Cubs, Dodgers Game 1

I'm coming to grips with the loss. At first it was devastating, but I've allowed it to simmer in for a few hours now. The Cubs season hinges on this game tomorrow, and I'm ok with that. If they can win than it's quite possible that this loss was the worst it will be of the playoffs. A team responds to a loss like that in one of two ways. They turn in a dominant performance the following night and assert their superiority for the remainder of the playoffs. Or, more frequently, they go belly-up before they get out of the gate. I'm confident though, we find the answer tomorrow night.

The crowd knew it was coming from the first pitch. It was a weird overcast night, extra chilly in the air, and it didn't feel right from the beginning. To my dad's credit, he called Dempster being off from the first inning. My dad doesn't watch that much baseball anymore, but he still has an eye, and he was right last night. Dempster was all over the place, consistently missing spots. The Cub bats were actually alive and well. They just weren't hitting in the right spots. The Edmonds near homer in the 8th, what would have made the score 6-4, was painful because of the way the wind sucked it out of the air. And Alfonso Soriano's 0-5, 2 K'S, and 3 runners left on was no help either. Still, Lee, Ram-Ram, Edmonds, DeRosa, Theriot, Fontenot, and even Dempster got hits. The bats are healthy, and that's a very positive sign. On top of that, the Cubs' third best pitcher went tonight. As good as he is at home, we have Zambrano and Harden going the next two games. I love our chances with them on the mound.

Our work will be cut out for us tomorrow night. Chad Billingsley has been no push over this season. He's 5th in the league in strikeouts and 7th in the league in ERA, and wins. He's also 8th in the league in walks, and the Cubs got this far because of their ability to get on the bases, and gain walks from pitchers. It's his first playoff start, and it needs to be in a raucous Wrigley Field. I understand Cubs fans went into the game tonight a little jittery, and maybe expecting to just walk all over the Dodgers. Wrigley has to be the same place in the playoffs as it was during the season, a 56-win fortress. With a Big Z who's absolutely starving to get out there and dominate this game, I like our chances to even this series out. (read the interviews with him, he knows what people are saying, and he knows what's at stake. He has to be there tomorrow night, or he gets the bust label)

The key tomorrow night will be Big Z. I have extreme confidence that he will be in his top-of-the-line form for the game. I think Lou knows the right things to say to these guys, and I think the crowd at the stadium tomorrow night knows their part too. The worst is over, we've passed high tide. Either that, or the count goes to 101. Now I have to figure out how to sleep.