Eyyyy welcome back. Glad ya stopped by.

Alright well...tomorrow's the big day. Brandon Webb versus Biggg Carlos Zambrano. Cubs fans (myself included) are waiting to see which Carlos Zambrano shows up.

I think the first game is going to tell a lot about the series. The Cubs and Diamondbacks are good teams. From a Cubs perspective, I can see why we are good (most of the time...please exclude all games played against the Florida Marlins, thanks). When we're firing at all cylinders, who can match our power, our small ball, our dominant starting pitcher(s) and our bullpen? Not many. But when we stop hitting for power, fail to move runners up, give up a ridiculous amount of runs and blow saves, we're just as good as the Devil Rays (sorry, guys...there better not be Lou connection there, though, eek!) I cannot, however, see why the Diamondbacks are good, even with Brandon Webb and the occasional power of Chris Young. Eric Byrnes led the team with under 90 RBIs. Oh and the negative run differential. Weirddddd

If you ask me (and who does??) I think we have a few keys to tomorrow's game:
~ Be patient. Webb averaged close to a hit an inning (209 hits, 236.1 innings) and although the walks are down (72) it is still possible. So don't bite right away. Make him work and get his pitch count up. He's not superman.
~Steal bases. Cubs didn't really steal a lot this year, but why not start the playoffs by surprising them with steals? They will be unprepared and irked, definitely a good thing. If Soriano's healthy, which we might be able to assume he is (given his monster month), I'd try him. He did go 40/40/40 with Washington...
~Be calm. Throw strikes. This goes for you, Carlos Zambrano. And Ryan Dempster. Both of ya!

CUBS IN FOUR.
NLCS HERE WE COME!
 

Tomorrow is when time will tell. Go Cubs! 

Whoa, I pretty much took the whoooole summer off. But here I am back, and I'm ready to chronicle my trip through October. Through thick and thin, bad and good, and curses. Yowza. (oh p.s. I deleted my other posts...so...yeah...haha)

I'm gonna start later tonight but let me lay it down for ya here...

...I'm gonna take this space to write about my feelings, experiences and emotions. Whoa, I sound really girly there. Don't worry, I'm not talking about those feelings, and I definitely am not gonna start to nag ya.

So before I start, let me tell everyone...

I love comments. I love story proposals. I love responses in general.

So keep it comin, let me know what you think...and you know I'll give you somethin' in return ;)

Peace
Love
& Cubs 

Alright, well I don't think I have any readers but I should explain myself here incase anyone wants to go back to the beginning and figure out what I'm all about. I'm 18 years old and a student at the University of Illinois; hopefully a Journalism major and hence the inspiration of this blog. What might make this a little different is that I'm a girl. So what you say? How many girls do you know who are obsessed with baseball, who can give you stats and names in a second? Not many I presume. And if you do? You must be pretty lucky. Us TRUE baseball girls are few and far between.

So this is my (hopefully not) pathetic attempt to be more fluent in sports. I know my stuff, don't get me wrong, but the whole opinion part of it isn't always easy for me. Many people don't want to hear the opinion of some girl. Believe me, I know. A lot of people think that I don't know what I'm talking about.

If you haven't already figured it out, I'm a Cubs fan. It's funny how it happened, actually. It just sort of came to me one day. My dad, still bitter about the baseball strike, never really immersed me into a game. Luckily I started in 2002, therefore avoiding the "bandwagon" tag which would've been applied had I started following in 2003. The first game I can actually remember going to was against the Cardinals. What a way to get started, eh? The best rivalry in sports, hands down. But aside from that distinction, the Cubs don't have much else. Last World Series appearance was in 1945...and everyone knows that we haven't even WON one since 1908. What makes it worse is that the White Sox and Cardinals have won in the past two years. Talk about adding salt to an almost century old wound. The only thing that would make things worse would be for the Houston Astros or Tampa Bay Devil Rays (or "Rays" as it may soon be) to win one. At least now we can say we've won at some point, no matter how long ago.

So there you have it, my story. I'm hoping to post a few times a week about whatever intrigues me from the baseball world, but mostly concerning the Cubs. I figure it will tide me over until the first Spring Training game and ultimately until the season (and life) starts over again.

If you're reading this now, cool. Obviously if you have any comments or suggestions (or *gasp* corrections!), just post them. I'll do my best to hopefully be funny and informative over these next few months. Thanks for stopping by!