Game Of The Week

The Fox TV people scheduled the Cub/Cardinal game as one of the primary games of the week and put its #1 announcing team, Joe Buck and Tim McCarver, on the telecast. Buck showed how professional he is, as he went out of his way not to root for his hometown Cardinals. I know lots of people don't like Tim McCarver; he does tend to prattle sometimes too much, but I like his analysis, which is pretty much spot-on.

The two teams didn't disappoint in their play either as they both played well; in the end the Cubs came out on top 2-1 on a pinch-homer by Mark Bellhorn in the top of the 9th.

When I see lineups like this I cringe -- Lenny Harris starting at 3B for no particular reason, Eric Karros starting against another righthander (and not a great one either -- Brett Tomko), but somehow Dusty Baker pushed the right buttons again, saving Bellhorn for a key pinch-hitting situation in the 9th. Bellhorn had a terrific at-bat, taking close pitches with his good hitting eye, and fouling off a couple he didn't like before lining a HR into the second deck in left.

Corey Patterson made a terrific catch in CF in the 8th; Mark Prior threw seven plus good and efficient (107 pitches) innings and also had three hits -- I'd like to see Dusty use him as an extra righthanded bat off the bench when he's not starting -- and the Cubs evened the series at a game each.

I spent a lot of the between-innings time, and after the game, cleaning up my house, which has needed it. Spring cleaning is supposed to be earlier in the year, but so many things got in the way. There's still a lot of junk that needs to be gone through, but at least I got started. It feels a lot better to do that after a Cub win, too.