Nothing warms the hearts of Cubs fans more than a record 500 in August and when combined with a White Sox team so deep in the basement that they squint when they see daylight it makes summer days happy. . But coming into August above 500 and playing not only well but also great leads a Cubs fan into a rarefied atmosphere. Most years are over at this point in the season and we bask in our memories of the years when it wasn’t, the years that held so much promise for us that they never came to be.
One of my favorites was the 1989 Cubs, patched together with veterans and stars, but whose heroes tended to be rookies you’d never heard of before. The team played with heart and emotion once they came back from a 9-nil deficit. Although they didn’t win it all, they showed me that it could happen, that the impossible was possible. That when a team comes together and plays as a team, not only do they win more and play better, but the team members perform better.
Don Zimmer called them a special team and explained that during spring training they eliminated players not because of what they did on the field but because of what they did in the clubhouse. Does that ring a bell, fellow Cubs fans?
This year’s team reminds me a lot of that roller coaster team in 1989, if that team was the roller coaster this team is the O boys. Soriono, Zambrono, Fontenot, Theriot, Marmol, DeRosa and the most important O of all, Lou. It takes a special kind of baseball man to take on the job of Cubs manager, a Herculean task that many have attempted and none have yet succeeded in, to untie the Gordian knot of a championship. To take on the best of the National League, as well as the fickle winds of Wrigley.
Lou Pinnella seems to have it all right, in the recent series against the Giants with the Cubs tied 2-2, the Giants were threatening a man at third. Lou called a pitchout correctly smelling a squeeze, leaving the runner on third a dead duck. Lou won that game as sure as if he had thrown it himself. How many times have you seen hard-hit balls hit Cubs players directly? That’s good training.
Last week against St. Louis pitcher Adam Wainwright, the Cubs looked like the Cubs from April with just one hit through the first three innings with six strikeouts. Someone on the Cubs bench noticed something because the second time in order 5 runs on 8 more hits. Giving Wainwright his first loss since June 30, if he had been a 3-run homer, you could say he maybe he made a mistake with a pitch, but this rally was made up of singles and doubles, all with 2 out.
The team that started the season as cold as grandma’s toes but made up for lost time with late-inning heroics. Perhaps the coldness of the beginning of the season, which caused so much frustration not only among the fans but also among the players, was a good thing. The team was well aware that they were much better than they were hitting and Zambrano wasn’t pitching to his potential. Now the long balls are starting to come with Sorriano and Derrick Lee hitting them in groups along with Aramas Ramirez playing a defensive third baseman who matches his offensive prowess with a .552 slugging percentage and MVP potential.
In the middle are Theriot and Fontenot, most teams would be grateful just for a rookie phenom who plays every day. But these guys don’t play like rookies, they play like champions. Both from LSU’s College World Series champion team brought their awesomeness to town with them. Theriot’s fine play earned him the shortstop job every day when June Fontenot came in swinging, batting over .400. Everyone said she couldn’t keep up that pace and now she had cooled down to the human realm of .309 with a .463 slugging percentage with 46 hits in 43 games. Theriot with 88 hits in 92 games plus 32 walks and 18 stolen bases, not bad for a couple of rookies huh? It’s like finding oil and gold at the same time, you just don’t know which one is worth more.
Mark DeRosa has been a one-man bank and one-man wrecking crew. Him doing all the jobs that have been asked of him, except for selling peanuts and singing the national anthem. Averaging .300 and headed for a 100-RBI season with 28 of his 88 hits going for extra-base hits. Lou should sleep well with problems like where to play DeRosa, if only he could catch! Now, with Angel Pagan and Jacque Jones starting to hit, it gets really interesting. After a rough introduction, Jason Kendall is starting to hit as advertised, making the already formidable Cubs lineup that much tougher.
But a good pitch stops a good hit and vice versa, right? Big Z has a date with Cy Young if the numbers keep up, can a pitcher win the Cy Young Award and be player of the year again in one season? Big Z turned it around in a big way and seems to be throwing better with every outing. But Zambrano isn’t alone, of the Cubs’ five starters, only Jason Marquis has an ERA higher than 4. Ted Lilly (11-4) has pitched 132 innings, allowing just 32 walks against 108 strikeouts or averaging two walks per play. Rich Hill has thrown much better than his 6-6 record would indicate.
The bullpen begs the question, are they so good because they get so many innings out of starters or are they so good? They’re that good to me, especially when I see Cub bats pummeling other bullpens. I think Will Ohman is the most underappreciated pitcher on the staff, he has the worst middle relief job. He rarely gets the win, he can’t get the save, but he’s the guy that comes in with guys on base and tries to stem the tide. When he succeeds, he forgets, but when he fails, it’s all his fault. Yes, he gave up a home run to Barry Bonds, but he also lined him up last night in the same situation. Hundreds of pitchers have given up home runs to Barry Bonds. Ohman does his job and does it well.
Carlos Mármol has become a pitching machine allowing only 7 earned runs in 32 innings and giving 16 walks while allowing only 2 home runs. He quickly became one of the leading closers in the game and then the Cubs have Ryan Demster behind him, allowing only one home run in 32 innings. So the question in late innings for opposing hitters has become, “What are you going to do after the game?”
The O Boys have been a lot of fun so far and if they continue to play to their full potential they will provide us all with a lot of fun until October. Wildcard? Don’t be silly, this team won’t win with any wild cards. The way they play today, they’re the class act of the National League, they’ve got the division winner written all over them. But I’ve been a Cubs fan my whole life, I know having the best players on a Cubs team isn’t always enough. But my fingers are crossed that I know the O word that scares me and every other Cub fan, the most dreaded O word in the vocabulary, Oh no.
But I think this team can do it, they have the brawn and the brains, the pitching and the hitting, the power and the speed and the ability to end global warming in our lifetime. Because if these Cubs can go all the way and win the World Championship, hell will surely freeze over. I and millions of other Cubs fans can live the rest of our lives rejoicing in the fact that we live to see the day. But I won’t get too anxious just yet, not until day 27 of the championship game, but in the meantime, oh boy! This is fun!