Lilly was very good and had his best outing of the year. Wood was DOMINANT and had his best outing too. Marmol was his usual self. The offense executed. The defense was solid, particularly Kosuke and Theriot. And all against the best team in baseball and one heckuva good pitcher in Haren.

getting a win in the first game of a home stand on a Friday afternoon. Post that win and watch everybody else try and match it. And winning against the #1 team in the league makes it that much more sweet.

First off, what a great win to start the homestand. We needed this bad, getting a close win against a good team.

I have three positives to take from this game

1. Ted Lilly’s pitching performance. We’ve seen a couple different Ted Lillys so far this season, but today was a Lilly I hope to see more and more. He was under control and threw first pitch strikes. I was pleased to see after the Young HR he didn’t get rattled. Settled in and threw a great ballgame.

2. Alfonso Soriano. Yes, he’s still having issues at the plate, but he really came through for us today and provided the winning RBI. I am really hoping this will get him moving in the right direction. I don’t know who posted it earlier, I’m sorry, but they had a great point. Soriano will not continue this poor performance all year. I am willing to let his track record speak for itself and this guy can flat out play. He needs a spark and I hope today was what he needed.

3. Kerry Wood. IIRC 12 pitches ALL Strikes. Wood closed down a tight game with the swagger of a legitimate closer today. Let him round into this position. This guy has a great shot at becoming a consistent 35+ saves a year closer.

Great game, lets roll it into the weekend!

Fan post game thread was posted because the first thread was bogged down about 2:30 CT but the overflow thread did not show up until close to 3:15 CT.

The Cubs are now 3-0 on days when Lou’s picture is on the season ticket.

Released by San Diego today. This once great player has dropped off the face of the cliff over the past year. But he is a famous Cub killer, bats from the left-side and can still play a good centerfield. Might not look bad as an option coming off the bench??? If we can get over his long-term St. Louis connection and his ridiculous diving attempts in the outfield all those years….

I got to say, I’m at least intrigued. A Reed Johnson and Jim Edmonds combo in CF might be pretty darn good for a playoff push year.

Personally, I think too much was made of Lilly slamming his glove down in disgust. He was pissed, and let his emotions show. We don’t get on Z for “letting his emotions show” when he’s pumping his fist and pointing at the sky.

Lilly didn’t have good stuff in a playoff game when his team needed him, and let everyone see his frustration. And before anyone starts in on the whole “role model” b.s., this is MLB…not the boy scouts!

Bottom line, he gave the boys a great start today when they needed it, and is pitching much better of late. Should take 2 of 3 now. It’s what you need to do at home, even against the mighty snakes.

come out of his funk with a big two-out, game-winning hit. That should keep people from trashing him for about two hours.

Derosa also swung the bat much better today.

Ted Lilly was huge and Wood looked untouchable.

Also, I posted a game thread in the comments because, one, the game thread was interminably slow and three or four commenters had asked for some play-by-play since they were at work, so I posted a separate thread. I hope that wasn’t a problem….

9 pitches, all strikes, and I believe the 8th pitch was a 96 mph heater. What a nice collection of pitches today, he looked MONEY.

Dan

This is the first time in a long time I haven’t seen or heard one second of the game. The Cubs could have come out wearing tutus and done the honey pokey to begin every inning as far as I knew.

Thanks for the excellent recap Al as always. I felt I didn’t miss a beat thanks to the details.

It was also nice to break out of our recent funk of winning 1 losing 2.

Had no idea since i was working all day but its good to hear. I cant wait to watch this tonight.

Its awesome to see Lilly pitching like he is, really exciting. Kerry seemed to pitch well and the hitting seemed to be clutch again.

probably about 5,000 no-shows today

That frustrated me a bit in watching the game. I noted the no-shows. Last week I perused Cubs.com for tix but my options consisted of over priced nose-bleed or even higher priced nose-bleed seats. The no-shows were likely casual cold-adverse dilettantes. Feh.

Anyone is preferable to Tim McCarver. Listening to him makes my ears bleed, and I don’t mean Cubbie Blue.

I used to regard Edmonds as the kind of player you hate on other teams but would love to have on yours. However, after a few years of watching him whine about every other called strike and often turn what looked like fairly routine plays into dramatic diving catches just for effect, I’m not sure I would have wanted him even when he still had something. A good friend of thirty years who lives in St. Louis and is objective and very knowledgeable about baseball even though he is a Cards fan, told me a couple of years ago that Edmonds had a habit of lying motionless on the ground for a few seconds after a diving catch, especially with two outs. Then, when the crowd went quiet and started to murmur as if he might be hurt, he’d get up and run to the dugout while inevitably getting a big hand. Yes, the guy was a great player in his day, but he was also one of the biggest drama queens I’ve seen in the last ten years.

Cant find any and not really interested in the Lakers sweeping the Jazz or the terrible, terrible offense of the White Sox..

Will i just have to deal with watching slow updating Brewers/Cardinals?

Thx in advance guys!

Top of the 2nd, Parra can’t find the strike zone. Boy is that team in a free fall.

Reed Johnson is the proud owner of a .640 OPS. Felix Pie’s is an even more atrocious .567. Those almost make me yearn for the return of JJ. (I said almost.)

What would be hurt if Lou tried Ronny Cedeno in CF for a week? Ronny’s had a hot bat, and he does have a little experience in CF, at least in the DWL. He’s fast enough to outrun some mistakes (as opposed to DeRo, who would have to get a good jump on everything if he were to play CF), and he has a good arm. Pie would be available as a defensive replacement. I’d like to see it, at least with Marquis or Lieber on the mound.

It’s obvious that Lou loves the Riot (why???), and Lou can’t bench DeRo if he hopes to have Hendry trade him. It would be nice to get Ronny a few ABs, and this would be better than moving Dome to CF while he is trying to get adjusted to ML pitching.

Anyone else have any thoughts on this?

Cards just lost a heartbreaker to the Brewers in the bottom of the 9th. Cards were winning 3-2 with two out and the bases empty, and the Brewers put together two hits and a walk to load the bases. Then Weeks hit a walkoff 2-run double.

the game but listened to it on the radio. Glad to hear them get the win. Good for Lilly, so glad to hear he pitched so well. Soriano came through too.

Hope my little spot in the world is part of the 37% for tomorrow’s game.

on Lily’s average vs. this year and last year, good signs to come? I certainly hope so….

Great to see Wood have an effortless 9 pitch effortless save. Don’t you love it…he looked really Good! Especially, after reading about Gag-me (preferred name of the young ‘08 season) the past couple of days.

Love his quote in the Tribune this morning, “I guess [Harren] just threw on into my swing” (may not be a direct quote).

Why not try Theriot out there, and put Ronny at SS. Just a thought, if Pie isn’t seen as a legit starting option. and Lou insists on going with guys that are hitting.

But I guess the problem with either SS starting in CF is that it limits Lou’s ability to double switch (unless E-Patt came up and Felix went down).

That you can win with a defense-focused CFer, but I gotta believe Theriot is not going to continue to be an offense-focused SS (and he certainly isn’t a defense-focused one). If Cedeno crashes and DeRo keeps slumping, that’s an entire “up the middle” that’s light hitting and not entirely strong on defense. I’m not against starting Pie regularly, I just think it’s not too much to expect a little offense out of CF.

It was nice to pull that one out with two out punch at the bottom of the order….and it was better to go home and to watch Issy cough one up with two out and at the bottom of the Brewers line-up coming through….. those Brewer fans filing out of the park missed a hell of a finish…... good on them.