Game Recap
Game 4 Recap: Cubs 3, Brewers 4
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Game 3 Recap: Cubs 11, Astros 6
W - Ted Lilly (1-0)
L - Brian Moehler (0-1)
In the spirit of Passover, we begin tonight's recap by asking, why is this night different from all other nights?
The answer:
Tonight the Cubs sent nine men to the plate in each of the first two innings, building a lead so large, it allowed Ted Lilly to throw his own personal game of Home Run Derby and still win his first game of the season.
Details after the jump.
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Game 2 Recap: Astros 3, Cubs 2 in 10 Innings
Update--more on Soto...
From Wittenmyer's game story in the Sun-Times:
Soto, who said he felt ''discomfort'' on an awkward throw to second...is to be re-examined [Wednesday]. Manager Lou Piniella suggested a possible return during the next series, which opens Friday in Milwaukee. It wasn't considered serious enough to schedule an MRI.
Soto...downplayed the injury. He said he has had similar discomfort before, as recently as this spring.
W - Doug Brocail (1-0)
L - Neil Cotts (0-1)
In the early innings of Tuesday night's game, Pat Hughes and Ron Santo discussed the fact that the Cubs have not started a season 2-0 since Pat and Ron began working together in the WGN radio booth in 1996. Naturally, this had the effect of jinxing the team and thus, the outcome was inevitable.
Game 1 Recap: Cubs 4, Astros 2
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Game 32 Recap: Cubs 2, Astros 0
W - Wood (3-2), History. Fastballs over the outside corner. Generous outside corners.
L - Reynolds (2-3), any losers who didn't see this game live because they were out in the rain and cold shooting a bad round of golf. Trying to come up with an adequate term for that freaky breaking pitch of Wood's.
Things to Take from This Game
1. Wood Strikes Out 20, Two Batters Reach in Complete Game Shutout
From the first few pitches of the game it was clear that Wood had a potentially history-making fastball and breaking stuff working today. Wood K'd his first five,and gave up his only hit on a grounder by Gutierrez off of Orie's glove. This won't make me the most popular guy around here, but yeah, it was a hit. It also was a play that Orie probably makes more often than not. Tough luck for everyone involved. The only other runner came on a curveball that got away from Wood and beaned Biggio. The performance is every bit as dominating as the box score will indicate. Almost without exception, the Astros looked completely helpless.
2. Cubs scratch out 2 runs against Reynolds
Reynolds threw a complete game gem, himself, with 10 Ks and 1 ER in 8 innings. The Cubs' scores came on a Grace "double" in the second, on an incredibly generous ruling where third-baseman Howell got completely devoured by a bouncer. Grace then advanced to third as left-fielder Dave Clark throws away the potential play at second base. Oh Henry! drove him in with a sac fly to Alou in deep center field. They added another for good measure in the eighth; Morandini and Grace singled, with Morandini scoring on an attempted 5-4-3 double play that was too slowly turned and resulted in a fielder's choice.
3. Greatest Game Ever?
A traditional recap can not adequatly contextualize this game. The central question at this moment, just minutes after witnessing this gem, is not "what do we take from this game?" but "where will this game place among the all-time great games ever pitched?" Larson's perfect game came in a far more important context. Haddix's perfect game through 12 innings kept more hitters off base for longer. Clemens has two 20-K games to his record, but as I thumb through the pages of my favorite baseball encyclopedia, I see that Clemens gave up five hits in his 1996 gem, and a run on three hits in 1986. The 1996 Tigers and 1986 Mariners, furthermore, were no 1998 Astros. IS this the greatest game ever? If only we had some sort of pitcher's in-game dominance statistic, and a place that compiled every statistic from every game ever played. Then we might have a more objective idea of where this game ranks on the list of all-time great pitching performances. In the meantime, here's hoping that Wood's career is as successful and distinguished as the Rocket's.
4. Looking to the Future... All the way to the Year... 2000...
This has to portend well for the Cubs. If Wood can stay healthy and anchor a rotation with Trachsel, and another talented young arm like Geremi Gonzalez or Terry Adams or Telemaco emerges as a compliment, we could have a dominant rotation for a decade to come. We just need Wood's health to hold, and though we know he was worked hard in high school, he seems to be a very well built young man, and hopefully can keep his strength up. The Cubs winning a world series may be about as likely as a black president or a second Great Depression, but Wood may have the arm to get us there.
The if-this-is-his-rookie-year, just-imagine-the-things-to-come details, below.
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NLDS Game 2 Recap: Cubs 3, Dodgers 10
Booted
W - Billingsley (1-0)
L - Zambrano (0-1)
Things to Take from This Game
1. Alex Gonzalez Redux
Second inning with Ethier on first, the dodgers put on a hit and run. Loney hits the ball to shortstop. But with Theriot covering the bag, he's out of position, can't make the barehand stop of the chopper. Ruled a hit. Correctly. Two batters later, DeWitt hits a potential inning-ending double-play ball right at DeRosa, but it pops out of his glove, and everyone's safe with a run scoring on the play. Lee makes an error on the next play, a chopper right at him hit by Blake, loading the bases. A Furcal bunt and a Martin bases-clearing double to the left-center Gap, and the Cubs found themselves down 5-0 going into the bottom of the second. A particular shame as Z had looked really focused, sharp, pitching quickly, with an awesome fastball, only to have his defense betray him and then give up a legit double.
- Ramirez also made a lame error a couple innings later. No damage was done, save to our pride.
- And Theriot gives the Cubs infield the Defensive Anti-Cycle, an error by each infielder, when he throws one away in the ninth.
2. Manny Ramirez Redux
Manny hit a gargantuan home run. He's good.
3. Ah, screwit.
Cotts and Marmol struggled, the Cubs got through 2/9ths of a 9-run comeback in the bottom of the ninth, other things probably happened to.
The "we have not yet begun to fight!" "No, really... we haven't yet begun to fight...." details, below.
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NLDS Game 1 Recap: Cubs 2, Dodgers 7
Things to Take from This Game
1. Cubs out to an early lead
2. Dempster's wildness catches up to him
The worrisome details, below...
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Game 153 Recap: Cubs 5, Cardinals 4
Cubs Clinch Division, First Back-to-Back since 1907-1908, Earliest since 1932
W - Lilly (16-9), You, Me, Santo, Harry, 104-year-old-dude-who-threw-out-the-first-pitch, all Cubs fans.
L - Pineiro (6-7), the rest of the NL Central
S - Wood (32)
Things to Take from This Game
1. A bases loaded three-run single for Soriano
Well, two rbis and an error leading to the third run. In the bottom of the second Soriano lined a single right at Brian Barton in left. The ball kicked off his glove and rolled to the wall, clearing the bases. The Cubs raced out to a 3-0 lead.
2. More fielding problems, more runs.
The Cubs got two more runs in the fourth, as Soto began the inning by smashing one through Glaus at third. DeRosa hit a double high off the ivy to score Soto, and after advancing to third on a Fukudome ground out, scored on a nicely executed suicide squeeze by Lilly. 5-0 Cubs through four innings.
3. Glaus homers in 4-run Sixth
Lilly looked great, very economical, through five. In the sixth Felipe Lopez gets an RBI single on a smash up the middle off Theriot's glove, and Glaus unloads a no-doubt three-run home run into the left field well. Suddenly we had a close game. 5-4 through six.
4. Lilly Recovers, Marmol and Wood close it out
Other than a leadoff walk to Glaus in the ninth, the last three innings passed uneventfully as Lilly pitched the seventh, with Marmol and Wood doing their jobs to close out the game. A soft fly out to Edmonds off the bat of Aaron Miles ended the game, and a happy Cubs team celebrated between the pitcher's mound and first base.
The Back-to-Back NL Central Champion Details, below.
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Game 151 Recap: Cubs 7, Brewers 6 (12 Innings)
Game 150 Recap: Cubs 2, Brewers 6
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Recent comments
crunch (view)
...and bellinger is gone in the 7th because of that 2nd blown chance and the wall he bounced off of...
hopefully his rib cage/shoulder feels better tomorrow, we just got happ back.
Childersb3 (view)
Phil,
Any thoughts on Y. Rojas' stuff and Y. Melendez's game (I believe I've asked about him before, sorry)?
crunch (view)
wow, things are moving fast. hopefully it continues.
crunch (view)
morel with 4 clean plays in 4 innings...showed off his 100000000mph arm a couple times.
cody bellinger not having a good 4th, though...5 run leads are handy when your CF is making your pitcher have a 5-out inning. 2nd blown chance was ruled a hit even though it went in/out of his glove...1st was lost in the lights, also ruled a hit.
crunch (view)
welcome back happ! double off the wall 1st PA back.
crunch (view)
oh yeah, totally, i was just chiming about why i fan like i fan.
i would like nothing more than hendricks to keep on hendricks'ing. guys with his stuff can throw for a long, long time as long as it works.
he velocity is actually up a minor amount this year. it's really "damn" when a guy like him not only has gas in the tank, but it's looking like it was years ago. he added a curve a few years ago and it helped a little bit, but he's throwing it less and less while the fb/change combo are less effective.
Alexander Dimm (view)
CRUNCH—There is no one person in this community I’m talking about. My remarks were not directed at you or anyone, but at a tone I’ve noticed lately.
You have a great, dry sense of humor and there is thought behind your comments. You and I don’t always agree but I always understand your position.
Lastly, and I’ll be quiet, I agree with you on Hendricks. We can dislike the recent performance but still love the guy. Lots of questions about his future.
crunch (view)
myself, i make a good amount of outrageously unrealistic comments that are sometimes "violent"...like my recent suggestion of "pulling the bandaid off" by having hendricks throw every inning of every game until he's on the IL.
i would hope any athlete that cares about what is written on the internet realizes how casual fans can be about treating their lives like scripted TV characters that don't have real lives. it's not an excuse to do it, but there's a lot of it out there.
but yeah, in real life i'm rooting for guys to have long and healthy careers even if i'm not happy with current performances...except for some guys...and i'm pretty sure i don't leave grey area for those comments...and almost all of them are not good humans whether they're playing baseball or not...
hendricks was getting a good amount of boos in his last game. i would bet a million that he will get a standing O every time he visits wrigley in his post-playing days, or a return with a new team should his career continue...or if he comes back and puts in an oldschool good performance.
Alexander Dimm (view)
What are the chances we can back off on gloating over other people’s misfortune? One of the things I appreciate about the TCR community is that the remarks are more productive and add to how I like to follow the game.
Lately, however, I’m reading comments that are just mean. If I were an MLB player, I would hate to get a back or finger injury and have someone write ‘hurrah! I hope we never see him again!’ Especially when it is someone we were praising not long ago. I’m not saying ‘don’t express how you feel’ but some comments lately seem downright mean spirited. Stuff I expect from other communities but don’t often see here. The TCR community has always spoken the truth but never with such a dark tone.
Just my two cents. I hope Hendricks comes back and is the professor we all know. He can pitch for the Cubs as long as he wants in my book.
crunch (view)
happ is back (and starting), mervis DH, tauchman gets RF.
morel 5th in the lineup. hoerner continues to lead off, even vs a righty.