Lose-win situation: Cards bail out Cubs
Despite loss, magic number is shaved to 3 as Brewers lose
MIAMI -- Uh-oh.
Don't look now, but that final-week stroll into the playoffs for the Cubs has sunk knee-deep into South Florida swampland in a two-day span and threatens to put Milwaukee back in play for the National League Central title over the final few days of the season.
(AP)
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Marlins spear Cubs
A 7-4 loss to the Florida Marlins on Wednesday night at Dolphins Stadium -- the Cubs' ninth straight loss to the Marlins dating to early last season -- shaved Sunday's season-high 3½-game lead down to 1½ until the Brewers lost later in the night to push it back to a two-game gap with four to play.
''Reality's setting in,'' second baseman Mark DeRosa, who committed a costly throwing error in the second inning, said of the change in emotion in the clubhouse since the Cubs swept Pittsburgh at home over the weekend.
''We realize we've still got work to do -- this thing is not over,'' he said as the Cardinals and Brewers played on TV across the room. ''We're not making it easy on ourselves, and we haven't all year. It's nice to know we have a cushion and will still have one after tonight, as slim as it might be.''
That cushion has been ravaged by ineffective starting pitching from veterans Ted Lilly and Jason Marquis the last two nights and compounded by the Cubs' inability, at least on Wednesday, to do much offensively against an eight-man parade of little-known Marlins pitchers.
''We started [Tuesday] with three mulligans in our pocket,'' manager Lou Piniella said before the game. ''We hit one out of bounds. Now we're down to two.''
Then they hit one in the water -- watching rain come down most of the day Wednesday and wash out another day of batting practice.
''We should have made a few plays behind [Marquis]. It was a bad ballgame for us,'' Piniella said. ''It wasn't a good game at all. I don't know if it was because we haven't been on the field now for three days or what. But it wasn't a good ballgame.
''We've got to play better than that if we want to go forward.''
Piniella met with the team for a brief relax-and-play pep talk. And nobody seems to be hitting any panic buttons yet.
''I still think we feel like we're in first place, which we are,'' said Jacque Jones, who drove in three runs. ''That's the bottom line.''
But if the trend continues, and the Brewers pick it up in the next few days, that slim cushion DeRosa talked about could evaporate quickly.
And for all the decades of futility and heartbreak of historic proportions with this franchise, that would put the Cubs face-to-face with the biggest final-week collapse in major-league history.
No team has blown more than a three-game lead in the final week, and none has done that since the 1962 Los Angeles Dodgers, according to ESPN.com's Jayson Stark. And even that Dodgers team got a chance to beat the Giants in a one-game playoff to overcome their collapse.
''Yeah, we got one left,'' Piniella said of his mulligans after the game -- and before the Cardinals knocked off the Brewers. ''And I tell you what, I usually like to keep it on the golf course until the 18th hole. But I'm not sure now.
''We'll beat these guys [today] and go from there, that's all.''
Marquis was optimistic.
''Obviously, our fate is in our hands,'' said Marquis (12-9), who would pitch a tiebreaker against the Brewers on Monday if the Cubs crash that hard this weekend. ''We're still in the lead. Maybe we can get help with the Brewers. We're still in a positive frame of mind.''
Even if they've put fans' minds into a state of panic this week.
''I hope not,'' DeRosa said. ''I hope they have faith in this team that we'll get it done. We've got the guys in here with the frame of mind. We trust in each other, and there's no doubt in my mind we'll get it done.''
MARLINS 7, CUBS 4 | CUBS LEAD BREWERS BY 2