Ever since the Cubs decided to give Rich Harden a 12-day rest between starts, the oft-injured right-hander has responded to questions about his shoulder with a question of his own: “What’s the big deal?”
As it turned out, absolutely nothing.
Harden turned in another sterling performance Thursday in the Cubs’ 3-2 victory over St. Louis, giving them their first series victory in September.
In a heart-stopping ninth, Brendan Ryan greeted Kerry Wood with a double over Kosuke Fukudome’s head in right. Cesar Izturis followed by placing a bunt down the first-base line. Derrek Lee’s throw to third was too late, but Ryan overslid the bag and was tagged out by Aramis Ramirez.
Skip Schumaker followed with a blooper to left to put two on with one out before Wood struck out Aaron Miles. Facing Albert Pujols with the game on the line, Wood induced a pop-up behind second, where Mark DeRosa gloved it to end the game.
Pitching between raindrops most of the night, Harden shut down the Cardinals on two runs and five hits over six innings to improve to 5-1 as a Cub.
With the victory, the Cubs’ magic number to clinch a postseason spot was down to 8 with 16 games remaining.
Now they will take an unexpected two-day break thanks to Hurricane Ike’s expected assault on Houston, returning to Chicago after Thursday’s game to await the news of where and when they will play their scheduled three-game series against the red-hot Astros. It could be in Houston, Tampa Bay, Atlanta, Washington or an unknown venue to be determined.
But at least they managed to get out of St. Louis with a 5 1/2-game lead over Milwaukee, which lost in Philadelphia to see their wild-card lead dwindle to three games over the Phillies and Astros.
After losing eight of nine games, the Cubs seemed to awaken after manager Lou Piniella’s fiery postgame speech Tuesday night, thanks in part to the pitching of Ted Lilly and Harden.
Thursday’s game was scoreless in the fifth when Todd Wellemeyer ran into control problems. He walked Geovany Soto leading off the inning before Pujols committed an error while trying to start a double play.
After Harden fouled out on a bunt attempt, Alfonso Soriano and Ryan Theriot were issued back-to-back walks to force in a run. Lee followed with an RBI groundout to third that gave the Cubs a 2-0 lead. Wellemeyer was lifted for a pinch-hitter in the bottom of the inning before DeRosa and Mike Fontenot hit back-to-back doubles off Kyle McClellan to bring home the third run.
Harden carried a three-hit shutout into the sixth, throwing in the 90-92 m.p.h. range and mixing his pitches well. But Pujols doubled to left with one out to bring in Miles, making Pujols only the third player in major-league history to begin his career with eight straight 100-RBI seasons, joining Al Simmons and Ted Williams. Felipe Lopez added an RBI single, cutting the deficit to one run.
Jeff Samardzija pitched a scoreless seventh.
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psullivan@tribune.com
