6/8 Cubs (Marquis) @ Dodgers (Penny), 7:05 PM, ESPN

[JonnyRed]

In bizarro world, Carlos Zambrano falls apart horribly, but Jason Marquis is there to pick up the pieces.

 

In all seriousness, its nice to see a winning road series with little to no production from Lee, Ramirez, and Soto, the keys to our early season success. Needless to say, Id much rather see them produce and not have to bite my nails to the bone.

 

Z actually had some help blowing the game yesterday--or I should say lack of help in the field. But you're correct about Marquis, very nice job tonight. Could he be turning the corner?

[Fred Hornkohl]

you and all your stats...you got a remedy for sore feet?

Yeah ! Sit more, and stand less.

 

CUBS are 1-0 when Yeti has sore feet.

 

 

Go CUBS !!

[Magnetic Curses]

love me some sham closer.

[Yeti]

you and all your stats...you got a remedy for sore feet?

Yeah ! Sit more, and stand less.

i tried that...hell, i bet i only been on my feet for aBOUT an hour today...im gonna try breathing less and drinking more :wink:

[Little Slide Rooter]

In bizarro world, Carlos Zambrano falls apart horribly, but Jason Marquis is there to pick up the pieces.

 

In all seriousness, its nice to see a winning road series with little to no production from Lee, Ramirez, and Soto, the keys to our early season success. Needless to say, Id much rather see them produce and not have to bite my nails to the bone.

 

Z actually had some help blowing the game yesterday--or I should say lack of help in the field. But you're correct about Marquis, very nice job tonight. Could he be turning the corner?

 

I dont know about turning any corners. Id be willing to accept a few more decent starts before he traditionally becomes completely worthless come July.

[CubColtPacer]

In bizarro world, Carlos Zambrano falls apart horribly, but Jason Marquis is there to pick up the pieces.

 

In all seriousness, its nice to see a winning road series with little to no production from Lee, Ramirez, and Soto, the keys to our early season success. Needless to say, Id much rather see them produce and not have to bite my nails to the bone.

 

Z actually had some help blowing the game yesterday--or I should say lack of help in the field. But you're correct about Marquis, very nice job tonight. Could he be turning the corner?

 

I doubt he's turning the corner. He'll spray a few of these here and there throughout the season. Now if he can keep throwing strikes, he can be an average starter once again this season like he was last year (he should be very close to that average starter mark after this game). He'll still have plenty of his 5 2/3, 3-4 run starts where he looks pretty bad, but I really thought that the one thing ESPN got right (probably because they got it straight from Lou) is that the key to Marquis is for him to be aggressive. He's been trying to nibble all season, and it's caused him to get behind in counts, which has forced him to come in and throw easy pitches to kill.

 

If we can get a 4.75 ERA or better out of him this season (he has a 4.54 right now), I'll be satisfied with him. To do that, he needs to continue to go right at hitters for at least a majority of the starts, because that disaster start that he hasn't really had yet is going to come at some point. So he needs to have more good starts to counterbalance that.

[Fred Hornkohl]

you and all your stats...you got a remedy for sore feet?

Yeah ! Sit more, and stand less.

i tried that...hell, i bet i only been on my feet for aBOUT an hour today...im gonna try breathing less and drinking more :wink:

Lemme see.... breathing less, drinkin' more..... well..... that breathin' less part kinda worries me. :wink:

[Yeti]

you and all your stats...you got a remedy for sore feet?

Yeah ! Sit more, and stand less.

i tried that...hell, i bet i only been on my feet for aBOUT an hour today...im gonna try breathing less and drinking more :wink:

Lemme see.... breathing less, drinkin' more..... well..... that breathin' less part kinda worries me. :wink:

ok ok, i'll keep breathing at the same rate...but my neighborhood bar is calling my name...i bet if i drink enuff, the pain will go away

[Old Style]

Marquis didn't suck tonight! :clapping:

[gflore34]

Beyond the Cubs winning and Wood overmatching the Dodgers, my favorite part of the game was Ramirez forcing Pierre at 3B in the 8th.

[Slugger_16]

Nice game!

[Fred Hornkohl]

you and all your stats...you got a remedy for sore feet?

Yeah ! Sit more, and stand less.

i tried that...hell, i bet i only been on my feet for aBOUT an hour today...im gonna try breathing less and drinking more :wink:

Lemme see.... breathing less, drinkin' more..... well..... that breathin' less part kinda worries me. :wink:

ok ok, i'll keep breathing at the same rate...but my neighborhood bar is calling my name...i bet if i drink enuff, the pain will go away

I don't think I'll take you up on that one.... sounds like a sucker's bet to me !! :wink:

[erik316wttn]

man when he is throwing strikes, he might have the best stuff of anyone in the game.

 

Might?

 

If I could choose any pitcher in baseball to pitch in relief for me, and I knew I'd be guaranteed their "A" stuff, I'd pick Kerry Wood without much thought. When he's on, he's better than everyone else.

[BigSlick]

The only thing seperating Marquis from being a league average starter is his inability to consistently get ahead of hitters

 

Today you'll notice how instead of getting in 2-0, 3-1, 2-1 counts he typically got ahead of the hitter 1-2, with a couple 0-2's in there.

[chuckywang]

Do the Cubs have the nastiest back end of a bullpen in all of baseball? I'm talking in terms of ability to miss bats and just blow batters away.

 

Yes. yes we do. While Wood may not be the best closer in the game, the 1-2 combination is the best there is.

 

Broxton/Saito is pretty nasty.

[BCVM22]

Broxton/Saito is pretty nasty.

 

Broxton alone has the ability to eat just about any reliever currently in the majors.

[splintersag]

Haha, I don't know if this is a coincedence or if ESPN has some people from NSBB working for them, but the replay of this game is on ESPN2 and a commercial just came on for ShamWow.

[sweetpeteman]

40 Wins people!

 

Last year it took until July 1st to get to 40 wins (also got to .500)

 

06/08/2007: 27 wins

06/08/2003: 34 wins

 

Its also the first time the Cubs have ever had 40 wins as early as June 8 (The closest was in 98 when they had 38).

[Soul]

The only thing seperating Marquis from being a league average starter is his inability to consistently get ahead of hitters

 

Today you'll notice how instead of getting in 2-0, 3-1, 2-1 counts he typically got ahead of the hitter 1-2, with a couple 0-2's in there.

 

Which is probably why Lou goes crazy on him when he starts getting behind every hitter.

 

He was good last night. I'm not getting my hopes up that he will do it consistently though, because he's shown that he can't.

[Fred Hornkohl]

40 Wins people!

 

Last year it took until July 1st to get to 40 wins (also got to .500)

 

06/08/2007: 27 wins

06/08/2003: 34 wins

 

Its also the first time the Cubs have ever had 40 wins as early as June 8 (The closest was in 98 when they had 38).

 

The '69 CUBS were 40-18 on 14 June 69.... but the season didn't start until 08 April back then

The '34 CUBS were 40-26 on 26 June 34.... season started on 17 April

The '29 CUBS were 40-23 on 27 June 29.... season started on 16 April

The '18 CUBS were 40-17 on 26 June 18.... season started on 16 April

The '10 CUBS were 40-23 on 03 July 10.... season started on 14 April

The '09 CUBS were 40-23 on 03 July 09.... season started on 14 April

The '08 CUBS were 40-25 on 04 July 08.... season started on 14 April

The '07 CUBS were 40-11 on 18 June 07.... season started on 11 April

The '06 CUBS were 40-18 on 19 June 06.... season started on 12 April.... (this team won 116 games)

 

The point stands.... it's been a hell of a long time since the CUBS were this good this early.