Another terrible performance by Ryan Dempster tonight as he walked a batter and then had a game winning double hit off him in the bottom of the 11th inning.  But should the game even have went that long?  No it shouldn’t have, the Cubs have got to start getting a key basehit when you have a runner in scoring position late in the ball game.  Stop grounding into damn double plays or hitting soft groundballs and hit a damn line drive somewhere.

Jason Marquis only lasted five innings as he gave up three earned runs.  Everyone was hoping for a better perfomance out of Marquis but it wasn’t meant to be.  Carlos Marmol and Bob Howry came in and pitched four scourless innings before Dempster came on board in the 10th inning and into the 11th where he allowed the game winning run to come across.

The one big hit the Cubs did have tonight was off Mark DeRosa’s bat when he connected for a three run homer in the third inning.  Jason Kendall also had a RBI in the 2nd inning as Jacque Jones cross the plate.  You have got to have more production then that however.  If you have a runner on second and 1 out, you have got to get that run in.  If you have the bases loaded and 1 out, you have got to a run in.  Right now the Cubs are just not executing at all.  They aren’t playing smart baseball like they were a month ago.  They better get going as they are now a game behind the Brewers in the division.

Ted Lilly picked up his 15th win of the season today as the Chicago Cubs cruised past the St. Louis Cardinals 12-3 at Wrigley Field.  I blogged yesterday that I thought this was a must win for the Cubs if they want to stay in contention for a division title and that is exactly what they delivered.

Lilly was the man on the mound as he pitched seven strong innings only allowing five hits.  Two of them being homeruns by Jim Edmonds and So Taguchi.

Aramis Ramirez and Derrek Lee got to Cardinal starter Joel Pinero in the 4th inning when they went both connected with homers to give the Cubs the lead for good.  It was a huge 4th inning as the Cubs scored five runs and pushed the lead to 6-1.  Lilly even contributed in the 4th as he hit a 2 RBI double.  Jacque Jones and and Jason Kendall also had RBI’s in the 4th inning.

Ramirez hit his second homerun of the game in the 8th inning.  Lets hope A-Ram stays hot and leads the Cubs to the post season.  We all know that he isn’t playing at 100% but is hustling out there and swinging the bat very well.  We also know he plays good defense at thirdbase and has saved the Cubs pitchers many times, so he needs to be the lineup all the way to the end!

With the 12-3 win over the Cardinals, the Cubs will now travel onto Houston to face the Astros in a three game set.  This series is HUGE for the Cubs and their playoff chances.  With the Brewers playing the Pirates, I expect them to sweep the Pirates so the Cubs must do the same against the Astros.  You never know how things will go in the “Juice Box” in Houston, so lets all hope the Cubbies swing the bats well and score some runs and win some ballgames!

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The Chicago Cubs are no longer in first place in the Central Division after falling to the Pittsburgh Pirates today 10-5.  It was not the way the Cubs wanted to finish the road trip as they dropped two out of three against the Pirates.

Chicago got off to a promising start, taking a 2-0 lead in the second on former Pittsburgh catcher Jason Kendall’s two-run single up the middle against Matt Morris.  Matt Murton and Jacque Jones both scored on Kendall’s single.

It wasn’t long though as the Pirates rocked Cubs starter Steve Trachsel who only lasted two innings in the game. In his two innings of play, Trachsel let up six earned runs on six hits and one walk.  A Freddy Sanchez triple in the second inning with the bases loaded was the dagger for Trachsel.  Terrible performance out of the veteran that was brough in to help spark the team and give them a few good outing down the playoff run.

Alfonso Soriano and Geovany Soto both homered as they tried to bring the Cubs back, but the Pirates pushed across three more runs in the 8th inning to secure the win.

The Cubs play a huge game tomorrow afternoon as they play the St. Louis Cardinals in a make up game due to the rainout a few weeks ago.  This is a must win for the Cubs, they must come out and throw a good game, and hit the ball around the park.

What an up and down game for the Chicago Cubs tonight.  The offense was dead for the first six innings of the game as they could not move a runner along and killed any sort of hope to score with inning ending double plays.

It was Rich Hill however that kept the team in the game as the threw seven strong innings and striking out seven Brewer batters.  An outstanding starting performance for Hill, exactly what the team needed tonight as they have a short bullpen after the team optioned Carmen Pignatiello to Triple A Iowa when Alfonso Soriano rejoined the team.

In the 7th inning, Cliff Floyd was hit by a pitch to lead off, then with Floyd stealing, Mark DeRosa reached safely on a grounder into the hole between shortstop and third.  With two runners on and 0 outs, Jacque Jones came up and drilled a double to the right-center field gap that scored Floyd and Derosa.  The Jones doubled tied the game up at 3-3.

Jason Kendall then flight out to right which brought up pitch hitter Daryle Ward who was hitting for Hill. Ward was intentionally walked and Soriano followed up with a flyout to rightfield.  With two outs and runners on the corners, Ryan Theriot hit a sharp ball to Linebrink the Brewers pitcher and he was unable to handle it and was charged with an error.  On the play Jones scored from third, Ward advanced to second, and Theriot was at first base.  Felix Pie came in and ran for Ward at second base and it was a good thing that he did because Derrek Lee came up and singled to left field and Pie scored from second to push the lead to 5-3.

Bob Howry and Ryan Dempster finished out the game for the bullpen as they did not allow a run in the 8th or 9th innings.  Great job guys!  Way to hold the lead.

This was a huge come from behind win for the Cubs tonight.  First off it was against the Brewers who are now down 2.5 games after dropping tonights game.  The Cardinals continued to stay hot as they beat up on the Astros and are now in second place of the division.  It is the Cubs, Cards, and Brewers with the Cubbies ahead by two games.  Will they stay there?  Time will only tell but we all sure hope so!

I’ll just catch to the chase today as I’m pretty pissed off with out the last inning of the Cubs and Diamondbacks game went.  Why in the damn world do you have your two base runners attempting to steal third and second base with 0 outs?  I don’t care if Jason Kendall makes any sort of contact, in most cases, if he makes contact the least that happens is you have Mike Fontenot at third base if Kendall grounds into a DP?  Well what happens?  Kendall strikes out and Fontenot is thrown at third ending pretty much all hopes of any sort of game tying run in the ninth.

Stupid move by the coaching staff if you ask me.  Say Kendall strikes out, but you still have runners on second and first but Ryan Theriot and Jacque Jones are due up.  Theriot makes good contact, and ended up walking, and Jones grounded out at first by a nice diving stop by Tony Clark, but what would have been had the damn runners not been trying to steal during the Kendall at bat?  I guess we will never know…

As it stands know, the Cubs are 1.5 games up on the Brewers but only 2 games up on the damn Cardinals.  I’m not scared of the Brewers at this point, it is the damn Cardinals that are playing red hot baseball that I’m scared of.  The Cubs had better take two of three against the Brewers during their mid-week series or this season isn’t going to end up in the Cubs favor.

What do you all think?  Leave a comment and let us know your thoughts on the 9th inning of todays game.

- Cliff

Sean Marshall through six strong innings last night and then Carlos Marmol, Bob Howry, Michael Wuertz, and Ryan Dempster finished off the game as the Cubs extended their Central Division lead to 1.5 games over the Brewers.

Marshall really only had one bad pitch and that was a first pitch fastball that he through the the Diamondbacks pitcher Micah Owings who hit it into the left field seats for a homerun.  Other then that Marshall was pretty dominate as the Diamondback hitters were aggressive all night and popped a lot of balls up.

The Cubs offense got off to a really good start as they were able to push across two runs in the top of the first.  Derrek Lee singled that brough in Ryan Theriot and then Mark DeRosa singled which scored Lee.  The Cubs would not score again until the sixth inning when Aramis Ramirez hit a sac fly that plated Jacque Jones.  We should mention that Jones also went 4-5 on the night to continue his hot streak.

It was a big ninth inning that sealed the deal for the Cubs however.  They scored three insurance runs off a wild reliver who couldn’t find the strikezone, and when it was a strike, the ball got it hard.  DeRosa, Felix Pie, and Jason Kendall all scored in the ninth inning to make it a 6-1 game.  The D-backs did score once in the bottom of the inning but it was nearly enough.

The same two teams will face off Saturday night.  It will be Ted Lilly starting for the Cubs and Doug Davis starting for the Diamondbacks.  Lets win another one Cubbies!

It was another late inning rally by the Chicago Cubs tonight against the SanFrancisco Giants.  It was a 2-2 game from the 4th inning until the top of the 10th inning when the Cubs were finally able to push across the game winning runs to beat the Giants 4-2.  They wouldn’t have had a chance though if it wasn’t for the great pitching perfomance by Rich Hill.

Hill pitched an outstanding game for the Cubs tonight.  He only allowed two earned runs during his seven innings.  Hill kept the Giant batters off balance all night long and really helped out the team by throwing seven innings.  Hill also had 10 strikeouts and only allowed one walk on the night.  Now that is good!

Aramis Ramirez got the Cubs offense started in the top of the 4th inning when he had a two RBI double tied the game 2-2.  The game stayed tied until the top of the 10th inning when Cliff Floyd led off with a double, and then Felix Pie (who was pitch running) advanced to third on a passed by.  Mike Fontenot then walked and Jason Kendall hit a sharp groundball to Rich Aurilia who bobbled the ball and let it get into the outfield which allowed Pie to score the go ahead and game winning run!

The Cubs were not done however as they still had Fontenot at third base and Kendall at first when Henry Blanco came to the plate with one out and succesfully laid down a suicide squeeze that score Fontenot from third base to give the Cubs a 4-2 lead.

Ryan Dempster then came into the game and closed it out with his 20th save of the season.  With the victory tonight, the Cubs moved 1 game ahead of the Milwaukee Brewers who lose 2-3 against the Arizona Diamondbacks!

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- Cliff

For 8 innings Tuesday night, the Cubs were dominated by Tim Lincecum. Luckily for the Cubs, they had only given up 1 run in that span. Jason Marquis went 7 strong giving up only 3 hits and 1 run. Coming into the 9th, the Cubs had only 2 hits. Ryan Theriot led off with a double and then back to back singles by Jacque Jones and Derrek Lee to tie the game brought the end of the night for Lincecum. After a walk to Ramirez, Cliff Floyd drove in 2 with a single to give the Cubs a 3-1 lead. DeRosa sac bunted and Jake Fox struck out before Jason Kendall brought in 2 more with a single of his own. Ryan Dempster pitched a scoreless 9th. Both the Cards and Brewers won as well on Tuesday so no change was made in the NL Central standings. Barry Zito faces Rich Hill at 9:15 CT Wednesday night.

-Mike

Another poor game by the Chicago Cubs have they have now lost 4 games in a row after dropping the game last night to the Cincinnatti Reds 9-11.  It was two runs by the Reds in the top of the 8th inning that pushed them over the top.  The Cubs were unable to come back in their final six outs continued their losing streak.

It was a two run homer by Josh Hamilton off by Bob Howry that gave the Reds the lead for good.  It was and up and down for the Cubs.  The offense was there today, but the pitching just sucked.

Ted Lilly threw the first six innings of the game and stuggled as he allowed six earned runs on six hits with two of them being homeruns.  It’s good that Lilly lasted six innings, but cut down on those homeruns!

After Lilly, it really didn’t get much better.  Michael Wuertz and Howry both allowed two earned runs.  Carlos Marmol and Kerry Wood were the only relievers that didn’t not allow a run to score while they pitched.

Aramis Ramirez hit a solo homer, his second in as many games, Jason Kendall hit a two-run shot, his first homer for the Cubs, and Jacque Jones and Ryan Theriot each drove in two runs in the loss.  But it wasn’t enough since the Cubs pitching staff sucked…

The Cubs better get playing better baseball or they are going to find themeselves in third place in the Central Division as the St. Louis Cardinals are red hot and only 3.5 games back of the division leading Brewers.  The Cubs and Cardinals begin a four game series this Friday in Chicago.  They better win, as we have came half way across the country to watch the games on Friday and Saturday!

The Chicago Cubs stay hot in Denver as they beat the Colorado Rockies 6-2 last night at Coors Field.  It was a hell of a game all around for the Cubbies as they got good starting pitching by Jason Marquis, and the bullpen gave a little bend but did not break in the late innings.  The Cubs offense lead behind Jacque Jones helped out the team by jumping ahead of the Rockies and holding on to win the second game of the four game series.

Marquis finished the game lasting 6 2/3 innings while giving up only one earned run.  He did hit Jeff Baker in the head in the seventh inning and was why Lou pulled him.  He thought that Jason was rattled after Baker was hit and didn’t want any other damage to happen.  I was sitting 8 rows behind homeplate/cubs dugout and the crack of that helmet was pretty damn loud. I was suprised Baker was moving around as much as he was to be honest.

Jacque Jones sure likes Coors Field this year.  Batting the in the #2 spot for the second straight game against the Rockies, Jones went 3-5 with and driving in two RBI’s.  Matt Murton also hit one out in the thin air of Colorado in the ninth inning.  I didn’t think his ball had a shot to get over, but it carried into the second row in right field.  Jason Kendall also stayed hot for the Cubs as he finished 3-4 and driving in two runs.  I love getting production from the bottom of the order like that!

The Cubs and Rockies will play again tonight at Coors Field.  It will be Rich Hill facing off against Josh Fogg.  Lets win another one Cubbies!