Cubbies Poised To Get Back To .500

After two impressive wins over the Rockies (10-3 on 5/27 and 5-1 on 5/28), the Cubs are one win away from .500. While it’s an arbitrary number, it provides some reassurance the Cubs aren’t a failing ball club even though they’re 8.5 games behind the division squashing Cards.

The most notable aspect of the last two games has been the Cubs’ offense: 15 runs coming from 21 hits (seven of which were homers, four from D. Lee). It’s hard to lose putting up numbers like that. Let’s hope we can continue to produce…

…which brings me to the source of most of my Cubs-related frustration: consistency. We’ve been hot and cold all season, win 3, drop 2, win 2 etc. Our bats get hot (the past two days for example) then we have trouble putting up more than two runs. I’m not sure what Dusty has been saying over the weekend but he needs to keep it up so we can keep giving our starters healthy run support.

Now on to pitching…a lot of stuff going on here. First of all, I’m sure everyone has heard about Prior so I’ll spare you the details. He’s out of the picture for quite a while. Second, we got rid of LaTroy. Personally, I think we got a great deal in this trade. Hawkins has had some bright spots this season but time after time he collapsed in the 9th which is unacceptable. Whatever’s going on in his head, I hope San Fran is a better place to work it out because it wasn’t happening in Chicago. In return for Hawkins, we get Jerome Williams and David Aardsma. Both are promising in my opinion and have the potential to be molded into a decent starter and closer respectively. I haven’t researched these guys extensively so if anyone else cares to comment on this acquisition, feel free.

This afternoon’s match up is Mitre v. Francis. Mitre was impressive (relative to other Cubs’ pitchers starting performances this season) in his last outing going seven innings and allowing only two runs. With a similar performance today, I’m confident the Cubs well be at .500 by this evening. Anyone else care to add anything?

P.S. Just to clarify, my name has nothing to do with the now-giants pitcher LaTroy Hawkins. Go back a little further in Cubs’ history to link my name to a former Cubbie.