Thoughts on Game 1 after a night of fitful sleep

I’m not going to try to organize these in any sort of coherent manner, here’s just a rambling smattering of my thoughts after the dreary loss last night.

-Dempster really was playing with fire all night.  He’s kinda done this balancing act all season, but I really haven’t seen him with this little control.  He’s lucky to have escaped with only giving up 4 runs.  He had several chances to get out of that inning but just couldn’t put guys away.  That’s a credit to the Dodger hitters, especially Manny.  He got quite a few guys chasing on his splitter early, but once the Dodgers realized he wasn’t getting strikes on anything but his fastball they were able to wait for him to make a mistake.  I said at the time Lou was right to leave him in, and I still think so.  And this was definitely the fear we had when we learned Dempster was starting game 1 (and potentially game 5). 

-Some bad luck was involved.  I don’t see much of a difference in the balls that Loney and Edmonds hit.  Loney’s went out, Edmonds didn’t.  Both have uppercut swings (Edmonds’s is much more pronounced, of course), but both balls seemed to be hit just as hard and both were long fly balls.  I have no explanation for how Manny’s went out, because it sure didn’t look like it was hit hard at all.  Martin’s was just a line drive that the wind had no chance to mess with. 

-Lowe pitched a great game.  The Cubs tried to wait him out, but he didn’t give them much to hit.  He had his sinker working and the Cubs didn’t square him up most of the night.  I’m surprised DeRosa’s went out, but that was probably Lowe’s only mistake.  Soriano did his usual hacking, Fukudome swung himself into the ground several times (his single/error was hit pretty hard, which is unusual for him), Lee saw Lowe pretty well but didn’t hit him hard, Ramirez looked like the bad Ramirez we’ve seen for some long stretches this year, Soto’s hand slid off the bat a couple of times (enough to make me wonder how his hand is feeling), etc… But all the credit goes to Lowe.  Nothing about the Cubs approach (outside of Soriano) really worries me going forward. 

-Marshall looked really sharp.  As I said above, Manny beat him on a good pitch.  No shame in that.  I’m not sure why Marquis pitched, maybe so Lou could justify putting him on the roster?  I want to see Fontenot at 2nd tonight with DeRosa in RF.  DeRosa doesn’t make that catch in the bullpen that Fukudome did last night, but I think the significant upgrade in offense makes up for that.

-It’s going to be cold again tonight, so no reason to think the wind won’t be blowing in again.  Cubs need to stay patient against Billingsley and not press too much.  This series is still very winnable; the Cubs are still the better and deeper team.  No time to panic yet.  And for some reason, I have no worries about Z tonight.  I fully expect him to pitch a great game, even if he hasn’t done anything lately to justify that faith. 

In summary, Lowe significantly outpitched Dempster and that’s the difference.  No choking involved, and no need for drastic readjustments.  Now, to find something to distract me for 12 hours until this game starts…