Last week when I did my preview of the Cubs-Brewers series at Wrigley, I did a comparison of Jeff Suppan's contract with Alfonso Soriano's...and the result was that Suppan was actually being paid a higher percentage of the overall Brewers payroll than Soriano was.
It was very obvious last night that the Brewers fans were quite aware of this.
There are those who complain about the amount of booing at Wrigley Field...
That isn't an isolated phenomenon. If it wasn't for the fact about 30% of the crowd was Cubs fans last night, the booing of Jeff Suppan as he exited that game would have been far exceeded anything we've seen with Alfonso Soriano at Wrigley this year. Luckily for Suppan, the Cubs fans were cheering him loudly...so it kinda drowned the booing of the Brewers fans. Suppan didn't want to stick around long to find out as he left the field about as fast as I've ever seen a pitcher leave.
Ryan Dempster was very good again last night...and, with the absence of Ted Lilly so far this year, he has emerged as the teams ace. The pitcher formerly know as Dumpster pitched 7 2/3 innings giving up only 1 run. Marmol pitched the remaining 1 1/3 innings.
Cubs win 8-1.
The Brewers were all around bad last night. They committed 3 errors, as they started looking like the team that blew the division title in 2007.
Speaking of defense, anyone that watched that play from the fourth inning off of a Derrek Lee grounder where Alcides Escobar threw an absolute dart over to first base should understand why Ryan Theriot cannot be this team's shortstop after this season. (Granted, to innings later Escobar committed an error, but still...)
Offensive highlights? Theriot and Fukudome had a couple hits, each having a double, Fook with a homer, and Theriot with a triple. (Theriot also got thrown out stealing a base.)
Byrd, Colvin and Koyie all had two hits as well.
When first looking at this lineup, with Soriano, Ramirez and Soto all on the bench, you would have thought the Cubs were done for. Nope!
Speaking of Colvin, in the 9th inning, he hit a Fielderesque homer to center field.
Overall, it was a fun game to watch.
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I'll be MIA today as I will be timing a track meet at UW-Whitewater today, in the rain...boo!!!
Anyway, Ted Lilly makes the start...finally...against Doug Davis. With Davis being a lefty, expect a wonky lineup again.
