Early on in the White Sox 5-1 drubbing of the Cubs Sunday night, the keen baseball mind of Lou Piniella saw the writing on the wall. In the bottom of the second, presumably reacting to a Joe Crede check swing call, Lou stormed out of the dugout to exchange views with 1B umpire Chad Fairchild only to be ejected, leaving Alan Trammell to preside over the Cubs fourth straight loss and embarrassing sweep by the hated White Sox.
I don’t blame Piniella for throwing a tantrum to secure a little “me” time in the clubhouse. His Cubs are a team best left in the rearview mirror. Without Rich Hill and Carlos Zambrano, the staff is a mess. The meltdown of Carlos Marmol and the noises coming out of Kerry Wood’s elbow make the Cubs pen an alarming place, and with Soriano out, Edmonds struggling with senior issues and Aramis Ramirez going 0 for 13 on the weekend, well, you’d take a walk too.
Fast-working LHP Mark Buehrle (W, 6-6, 5K, 2BB, 6H 1R) continued his dominating June, cutting over 2 runs off his ERA in a four double-play perfomance that shut down the Cubs, leaving Henry Blanco as the only North Sider with a good look at Buehrle’s cut fastball.
The Sox lineup went yard twice on Zambrano stand-in Sean Marshall (L,7IP, 1BB 5H 5K), including Carlos Quentin in the fourth, and a Brian Anderson 2-run shot in the fifth.
But it took a Piniella-free Cub brain trust to put away the game by reviving the bat of Sox DH Jim Thome in the bottom of the 8th. Despite lefty Neal Cotts being warmed up, underwhelming righty middle reliever Jose Ascanio was left in to face the dormant slugger. Thome obligingly crushed his 522nd homer, driving in Jermaine Dye and passing up Ted Williams and Willie McCovey’s lifetime yard numbers.
Goodbye Cuburbanites, it’s been fun. If you get confused which direction to turn on the Dan Ryan, just follow the tangy aroma of urine to get back to Wrigelyville. You can figure out how to get back to the north shore from there.
Note to Gerard: There’s too much Chicago baseball coverage on your site.
Rob: I was going to post last week’s scores for you to show you what a drubbing looks like, but in adding them up, the Cubs only outscored the Pale Ho’s by 1. Congrats to your Sox on proving they can match up to the Cubs’ DL-squad any day. And despite this weekend, Ozzie Guillien is welcome up to the North Side any time for barbecues at Zambrano’s or whatever anger management classes he needs. Is it urine he’s sniffing at Wrigley or a job after Piniella’s 3-years are up? Can you blame him? At the Cell more bats come from the stands then go in. I’d think you’d at least be thanking Piniella for going out of his way to publicly embarrass Jay Mariotti.
And finally, lay off the Kerry Wood jokes, I’ve been on that six-inning/million dollar doofus for 10 years.
Ben
Hoping GC can add a post soon, curious as to his take on the Cubs/Sox game. It will be like Rashomon.
sorry, Andrew, I was out watching Round Rock clobber 3 HR’s against Nashville tonight. Despite all of that Johnny Drama money pouring in, Chris Woodward still finds time to play shortstop for the visitors.
Is this M. Warmowski’s debut as a bylined CSTB contributor? If so, I’ll lift a can of Old Style to that. If not…it’s really too early for me to be drinking beer, anyway.
Excellent post, Rob. Concise, funny at times, not corny and not reaching for something too obtuse for the rest of us to care about. I look forward to reading your posts about how much better the White Sox are than that team on the north side with the redneck, racist fan base.
“Without Rich Hill and Carlos Zambrano, the staff is a mess.”
That’s about as astute as “Cuburbanites.” You do know that Hill has been in the minors since May 3, right? Cubs since then = not a mess by any measure. Try again.
JD: Being in the minors didn’t get in the way of Sean Marshall.
Rog: Thanks, you jerk.
David: Yes, and as the poles say about morning beer, “Zimne piwo dla Å›niadania jest lepsze ” which means “help me change this light bulb”
Ben: Any anger management for Ozzie should be attended by Lou – they both didn’t get paid enough for that unspeakably shitty rap commercial.
You’re welcome. I was being serious.
JD: Mr Warmowski’s judgment re how momentous it is to beat Sean Marshall and the Iowa AAA team Lou meant to field at that Hall of Fame game comes from a combination of more sunlit baseball than a Sox fan is used too plus the usual Sox-fan dosage of PBR — which means he typed this post with large sun-spots in front of him.
Ben
Lou goes to the trouble of putting Daryle Ward in the outfield to provide shade, and these guys don’t even take advantage of it. Sad, really.