Faithful, Too: “Game 18 W w/ Bad News"

In another cruel twist of fate, celebrations for yet another Cubs series-win (on the road against the Dodgers in a getaway game, no less) was seriously dampened by news of Justin Steele’s season-ending Tommy John surgery. Steele was 3-1 on the short season despite wonky control and coming off his best start (as previously noted multiple times in this journal). The team was able to get away with a bullpen game against the Dodgers, but such a game is rare. Trade rumors will begin circling. The Cubs have amassed a good number of prospects in their Minor League system in recent years so big moves could be forthcoming, with big names on fading teams possibly headed our way.

A brief note on the aforementioned “bullpen game”. Each baseball team usually has five “starters”: pitchers who begin games with the hopes of pitching at least the first five or six innings before giving way to the bullpen. The “bullpen” consists of “relievers”: pitchers who will pitch around an inning or so before handing it off to another reliever, and so on, and so forth, before the game ends. The Cubs started their game on Sunday with normal-reliever Colin Rea, who pitched 3 2/3 innings. Six additional pitchers pitched in the final 5 1/3 innings, with yet another hold for Porter Hodge (Porter “Hold”ge sounds like a good nickname. I’m gonna run with that) and Ryan Pressly pitched a perfect ninth for his fourth save of the season.

Good news, right? For Sunday, certainly. But it only plugs a wonky hole. If the Cubs did this the rest of the season, they would exhaust too many relievers who would become unavailable throughout the rest of the week. Hence the need for solid starters to kickstart a bullish bullpen.

Staying a bit more happy for a bit longer: PCA finally came through at the plate with not only his first home run of the season, but his second, as well, and saluted his parents who were in attendance. Did I mention his parents appeared together on NBC’s Heroes? I’m sure I did, but it’s a long season and I can’t remember everything. Michael Busch also continued his revenge tour against his former team with another home run.

Off to San Diego for a three-game set against the Padres. This should make for yet another entertaining series, since the Padres are 12-1 against all teams that are not the Cubs and 1-2 against the Cubs. Who will break? Who will replace Steele as a crucial starter? Can the Cubs win their fifth consecutive series? We’ll know soon enough…