The Sunday Slant

"Is Chicago!
Is not Chicago!
Is Chicago!
Is not Chicago!"

Soul Coughing: Is Chicago, Is Not Chicago

NL Central Merry-Go-Round Goes Round Again

The Cubs' stay in first place in the National League Central lasted less than 24 hours as they dropped a half-game behind Houston. They hadn't been in first after 121 games since they won the East Division title in 1989.

Yesterday was the double-whammo: They lost to the Dodgers 10-5 while the Astros were beating Cincinnati, 5-2 and one of the anchors of their league-best rotation and the major-league strikeout leader, Kerry Wood, it is now revealed, has had a bad back. As Jay Mariotti pointed out today,

"now, Kerry Wood's back is hurting. And like a cozy living room fire, the Cubs won't be going anywhere without an ample supply of Wood...The Cubs have a tendency to downplay injuries involving their stud pitchers, telling us Prior's right shoulder injury was "day to day'' (when he wound up missing 25 days) and giving hopeful diagnoses through the years about Wood's ailments. But this time, they weren't painting overly positive scenarios after Wood allowed five runs, five hits and four walks in 2-2/3 innings, his shortest outing in almost three years..."

But not all news in Cubland was bad news. To offset the back problems and the loss, the Cubs traded for renowned Sausage-beater Randall Simon to take over the left-handed hitting first-baseman duties from my favortie MLB sidedish, Hee Seop Choi. Choi has been chopped suey ever since he ran into a wall named Kerry Wood and struck his head on the ground, suffering a concussion. Since then, Choi has hit .180 with a lone homer and 6 RBI to show for 61 at-bats. Since the sausage-beating incident, Simon has hit .304 with 3 homers and 11 RBIs in 79 at-bats. Better to beat a sausage than run into Wood.

In any case, the trade gives the Cubs another lefty bat and one which rarily strikes out. It also means they don't have to cry about the over-rated Viagra King, Rafael Palmeiro preferring to stay with the proven losers down in Texas any more. Palmeiro can pad his stats with losers and the Cubs have a guy who is only 28, who only makes one and half million a year versus Rafael's bloated $9 million salary, PLUS, Simon doesn't need days off like Palmeiro to "clear his head" AND, Simon is from former Dutch colony town Willemstad, which is now a drug smuggler's paradise.

Of course, the Cubs loss and the Astros win meant that the Astros moved back into first place in the division before a crowd of 29,902 at Great American Ball Park. The Cardinals, however, remain on the periphery after suffering their second consecutive disturbing loss to the Phillies, as Dan Haren, a rookie who started this season with Double-A Tennessee, took the mound for the Cardinals and did well until the 6th, when he gave up four runs, including back-to-back home runs to Jim Thome and Mike Lieberthal. The Phillies took the game 5-4 and the Cardinals fell a full game behind the Astros.

If you think all this leadership leapfrogging is fun for the players, you can ask Astros starter Wade Miller, who pitched well yesterday, allowing one run on one hit in six innings, improving to 6-0 over the Reds. "There's nothing fun about leapfrogging,"Miller said "I'd rather be up by 10 games right now. We're in a position right now where we're leapfrogging, so that makes things interesting."

Interesting indeed. The Astros will play the Reds once again this afternoon, then they have Monday off and then they will host the Cubs all over again. The Cardinals meanwhile, get nothing but the Pirates and the Phillies over their next seven games.

NL Wildcard Rides the D-Train

I'll answer one of my own questions. Yesterday, I asked whether Thome was worth the money the Phillies paid to get him: After yesterday's victory over the Cards, the Phillies are now 22-6 in games in which Jim Thome hits a home run. Homers or not, the rest of the month is the Phillies big chance to make their move or fade fast as they come up on a 13 game road trip which will see them play in Milwaukee, St. Louis, Montreal and Queens. They have only 17 more games in Veteran's Stadium where they have played since the Spring of 1971 and there is an All-Vet Vote available. But if you want to vote, say, 3,000 times in order to make sure that Lenny Dykstra gets more votes than Gary Maddox for the CF slot, today is the last day you can vote. Believe it or not, ultra-Goat Mitch Williams has managed 1,419 votes for reliever. For the record, my All-Vet team was:

1B: John Kruk
2B: Juan Samuel
SS: Larry Bowa
3B: Mike Schmidt
C: Darren Daulton
LF: Greg Luzinski
CF: Garry Maddox
RF: Bobby Abreu
RHP: Curt Schilling
LHP: Steve Carlton
Reliever: Tug McGraw
Manager: Danny Ozark

I guess we'll have to wait at least another year for the Pro Player Stadium All Star team. With the D-Train taking the mound last night, the Marlins defeated the Padres 6-2 to remain a half-game behind the Phillies for the NL wild card spot. Saturday marked the Marlins 27th comeback win.

As usual, the only time the Marlins draw more than a few thousand to their illustrious football stadium is when Dontrelle Willis is pitching. Last night he induced a crowd of 26,104. Can you imagine what Dontrelle's salary would be if he was paid a percentage of the gate he brings in all by himself? He regularly brings in at least 10,000 fans for each start. If you average all the seat prices, from the $4 "Fish Tank" seats to the $60 "Founder's Club Box Seats" which includes everything but its own hookers, the average price of a seat is $25.10. If the D-Train brings an extra 10,000 to the stadium each start, that's $251,000 per start. He's had 11 home starts so far, that's $ 2.761 million, just for home starts. Give him half that for road starts, over $4 million just based upon attendance. What's he making this season? Why of course, the league minimum annual salary of $300,000. Dios Mio! If Dontrelle were Dominican, Pedro would have called a general strike for racist pay practices by now. In addition to the $125 Dontrelle Willis jerseys, the Marlins also cash in by selling the D-Train Flex Pass, a package of tickets to five games for $75 that guarantee seats for Dontrelle's starts.

Normally, I'd say so what, he'll get his down the road when he's making $8 million a year to produce 5 wins like Rick Reed. Or Mike Hampton getting $12 million for 10 victories. But I've got a sad feeling that the D-Train is going to be a one-season wonder. Like The Bird, who went 19-9 with a 2.34 ERA and went 10-10 the rest of his career. Fidrych was a real workhorse his first season. He started 29 games and threw 250 1/3 innings. Of course, Dontrelle started off in AA this season but if you project his numbers in his first 19 starts (including last night's game), over the same number of starts Fidrych had, the D-Train would have finished this season with a 17-5 record, 150 1/3 innings pitched, 167 punchouts and a 3.25 ERA. So it isn't so much a matter that the D-Train will burn out his arm as it is hitters getting accustomed to his unorthodox style. Since the All-Star break, he has started 6 games, has a 2-2 record and a 6.10 ERA. He left the game last night trailing 3-1 and in danger of losing consecutive starts for the second time in his professional career. After allowing three homers in his first 14 outings (84 1/3 innings), Willis has served up one in each of his last five starts (29 innings).

By the way, if you want a Dontrelle bobblehead, you'll have to go to the Jupiter Hammerheads' Aug. 30 game at Roger Dean Stadium. The Marlins' Class A affiliate ordered 2,500 dolls of Dontrelle in a Hammerheads uniform. There will be no bobblehead giveaways at any Marlins games this year and there's nothing on Planet Earth more valuable that a Dontrelle bobblehead in a Jupiter Hammerhead uniform. Trust me. Not only that, but the Hammerheads don't play their games in a football stadium on Dan Marino Blvd. How psyched can you get walking up Dan Marino Blvd. to watch a baseball game? No wonder they don't draw flies to their games.

Royal Meltdown

I have to admit, for some reason, I can't get it out of my head that these Royals are a happy-go-lucky sort of team. After all, Kansas City, home to great BBQ and Blues, seems like a mellow place. So I didn't really picture any sort of wild-eyed passion coming from any of them. Just a brief run for the division lead, a shrug of the shoulders and a legitimate excuse of we did the best that we could with one of the tiniest budgets in the league. I think it's all Royal Blue and happiness, but no, suddenly you see that Kansas City is ranked the 8th Most Dangerous American city with a population of between 100,000 to 499,999 people. Then I see Mike DiFelice, (whose name, ironically enough, means literally "happy" in Italian) getting Medieval on home plate umpire Jerry Layne in the first inning of yesterday's game against the Twins, and I think to myself, hey, maybe these Royals aren't such mellow cats after all. DiFelice threw a ball to the ground and later hurling two water coolers, a trash can from the dugout onto the field, plus threw a glove into the stands after he got ejected from the game for arguing with Layne after Layne blew a call at home plate.

"You've got to be able to have some reactions in this game," DiFelice said. "It's a competitive sport out there. Your job is to block the plate."

I like that. These catchers are going crazy in the heat of their races. First Pudge Rodriguez makes his bid to be institutionalized and now DiFelice throws everything but Sluggerrr!!! onto the field. Catchers are very temperamental players. It really makes you wonder why all Dominicans aren't catchers.

So here's to the Royals, despite the fact that since the All-Star break, they are just a combined 2-8 against the Twins and White Sox, their two rivals for the AL Central. They still hold a two game lead over both the Twins and the White Sox.

Speaking of the Royal Blue, my soon-to-be-adopted home team, Birmingham City, earned the first three points of the season yesterday as newly signed David Dunn netted the only goal of the game from the penalty spot in a 1-0 home win over Tottenham Hotspur. That means for now anyway, they're tied for first place in the Premiereship with five others. Hoo-haa! Bring on the chips and the Tetleys Bitter!