Win's good as tie
Cubs share first place with Brewers after victory over Phillies
Cubs manager Lou Piniella was asked before the game Wednesday whether he knew where the Cubs stood in the National League wild-card standings.
‘‘Does it really matter?’’ he said.
‘‘Does it really matter?’’ he said.
Not anymore. Not after the Cubs completed the long climb from 8œ games back, from nine games under .500, from the cold, harsh, dumb baseball of April and May, to first place in the National League Central.
(Tom Cruze/Sun-Times)
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Cubs tie for first
Not anymore. Not after the Cubs completed the long climb from 8œ games back, from nine games under .500, from the cold, harsh, dumb baseball of April and May, to first place in the National League Central.
Now they just have to stay there for two months.
With another capacity crowd at Wrigley Field sounding even louder than those hoarse-powered crowds of the last few days and weeks, the Cubs watched the Milwaukee Brewers’ loss to the New York Mets become final on the scoreboard, then rallied for a ninth-inning victory over the Philadelphia Phillies.
They won 5-4 when Matt Murton legged out a hustling double to lead off the inning, went to third on a wild pitch and scored the game-winner on a wild pitch with one out to set off head-slapping, hand-slamming Cubdom-onium behind the plate and in the stands — over a win that put them percentage points ahead of Milwaukee in the division.
‘‘This is an exciting day for us,’’ said closer Ryan Dempster, who got the win after escaping a nail-biter ninth, ‘‘for us to have battled back from as far as we did. We always believed in ourselves.’’
The culmination — so far— of a major-league-best 35-18 run since June 2 has put them in first for the first time since April of last season.
‘‘You people make too much out of first place on the first of August,’’ Piniella said. ‘‘We’ve played good baseball to be where we’re at, but there’s so much more baseball to be played.’’
And if Wednesday was any indication, it could get wild.
The Cubs won this one despite starter Rich Hill lasting only 4‰ innings when he lost his command in the fifth and blew a 4-1 lead.
They won it with embattled reliever Scott Eyre bridging a critical four-out stretch after Hill got knocked out with three strikeouts, including big Ryan Howard swinging to end the sixth.
They won it despite falling short in a two-out eighth-inning rally that included Piniella pinch-hitting for Mike Fontenot in the middle of an at-bat after Alfonso Soriano stole second to get into scoring
position.
Ryan Theriot finished Fontenot’s at-bat by drawing a walk, and Derrek Lee walked to load the bases before Mark DeRosa popped up.
But when center fielder Jacque Jones made another diving catch for the first out of the ninth, and Dempster evaded just enough trouble to leave the bases loaded after that, the game turned.
And the volume turned up. And by the time Murton turned it all the way up with his double, the Cubs were starting to look like division champs.
Or at least a team in a virtual tie for first in early August. With the promise of two months’ worth of loud, meaningful baseball to come.
‘‘It’s exciting and it brings energy,’’ Dempster said of the crowd reaction. ‘‘And we feed off that energy.
‘‘Now we just have to not have a letdown and keep going out there and playing hard and hopefully stay there.’’