This is what I thought Aramis Ramirez said Tuesday when I asked him whether he was concerned about further injuring his already sore shoulder:
“If I’m going to have to die, I’m going to have to die.”
All I could think was: Die? For this middling team? Don’t do it, brother!
But as I was informed later, the Cubs third baseman said dive. If he was going to have to dive for a ground ball, he was going to have to dive. OK, that’s better. Nothing the Cubs have done this season should make anyone want to make the ultimate sacrifice.
Chances are, if Ramirez has to dive for a grounder when he returns, he not only will re-injure his dislocated shoulder but break a leg in the process. That’s the theme of this season, isn’t it? Not necessarily that the Cubs have been done in by injuries, though you certainly could make that argument, but that bad things just happen to this club. If it’s not one thing, it’s the other, unless it’s both. A Ramirez injury becomes a Carlos Zambrano meltdown. A Milton Bradley meltdown becomes a Geovany Soto slump.
If Ryan Dempster isn’t hurt, then Ted Lilly is.
Zambrano gets injured while running out a bunt earlier in the season and, more recently, hurts his back, possibly during another exuberant batting-practice session. This guy is a pitcher, not the cleanup hitter, right? Just checking.
When somebody tells you there’s a lot of baseball left, you might want to plug your ears. People around the Cubs have been saying that most of the season. The baseball that is left soon will start to shrink to trace amounts. It would be one thing if the Cubs had showed signs of life this season, but they really haven’t.
It took some very trusting people to believe Tuesday’s series opener against the Phillies at Wrigley Field would be radically different. But there was Rich Harden cutting down the defending World Series champions, a machete having its way with the underbrush.
Jimmy Rollins broke up Harden’s no-hitter with a two-run homer with two outs in the sixth inning.
What, you thought this was going to be fairy tale stuff?
Lest there be any doubt, Carlos Marmol loaded the bases in the eighth, walking two and hitting a batter, then proceeded to walk Ryan Howard on four pitches. It broke a 2-2 tie.
Bradley tied it with a RBI single in the ninth. Can it ever be easy? No.
All the talk about there being enough time for this club to right itself misses a key point: This isn’t a very good team. The rallying cry all season has been, “We’re playing poorly, but we’re only (your number here) games out of first place!”
It’s almost impossible to get 17 hits in a game and lose, but the Cubs did that against Colorado the other day. Beyond all the injuries and distractions, there’s something that’s not right about this team. Maybe it’s this: They’re one of the worst hitting and fielding clubs in the National League. And their emotional temperature looks to be below freezing.
These two eyes say the Cubs have looked numb most of the year, bordering on shell-shocked. Maybe it’s because the Cubs have been beaten down so much, but there’s nothing in their flabby body of work to suggest they’re going to turn everything around in the last month and a half.
Bradley has started to hit lately, but listen to what he told MLB.com Monday about being moving to the No. 2 spot in the order:
“If you want to give Lou [Piniella] credit for putting me in the two-hole and me starting to get hits, then you can do that. If you want to say eventually Milton Bradley’s a good hitter so he’s going to hit and we should have just been patient, then you can say that.”
I want to say that asking everyone to be patient with Milton Bradley until his hitting comes around in August is asking a lot.
Too many things have happened this season to dismiss. And, no, it has nothing to do with the fact the Marlins’ mascot brought a goat to the park in Florida when the Cubs were there.
Ramirez had a cortisone shot Tuesday to alleviate some of the pain and swelling in his shoulder. Can the Cubs mask their own pain? Doubtful.
“The next two weeks will tell a lot about our club,” Piniella said.
That’s what he says now, but even if those two weeks don’t go well, there’s a decent chance the Cubs still will be within sight of first place in the NL Central.
Believe at your own risk.
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rmorrissey@tribune.com
