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That might be what he's doing here. Pitch him 3 innings in preparation for a possible start on Sunday.

The main thing the Cubs need to do on offense for the rest of this one is continue to work the count. Nunez (the pitcher right now) is going to be out for the series as soon as he leaves this game. You'd like to make them have even bigger bullpen issues for tomorrow by the end of the 2 games today, and getting another reliever or two into the day game today could be huge for that.

Brian Giles is not eligible to be traded. He did not clear waivers.

One run in 4 innings is great. I'll take that every time. Edit: What did DeRo do? A ground ball to the right side. Lee dove and it went past him. DeRosa dove into short right field, got the ball, and threw it to a covering Marquis just before the runner got there.

The Braves turned the lights on when the Braves were batting last inning. Joe West stopped the game and made them turn it off (the lights can only come on at the start of an inning). Then at the beginning of the inning, West delayed the game again while they waited to turn them on. Cox from the bench apparently said something that West didn't like about the delay, and West threw him out from where he was standing close to the pitcher's mound.

Once again, he pitched himself into trouble with McCann by trying to throw 3 consecutive changeups in the dirt. McCann fouled two of them off, then took ball 3. Marquis can't waste the 2-2 pitch. His control isn't good enough, and if McCann had kept the bat on his shoulder on the 3-2 pitch it would be a 4-1 score right now.

I don't mind that pitch to Chipper, but that's a problem with Marquis when he gets to 2 strikes. He's afraid of giving up basehits on 2 strike pitches, so he tries to strike people out on pitches outside the zone. His stuff isn't good enough for it. He should continue to concentrate on pitching to the bottom and edges of the zone. If they get basehits on pitchers strikes or balls just outside the zone, then they do. But you can't waste pitches outside the zone.

With an off day on Monday, I really doubt that they're going to option anybody. You don't want to lose the services of Marshall or Samardzija (who are two of the 3 candidates to start on Sunday) for 10 days just to get bullpen relief for 4 days. I think they'll just go with what they've got and extend Lilly/Z/Dempster deeper into the ballgame. They will all be on 5 days of rest before this start, and will have 5 and possibly 6 days of rest after as well. The bullpen will be tired, but I don't think it will be a huge deal.

What's weird? The fact that double headers are swept like 49% of the time. The fact that it's so far from 50 percent, or so close? I think it's about where it should be. It shows that it's slightly harder to win a doubleheader than to win 2 in a row, but not as much as conventional wisdom would believe. Well, before any games are played (or coins are flipped) the odds of a 50/50 (which these games more or less are) going the same way twice in a row are 1/4 or 25%. ...and now that's causing me to confuse the hell out of myself trying to figure this out. It's 48% for either team to sweep. Think of it as 24% chance Braves sweep, 24% Cubs sweep. 52% split. Over the course of baseball history then, that 2% becomes indicative of something, correct? Psychological letdown after winning game 1 of the DH? More likely what others have said. Teams tend to put out bad lineups for 1 game of a DH in order to rest players, which they wouldn't do as much if they were playing on different days. Plus, the winning team in game 1 if it's close has an inherent disadvantage in game 2 because they already used many of their good bullpen pitchers earlier in the day in order to nail the game down.

dude, why is it so hard to believe that the brewers will win the division? it's august and they're going to be 3 games out. it's not like i'm predicting that the pirates are going to win the division. i don't get why that's so unbelievable. Because the Cubs are clearly the better team and it makes no sense for someone to be sure that the worse team that's 3 games behind is going to prevail? Sure, it can happen, but it would definitely be an upset. so, when my prediction comes true, it'll just be a fluke? sheets and sabbathia are like automatic wins right now. that's 2 for sure victories every 5 games. Ben Sheets in his last 8 starts (actual runs, not earned runs, since we're talking about how the team might do in his starts): 7 IP, 5 R 5 2/3 IP, 1 R 6 IP, 3 R 5 IP, 4 R 7 IP, 3 R 5 1/3 IP, 6 R 6 IP, 3 R 9 IP, 0 R The Brewers are 4-4 in his last 8 starts, including 1-2 in his last 3 starts. That doesn't scream automatic win.

The color gym sorta hinted at that. LOL, so this is extremely fishy now. Here's the quote: So let me get this straight. All they have to send is their own passport? What about checking the records of the newspapers that reported the age @ 14? BTW, doesn't matter anyway because the USA girls are pretty much nuking themselves. But still. The problem is that the newspapers don't have any proof. You can check the passport, birth certificate, anything you want. Anytime you have a government that can change documents at will like that and convince its people to keep up that deception, there's nothing the international community can do.

Remember those Murton for Byrd rumors??? :lol: Remember when we thought we'd be getting ripped off on the deal? :( I looked up Byrd's numbers a few weeks ago. He wasn't very good then. It's amazing what a few good weeks can do for a part-time player. Just looked it up again. On July 23rd, he had a .707 OPS. Going into the game tonight, it was .838. That's thanks to a .474/.556/.773 line so far in August. 5 for 5 tonight is probably going to drive that total OPS up near .860 or .865. Wow.

I probably agree with you that Lou's tirade had little to do with turning the season around, but Aramis's walkoff against Milwaukee was an extension of better play, not a catalyst. After Lou's tirade and before Aramis's walkoff, the Cubs: won 1 against Atlanta won 2 out of 3 at Milwaukee won 2 out of 4 against Atlanta (probably could have been 3 out of 4 if Lilly hadn't been thrown out in the first inning) won 1 out of 1 against Houston won 2 out of 3 against Seattle won 1 out of 3 against San Diego (Lee-Young-Zambrano-Branyan was the Saturday game of this series) won 1 out of 3 against Texas won 3 out of 3 against the White Sox won 3 out of 3 against Colorado won 1st one against Milwaukee (Aramis walkoff shot). Record before that stretch: 22-31. Record during that stretch: 17-8. Record after that stretch: 46-38 That 4 week stretch was tied for the best 4 weeks the Cubs had all year, and could have been even better if they weren't getting into fights seemingly every weekend. The Aramis walkoff only continued to fuel the fire for another 4 weeks. The walkoff wasn't really a turning point for the Cubs season though, other then the fact that it's when the improved play really started to make a difference in the division race as the Brewers started to collapse.

Most of the current Braves have very little history against Marquis. Andruw Jones killed him, but he's moved on. Chipper has hit 3 home runs against him in only 6 at-bats. Overall though, there's no real idea if this Braves squad is a bad matchup for him.

Against Ryan O'Malley no less. O'Malley's numbers are strange. Very low home run rate, low walk rate, decent strikeout rate, and giving up a .398 BABIP so far this year.

That's a good point. In fact, this is the only day of these 6 games in which a rainout would have caused this problem. But I do think Marshall will have to go on Sunday, unless they decide to pitch Marquis on 3 days rest.

What's weird? The fact that double headers are swept like 49% of the time. The fact that it's so far from 50 percent, or so close? I think it's about where it should be. It shows that it's slightly harder to win a doubleheader than to win 2 in a row, but not as much as conventional wisdom would believe.

Just watching the boxing. At the end of a third round here, the guy in red moves in on the guy in blue. The guy in blue tries to turn and simply held up his hands to protect himself while the guy in red got a blow or two in. No punches were thrown by the guy in blue. A point was added for the guy in blue right before the end of the round.

What's weird?

It's a combination of 2 things. 1) The Cubs lead the overall series. It's much harder to ignore a team when they've beaten you more than you have them. 2) The biggest reason the Cubs lead the overall series is that the rivalry had been going strong for 60 years before the Cubs really started to slip as a team. The rivalry by then is not likely to be dropped because children learn the rivalry from their fathers and continue to carry it on.

True, but even the second guessing doesn't really hold together as a reasonable thing for the Cubs to have done: For the Cubs to have a successful Hamilton..they would have to do all of the above: draft Hamilton and plan to keep him on the roster despite Hamilton having 50 AB's in the minors in the past 4 years combined not sign Cliff Floyd (Floyd was the only backup OF to start the 2007 season). Get enough PT (which was possible once Soriano got hurt that year and moved back to LF-but that's definitely hindsight and wasn't really that reasonable before the 2007 season started). That doesn't even get into the fact that the Reds had connections to Hamilton's past which helped him to stay clean and for them to feel better about taking a risk on him, or that even with a little PT and success there would be no guarantee that Hamilton wouldn't have been pushed out of the lineup because of his first slump. I doubt this would have even been an issue if say the Dodgers had been the one to trade the Reds the pick. But since Hamilton was Cubs property for a very, very short time, many people like to blame the Cubs for not seeing Hamilton's talent. Really though, any team in the league could have had Hamilton very easily if they wanted him. The Reds were the one to take the risk, and this time, it worked out. That doesn't mean the Cubs (or the other teams who passed on Hamilton) did anything wrong.

I have no problem with Randy Winn as a bench bat this year. He's a somewhat versatile decent player, and the Cubs could use another one of those in the playoffs. The problem is next year. He's due to make 8.25 million. I don't think the upgrade this year is worth the salary next year.

I think Wood will be re-signed because of his loyalty to the Cubs. Exactly... plus would is no where near K Rod... Wood will probably get 4-5 Mil only. Wood is making 4.2 million this year. That's after he only pitched 2 months last year because of arm injuries, and was pretty effective but not great when he returned. This year, all his numbers have gotten better. In addition to that, he's now a "closer" with 24 saves already which inflates his value. His only injury was not arm related, but was a blister. There's absolutely no way that he signs for so little. He'll easily get double that per year over a potential multi-year deal if not more. That's with incentives though, right? No. 4.2 million was his base salary that he got regardless. He then had incentives piled on top of that which could have made it closer to 8 million this year.

I think Wood will be re-signed because of his loyalty to the Cubs. Exactly... plus would is no where near K Rod... Wood will probably get 4-5 Mil only. Wood is making 4.2 million this year. That's after he only pitched 2 months last year because of arm injuries, and was pretty effective but not great when he returned. This year, all his numbers have gotten better. In addition to that, he's now a "closer" with 24 saves already which inflates his value. His only injury was not arm related, but was a blister. There's absolutely no way that he signs for so little. He'll easily get double that per year over a potential multi-year deal if not more.

I didn't think we'd get an answer to this question, but here it is: Valdosta, Georgia http://chicago.cubs.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20080807&content_id=3270063&vkey=news_chc&fext=.jsp&c_id=chc A couple good quotes from Eyre in there. Good luck to him, except when we possibly meet his team in the playoffs.