

One player that did not have a good game was Milton Bradley. Bradley went 0-4 and has got the entire city of Chicago yelling at him it seems like. Milton needs to takes Alfonso Soriano’s advice and just try to block everything out. And fans, lay off him when he is out in the city or grabbing a bite to eat with family. Keep it at the ballpark.

The Cubs have gone 6-15 since Aug. 5 to fall nine games behind St. Louis in the NL Central. Before that skid, they had won 14 of 19 and were tied for first place. Terrible way to close out the season like they are doing right now.

***Also during the game it was announced that Rich Harden and Aaron Heilman were claimed off waivers by a team. The Cubs now have this weekend to work out a deal with the teams involved if they choose.***

- Cliff