Through yesterday's games, only five complete games had been pitched in the National League in 2008 -- the CG may, at some point, become a thing of the past. (In 2007, three teams -- Washington, Texas, and Florida -- had zero CG, the first time any team had gone through a whole season without one.)

You know that Carlos Zambrano wanted to finish tonight's 3-0 Cub shutout of the Reds -- their second shutout of the year -- but it was left to Kerry Wood, who registered his fifth save of the year, and in easier fashion than many of his previous outings, including a real nasty slider to strike out Edwin Encarnacion for the second out of the 9th. And so, ten years to the day after Kid K's 20-K game, Kerry strikes out two of three in the 9th inning to get a save. Who'da thunk it?

I was out for a while tonight and while listening to the game on WGN radio, Pat and Ron (well, mostly Pat, since Ron had a cold and could barely talk) were commenting that Z didn't have very good velocity, had "hardly thrown a good fastball yet", Pat said in the third inning.

No matter. Z threw 113 pitches, 69 for strikes, and allowed only three harmless singles and three walks, and was never in serious trouble in this fairly swift game that ran only two hours and thirty minutes. In so doing he became the first Cub pitcher this season to go eight innings.

Meanwhile, ONEDEC, who finally managed to get off the bench and into the starting lineup (I'd give BCB credit, since we've been lobbying for this for several days now, but that would be pretty presumptuous. Let's just say Lou made the right call, and gave Mark DeRosa a day off to clear his head), drove in two runs with a single and played good defense. I think we'd all like to see him get more consistent playing time, and the same for Felix Pie, who had a single in four AB, his average creeping up to .232.

If I were making the lineup decision, I'd start ONEDEC again tomorrow, and give DeRo another day off, which would let him rest till Friday. Or, maybe tomorrow would be a good day to give Kosuke Fukudome a day off, since he went 0-for-3 today (and didn't look real good doing it), and let DeRo play RF.

While the Cubs haven't quite righted the ship yet (they're still only 4-8 since hitting the high-water mark for the year at 15-6), it is significant to note that they haven't lost more than two in a row yet this year, and this despite having less than consistent starting pitching. What this tells us, I think, is that they've been able to use multiple weapons to win games. Sometimes they do get good starting pitching. Other times the bullpen holds the opposition down till the offense gets going. Still other times, the offense bludgeons the other side. And sometimes they just get lucky.

All of those things are elements of building a championship team. The Cubs, clearly, are not yet there, and they probably need to change or add some parts, depending on how certain players perform over the next couple of months. But at 19-14, win tomorrow afternoon and they'll have a .500 road trip (yet another mantra of winning: win 2/3 of your games at home, play .500 on the road, and you'll win your division easily), and come home Friday to what shapes up as a terrific matchup with the hottest team in baseball, the Diamondbacks.

Last night BCB reader Unique challenged me to write a recap in the evening if the Cubs came back to win. They didn't, so I didn't. But with the quick win tonight, and a day game tomorrow, I figured I'd take care of this one while it was still fresh. Nicely done, men in blue. See you all tomorrow.

Just win, baby.

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Ten years ago today, Kerry Wood tied the major league record for K's in a single game by striking out 20 Astros and shutting them out 2-0 on one hit with no walks. It is arguably the most dominating single-game pitching performance in baseball history.

Bruce Miles has today written a personal memoir of the 20-K game, including some details I had not heard before:

On his first pitch of the game, Wood hit home-plate umpire Jerry Meals in the face mask. It was a ball that catcher Sandy Martinez couldn't quite reach. With Wood having uncorked that pitch, it's difficult to believe he didn't walk a single batter that day.

"First pitch," Wood said as he leaned against his clubhouse folding chair and chuckled. "I threw a fastball. Sandy didn't get it; it just barely nicked his glove, and it hit him in the mask. First pitch of the game."

I asked Wood if he ever talked with Meals about that pitch.

"No, but I remember kind of thinking, 'That's probably not the way I want to start the game off, hitting the umpire in the face with the first pitch,'" he said. "When you see it later on, when you see it on the replay, it's, 'Oh, yeah, I forgot about that.' It was kind of funny."

"I think I've met everybody at the game," Wood said facetiously. "I've probably met about 26,000 of them. I've met all of them. Every last one."

I know he's kidding, but I was there, sitting through the drizzle that lasted a couple of innings and the excitement you could feel in the crowd. I've never met Kerry Wood. Someday, I'd like to, if only to thank him for this memorable day and for his classiness as a major league player. Who would have guessed that ten years later, he'd be closing for the Cubs?

I hope he closes out tonight's game by striking out the side.

Today's Starting Pitchers

C. Zambrano Cubs vs. A. Harang Reds 4-1 W-L 1-4 2.11 ERA 2.98 35 SO 41 11 BB 11 3 HR 5 vs. Cin -- vs. Cubs

I'm opening this game thread early because you guys have been real chatty in the recap thread from last night's game and with over 300 comments at 1 pm CDT, it's likely to start running slow.

This is a matchup you don't often see these days -- ace vs. ace. Z has been outstanding this year, and has already beaten the Reds once, throwing 7 strong innings on April 16. And the day before that, the Cubs beat up on Harang, with D-Lee and Mark DeRosa homering off him. That was Lee's 5th career HR off Harang; he's 13-for-38 (.342) lifetime against him.

The Reds usually hit Z pretty well, especially Dunn (6 career HR) and Griffey (.364/.447/.697). Dunn homered in the April 16 game, but off Kevin Hart. If Z keeps the ball down as he has been this year, the Cubs will break their two-game losing streak.

Today's game is on cable in Chicago and Cincinnati and at theMLB.com Mediacenter.

MLB.com Gameday (2007 version)

MLB.com Gameday (2008 version)

Baseball-reference.com game preview

Today's overflow comment thread will post at 7:45 pm CT.

Discuss amongst yourselves.