Game Recap

I didn't get to see all of Saturday night's loss, but the portion that I did catch was more than enough for me to get the gist:

The Cubs' woeful offense—over the last two nights, for example, the team is 0-for-17 with RISP—offers no cover for defensive mistakes and boneheaded baserunning.

If the starting pitching weren't so good, the Cubs wouldn't even be competitive.

Before the game, I wondered what problems Lou Piniella was creating by stationing a defensively challenged rookie in rightfield. Turned out that having a second baseman butchering the third baseman's job was problem enough on this night.

Randy Wells, who has been mostly brilliant but mostly without support from his bullpen or his team's bats, pitches Sunday against Bronson Arroyo as the Cubs try to escape Cincinnati with a series win.

The Cubs take a nail-biter from the Reds to open their series, winning their second road game in a row.

It took 11 innings, but the Cubs walk away with their first road victory in almost a month.

The Cubs split versus the best team in the league and head out for a 9-game road trip, where they've played ever so well.

Today at Baseball Prospectus (subscription), Joe Sheehan wrote about how the Cubs have become one of baseball's most home run-dependent teams and tonight, we saw, yet again, where that generally gets you.

A pinch-hit home run by Bobby Scales in the eighth inning against Randy Wolf accounted for all the Cubs' scoring Thursday night in the team's most recent, painful defeat.

An eventful afternoon at Wrigley as the Cubs take their first series in two weeks and climb back over the .500 mark.

The Cubs end their eight game losing streak with a 6-1 rain-shortened victory over the Pie-rats.

Why the Cubs Won: The offense continued where it left off yesterday with a six-run outburst in just five innings of play. Fukudome started the fun with a home run in the first, his first home run in May after four in April in what should be his only other start this homestand besides Friday against Chad Billingsley as south-paws are scheduled to face the Cubs the rest of the month. Sean Marshall then came through in the second with a single to score the Cubs second run and and a Hoffpauir double to deep right netted the Cubs third run in the first three innings. They tacked on three rather meaningless runs in the bottom of the fifth and then the clouds opened up to ensure the win and end this rather dreadful losing streak.

Marshall on the mound was effective as well, including a few defensive gems to help himself out. He finished with the easy 5 inning pitched complete game with 6 K's and just one run allowed.

Fun Stat: 5.14 Runs per game at home for the Cubs, 4.04 on the road.

Monday night's game seemed otherworldly from even before the first pitch.

A Wrigley Field home game on a holiday at night? It made scheduling sense, given that the Cubs had to fly all the way east from San Diego following Sunday's game, but it still felt wrong.

Then the lineups were published and owing to a combination of illness, injuries, and an opposing lefthander, we saw Reed Johnson hitting cleanup and an infield of Freel, Theriot, Miles, and Hoffpauir. In other words, the stuff of split squad spring training games.