Game Eighty-Two - Cubs 1 Braves 4
WP - Kenshin Kawakami (5-6) LP - Kevin Hart (0-1) Save - Rafael Soriano (10)
The frustration surrounding the Chicago Cubs might be hitting a boiling point ... and not with just the Faithful. After another pathetic performance by the offense, Lou Piniella told the media that they should ask the players and the hitting coach why they are not hitting and scoring runs. After a weekend of putting crooked numbers on the board and a solid start on Monday night, the Cubs managed just two runs over the last 24 innings of the three game series.
The Cubs managed to win only two out of the six games against Atlanta this season after sweeping the season series a year ago. Wednesday's game was within reach again but after a sloppy ninth, the heart of the Cubs lineup went quickly in the bottom of the inning to close out the series.
Kevin Hart made his first career big league start on Wednesday. He struggled with his command and gave up five walks, one intentional, but allowed only one run on four hits. While Hart's performance was shaky at best, he kept his team in the game and gave them a chance to win. If Kevin Hart is the Cubs' fifth starter while Ryan Dempster is on the DL, Hart did on Wednesday what is expected from a back of the rotation starter.
The Cubs only run came via Kosuke Fukudome's seventh home run leading off the sixth inning. The offense walked twice and managed only six hits on Wednesday against the Braves' staff, four against Kenshin Kawakami. The Cubs put two runners on base at the same time just once on Wednesday afternoon ... and that is not going to win many games at the big league level.
The Braves showed the Cubs the value of defense throughout the series. Yunel Escobar put on another clinic Wednesday and robbed Kosuke Fukudome of at least a game tying single in the eighth. The Braves turned three double plays, one of the inning ending variety in the sixth.
Lou Piniella's crew slipped to the .500 mark once again this season and finished the 22-games in 22 days stretch with an 11-11 mark ...
The Braves first run came in the third inning after a two-out double by Nate McLouth. McLouth ripped a ball down the first base line that hit the bag and ended up in right field. Martin Prado followed with a single to left. Jake Fox misplayed the ball but the error did not hurt the Cubs ... McLouth scored and would have without the error. Prado ended up at second but was stranded there when Brian McCann flied out to right on a 2-1 pitch to end the inning.
Kevin Hart pitched his way in and out of a jam in the fourth. Yunel Escobar led off the inning with a single to center. Casey Kotchman hit what appeared to be tailor made double play ball to second base. Jeff Baker's throw pulled Ryan Theriot off the bag. Escobar was called safe but Kotchman was out at first.
Jeff Francoeur grounded back to the mound and they caught Escobar in a run down between second and third. Escobar was eventually tagged out on a poorly executed play ... Jeff Francoeur ended up at second on the botched run down. Brooks Conrad was intentionally walked to bring up the pitcher.
Kevin Hart could not throw strikes and issued his fifth walk of the game to Kenshin Kawakami on five pitches. With the bases loaded and two outs, Nate McLouth lined out to left center to end the inning ... McLouth did not miss Hart's pitch, Kosuke Fukudome just caught it.
Casey Kotchman led off the sixth against Angel Guzman and ripped a 1-0 pitch over the wall in right. With the way the Cubs' offense was not performing a 2-0 hole seemed insurmountable at that point.
Kosuke's home run cut the Cubs' deficit in half in the sixth but the game got out of hand in the ninth.
Nate McLouth reached on a one-out single to center against Kevin Gregg. Martin Prado followed with a sinking liner to center that got past Fukudome. McLouth scored all the way from first and Prado ended up at third on the error. After retiring Garrett Anderson on a groundout to short with the infield in, Gregg uncorked a wild pitch on the first offering to Brian McCann ... Prado scored the Braves' fourth and final run.
For the record in the ninth the Cubs went down in order. Derrek Lee struck out swinging, Aramis Ramirez flied out to center and Milton Bradley struck out on a 3-2 pitch to end the game.
The Cubs have four big games in three days against the Cardinals to close out the first half ... hopefully their first off day since June 15 will wake up the offense.
The Cubs are off on Thursday. Rich Harden is slated to start the opener on Friday. Tony LaRussa is set to send Brad Thompson to the mound.
BJ Ryan just released. Any chance the Cubs sign him to incentive laden deal maybe? If he gets back on track he was a stud and then marshall could go back to being a starter.
There's really no good fit for him here. Marshall is, at best, an average longman/leftie specialist. Right now, he's doing his job. You can't send down Hart or Samardzija for someone like him, since they're probably close to being out of options as is. Heilman and Gregg aren't going anywhere, since Hendry's pride won't let him get rid of them, not mention Heilman actually seems to be picking it up just a bit. And Marmol and Guzman are too good to move aside. Plus, Jason Waddel is still on the DL, but was effective as a leftie specialist, so you really can't just throw him aside either.
Really, he'd just be another arm sitting in the pen.
Agree 100% on all points.
Marshall is not a starter. He is pretty valuable right where he is.
Another thought. Lou's primary focus when he came to the Cubs was to have a solid defensive team. I think that is so key. Our defense this year is the worst its been since Dusty.
Our outfield was so much stronger with Reid/Edmonds in center and Kosuke in Right. Bradley and Fox is not that great deffensively. Soriano has just gotten worse.(head up his butt syndrome)
I love Fontenot and Theriot but their size limits the plays they can make. I think we should've gotten a better deffensive shortstop this past offseason and shifted Theriot to second. The play at blanco at second proves that we could stand to improve our infield deffense.
Atlanta proves deffense helps win games.
Our guys with exception to a few have made repeated misplays that don't show up as errors. Many times this year it has been the difference between a W and an L.
Tired of the sloppy play!
Ryan isn't the answer because he hasn't recovered from an arm injury. For most of this season, he hasn't been able to get his fastball to 85 mph. He's 34 as I recall, and the Jays probably know that his future is not good.
Money isn't the issue because the Jays are on the hook for the (about) $10 mil he is owed again next year. A signing team would only have to pay the league minimum for him.
Early in the season, I thought we might get fellow lefty, Downs, from the Jays--in part because the Jays couldn't trade Ryan. Downs was owed $8 mil over '09-10., and the Jays did/do need to pare payroll. Then Ryan hit the skids, and Downs became their (effective) closer.
Funko hasn't done badly at leadoff. After watching Sorry-oh-no, he seems like Ricky Henderson.
Our problem is that we have no pop. 7-10 singles a night with no doubles or HRs doesn't cut it. JHendry didn't realize that last year, when the offense was #1 in the league, that it was the bottom of the order winning games for him. DeRosa, Soto, Edmonds, Theriot. And this year neither the middle or the bottom of the order has any punch. DLee has some punch, but beyond that, we have too many automatic outs. And Lou has compounded the problem by refusing to play the hot hands with pop--Hoffpauir and Fox. Plus our bench last year really produced: Fontenot and Johnson and even Cedeno.
No quick cures available for this team.
The Cubs really need to sweep the Cards. If the Cards sweep us, it is going to be very difficult to catch the Cards.
Now Rip, you and I both know the way the Cubs' offense is on "sputter" right now, there's hardly a chance the Cubs are going to sweep the Cards in this upcoming series.....proverbial snowball in hell syndrome. The Cards sweeping the Cubs? Now that's what to be afraid of for sure!
Why does Pinella like the sucky Mike Fontenot. It pissed me off when he took Baker out and put Fontenot to pinch hit an what does Fontenot do GIDP.
The Cards are interested in Halladay. I really dont think they will get him because they dont have the money and they will have to give up there a lot of propsects plus there top 2.
I think his thought process there was that he was tired of looking at Baker's poor AB's earlier in the game. They were quite ugly.
It might actually spell the end of his tenure with the Cubs. Who knows? But, I think Baker punched his ticket out of town. For the most part, if you look at the Cubs with Piniella at the helm (even before that), if you're a young player or if you're coming in with a small salary, and you don't produce right away, it's quite possible you'll be looking for a new address.
Think about this for a minute...If Fontenot, Soto, Hoffpauir, Hart, Wells, or Fox didn't produce immediately after they were called up, they would most surely be sent packing. It's just how it is with the Cubs right now.
As for Halladay, I believe the Cardinals get it done if they include Rasmus. If they include Rasmus, along with Brett Wallace, that probably gets the deal done with just 2 players. It also makes a trade of Rios a little more palatable for them.
Aaron:
It amazes me that the Cardinals always seem to get their man no matter who is calling the shots. A look back:
Hello Anaheim, For Jim Edmonds We'd like to give you Kent Botenfield and Adam Kennedy.
Hello Colorado, Uh, yeah we will take Larry Walker off your hands.
Hello Cleveland: For Mark Derosa we would like to offer you Chris Perez.
Unbelievable!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I would love to get Rios and Wells from Toronto. Actually, if Lou keeps benching Soriano he might request a trade.
If the Cards get Halladay...it most likely puts them in the drivers seat
in our division for the next several
years with Pujols....But who knows...remember at the start of '04 when we were actually the favored team to make the World Series?...This year...
favored to win the division?
I read Ricketts and company went to Boston to see how they operate...my hope is they put together a Boston-like organization...We will rise...if not this season than soon.
I put no expectations on this weekend.
Good Cubs/Bad Cubs??? Who knows what
will show up.
you actually might be onto something there. I'm kind of a conspiracy theorist at heart...but you definitely might be onto something.
If a guy won't waive his no-trade, what's the best way to get him to at least consider? If the player has any pride whatsoever, if you bench him, he's going to want to leave...at least in my opinion
Aaron there is no way they will include Rasmus, ROY winner as of right now.
Normally, you might say it's inconceivable, but if they've added DeRosa already to off-set some of the offense they'd lose, and outside of Wallace, they wouldn't have to include anyone else. Prior to his break-out season, they already had Ryan Ludwick, Ankiel, and Duncan in their OF, so losing Rasmus and his 11 hr, 34 RBI won't seem as bad.
Think about this for a second....let's assume that our offense was dynamite again this year, but in our rotation, outside of Z and Lilly, it was quite shaky. If you had the opportunity to trade just 2 of your young players (one still in the minors) for a Cy Young winner and perennial All-Star, wouldn't you do it in a heartbeat? It'd give them a top 3 in their rotation of Carpenter, Halladay, and Wainwright. If you're an opposing team in the playoffs, you can kiss your chances goodbye. There's no way in hell you're going to beat them, especially when you STILL have the likes of Pujols, Molina, DeRosa, Ludwick, and Ankiel in the lineup. Those are some fairly dangerous bats. Throw in the pesky Shumaker and Brendan Ryan, and it's even worse for opposing teams.
Rasmus might win you some games with his bat and glove, but he can't shut another team down like Halladay can. And consider this...if they added Halladay today, here's what their rotation would look like:
Carpenter-6-3, 2.32 ERA
Halladay-10-2, 2.79 ERA
Wainwright-9-5, 3.08 ERA
Piniero-6-9, 3.39 ERA
Lohse-4-4, 3.99 ERA
*you'd get rid of Wellemeyer's 5+ERA, and then you finish of the rotation with a back-end bullpen like this:
McClellan-set-up, 2.70 ERA
Miller-lefty set-up, 2.35 ERA
Franklin-closer, 0.83 ERA
Any advantage that we might have with our rotation (very slim) is completely lost if they acquire Halladay, so, yeah, I think giving up Wallace and Rasmus would EASILY get the deal done for the Cardinals, and would send us planning for next year.
I bet the Cardinals would give up Wallace and a spare part. They never seem to get burned.