Final score: Mets 7, Cubs 6. Will any of what occurred in the past four days matter come October? Who are the Cubs going to play in the NLDS? This race has been so entertaining, I don’t even want to be able to know the answer to that until after all the games end on Sunday.
Mets are hanging in there…Marlins are up next for them and they are no slouch. Then again, they’re no Cubs either.
3 games left. Mets are behind the Phillies by 1 game in the East and tied with the Brewers for the Wild Card. Again, tied for the Wild Card…three games left.
This is one of the greatest playoff positioning battles I’ve ever seen going into the final weekend of a season. All three teams battling to get in to the final two spots in the NL are playing at home this weekend…each with varying degrees of difficulty in their opponents. Mets get the Marlins, again no slouch. Phillies get the Nationals…somebody from Philly organize this year’s schedule in case it came down to the wire again like last year? I mean, the Nationals??? Come on. The Nationals may surprise people every now and again but let’s face it, if I’m the Brewers…I am not happy about this situation one bit.
Sure I’m at home…on the same field the Cubs borrowed and threw their nearly perfect, first no-hitter in club history in over forever ago. Facing the team with the best record in the National League…who will show up as the away team…yet playing in a stadium often considered Wrigley North.
Forget Houston being rescheduled to play home games in Milwaukee…this hardly seems fair.
So here the Cubs are. Already captured the NL Central, earlier than they ever have. Best record in the National League, home field advantage through the NLCS (if they make it that far). And as if that weren’t enough…they now get the added bonus of possibly playing spoiler for the Brewers.
Wow.
The Mets were great this week. If it wasn’t for their bullpen blowing leads, they may have faired better. Considering we weren’t going full lineup in every game gives me very little concern about the Cubs in looking at these past four games. Although I suppose Zambrano does raise some concern. He didn’t look so hot on Wednesday and of course the start before that he got ROCKED. Nobody is going to care about Z’s no-hitter come October, especially anyone in an opposing team uniform. Dempster’s going to kick things off, but we are definitely going to need Z to be closer to no-hit form as opposed to ‘last two starts’ form. As always with the Cubs, this is about to get (even more) interesting.
I love that we’re in a position to take a look at some guys in figuring out our postseason roster though, a luxury teams like the Mets, Phillies and Brewers don’t have. Man, what an audition Hoffpauir had tonight! 5 for 5, 5 RBI’s and 2 HR’s. I was IMPRESSED by him in Spring Training, unfortunately there just weren’t enough roster spots to fit him into for pretty much the entire regular season. Once we had a chance to call some guys up, Hoffpauir and Pie were the two guys I hoped would get called up. I expect them both to be on the roster for the NLDS and when called upon, while more so Hoffpauir than Pie, I expect them both to be ready and prove to be contributors in the clutch.
Three more games to the 2008 regular season. Mets, Phillies and Brewers playing for a division …a wild card…an opportunity. The Cubs on the other hand…playing in hopes of being champions…contributors…and quite possibly, spoilers.
159 games played. And yet still, 3 more needed to make sense of it all. GO CUBS GO!!!
Prose and Ivy 