General manager Jim Hendry has countered the Milwaukee Brewer’s trade for CC Sabathia with a trade of his own.  Hendry and the Oakland Athletics worked out a trade that will send Rich Harden and Chad Gaudin to the Cubs for Matt Murton, Eric Patterson, Josh Donaldson, and Sean Gallagher.

I don’t mind one bit giving up Murton and Patterson in the deal, I would have rather had someone else go instead of Gallagher but you have to give up something good to get something good in return.  Murton should now get some good playing time on the A’s so the trade is very good for him.  I’m not sure what the A’s plan will be for Patterson but Gallagher could go right into their rotation.

So Cubs fans, is Hendry done wheeling and dealing?

The Chicago Cubs are sending a total of seven players to the 2008 All Star game in New York City.  Kosuke Fukudome, Alfonso Soriano, and Geovany Soto will all be starters in the game.  Aramis Ramirez, Carlos Zambrano, Ryan Dempster, and Kerry Wood were all named reserves.

The seven All-Stars is a franchise record. The Cubs have had six, most recently in 1988, when Andre Dawson, Shawon Dunston, Vance Law, Greg Maddux, Rafael Palmeiro and Ryne Sandberg were all named.

We cannot forget that manager Lou Piniella will also be a coach on the team.

Congrats to everyone, and good job by all the Cubs fans voting for for the players!

The Chicago Cubs finished up a three game series with the St. Louis Cardinals on Sunday with a 7-1 victory.  The Cubs took two out of three games from the Cardinals in St. Louis and extended their lead to 3.5 games over the Cardinals and Brewers.  Yeah, if Wood wouldn’t have blown the game on Saturday, the Cubs would have swept but I’ll take two out of three games on the road any time against the Cardinals.

Aramis Ramirez, Derrek Lee, Reed Johnson, and Geovany Soto all had good games on Sunday for the Cubs.  Ramirez finished the game with three rbi, while Lee, Soto, and Mark DeRosa all had one rbi.  Eveyone at the plate did a pretty good job over the weekend and that was really nice to see.

Sean Marshall earned his first victory of the season and is now 1-2.  Marshall tossed six innings while giving up six hits and one run.  It was also awesome to see Carlos Marmol throw a scoreless inning in the eighth as he got back on track and threw some strikes.

The Cubs are now off on Monday and will pick things back up on Tuesday when they start a series with the Cincinnati Reds at Wrigley Field.  Will the Cubs stay hot in Chicago and extend their lead over the Cardinals and Brewers?

Carlos Zambrano came off the 15 day disabled list at the right time as he pitched six innings and the Chicago Cubs defeated the St. Louis Cardinals 2-1.  Zambrano was on a pitch count of 90 and he threw 87 pitches before being pulled.  Big Z said that he could have went one or two more innings but he appreciates the way the coaching staff handled the situation.

Kosuke Fukudome got the Cubs started in the first inning when he hit a solo home run to put the Cubs up 1-0.  Geovany Soto then hit his 14th home run of the season in the fourth inning to make it 2-0 in favor of the Cubs.

Kerry Wood pitched the ninth inning to get his 22nd save of the season and the Cubs are now up 3.5 games on the Cardinals in the division.

I sure hope that Aramis Ramirez can come out of his slump on Saturday afternoon as the two teams play once again on Saturday afternoon.  Ramirez is in an 0-for-22 slump his last six games.

The Chicago Cubs lost 8-3 to the San Francisco Giants on Thursday as the two teams split a four game series out in San Francisco.  The Cubs were right in the game until the the seventh inning when Carlos Marmol gave up a three run home run to Rich Aurilia.  Something is wrong with Marmol like we have blogged about before.  I just hope the kid can make it to the all stat break and get a much needed rest.  He needs rest for the body and the mind I’m afraid.

Sean Gallagher had one bad inning where he gave up four runs.  He was only charged with three runs however as one of the runs scored unearned due to a Cubs error.  Gallagher is now 3-4 and could be moved to the bullpen soon.

Jose Ascanio gave up two runs while Jon Lieber gave up one run.  The Cubs pitchers just didn’t have it going on the mound.  Hopefully they weren’t thinking ahead to the big weekend series with the St. Louis Cardinals.

Mark DeRosa had two rbi to lead the Cubs at the plate. DeRosa doubled in the sixth inning to score Derrek Lee and Jim Edmonds.  Lee had the Cubs first rbi in the first inning when he scored Reed Johnson.  It was nice to see Johnson make his return to the lineup as he went 1-3.

To make room for Johnson on the roster, the Cubs sent Eric Patterson back down to Triple A Iowa.

I hope everyone has a fun and safe July 4th tomorrow and we can all sit down and watch the Cubs beat the Cardinals!

The Chicago Cubs defeated the San Francisco Giants on Wednesday night by the score of 6-5 after Mike Fontenot hit the game winning home run in the top off the eighth inning off Giants reliever Tyler Walker.  Fontenot came up big for the Cubs as the Giants had just tied the game at 5-5 in the bottom of the seventh inning.

The Giants were able to tie the game up when Ray Durham hit a three run home run off of Cubs reliever Carlos Marmol.  I don’t know what is going on with Marmol but I sure hope it is all mental and nothing physical is wrong.  Marmol just hasn’t been the same the last two weeks or so.  Even though Marmol gave up the three run homer, he ended up getting the win in the game and is now 2-3.

Kerry Wood was finally back in the game and in the spot where he could get the save for the Cubs.  Woody gave up one hit but struck out two batters and nothced his 21st save of the year.  Wood has had a great year so far in the closers role.

Ryan Dempster pitched a quality start for the Cubs as he lasted six innings.  Dempster gave up a two run homer to John Bowker but that was really his only mistake in the game where he gave up five hits and two runs while striking out seven.  Even with the quality start, Dempster is still winless on the road this season.

Jim Edmonds swung the bat good once again as he had a two run home run in the sixth inning.  Geovany Soto added two runs on a rbi single in the seventh inning for the Cubs.  Matt Murton got the Cubs scoring going in the second inning when he grounded into a double play and Edmonds scored.  Of course Fontenot also had one rbi in the game with his game winning home run.

The Cubs will now send Sean Gallager to the mound on Thursday as the Cubs and Giants will battle it out once again before the Cubs fly to St. Louis for a big weekend series.

The Chicago Cubs wasted a good outing by Jason Marquis on Tuesday night as they struggled at the plate and lost to the San Francisco Giants by the score of 2-1.  Marquis tossed seven innings and only gave up four hits and two runs in the game but took the loss and is now 6-5 on the season.  The Cubs and Giants have each won one game in the four game series now.

The first run that Marquis allowed was when Fred Lewis stole home in the first inning.  The second run came in the sixth inning when Randy Winn singled in Lewis.  That was all the offense that the Giants needed in the game as the Cubs offense was pretty much dead until the late innings.

In the seventh inning I thought that Daryle Ward should have had a triple, and then scored on the Jim Edmonds fly ball to center.  Too bad Ward is too damn slow!  In the ninth inning the Cubs had a rally going as well as Derrek Lee led off the inning with a triple and scored on a Geovany Soto single.  Edmonds then flied out before Mike Fontenot reached on a infield single to put runners at first and second.  Ryan Theriot had a good at bat but ended up striking out against Brian Wilson to end the game.

This loss goes completely on the offense who only had five hits in the game.  Matt Cain dominated them as he held them to only two hits through the first eight innings of the game.  That just can’t happen when you have the offense that the Cubs do.

The Chicago Cubs got a great pitching performance out of Ted Lilly who threw his best game of the year and then a great performance out of Mark DeRosa at the plate as they beat the San Francisco Giants by the score of 9-2.  It was a great win for the Cubs who really kept the pressure on the Giants all game long with runners getting on base.  The Cubs could have made the score a lot worse then it was in my opinion but they left 24 runners on base against Barry Zito and the Giants bullpen.

Lilly pitched into the ninth inning until he ran into some problems and the Cubs had to call on Kerry Wood.  Wood then gave up a double that scored two runs (both runs were charged to Lilly), and walked a batter before finally ended the game with a fly out to center field.  Lilly improved to 9-5 with the victory as he threw the ball very good.

DeRosa was filling in for some big shoes at third base and he filled those shoes with out any problems.  DeRosa was playing third base for Aramis Ramirez who will miss the Giants series as he takes care of an emergency down in the Dominican Republic.  DeRosa hit a two run home run in the fifth inning that traveled over 410 feet and then added a grand slam in the eighth inning to really blow the game wide open.  DeRosa finished with six rbi in the game and was the Cubs MVP at the plate.

Matt Murton got the start out in left field and went 2-4 with a two run double in the third inning.  I’d like to see Murton get some more playing time out there and I know a lot of other Cubs fans do as well.  Kosuke Fukudome also added a rbi single in the game for the Cubs.  Besides leaving 24 runners on base, the Cubs did a really job at the plate on Monday night.

Jason Marquis will now take the mound on Tuesday night as the Cubs try to win their second straight road game.  He will face off against Matt Cain who will pitch for the Giants.

The Chicago White Sox returned the favor to the Chicago Cubs as they south siders pulled away late to beat the Cubs 5-1 and sweep the Cubs in the three game series.  It wasn’t how I pictured the weekend going for the Cubs, but the White Sox bullpen held up all weekend and the Cubs bullpen did not.

Sunday night we say manager Lou Piniella get thrown out of the game after arguing a check swing call that went against the Cubs in the bottom of the second inning.  Piniella rushed out of the dugout towards the first base dugout and was quickly told to stop and get back in the dugout and as he was walking back was thrown out of the game by the home play umpire.  Lou got some words in with him as well.  From what I understood during the telecast last night, both the first base and home plate umpires were called up from the minor leagues for the series.

Sean Marshall pitched pretty good but took the loss and is now 0-2 on the season.  Marshall gave up two home runs, five hits, and three runs over seven innings of action.  Jose Ascanio gave up another home run (two run shot) in the eighth inning as the Jim Thome took him deep to extend the White Sox lead by 4.

The Cubs had chances to score runs in the game but once again failed to come up with the big hit with runners in scoring position.  Only one run for this Cubs offense is pretty bad.  Ronny Cedeno provided the one rbi for the Cubs when he singled in the seventh inning and Mark DeRosa scored.  Ryan Theriot, Derrek Lee, and Aramis Ramirez went a combined 0-11 in the game.

The Cubs boarded a plane right after the game and flew out to California where they will begin a series with the San Francisco Giants on Monday night. Yay more night games on the West coast.  I really hate these late games.

The Chicago Cubs lost to the Chicago White Sox for the second straight day as the White Sox outscored the Cubs 6-5 on Saturday afternoon.  A home run by Carlos Quentin off of Cubs reliever Carlos Marmol in the seventh inning won it for the White Sox.  Most times the ball wouldn’t have been a home run, but with Marmol’s fastball and the wind blowing out, the ball was able to get over the fence.

So now the Cubs have lost two in a row to the White Sox and will have to win on Sunday night to avoid the three game sweep by their crosstown rivals.  The Cubs just didn’t get that big hit late in the game like they have in the past.  Derrek Lee started off the ninth inning with a double and was moved over to third on a ground ball by Daryle Ward but Aramis Ramirez and Jim Edmonds both hit little ground balls to end the game.  Have to get better swings on those kind of pitches late in the game with a runner on third base.

Lee finished the game 5-5 at the plate and knocked in three rbi.  Mark DeRosa and Daryle Ward had the other two rbi for the Cubs.  As a team they struck out a season high 14 times as they were not patient at all.  Usually they will have more walks than strikeouts but this time they only had three walks compared to the 14 strike outs.

On the mound for the Cubs, Sean Gallagher gave up five runs over six innings of action.  Gallagher gave up two home runs and eight total hits in the game.  I was actually suprised that Lou left him in the game for as long as he did because he was really getting hit hard and the pitch count was getting up there.

Carlos Marmol ended up taking the loss as he gave up the home run to Quentin in the seventh inning.  Like I mentioned before, in most cases that ball doesn’t leave the ballpark, and it was actually a pretty decent pitch by Marmol.  Tough break for the kid and the team.

So now the Cubs will send Sean Marshall to the mound on Sunday night.  The game will be on ESPN in front of a national audience.  Hopefully Marshall and the Cubs can put on a show and pick up a win in the series.