Saturday, April 11, 2009

Rich Harden Impresses, Lou Pinella and Kevin Gregg Blow It

This took a while because I didn't want to write about the game at all, but considering Harden at a pretty impressive start I thought I should throw something up. 

Rich Harden was great today, 6IP 10K 1ER 3 H 2BB. If he does that every start then he will win lots of games. Now he won't do that every time he pitches, but he deserved better today. The offense sucked again Milton Bradley hit a bomb for his first ever Cubs hit and home run. Then the Cubs got lucky with a Koyie Hill 2-run homer. They had a 3-2 lead going into the bottom of the seventh despite some shaky defense and blown chances on offense.

That's when Lou Pinella took over and really blew this game. Aaron Heilman came in a walked a guy then recorded and out, Lou then brought in Neil Cotts to face the lefty, who he hit. Then Carlos Marmol had to come in early and bail out his teammates which he did. Top of the eighth Lou called on Aaron Miles to pinch hit for Marmol with runners on first and third with one out. Micah Hoffpauir is on the bench for that situation Lou not Miles. Miles sucks, I won't get into his even being on the team, but that situation wasn't the proper use of Miles. Of course he grounded into a Derrek Lee play (double play for those not aware of DPLee) and that threat was over. 

Sean Marshall started the bottom of the inning to face a lefty, who he quickly walked then Lou pulled him for Luis Vizcaino. Vizcaino got his two batter out and should have just been left in to get the final out, but Lou brought in Kevin Gregg who did get a strikeout to end the inning.

After a useless top of the ninth Gregg tried to finish the game, but it didn't work. He walked a batter, gave up a double to Rickie Weeks to tie the game and eventually Ryan Braun hit a weak grounder to SS that Ryan Theriot tried to throw home without success. Cubs lose, Theriot, Lou, and Gregg all are the goats of the day.

Marmol should be moved to closer pretty soon since Gregg has been awful in all three of his appearances so far this season. Two of them have resulted in weak walk off hits and the other he allowed a run on opening day. Theriot sucks at defense, which we all know, but he was especially awful yesterday. 

Hopefully Lou just had old man problems for one day, but he lost that game. If Micah Hoffpaiur is sitting on the bench and you need a pinch hitter there is never any reason for anyone else to be used. Especially in the eighth inning. Also don't parade out relief pitchers when they can get more than one out or face more than one batter. Just stupid managing yesterday, but its one game and Big Z is going today.

Big Z against Dave Bush tonight at 6:05. Again Bush is a righty so the standard Soriano, Fukudome, Lee, Bradley, Aramis, Fontenot, Theriot, Hill, Zambrano should be put out there. The nice thing about Z starts is that his bat is actually useful for hits instead of bunts. 

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