Chicago Cubs vs. Milwaukee Brewers Preview, Saturday 5/12, 12:05 CT

Yawn.

Did you stay up to watch the end of Friday night's game? If so, you're probably as tired as the Cubs and Brewers are today. I wouldn't be surprised to see a fairly quick, 1-0 game this afternoon. (Hopefully, with the Cubs scoring the "1".)

First things first: Carlos Marmol is likely headed to the DL:

Marmol was diagnosed with a strained right hamstring and will head back to Chicago for an MRI on Saturday.

"There is a chance we are going to have (to) DL him," Cubs manager Dale Sveum said.

More than a chance; it's happening:

Cubs call up Casey Coleman to replace Marmol, who goes on the DL.

— Paul Sullivan (@PWSullivan) May 12, 2012

This is a bit of a surprise; I thought Scott Maine would be the guy recalled, since the Cubs could use another LHP in the bullpen and Maine did well when he was with the Cubs earlier this year.

Now, let's talk about Cubs pitchers' hitting. After having some pretty good-hitting pitchers over the last decade or so, Cubs pitchers have been atrocious at the plate this year. They have made 67 plate appearances. They have five sacrifice bunts, one walk (Paul Maholm), one HBP (Jeff Samardzija, as a PH) and are hitting .067 (4-for-60) with 28 strikeouts. Three of those hits are by pitchers now toiling at Iowa (two by Travis Wood, one by Randy Wells). The other one is a single by Matt Garza, who has a career batting mark of 7-for-89 (.079) with 62 (!) strikeouts.

I am a traditionalist, most of the time. But I cannot stand watching Cubs pitchers attempt to hit, particularly Garza, who looks like he's standing up there with his eyes closed, swinging when he hears the ball get close to the plate.

Beyond that, there's the move of the Astros to the AL in 2013, making year-round interleague play necessary, and a good argument to have the same rules in both leagues. Therefore: it's time for the DH to come to the National League.

There, I said it. If nothing else, it might make some use for the Cubs for the last two years of Alfonso Soriano's contract.

Cubs lineup:

DeJesus rf, Campana cf, Castro ss, LaHair 1b, Soriano lf, Stewart 3b, Soto c, Barney 2b, Volstad p

Brewers lineup:

Morgan cf, Lucroy c, Braun lf, Ramirez 3b, Hart rf, Ishikawa 1b, Maysonet 2b, Izturis ss, Marcum p

Today's Starting Pitchers

Chris Volstad Cubs vs. Shaun Marcum Brewers 0-4 W-L 1-1 6.55 ERA 3.41 21 SO 33 10 BB 14 2 HR 3 vs. Mil -- vs. Cubs

Chris Volstad threw five halfway-decent innings against the Brewers on April 9 at Wrigley Field, giving up three runs and striking out six. Decent, not great. Volstad has usually had one really bad inning in each of his starts and been OK otherwise. Rickie Weeks homered off him that night.

Shaun Marcum was Volstad's opponent in the April 9 game; Marcum threw one more inning than Volstad, also had six K's, and also allowed three runs. The Cubs' bullpen was the difference in the game, as it has been so many times this year. Cubs hitters one-upped the Brewers on home runs that night; both Bryan LaHair and Darwin Barney homered off Marcum.

Today's game is on Fox. Here's the coverage map for the three games Fox is covering this afternoon. They make a lot of assumptions that could very well be wrong -- such sending the Rangers/Angels game to the Detroit and Cleveland markets, just because they are AL cities. Guaranteed: there are more Cubs fans in Detroit and Cleveland than Rangers or Angels fans. Here is the complete MLB.com Mediacenter for today.

MLB.com Gameday

Baseball-reference.com game preview

SB Nation game preview

Please visit our SB Nation Brewers site Brew Crew Ball. As always, be careful over there.

Today's first pitch thread will post at 1:05 p.m. CDT and the overflows at 1:05, 2:05 and 2:50 p.m. CDT. If you need more overflows due to extra innings, post them in the fanshot section.

Discuss amongst yourselves.