Opening Day, Again :April 8th-April 10th

At 21 years old, Carlos Zambrano, or Big Z as his teammates like to call him, still hasn't reached his full potential. You can see it's there and you have a feeling that one day, something is going to click and then he might become the type of pitcher you build your team around. This season just might be it for Z, as he shuts down the Expos for 6 innings on his way to victory number 2 on the season. Sure, it would have been nice to see him stay out there longer, but throwing 103 pitches through 6 innings is enough for me and that's why God created relievers. And the bullpen did it's job, holding the Expos to 1 baserunner over the next 3 innings to seal the 4-0 victory. Sammy Sosa's 4th homer of the season provided all the runs the staff needed for the victory today, but I have a feeling that won't always be the case.

Even before the Cubs came back and tied the game in the bottom of the 9th at 6 all, I decided that I would try and look at the bright side of things for this game. Like, for instance, the fact that my team was down 6-0 going into the bottom of the 7th and they never gave up. Like Sosa hitting a 3-run homer in that 7th inning to cut the lead to 6-4. The bullpen finishing the game with 6 scoreless innings of relief. Kerry Wood lowering his ERA from 13.50 to 11.88. All those things were positive things to look at and this was before Sosa hit a second 3-run homer, this time in the bottom of the 11th to send the Cubs to their 3rd victory in a row. That was Sosa's 6th homer of the season and he now has 13 RBI, 12, in his last 3 games. And were one-game away from making us above .500 for the first time all season.

Now, before I continue, let me tell you a little bit behind how I manage. Once a starter hits a 100 pitches, I'm the type of person that doesn't like to keep them in. I prefer to not burn out my pitchers and cause them to get injured, because finding a starter to replace an injured pitcher isn't exactly easy. That being said, I did break my rule with Matt Clement. After using my bullpen like they were robots the past few games, I realized that I needed to have Clement throw a few more pitches past 100. And it cost me. No, Clement didn't get hurt, but he did give up the tying run in the 8th while throwing his 115th pitch. Not a lot, but it is more than I would have liked. But the only fresh arm I had in the bullpen was Joe Borowski and that's because we haven't had a lot of save opportunities (0) so far this season. And after losing the game in the 10th inning, that decision cost us our chance to go over .500. We outhit the Expos 9-8, just couldn't do anything with them, losing 4-2. We do have our first winning series on the season, so hopefully we can build on that with Pittsburgh coming to town for 3.

The Pirates come in sporting an identical 4-5 record as us, so one of us might be over .500 after this series. Salomon Torres, Kris Benson and Dennys Reyes will take the mound and face Shawn Estes, Mark Prior and Zambrano. Funnily enough, earlier I was talking about the Ramirez/Bellhorn/Hernandez situation and how I decided to handle it. Well, the Pirates have both Jose Hernandez and Mark Bellhorn, trading Tike Redman to get Hernandez.