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Thursday, March 28

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« Cubs Rout Angels, Win 12-1 White Sox: Rotation Lifts Team to .500 »

Cubs Mon Jun 21 2010

Talkin' Cubs Baseball

With the Cubs on their way to the Pacific Northwest its the perfect time to talk some Cubs baseball. As good as the Cubs looked yesterday they looked as equally bad the two previous days before that. In the first two games against the Angels they committed five errors. In the first game three of those errors resulted in the opposition scoring runs. Had they not made those errors they would've been looking at a walk-off win on Friday.

In the first two games of that series the Angels just flat out embarrassed the Cubs. They did everything right. They fielded the ball, moved runners into scoring position when it was necessary, all the little things that the Cubs should be doing, but are not. I don't understand how a team can be that bad fundamentally.

If you expect to win and be in contention you have to execute the fundamentals its just that simple. It doesn't matter whether it is little league, college ball or the pros if you don't do the little things right you're not going to be winning too often.

I'm sure there were scouts at this series taking notes on how to beat this team. Believe me that knowledge will spread quickly amongst the league. The encouraging thing is that the Cubs turned the table on the Angels yesterday issuing a 12-1 drubbing. As I talked about in the recap yesterday is this something insignificant or will this be the point we all look back and say that was the day they turned it around and everything began to click.

The talent on this team suggest at some point they can, but you watch them play and you wonder what is going through their heads sometimes. We're too far into the season to say its early and it is no longer early. So I'm going to go with the old adage that baseball is a marathon and not a sprint. As bad as the Cubs looked over the weekend, how do you think the Reds feel?

They are in first in the National League Central and they just got swept by a Seattle team that has the third worst win-loss record in the American League. By all accounts the Reds should've taken two of three or swept them, but that is baseball for you and that is why the game is played on the field, not just on paper. It would be the Cubs luck that they would have to face that very same Mariners team.

However, turnabout is fair play. Seattle swept the Reds, how about the Cubs sweep the Mariners. It'd be only right if that happened. One good piece of news to come out of this weekend is the potential return of All-Star third baseman Aramis Ramirez.

Ramirez spent the weekend with Single-A Peoria
. While the results don't exactly jump out at you, considering he went 1-for-6 overall during his rehab, but it is the fact that he is healthy and ready to go. There is no two ways about it this offense needs Ramirez in it, healthy and producing. Jeff Baker and Chad Tracy have done okay during his absence, but lets face facts here. Neither one of them is Aramis Ramirez, combined and on their best days they are nowhere near his level.

That doesn't mean they aren't capable of picking up the slack every once and awhile. Hopefully whatever was wrong with Ramirez is taken care of and he can get back to doing what he does best and thats driving runs and playing good defense at third

The Cubs start a stretch of 20 games in a row with no off days until the All-Star break. If Sundays game was the start of a winning streak it would be nice to see them win 15 out of the next 20. What they really need to do to is start winning series. You take two out of three from each one and before you know you're playing above .500. We'll find out Tuesday night in Seattle. Until then keep the faith and Go Cubs!

 
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