Cubs Throw Ball All Over in Loss

Manager Mike Quade made his F bomb tirade one night too early. Just when you thought things were going really bad, the team goes out and does even worse. Last night the Cubs almost committed as many errors as they were able to score runs. Four Cubs errors lead to a rare seven unearned runs for the pitching staff in an effort that would have been more fitting on a Little League field at your local park district than under the lights and cameras at a Major League ballpark.

The Cubs offense had immediately spotted starter Matt Garza with a three run lead thanks to a towering home run by Carlos Pena in the 1^st inning (video courtesy of MLB.com). The slugging first baseman may never hit over .250 this season, but at least his power stroke is heating up after a slow start with his new team. This was Pena’s fifth home run of the season and all have come in the month of May after he went homerless in April. He is now second on the team in big flies, trailing only Alfonso Soriano, who already has 11 home runs on the season, but has been the opposite of Pena, as the left fielder’s last home run came over two weeks ago. This microcosm is yet another example of the units and parts of the Cubs team machine not getting in gear at the same time to produce victories.

Garza was able to tip toe around two walks he issued in the bottom of the 1^st inning, but the fielding wackiness began in the bottom of the 4^th (video courtesy of MLB.com). The Cubs committed a double error on one play that ended up clearing the loaded bases. Reds pitcher Edison Volquez hit a cue shot off the end of his bat towards Pena, who was not able to field the ball. The wet baseball squirted into shallow right field where the heads up Darwin Barney slid over to grab it. He spun and threw to the plate in an effort to get one of the runners trying to score, but Garza chose to cut the ball off 10 feet in front of Barney, maybe thinking Barney was trying to get the out at first. Garza promptly threw to home himself, but his throw rocketed past catcher Welington Castillo and off of a photography camera out of play, allowing the tying run to come in and sending Volquez all the way to third.

Despite that, the Cubs offense was able to put the team ahead a second time. They cashed in on a lead off walk to Soriano, who was replaced by pinch runner Tony Campana. The rookie came in to score on his debut after a bases loaded walk to Barney, but Starlin Castro grounded into a double play to end the threat. And for what seems like the umpteenth time in May alone, the Cubs failed to do maximum damage off of a bases loaded, less than two outs situation.

Campana stayed in the game to play left field, to the delight of friends and family that made the trip in hopes of seeing his Major League debut, and the quickly nicknamed Sam Fuld Clone gave all Cubs fans something to cheer about when he shot a double down the line off the first pitch he saw for his first Major League hit and RBI, scoring Aramis Ramirez from second to make the score 5-3 in favor of Chicago (video courtesy of MLB.com). But again the offense failed to dish out further damage, this time leaving runners on second and third with one out.

With a two run lead and the plan to bring in Kerry Wood and Carlo Marmol to seal the game, Cubs fans should have felt good about their chances right? But the throwing error wackiness plagued the Cubs again, this time Wood being the culprit (video courtesy of MLB.com). His fastball thrown to third in an attempt to nail the lead runner on a sac bunt attempt ended rolling down into the left field corner like a line drive double, allowing the tying runs to score. It did not help that Wood had led off the inning prior to the error by giving up a lead off double to Scott Rolen. By the time the Cubs were able to crawl out of the bottom of the 8^th, they were down 7-5.