Dee-Fense!

Seriously, on tomorrow's off day the Cubs ought to work on their defense. The Pirates scored five runs in the second inning (only two unearned, though there should have been another error that was uncharged) en route to an easy 8-2 win over the Cubs today.

This has been the one big thing wrong with this Cub team so far, that they haven't played sound fundamentally in the field. Shawn Estes also got himself into trouble with walks today. The bullpen did throw five innings, allowing only one run. And luckily, the scare that we all got when Sammy Sosa was hit in the head is probably going to be meaningless in the long run; he was back in the clubhouse after the game, showing no ill effects. I've never seen a helmet shatter like that before, though.

Hey, five wins in a row is pretty good -- the Cubs won another series, and come home 12-7, to face a San Diego team that was just about the worst team I saw in Arizona during spring training. Get past that series with a win, and they'll be pretty well set for the upcoming road trip to Denver to face a rejuvenated Rockies team, and then the hottest team in baseball, the Giants.