Both the Cards and Cubs pulling off late game victories???? What the hey! This race in the Central is going to great. I'm hoping the Cards pitching can hold up and I hope the Brewers actually stay in it. The only thing better than a tight two team race to end the season is a tight three team race.

I can't believe Klompus hasn't chimed in yet declaring his marriage proposal and many lustful thoughts to Theriot. Perhaps he's still having that wet dream with Theriot in it and just doesn't want to wake up?

No, no, no, no...here is the difference(s)

Back to Pujols and the Cardinals. They pulled off a rather unlikely win last night against the Florida Marlins. Well... they didn't so much pull it off as much as the Marlins handed the game to them. With two outs in the 8th inning Hanley Ramirez committed a costly throwing error and Ryan Ludwick hit a two run home run off of Armando Benitez to turn a one run deficit into a three run lead for the Cardinals. Isringhausen came on in the 9th to seal the deal.

...the Cubs TOOK that game from the Giants, the Cards had it handed to them. The Cubs won the game at the very end after being dominated the whole game, the Cards did some damage throughout the game before busting out in the 8th....the cubs are the greatest thing since sliced bread...the cardinals taste like salami

A win is a win. The Cubs didn't get 1.5 wins for "taking" it and the Cards didn't only get .5 wins for "having it handed to them".

Bread is boring. Salami makes the sandwich.

A win is not always a win....Winning Game 7 of the World Series is much different than winning Game 6

I was listening to this game on my AM radio last night. Santo and Hughes are the best radio team. I love both of their enthusiam for cubs baseball, Santo's going off on random totally unrelated subjects, and Hughes' patient with Santo.

Anyways great win for the cubbies. I know Soriano is on the mend and will undoubtedly return to the leadoff spot, but man Theriot has looked awefully good (in a non Klompus way) batting leadoff. Do you think Pinella is having second thoughts and could be consiering Soriano in a different spot in the order. I know this didn't work so well earlier in the year. Or will he move Theroit to number 2 when Fonzi is healthy again? Somebody with Comcast enlighten me (God I hate those commercials).

Soriano will hit leadoff when he comes back and Theriot will move down in the order.

Morning fellas. Jack, I too am tired as all hell and am so happy I stayed up last nite. Who got it all started with the leadoff double. THE RIOT! also, when the Cubs used to come to bat in these games in years past, the team sorta laid down and died. I have to give Tim Lincecome some credit. And if this guy can avoid Tommy John's surgery in the next 5 years, ill be shocked! the kid throws so damn hard that his shoulder/elbow HAVE to feel the strain. The reason they didn't who knows...but I'm gonna have to credit the managing of Lou Pinella. In regards to the Cardinals getting hot, they are, and Buck it does scare me a bit. But the old adage that hitting wins the first half of the season and pitching the second will come into play. St. Louis' bullpen is not solid and that will come back to bite you.

Credit Marquis also for not blowing up under the pressure. He gets so riled up it takes away from his focus; but a great effort by a guy who's notoriously a horrific 2nd half pitcher.

With Soriano coming back, I envision this to be the best/ most likely lineup.

1. Soriano
2. Theriot
3. DLee
4. AmRam
5. Floyd
6. Jones
7. Derosa
8. Kendall
9. Pitcher

Could be a ruthless and interchangeable 5-7 hitting slots. depending on pitching match ups and who plays. Murton or Fontenot (you see what i mean). Remember this team was built around Offense.

I take back every terrible thing, I have said about Jacque Jones. I'm really happy he's coming into his own. I still hate Daryle Ward.

Hank, the only problem IF (huge If, cause Sweet Lou has made his mind up) is what to do with the DLee/AmRam/Jones/Floyd if you move Soriano to 3rd in the BA. Like a Rubik's Cube, you gotta shuffle everything. I thought about having him (Alfonso) jump in the 2nd Spot. If Theroit reaches and Soriano can drive him home with a basehit or a HR its great (obviously). Even then you have Dlee behind Soriano in case he strikes out.

It's feasible and if I have thought about it; so has Lou. So we'll see.

"St. Louis' bullpen is not solid and that will come back to bite you."

Are you freaking kidding me Klompus? The bullpen has been their strong point all year long.

Here's the relievers stats as a whole for the year.
120 Games, 22-8 Record, 25 Saves, 3.80 ERA.

As for individual stats, here are their main relivers.
Izzy - 48G, 4-0, 24 Sv, 1.59 ERA
Springer - 58G, 5-1, 2.85 era
Franklin - 52G, 4-2, 1.75 era
Flores - 54g, 1-0, 4.10 era
Johnson - 41G, 1-1, 4.0 era
Percival - 21G, 3-0, 2.7 era

Then you have Thompson whose stats are affected by being in and out of the rotation, but is good in the pen.

That's a good bullpen there and I look for it to hold up.

Just a quick thing: Lost was good the first season, but I bet The Lovely Dentist becomes frustrated with the lack of answers in every season after that (I believe we're heading into season four). I, too, was quite addicted after watching the first season. But I haven't watched an episode since about the third episode of the second season because of how absurd and annoying it became.

If you guys want to know how bored I am.

Look at the picture of DLee Sliding past home. Jones is to the right and to the right of that is DeRosa.

So the formula Left to Right is:

25 (Lee) x 11 (Jones) = 275.

275/7 (DeRosa) = 39. And thats how many games the Cubs have left.

fucking A, thats scary, and pathetic.

Klompus...I think you've watched the movie, "Number 23" too many times, ha. I agree with your Cubs lineup, but I believe that Buck is right on about the Cards 'pen.

Erin...I know what you are talking about. I've been trying to prepare her for it all. She's renting them so I've already told her to push through Season 2 because all of the questions are answered in Season 3 (which comes out on DVD Dec. 11th!) You should finish watching Season 2 and continue on with Season 3. It's mind blowing, seriously. Almost all of the questions have been answered...of course after the Season Finale of Season 3 we now have more questions. It's good though that they know how many more episodes they are going to have. J.J. Abrahms and the rest of the creative team have talked about how some of the episodes are just filler because they weren't sure how many episodes ABC wanted and they couldn't prepare accordingly. With the new schedule, I think 16 eps a season, they said they are all going to be balls to the wall....

Also...please, please, please don't say any specifics about the episodes because she does read this site on Wednesday's....Actually I guess I could just delete the comments but I'd hate to do that. Thanks

I might give it a shot one day, but being the crazy television addict that I am (I make spreadsheets for my fall TV schedule, seriously), I don't know when to find the time to get back into it.

And, because of my television obsession, of course I would never mention anything specific, because I would kill someone else who did the same thing.

You should throw those spreadsheets on your site so people know what they should be watching in the Fall, that would be cool

Good idea, Jack. I'll probably do that. My "Fall TV Preview" issue of Entertainment Weekly should be arriving soon. Once I get that, I'll put together the spreadsheet and you can all be amazed at my geekiness.

Erin, you should absolutely check out the rest of Season 2 and especially Season 3. 3 starts out on a different note that had a lot of fans jaded, but the last half, if not 3/4 of the season is great.

Like Jack said, a lot of questions get answered, a lot that don't really matter don't get answered and there may be more questions swirling around the show now more than ever.

I'm thrilled with how the producers and ABC set an end date so the series won't go off into oblivion. They are also going 24 style this year. Season 4 starts late Jan/early Feb and will run all 16 epis consecutively.

Not that I want this to turn into a blog about Lost, but I will say that, along with the ridiculous storylines that went nowhere, my real problem with the show is that I literally hated every single character on it. Most of them were self-righteous assholes (Jack, Kate, Locke) and some were just whiny babies (Charlie, Hurley). Not a likable one in the bunch. I decided that once I started thinking that I'd be happy if they all just died in one big explosion, I should probably stop watching the show.

Hmmm...that's interesting. Maybe you shouldn't watch? I like them all for different reasons and dislike a few for things that they've done on the island.

I mean, if you can't like Hurley...who can you like?

Hurley is probably the least objectionable, but he's like the stereotype for "goofy fat guy" on the island.

I like that the writers now have some idea of where they're going, but in the beginning, it was clear that they were just throwing in some mysteries just because, and it eventually got to be too much for them to answer. But if I find the time, I'll see if it's worth picking it up again.

Well, actually they had almost all of it mapped out. It was just that ABC kept ordering episodes and they had to stretch things out more than they originally planned to. At least from the interviews I've read (and I sound like a huge dork) and DVD commentaries they had a plan for the first 5 or 6 seasons (fuzzy memory) and an end game in mind for where they wanted to go. Obviously they couldn't write out all those scripts beforehand, because that would be impossible, but they knew all the major things that they wanted to have happen.

Now they have like 48-50 episodes left (I think) where they can sit down and say..."we are here, we need to get to there" and just do it.

I'm telling you, you just have to have faith to get through Season 2 and the first few episodes of Season 3 because the rest of it will absolutely bring it all together and blow your mind.

Then again, maybe I'm just a huge fan of the show and would watch either way.

Okay, I was wrong about how much of the show I have watched. I just checked, and it turns out I made it through episode eight of season three (Flashes Before Your Eyes). That's when I gave up, so if I wanted to catch up, I guess I don't have that much to get through.

But, I have a lot of shows, and there are a lot of promising new shows this season (see my soon-to-come list on my site) so we'll see.

And Jack, you don't sound like a dork. You're talking to someone obsessed with Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Heroes (even though I would never really consider myself to be a "fantasy" kind of person).

Heroes....nice choice.

I don't know, you've seen a lot of the episodes, I'd hate to push you into watching it and then having you still hate it...

I'll give it a few more and see if I care, and I won't hold it against you if I don't like get into it.

Now I feel like I have to write about television on my Dodger blog. No connection, I know, but shit, I love TV. And people need to know what not to watch (Two and A Half Men, for instance) and what to watch (Friday Night Lights comes to mind). It's up to me to inform the public.

Erin-

two and a half men is great...it's the only show that i'll watch that isn't on hbo or on the espn family...i hate reality tv and most of the shows on the major networks...i'll also watch dateline just to watch the "to catch a predator" episodes...hilarity!

I try to live by the idea that everyone has his/her own taste in things, and that I can't impose my will on anyone if they disagree with me (with regards to television, anyway).

But in this case, I can't abide by that.

"two and a half men is great."

No. No it is not. I feel the need to elaborate more, but I'm going to save that for my own site, sometime in the very near future.

You can disagree and that is fine. I still will watch and you still won't. I'm fine with that.

GM....I believe Erin actually has TV employment experience to go with her imdb.com page. I think I read that somewhere.

I do, though that doesn't make me an expert, and certainly doesn't make my opinion any more valid. Still just an opinion. I will elaborate further on it all soon. I think it's two weeks until the Fall TV Preview issue comes out, but maybe I won't wait until then.

Jack-

I employ my TV too!

Erin, I am in love with you, I can't help it but here I am. Buffy the Vampire Slayer is perhaps the finest example of art turned television our nation has ever created, and I am not even excluding the A-Team. Joss Whedon is an unparalleled storyteller in the television environment. The only tv that could possibly compare would be Firefly if he had not placed yet another "barefoot redhead with perfect innocence and unerring judgment" into the show. I get what he is trying to do with that kind of character and I bought it twice but I won't buy it in space. I get a lot of shit from jack and a few others about Buffy but they don't read as much as I do so they don't know really good storytelling when they see it. i have other male friends more secure in their masculinity who see buffy in the same light I do. It is simply the best. People think that they are watching really complex storylines when they watch Lost or Heroes, but they have no fricking clue how muddied and heartbreaking television can actually be. Buffy is awesome. Look at us, two people from entirely different places and walks of life, with nothing in common and here we are, discovering a bond over Buffy the Vampire Slayer. i love the internet.

Bruce,

I, too, love you. Any man who can be secure enough to worship Buffy is perfect in my book.

I do like Heroes, though. We'll have to see how it goes in the second season.

I'll be writing about Buffy very shortly on my blog.

I already read your blog, but now I am going to read it twice every time. i am also going to tell all my geek friends who dont care about baseball to read it, and I hope money falls from the sky into your bank account.