A 40% chance of rain, it says. It'd be nice if all 40 of those percentage points held off till after the game.
Kerry Wood is ready and might be activated today; here's the only reason it might not happen:
The million-dollar question now becomes whom the Cubs will pay $1 million to take left-hander Scott Eyre in a waiver trade for a prospect -- the Boston Red Sox or Tampa Bay Rays, or even the Philadelphia Phillies or New York Yankees?
Or will they be forced to make an in-house roster move they don't want to make, such as optioning left-hander Sean Marshall to Class AAA Iowa?
In any case, he won't go back to closing immediately:
[Lou] Piniella said Wood will make at least one middle relief appearance — a "tuneup," he said — to make sure there are no complications from the blister. It's a caution the Cubs manager feels he can afford with Carlos Marmol, Bob Howry and Jeff Samardzija available to close.Marmol and Samardzija, fine. Howry, not so much.
Finally, the Cubs want the Friday and Saturday night game ban lifted, but:"It might benefit the Cubs, but I don't think it would benefit the community. The challenge of bringing 40,000 people into the neighborhood is a burden on the community," said Ald. Tom Tunney (44th).
"We're at capacity on Friday and Saturday evenings. There's enough activity with the neighborhood restaurants and bars without the Cubs having night games. There might be unneeded extra activity at a time when those businesses are pretty full."
While this is true, I think the city and the team could make a compromise based on the baseball schedule each year, to allow the Cubs maybe one or two Fridays when they are returning home late from a road trip (as from Milwaukee last week, or Tampa in June).
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Note: as has been the case since the trade, the above line shows Rich Harden's numbers only with the Cubs; the pitcher box above that shows his combined totals with the Cubs and A's.
Wandy Rodriguez threw a nice game vs. the Cubs on July 19 in Houston, but his career ERA in Wrigley Field is 7.58. Lou decided to play matchups in resting D-Lee and Ryan Theriot last night -- both of them hit Rodriguez well (Lee: 8-for-19, 2 doubles, 2 HR, .421/.520/.842; Theriot: 8-for-14, a double, a HR, .571/.571/1.000).
Rich Harden has never faced the Astros, and the only one of their current lineup who has had any success against him from his AL days is Carlos Lee (3-for-9, one triple). Harden's combined total of 131 strikeouts ranks 13th in the majors, despite the fact that he has five fewer starts than anyone ahead of him.
Today's game is on cable in Chicago and Houston; check EI for the channel in your area if you have it. Also see the MLB.com Mediacenter.
Baseball-reference.com game preview
Once again, a reminder that you can find the overflow comment threads, including the first pitch thread, on the right sidebar of both the front page and any interior page in the box headed "RECENT STORIES IN GAME THREADS". Today's first pitch thread posts at 1:15 CT, and the overflow comment threads will post at 2:15, 3:15 and 3:45 pm CT.
Discuss amongst yourselves.