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Get your power failure puns elsewhere; Cubs lose 8-5
Yeeechhh! That was nasty.
Wednesday night at Wrigley, the Cubs spotted the Dodgers a 5-0 lead, squandered opportunities to get the game close or even, then did get the game close, failed to get it closer, and lost.
Here's a professional summary of the 8-5 defeat, which was interrupted by an 18-minute power outage in the fourth inning.
Some quick thoughts...
— Tom Gorzelanny struggled with his command from the outset and all in all, pitched just poorly enough to provide some public relations cover to Jim Hendry and Lou Piniella in the next few days, when, I'm thinking, they will officially yank the lefty from the rotation in favor of Carlos Zambrano.
— To me, the overriding truth in tonight's game was expressed beautifully by Guest Seventh Inning Singer Pat Foley, who was actually describing his recipe for winning a Stanley Cup when he said, "Your best players need to be your best players." We all know how the Cubs have suffered and will suffer if Aramis Ramirez is not contributing, but the point was dramatized tonight by the team's failure to cash in on seemingly can't-miss scoring opportunities and some awful defense at third base, speaking of which...
— Mike Fontenot cannot play on the left side of the infield. He made a questionable but defensible decision to concede a Dodger run on a hard ground ball by Manny Ramirez in the first inning, after failing to glove the ball cleanly. In the second inning, Fontenot launched a throw over Derrek Lee's head which led to two unearned runs immediately thereafter, when Matt Kemp doubled. Maybe the only good thing about playing Fontenot at third is that by comparison, it makes his play at shortstop appear to be Gold Glove-quality.
— It's frequently frustrating to watch Alfonso Soriano play left field, but what Manny Ramirez does out there is just short of a criminal offense. Soriano is an incompetent fielder; Ramirez is indifferent, which I find much, much worse. He runs and bends over in slow motion, when he moves at all. If my favorite team employed that slug in the field every day, it would drive me to drink. Or following soccer full-time.
— Derrek Lee had three more hits and even rapped the ball sharply when grounding into a double play. Xavier Nady had a pinch home run and Jeff Baker had a pinch triple. Good to see all of those guys coming around (we hope). Starlin Castro, on the other hand, looked a lot like a 20-year-old just up from Double-A when he stepped in against Chad Billingsley. Castro personally left six runners on base in the game. Also, he and Ryan Theriot joined Fontenot in Wednesday night's error parade.
Like I said, yeeechhh.
Ted Lilly (1-4, 4.30) matches up with rookie John Ely (3-1, 3.41) in the series finale Thursday afternoon.
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