marquis takes the opener

one of the least imaginable things to transpire in this young year for the 9-13 cubs has actually been a positive -- the quality of the starting pitching. this club, without a healthy mark prior, figured and figures to have a pretty unspectacular rotation. carlos zambrano is what he is and rich hill has promised to shine for some time, but getting the kinds of performances out of ted lilly and -- particularly -- jason marquis that the club has gotten to date was totally unexpected.

marquis flashed that ephemeral quality again yesterday, holding down an underachieving cardinal lineup in the opening game of a critical three-game set at new busch stadium to the tune of 6.2 innings, 5 hits, three walks, and just three runs on 98 pitches -- all despite fanning no one. homers by club engine aramis ramirez and new-kid felix pie -- raising his line to 243/263/459 in his first 37 major league at-bats -- provided the winning difference, despite some frightening moments in the eighth as the redbirds loaded the bases.

of course, such quality is terribly unlikely to last -- these are, after all, not very good pitchers -- one supposes that goes without saying, but this page has said it anyway.

but of course it cannot last. mean reversion may have begun today for the cubs pitching staff. in one day, the cubs team figure for runs allowed moved from 3.53 per game to a round 4.00. but will not be felt in full effect until lilly and marquis come back into their time-proven form -- and rich hill comes back into the solar system, if not to earth itself. he's good, folks, but not this good.

but it should be noted that this lot has been good -- very good -- and as long as they can stay good this club has a chance to make up the ground it frittered away earlier in the year that has left it at this morning writing tied with houston in the cellar, still five games back of division-leader milwaukee. updating the previous team pitching table:

TEAM	LG	RA	WHIP	H9	BB9	SO9	HR	HR9	BABIP	AVG	OBP	SLG
NYN	NL	3.48	1.28	7.4	4.1	7.1	18	0.9	0.265	0.227	0.322	0.368
CHN	NL	3.86	1.26	7.8	3.6	7.4	24	1.1	0.266	0.231	0.310	0.379
SLN	NL	4.28	1.24	8.1	3.1	5.8	21	0.9	0.269	0.243	0.312	0.386
SFN	NL	3.59	1.29	7.9	3.7	5.4	12	0.6	0.269	0.238	0.319	0.346
SDN	NL	4.12	1.26	8.2	3.1	6.7	13	0.6	0.288	0.243	0.309	0.356
WAS	NL	5.47	1.55	9.3	4.6	5.9	27	1.2	0.290	0.265	0.350	0.442
HOU	NL	4.51	1.38	9.1	3.3	6.4	23	1.0	0.295	0.262	0.333	0.410
PIT	NL	4.01	1.40	9.2	3.4	5.3	15	0.7	0.303	0.270	0.335	0.385
ARI	NL	4.09	1.43	9.0	3.9	7.1	23	1.0	0.304	0.260	0.340	0.411
LAN	NL	3.73	1.33	8.7	3.3	7.0	14	0.6	0.308	0.257	0.325	0.380
CIN	NL	4.53	1.28	9.1	2.4	7.0	17	0.8	0.309	0.262	0.314	0.392
PHI	NL	4.66	1.39	8.7	3.8	7.9	24	1.1	0.310	0.259	0.341	0.435
MIL	NL	4.57	1.30	9.0	2.8	7.5	18	0.8	0.312	0.260	0.319	0.413
ATL	NL	4.74	1.51	9.2	4.3	7.3	17	0.8	0.314	0.264	0.348	0.412
COL	NL	4.71	1.43	9.8	3.1	5.6	20	0.9	0.316	0.282	0.341	0.435
FLO	NL	5.52	1.71	10.7	4.7	6.9	25	1.1	0.341	0.296	0.379	0.458

but if that somehow doesn't provide sufficient context for just how blessed has been the fortune of this club, perhaps this will. there are currently 65 pitchers in the national league with over 20 innings pitched. this is how they sort by babip.

	NAME	TEAM	IP Start	RA	WHIP	H9	BB9	SO9	HR9	BABIP	AVG	OBP	SLG
1	Matt Cain	SFN	29.0	1.55	0.83	3.4	4.0	6.5	0.6	0.130	0.120	0.241	0.196
2	Rich Hill	CHN	28.7	1.57	0.84	4.4	3.1	7.2	0.9	0.157	0.146	0.226	0.260
3	Mark Hendrickson	LAN	10.7	1.66	0.69	4.6	1.7	7.1	0.4	0.196	0.159	0.200	0.203
4	John Maine	NYN	26.3	1.71	1.10	5.1	4.8	7.5	0.7	0.200	0.169	0.279	0.247
5	Orlando Hernandez	NYN	32.0	2.81	1.09	6.2	3.7	7.0	1.4	0.218	0.204	0.301	0.370
6	Braden Looper	SLN	33.0	1.91	1.00	6.3	2.7	4.9	0.6	0.221	0.200	0.270	0.278
7	Jason Bergmann	WAS	22.0	3.68	1.23	5.7	5.3	8.2	0.4	0.224	0.177	0.293	0.291
8	Jason Marquis	CHN	30.7	2.64	1.17	6.8	3.8	4.1	0.3	0.224	0.204	0.297	0.257
9	Ted Lilly	CHN	33.0	2.45	0.79	5.7	1.4	9.0	0.3	0.238	0.178	0.216	0.246
10	Tim Hudson	ATL	37.0	1.22	0.97	6.1	2.7	7.5	0.2	0.245	0.192	0.261	0.246
37	Carlos Zambrano	CHN	27.3	6.91	1.79	9.9	6.3	7.6	2.3	0.299	0.280	0.400	0.523

that is to say, the cubs have three of the nine luckiest starters in the league at this moment, with zambrano trailing in the middle of the pack (his troubles stemming not from luck but from walks).

however, as they say, it works until it doesn't -- and the cubs have to hope that lucky pitching continues to support a charge at least back to break even before this year gets much older.

this writer has characterized an early violation of the five back rule as a death knell -- and it is.

however -- though nothing would be more surprising to this writer than to see this mediocre club with its mediocre offense (an estimate thus far essentially verified, as it plates 4.63 runs/game with a .313 babip) spontaneously revive -- once in a while folks wake up and pop out of the coffin.

the trick, of course, is to wake up before you're buried. this series is to be followed by a run of nine games -- six against pittsburgh, three against washington -- that must be the smelling salts for this club if it is to regain much hope. chances are, if it isn't the salts, it's probably the myrrh.