It's not just a season for Ted Lilly to get no hitting support from his teammates -- he is now last in the major leagues among qualified starters in run support (2.4 per start). He's not helping himself, either.
Ted Lilly is 0-for-23 this season.
There are now 60 player-seasons since 1901 (including Lilly) where a player has 23 or more at-bats without a hit.
All but three are pitchers.
Larry Littleton of the Indians, a backup OF, was 0-for-23 in 1981. Jason Smith of the Astros (former Cub!), a backup IF, was 0-for-25 last year.
And Hal Finney, a backup catcher for the 1936 Pirates, was 0-for-35 -- the biggest 0-fer for a position player.
Lilly could move rapidly up this list. An 0-for-3 tonight would result in 0-for-26 -- only 37 others have done this, including Sandy Koufax in 1957.
Here's the list of all 59 players who have accomplished this in full seasons through 2009. Actually, I'd love it if Ted got off this list tonight -- and maybe hit his first major league home run (he does have one triple, which he hit last year).
Tonight's lineup via tweet from Carrie:
#cubs lineup fri is rf fuke, 2b riot, 1b lee, 3b ramy, cf byrd, lf colvin, ss font, c hill, p lilly
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Chad Billingsley struggled against the Cubs on May 26 at Wrigley Field, allowing ten hits in 5.1 innings, including a HR by Xavier Nady. However, Tom Gorzelanny chose that day to have his worst start of the year and the Cubs lost 8-5. The Cub who hits Billingsley best is, oddly, Ryan Theriot (6-for-11, .545, but all singles).
Ted Lilly threw seven shutout innings vs. the Dodgers at Wrigley Field on May 27, allowing only three singles and three walks. A repeat of that performance would be nice tonight. Current Dodgers are hitting .202 (26-for-129) off Ted, but with six homers.
Today's game is on CSN Chicago Plus (check local listings!) and Prime in LA. Here is the complete MLB.com Mediacenter for today.
Baseball-reference.com game preview
Please visit our SB Nation Dodgers site True Blue LA.
Today's first pitch thread will be up at 9 pm CDT, and the overflows will post at 10:15 pm, 11:15 pm and midnight pm CDT.
Discuss amongst yourselves.