Cardinals stunned as Cubs learn to play defense

First off I want to quickly note, that I switched to Haloscan for our comments. The unfortunate result of this is that all previous comments written seem to be lost now.

Well the Cubs managed to take another one from the Cards this year, improving to 7-3 for the season series, and it wasn't from stellar pitching, or extraordinary offense. Nope, the Cubs actually played good defense. Some of you may have seen their swell defensive work on SportsCenter as they seemingly made up 12 of the plays on their Top 10 list last night.

(Seriously, why have a "Top Ten" when they always cram like 22 plays into the list? Ugh, can we crap on ESPN more? Its as dumb as all their features they've created as a means to offer more advertising during the show. The Budweiser Hot Seat! Coors Light Cold Hard Facts! My favorite, although it isn't SportsCenter related is the World Series of Poker sponsored by Milwaukee's Best Light. Really? This poker shit has blown up in the last couple years and we've got the Beast sponsoring it? The Beast should be sponsoring something like the World Series of Beer Pong, which could air on "the Ocho". We're here live in the basement of Mike and Dave's house to bring you the World Series of Beer Pong, sponsored by Milwaukee's Best. Stay tuned afterwards for the World Series of Asshole sponsored by Natural Light, followed by Keystone Light's North American Kegstand Quarterfinals, all right here, on the Ocho!)

Anyway all the flashes of leather last night and you'd think that Neifi and Aramis were defensive studs. Well I've already shown you that Neifi is not exactly the greatest second basemen, and his abilities at shortstop aren't that great either. Yes Ronny Cedeno ranks third among NL SS for most errors, but his range is much better than Neifi's. What was a ground ball stopped by Ronny in which he makes a bad throw to first, may have gone completely past Neifi into left field for a base hit because his pudgy butt couldn't even get to it. Pick your poison I guess. Sadly though Neifi is actually hitting better than Ronny, and his glove work last night all but inked his name in the starting lineup at short for the time being.

I could sit here and give Neifi backhanded compliments all day, but the fact of the matter is that we won last night and that's what's most important I guess. A few quick notes before I forget you guys for the weekend.

• Rich Hill, 3.1 IP, 1 K, 6 H, 3 BB, 4 ER. Not quite getting over the hump just yet I guess. But what do you do? He's destroying batters at AAA. Would some innings out of the bullpen help?
• Thunder Matt Murton drilled one to deep center over Edmonds' head for a double. Yeah, its nothing big but Thunder Matt's extra base hits have been a rarity this season, so we need to celebrate the ones he gets.
• Ryan Dempster's 6th blown save was foiled when John Rodriguez hit into a double play to end the game. Don't worry Ryan, there'll be another chance.

Hey guys, over here, man! Don't leave me hanging Neifi. Phil, Phil, high five over here. Hey I got the save assholes!