The Cubs offense got off to another slow start and the game was tied at 0 after 2 innings. That’s when Alfonso Soriano took over. He hit a solo home run in the 3rd, the first of 3 on the night. The Cubs added a run in the 4th, but Marquis gave it back. Soriano added another solo home run in the 5th that put the Cubs up 3-0. His next time up he hit a 3-run home run making it a 6-1 game.
None of his home runs were cheap. The Cubs had 2 other home runs as well. Mark DeRosa made it 9-1 in the 7th as he hit a line drive 3-run home run to CF. Jason Marquis hit a line drive home run to RF in the 8th.
Speaking of Marquis, he didn’t have great control though from reading through the comments, it sounds as though the strikezone was pretty shitty tonight. He pitched as well as he needed to and went into the 8th inning before being taken out for Jeff Samardzija. Marquis final line was 7.1 IP, 5 H, 2 ER, 5 BB, and 2 K. The Cubs led 11-1 at the time he was taken out. Samardzija hit the first batter he faced, which moved an inherited runner up to 2nd. Then he walked the next batter. He then got Patterson to ground easily to 1st base, but Lee made an error and 2 runs scored (one charged to Marquis). Then Paul Bako doubled home a couple other runs before Neal Cotts was brought into the game to get out of it.
The 11-1 lead became an 11-5 lead and the Cubs came to bat in the 9th inning. They’d add 3 more runs and turn it over, you’d think for the night, to Michael Wuertz who just sucks. Marmol was finally brought in after the bases were juiced and the first pitch he threw resulted in a grand slam. 14-9. Corey Patterson would single that inning, but that was the rest of it. The Cubs hung on to win 14-9.
The bats came alive in a big way. Soriano was 4-5 with 5 RBI and Derrek Lee was 4-6 with 3 RBI. The Cubs need more offense from Lee than they’d been getting and they need more from Aramis Ramirez as well.
Oh yeah, by the way, since a certain moron has told us that Koyie Hill is the greatest catcher on the planet and that CERA (Catcher’s ERA) is a good measure of their talent, and that small sample size is irrelevant and only an excuse for faggot statheads, this is interesting: Hill’s CERA in 2008 is 12.00 and the other “fantastic” stat for catcher’s, Wild Pitches plus Passed Balls per game. Hill’s WP+PB per game in 2008 is 1.5.
Great American Ballpark was packed with Cubs fans. I’ve been to several games in Cincinnati and I don’t think there have ever been as many Cubs fans as tonight.
1. pmayo — Sep 07, 2008 @ 03:03 AM
Marquis really stepped up last night. Good to see the offense come back to life, too.
The bullpen is becoming a concern.