"That certainly is Eric Gagne!"

... that's what I said yesterday in the bottom of the ninth, after Gagne walked Aramis Ramirez. That was before Kosuke Fukodome hit the three run home run to tie it, though I pretty much called the home run as well.

So, it may not have been a Cubs win, but it was a good game to watch. I'd pretty much written off the game after Kerry Wood gave up three runs in the top of the ninth, figuring that the Cubs wouldn't make up that deficit. But, I hadn't realized that the Brewers closer was now Gagne. When he was announced, suddenly I had hope.

A very good game of Fukodome, but he was almost the entire extent of the Cubs offense. A well pitched game by Zambrano and Marmol (and Ben Sheets for the Brewers). The temperature was OK, and we were underneath the stands enough that the rain was never bothersome. We stayed in the club late so that the pre-game rain delay was ignorable - I got to my seat just in time for the first pitch. And the second delay during the game wasn't too long at all.

A bad game for Prince Fielder. He hit one little ground ball that rolled out to second base, and DeRosa was playing so deep that I thought surely Fielder would beat it out. But no. Fat-ass Fielder was barely half-way down the line by the time he was thrown out. The ball could have come to a stop and any one of four Cubs could have strolled over, gotten the ball, and made it to first before Fielder.

Then in the ninth Fielder fields a groundball from Pie maybe 15 feet behind first base. But it takes him time to get to the base and he veers to avoid collision with Pie - in the process missing the base with his foot and failing to get a tag on Pie in time. I don't even know why he particularly tried to avoid the collision - he may easily weigh three times what Pie does. Felix probably would have thought he ran into a brick wall.

For about an hour in the afternoon, we could truthfully use the phrase "The Royals and the Nationals are tied for the best record in baseball", knowing we'd never use that phrase again. Then we added the Rays to that list, then the Diamondbacks (but it got less funny then). Eventually, the Nationals won so they could stand on top with the best record unchallnged. At least until today's games.