Little Slide Rooter

yup. someone needs to wake up that locker room, they just look like they are sleep walking right now. The time has come for a grown man to yell at a locker room full of other grown men.

This is where the mental magic of Joe Maddon comes in. These are still the same guys they were from April-September, so there's no reason to expect them to stay down.

http://i.imgur.com/BDn8iAT.gif Seriously though, that would be nice for any Cub to be a star with the bat tonight, especially for Heyward. Yeah, Heyward's looked too sad and too confused at the plate for too long to expect any offense out of him. Anyone else though.

Speaking of silly superstitions, whatever happened to the fail-safe NSBB game-thread guru? Don't recall his name, but he didn't post much, other than starting the occ. game thread when we really needed a win? Because this would be a good time for him to resurface.

LOL, everyone knows that Gpmza:ez spells his name with a colon, not a semi-colon.

But it has to be a Billy Goat. And the goat must be an equally consenting party. Goat rape would only make matters worse.

horsefeathers goats and curses. You're a mental midget if you believe in such nonesense And I don't. But if there were such a thing, this would be the time to embrace these glorious, majestic creatures.

I'm generally not at all superstitious. But if I was, I wouldn't be antagonizing the spirit of the goat, I'd be embracing it. I'd also recommend that every active poster here were to change their avatar to a billy goat. I have a good feeling about it. Just do it.

Here's a thought: -After Lackey pitches tonight, drop him for a spare RH bat, Candelerio or Scissors being the only options. -If we reach the WS, drop the least effective bench bat for Smith or Cahill. Then when Lackey's spot comes up, replace the least effective reliever with Hammel.

Until the Dodgers get on base; then they won't be able to reach the razors fast enough. But seriously, folks need stop trying to spin their own anxiety into a logical thought process. You knew October wasn't going to be a cake walk. We're not the 2005 White Sox, who somehow managed to defy all baseball logic. We might not win this game, but I have little doubt that we're going to take this back to Wrigley. And when we get there, we're going to run into Clayton Kershaw. Buckle up, bitches.

Taking the field: Soler LF/Fowler CF/Heyward RF Rizzo 1B/Zobrist 2B/Baez SS/Bryant 3B Contreras C Lineup: Fowler Baez Bryant Bryant wearing Rizzo's jersey Contreras Bryant in blackface wearing Heyward's jersey Bryant in gingerface wearing Zobrists jersey Soler Lackey

Quit freaking out? Perish the thought and heaven forbid. Take a short hiatus from freaking out? Time will tell.

You are smart. Why is it such a bad idea when the dodgers are a completely different team against LHP? They are like the 95 Indians against righties and the....206 NLCS Cubs against lefties. Ok maybe that's a liiitle bit extreme but I don't trust us to win 3 of 4 games when 3 of the games will be started by right handed pitching. It's a bit of a gamble because of the 3 days but I feel better knowing Lester is going 2 more times. He's had a really light work load lately. Now you respond with 500 reasons why my thinking is all wrong and change my mind Because Jon Lester is not Jon Lester on 3 days rest, and Jon Lester is especially not Jon Lester when you start him back to back on 3 days rest. It's especially because of the latter that you don't do it, because you either start Lester doing his best Lackey equivalent in Game 7, or you have a need to start Lackey anyway prior to that point. No, on 3 days rest, Jon Lester is not Jon Lester. On 3 days rest, Jon Lester is actually Gary Heffernan, and he sells supplemental medical insurance policies out of the trunk of his '97 Malibu. Times is hard for Jon Lester when he's Gary Heffernan. You see, the hand to mouth lifestyle of a cold-calling insurance salesman is a far cry from the lavish one of a major league pitcher, much less a star one. But Gary manages to get by, though he secretly hopes that Joe Maddon doesn't start him on 3 days rest, so that he can be Jon Lester.

Down 2-1 and 4-0 are two very, very different scenarios. Board up the windows, padlock the knife drawer and medicine cabinet and go to sleep. For tomorrow, we win.

So Hawk4Hall gets a bit carried away in the heat of the moment and is quickly chased away, yet Formerly Poster X here's been all out trolling for the better part of 48 hours and it's all good?

So Hawk4Hall gets a bit carried away in the heat of the moment and is quickly chased away, yet Formerly Poster X here's been all out trolling for the better part of 48 hours and it's all good?

and Hendricks and Arrieta and Lackey keep getting smoked. When did Hendricks get smoked? That night Geovany Soto came to visit.

Rich Hill may be going through his magical R.A. Dickey phase, but I'm not about to put him in the same boat as Clayton Kershaw. I'm starting to feel like it's not about the pitching but just our entire lineup for the most part being in a horrible slump or for some other reason just sucking. I mean, we got dominated by Matt Moore, too, just as much as the really good pitchers. Pretty much every starter has been good against us, and we couldn't even bash Shark that much despite a good start to that game. Pretty much. But IMHO, what it comes down to is Rizzo. You can't have a cog that's been that important all season long just shut down and expect the machine to run smoothly, if at all. I mean Heyward's been useless all year, Zobrist hasn't been much bwtter since the ASB, and Russell and Fowler have been streaky, though when they're on, they're ON. Bryzzo is the heart and soul of this team, and the zzo part is broken.

Two of them started by pitchers we absolutely cannot touch. And that is best case scenario. Rich Hill may be going through his magical R.A. Dickey phase, but I'm not about to put him in the same boat as Clayton Kershaw.

We'll still have the 1960s expansion have-nots. Jesus guys, even if we lose, last time I checked you have to win 4 in the NLCS times to get to the WS. Not twice. The doom vibe is a touch out of control here.

I don't. It will get even more annoying if we are the very last team that hasn't won in forever. I mean, 1948 isn't as long as 1908 but it's still really long. We'll still have the 1960s expansion have-nots.

How quickly Jake has become the reliable 4-5 starter we'd hoped he could become when we acquired him.

I audibly gasped when it came off the bat, then the camera angle was still nearly in the infield and I realized he backspinned the bejeezus out of it. I can't be the only one who's noticed that the cameras have done that with every ball hit into the air all postseason. And really, it's by design.

Fowler CF Baez 2B Bryant 3B Rizzo 1B Contreras C Zobrist RF Soler LF Russell SS Should be enough to send any LHP not names Kershaw into the fetal position. And if Jake falters early, Wood or Montgomery can take on some innings vs. the lefty heavy lineup that Roberts is sure to send out.

Hitting home runs in the 8th and 9th counts just as much as hitting them in the 2nd and 3rd. Arrieta had a good start in SF, has done well against this Dodger team, and to reiterate, the Dodgers have not hit for crap thus far in the series. that's awesome. we're hitting something like .190 in the playoffs so far, but thank god roberts decided to walk heyward and coghlan last night and the guy who's so crippled he almost didn't make the roster hit a bomb With a max of 12 games left to play, cumulative stats be damned. Anybody is capable of getting red hot at any moment, and in case you hadn't noticed, we've got a lot of guys who are capable of doing just that. If the 2015 team was Chester Copperpot, these guys are the horsefeathering Goonies.