The Cubs’ mission: to reverse their disappointing road record, particularly on the West Coast; to break their 0-2 record at Jack Murphy Stadium; to beat up on the Padres; to improve upon their nearly first-place National League standing.
Oh, and to beat up on the Padres, who have fallen into last place from their surprising first-place showing in the recent past.
Impossible? Hardly.
The Cubs started this all-important road trip Thursday by defeating the Padres 3-2. The 12-game, 14-day journey, the longest this season, also will take the Cubs to Los Angeles, Cincinnati and Pittsburgh.
While they have won 23 of 41 games at Wrigley, the Cubs’ road record–before Thursday’s game–had been a disappointing 10-19.
But don’t expect Cubs manager Jim Riggleman’s long-term strategy for improving the Cubs’ road performance to be full of intrigue and counterespionage.
“On one side you have Cincinnati and Pittsburgh playing very well. And on the other side, you have San Diego and Los Angeles that are very hungry for wins,” Riggleman said.
“We’re three games out (of first place) and it’s only mid-June. This is the time when people feel the races are starting to formulate,” he said. “But we just need to play good, fundamentally sound baseball. We can’t really come up with a plan (for the entire trip), we’re taking it one game at a time.”
Starting pitcher Jaime Navarro (5-7) dominated the Padres with six strikeouts and no walks, factors that kept the Padres off the scoreboard until the eighth inning.
Navarro, who was suffering from the stomach flu and got only four hours of sleep because the team’s charter plane broke down, said he managed to “keep the ball way down and I threw my 90-m.p.h. fastball. You have to make the right pitch and location is the key.”
Nevertheless, after he gave up a two-run homer to Marc Newfield in the eighth inning, Riggleman decided to take him out. He was replaced by Bob Patterson in a move that miffed Navarro a bit.
“Physically, I didn’t feel the best, but I could have gone all the way,” Navarro said.
After four innings characterized by strikeouts and foul pop flies into the stands behind first base, Leo Gomez put the Cubs on top with a homer to left in the fifth.
Padres pitcher Tim Worrell (5-2) “threw more fastballs this game than he did in Chicago,” said Gomez. “I tried to take a strong swing at it and got a home run.”
It was Gomez’s 12th homer this season.
In the sixth inning, Sammy Sosa launched a pitch 447 feet into the stands in left-center, bringing in Brant Brown and giving the Cubs a 3-0 lead.
“I just go out and play the game and whatever happens, happens. I don’t have time to worry about how far it went,” Sosa said of his league-leading 24th home run.
In the ninth inning, the theme song to “Mission: Impossible” blared over the sound system and fans tried to rally the Padres.
But the game ended when Turk Wendell (seven saves) relieved Bob Patterson following a leadoff single in the ninth and got the final three outs.
