The Morning After

By Marcus Gilmer in News on Jul 26, 2010 3:05PM

Sweep Goes To The Schlitter For Cubs
The Cubs battled back from an early hole but couldn't take advantage of men on base in a 4-3 extra-inning loss to the Cardinals, preventing a Cubs' sweep. The Cubs put the lead-off man on in each of the first five innings, giving themselves plenty of chances. But the team went 2-for-13 with runners in scoring position and left a total of nine men on base for the whole game. Marlon Byrd knocked in a run for the Cubs in the fourth and the Cubs took the lead in the fifth thanks to RBI from Ryan Theriot and Starlin Castro but the Cards scored in the sixth off of Ryan Dempster (7 IP, 9H, 3ER, 4K) to tie it up. The Cubs still had chances, putting the winning run in scoring position in the ninth and again in the tenth, when they loaded the bases. But nothing came of it and the Cards scored off of reliever Brian Schlitter in the top of the 11th to take the lead for good. The Cubs stay in the NL Central even as they hit the road for Houston where they kick off a new series against the Astros tonight (7:05 p.m., CSN).

A's Best Sox Again
The Sox closed up their West Coast road trip struggling, dropping their second straight game and their third loss in four, falling to the A's 6-4. The Sox found themselves down early and trailed 6-1 when they rallied for three runs in the seventh. But the rally ended there as the A's tagged rookie Daniel Hudson for five runs overall. Said a frustrated Ozzie, "We put the game back in a position to make it a close game. I'm not excited or happy about it, I thought we were going to play a little bit better, but it's a long road trip and hopefully we can go home and play better than we did on this road trip." The Sox return home tonight for a week that will look pretty familiar: they'll face both the Mariners and A's for a second straight week, albeit this time around at The Cell. John Danks gets the call for the Sox tonight against King Felix (7:10 p.m., WCIU).