Manager Don Baylor was disgusted to hear this statistic after Friday night’s 6-1 loss to the Marlins: The Cubs have left 36 runners on base in their last four games.
“I’m lost as far as trying to find the right combination [in the lineup],” Baylor said. “But I can’t sit back and go through this. I’ll give it a different look.”
What can Baylor do? He indicated that he would bench left-fielder Henry Rodriguez and third baseman Willie Greene. Rodriguez has driven in one run since May 27 and Greene has 12 hits in his last 65 at-bats [.185].
“You can live with guys hitting .230-.240 if they’re hitting home runs,” Baylor said. “But they’re not. We have to do something.”
The low-budget Marlins did plenty against Jon Lieber, scoring four times in the fifth inning. The key blow was a two-run homer by Mike Lowell on a 3-1 fastball.
“It was a terrible pitch,” Lieber said. “It was supposed to be a fastball away but it had too much of the plate.”
The Cubs finally scored in the sixth on Damon Buford’s 11th home run, a career high. But after Joe Girardi’s one-out single, Baylor let Lieber hit for himself with the Cubs trailing 5-1. Lieber sacrificed Girardi to second and Eric Young struck out to end the inning.
“I leave Lieber in hoping we can come back and get him a win,” Baylor said. “Plus I have Ismael Valdes with the blister going [Saturday]. I was trying to milk what I could out of Jon.”
Lieber gave up three hits in the sixth and allowed two more baserunners in the seventh before departing with a pitch count of 124.
Lieber, though, said he was anything but tired: “I don’t care if it’s 350 or 400 pitches. I want to go as long as I can.”
