Bay Area Bash:April 29th-May 1st

When you go into a series and plan on throwing out your 3 best starters, you have to feel good inside knowing that, while you might not win all 3 games, you should be at least be in the games. Unfortunately, a quick 6 spot in two innings will usually kill that feeling, fast. A quick exit by Mark Prior and I'm left wondering if this is going to be the year he turns into the CY Young candidate that he can be, or if he's still a couple of years away. We don't do much in the 7-1 loss against the Giants and with Jason Schmidt taking the mound for game 2, the hope that we will come away from this road trip .500 is slowly starting to slip away.

The early season battle of the CY Young candidates lives up to it's hype as Carlos Zambrano and Schmidt are locked in a pitcher's duel for most of the game. But when the Giants pull Schmidt in the top of the 8th, Sammy Sosa promptly greets reliever Joe Nathan with a solo homer to tie the game and you just know that once Nathan was out of the game, we would start hitting. Sadly, we didn't and we lose in the bottom of the 10th on a walk-off double by Jose Cruz Jr and suddenly, instead of hoping to finish the road trip at .500, were now hoping to not be swept. Before I go into the results of game 3, let me recap how we did the first month of the regular season.

We finish the month 14-13, sitting in 3rd place, 2 games back of the division lead. Are top hitter for the Month was Mark Grudzielanek, hitting .331 for April. Sammy Sosa led the team in homers and RBI, with 15 and 30, respectively. On the pitchers side of things, Carlos Zambrano and Mark Prior each have 3 wins and you can't help but wonder how many wins Zambrano might have if he didn't miss two weeks. Zambrano sports the lowest ERA of the starters with a 1.61 and him and Matt Clement are the only ones with ERA's under 4.00. Clement, Kerry Wood and Mark Prior are all tied for the team lead in K's with 37, but you have to give the edge to Wood, who has done it in 28 innings. On to game 3.

And with it now being May, I guess the weather is warming up enough for Moises Alou to start coming to games everyday ready to hit, as he sends a 2-2 fastball in the 1st inning over the fence for a 3-run homer. But that wasn't enough as Kerry Wood showed what happens when bad control and patient hitters meet on the playing field, giving up 5 walks in 5 innings to go along with the 4 earned runs. But at least he earned a no-decision out of it as Damian Miller hit a 3-run homer in the 8th inning to help propel the Cubs to an 8-6 victory.

Colorado comes to Chicago for a 3-game set and will throw out Aaron Cook and Nelson Cruz in games 1 and 2, and since Jason Jennings will miss the rest of the season, they will pitch Darren Oliver for game 3. Matt Clement, Shawn Estes and Mark Prior will hope to get this 9-game homestand off to a great start....