Tuesday, May 10, 2005

Out of hibernation

The Cubs' bats woke up from hibernation tonight, beating the Mets senseless 7-0. The pitching of Greg Maddux kept the pressure off the offense and really allowed them to rake today with 4 homers.

The offense was started off, by the true left fielder Jason Dubois, on a fielders choice to short scoring J Burn. Dubois also hit a homer in the 4th to left against the grain of the wind. C Pat's bat finally did something other than swinging at bad pitches and hit two dingers, one in the 3rd and the other in the 5th. Nefi continued his march to the all star game along with Derrek Lee by having a strong outing tonight tallying two hits and one stolen base. J Burn had a great game as well smacking one homer and a single.

Maddux really had his stuff today and boy was it nasty. Maddux struck out 10 batters in all and allowed 3 hits and 3 walks. Maddux was changing speeds on his pitches, keeping the hitters ahead of his pitches all night long. The movement on the ball was classic as he fooled batters again and again. He unraveled a bit in the 7th and worked himself into a bases loaded jam.

Dusty pulled him at the right time and M Dub came out to clean up the mess.

M Dub pitched a solid relief outing hopefully rolling his way into the favor of Dusty. M Dub was a bit off some times but none the less allowed no runs in 1 1/3 innings. Remmy, sans Billy Bob Thornton goatee, pitched a quick 9th inning and ended the game on a high note for the pitching staff.

I think tonight's game was a perfect opportunity to have 1R pitch in a situation that wasn't pressure packed and he couldn't screw up. Having a good solid outing in an easy situation would be good for 1R and would help to get his confidence up. Dusty wasted a great opportunity tonight to give 1R something he could feel good about.

I really wish that Dusty would stop his insane prejudice against young players and play Dubois out in left more than he plays THW. Dubois has played in half the games that THW has played in yet he has nearly twice the offensive output. In 16 games Dubois has hit 4 homers, 11 RBIs, scored 5 runs, and has a .286 BA. Compare that to THW's anemic numbers through 29 games. THW has hit 1 homer, 7 RBIs, scored 3 runs, and has a .211 BA. The number speak for themselves Dubois deserves the left field spot despite his bad defense which is no worse than oh say Moises Alou.

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