DELUSIONAL CUBS FAN

The Cubs celebrate their walk of victory (photo by David Banks – AP)

Cubs Beat White Sox in Walk Off Win!

Finally, something to celebrate!  As I said to the guy next to me at the bar after Derrek Lee hit his 3-run homer “That’s the first thing we’ve had to get excited about in two weeks”.  That could be an exagerration but only a slight one.

The Cubs had already lost one game to the White Sox and were on a serious offensive slump, scoring only 10 runs in the previous 6 games, winning just 1 of those six.  The offense has been lifeless.  The pitching had been superb.  The Cubs have the third lowest ERA in the league and are number 1 in quality starts by their pitchers but have the 2nd to last offense.  Pitching wins ballgames and sends teams to the playoffs but you’ve still got to score more than 1 or 2 runs a game most of the time.  It’s been getting harder to stay optimistic as the Cubs amazingly pathetic offensive slump lasted from April into May and into June.

This was exciting but it didn’t start out that way.  If fact, going into the 8th inning this looked like a tragically typical game for the Cubs.  I left my house to go watch the game at the bar with the Cubs down 3-1 and looking lifeless and when I arrived there 5 minutes later it was 5-1 in the eigth.  If you’ve been watching the Cubs lately, you know that four runs down might as well be 10 runs down they way they’ve been hitting.  But a funny thing happened on the way to defeat.

The Cubs put two men on in the eight with no outs.  But then we saw what we’ve seen a lot of lately: Ryan Theriot grounded out and Bradley struck out and it looked like another wasted opportunity.  Then up stepped Derrek Lee, who’s hitting .362 since May 17th.  BAM! Three run homer!  Signs of life!  Reason to cheer for the first time this game!  Up next came the pudgy Geovany Soto.  BAM! Another home run and the game is tied!  Brand new ballgame.  Next up was Jake Fox who gave the ball a ride and made people gasp for a moment but was just a fly out to center field.

Kevin Gregg looked pretty good and sent down the White Sox in the top of the ninth.  Up first in the ninth, the “gamer” Reed Johnson.  He slaps a base hit up the middle and the Cubs are rolling.  Then Andres Blanco lays down a bunt to get him over to second.  A moment to give props to them both: Johnson came through big and so did Blanco.  They both deserve more playing time.  Johnson always has and Blanco has been solid defensively at second since being called up.  He’s light hitting and maybe not a permenant solution at second but he has outplayed Aaron Miles for sure and deserves more time.

So the bar full of Cubs fans was happy but we all knew that a runner in scoring position isn’t worth much if you can’t get him in.  Next up was guess who: Aaron Miles.  Automatic out.  Now up came Soriano and we all thought: here comes the strikeout!  Guillen came out to the mound and we wondered if Jenks would be coming in but no change was made.  I assumed Guillen just said “don’t give him anything to hit”.  Thorton got two strikes on Soriano and the bar started yelling “throw him a breaking ball” and “just put it in the dirt” because we had seen this before.

But that’s not what happened.  Soriano got a bloop single between the outfielders to drive in Johnson.  CUBS WIN!!!  The Cubs run out of the dugout as if they had one the division but it probably felt that way after the last week or so.  Everyone celebrated and was full of smiles, on the field and off.

So yeah, I’ll take this moment to celebrate!  Cubs beat the White Sox!  I was so happy after I left the bar on my bike (no, I wasn’t drunk – only 1 beer!) that I raced down the trails and took a speedy twenty mile ride.  The rain and clouds were gone from the sky finally, the 50 degrees in June temperatures are starting to creep up and the Cubs have beat the White Sox.  Life is good.  Now I have the same hope as all the other delusional cubs fans:  Let’s make this the start of something good!

GO CUBS!

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