Vigilante Sports

Nevermind the fact that the Cubs had lost 6 in a row coming into their game Sunday, the previous 2 games were evidence enough that the train has come off the tracks. In Friday’s game, the Cubs starting pitcher (and supposed ace) Carlos Zambrano, and their starting catcher Michael Barrett got into a shoving match, that resulted in Barrett getting 6 stitches in his lip.

That silliness was followed by the Cubs manager Lou Piniella blowing his top on Saturday. He came out and argued Angel Pagan getting nailed at third base. It was a close play, but the ump made the right call. Of course we have to expect Lou Piniella will blow up big time a few times a year. That’s the way he rolls. And I understand that he probably wanted to take the heat off of Zambrano and Barrett. I think it’s all stuff a manager should do. I just think that the timing of it all couldn’t be worse. The tirade resulted in Lou being suspended “indefinitely”. So the team that is literally fighting in the dugout will not have the captain of their ship on board until MLB decides when Lou can come back. Just seems like a bad idea. This team needs to pull their heads out of their asses.

The Cubs are far from a good team right now, but they’re also in the weakest division in baseball that is very winnable. Jim Hendry has said that he has approval to add some payroll if (IF) the Cubs are in a position to make a run. I think in Lou’s absence the veteran’s on this team need to step up into a leadership role. I’d like to see Derrek Lee, Michael Barrett and Aramis Ramirez to step and make this team theirs. I would love to be able to say that Alfonso Soriano is the guy to do that. I think your highest paid player should be expected to be a leader, but I just don’t think he is the leader for this team. I think it’s Lee and Barrett. If this Cubs club is going to get back into the race in the NL Central, it will be because those guys step up, throw the team on their backs, and lead this team.

This entry was posted on Sunday, June 3rd, 2007 at 4:23 pm and is filed under Baseball, Chicago Cubs, MLB. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.