By Jim Coffman
This is the delightful little portion of the year when four local major-league teams are in action and they all took to court, ice and field on Sunday.
The White Sox managed to rally and knock off the Twins (with a little help from a head’s-up Mark Teahan leaving third base to go get a relay from Juan Pierre and then throwing out J.J. Hardy at home by a dozen feet for the final out of the game). But that just meant the first week of the South Side season went from “disaster” to “disturbingly bad.”
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Even with the loss, the Twins headed to Minnesota for their home opener with a 5-2 mark. The White Sox began by dropping four of six and the best part was they were all home games.
As for the Cubs, since Carlos Zambrano’s latest flameout in a high-profile game (that’ll be all for the Big Z and openers, won’t it Lou?) – the one where he allowed eight runs in less than two innings in Atlanta on Opening Day – Cub pitchers have turned in five straight quality starts. The squad managed to win two off those games.
I dare say the Cubs led the league in quality starts wasted last year and they seem determined to protect that crown this time around.
On Saturday it was Tom Gorzelanny’s turn to see a great effort go to waste. He did not allow an earned run in six-and-a-third innings of work, but it all went to waste because the Cubs could manage only one run despite receiving seven walks in the first six innings alone.
And how much longer can the manager play Alfonso “Mr. Futility” Soriano, who is off to another delightful start with bat and glove, virtually every day? His failure to catch a routine fly ball enabled the Reds to tie Sunday’s game with the Cubs and forced Lou Piniella’s bullpen hand earlier than he would have liked.
Analyst Bob Brenly sounds like he has just about seen enough. After criticizing Soriano’s defense in the bottom of the seventh, he had this to say after Soriano struck out meekly to begin the top of the ninth:
“Another sight Cubs pitcher and players have become accustomed to seeing . . . any opposing pitcher who can put a breaking ball on the outer half (against Soriano) has a great chance” to strike him out.
Bulls Eye
The Bulls powered through one heck of a basketball game early Sunday evening. My guess is not too many folks saw it, what with the Masters winding down during the first hour and then dinner time intruding thereafter. But it was the most satisfying effort turned in by the local NBA franchise in a long time.
And yes, the Raptors, who now trail the Bulls by a game with two remaining in the race for the eighth and final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference, were without star forward Chris Bosch. But they were playing at home and they were doing so with determination (until the one, last great stretch of Bulls basketball led to a 25-point lead midway through the fourth quarter). It was a game both teams had to have and the visiting team took an early lead, added to it in the second quarter and made it double figures in the third. The Raptors managed a few mini-runs but the Bulls never allowed them to make a game of it. The final score was 104-88 and it wasn’t that close.
Joakim Noah, who finally appears fully recovered from the foot injury that derailed his and the Bulls’ season earlier this calendar year, spearheaded the effort on the defensive end and Derrick Rose did so on offense. Actually, Noah did great work at both ends, posting his best yet (set of) numbers in this his breakout season. He hauled down 19 rebounds, tossed in 18 points and even had seven assists.
Rose scored 26 and also finished with seven helpers. His highlights were the handful of high-speed drives ending in clever layups that have become almost routine this season. But he established himself early with a series of intermediate jump shots. Rose has improved in a variety of ways this season but perhaps the best upgrade has been his ability to consistently deliver from 18 to 22 feet. Maybe he’ll stretch the range all the way out to the NBA arc next year but the mid-range jumper is a great tool for him. It is great to see this lost art (so many guys just want to heave it up for threes these days) revitalized.
The Bulls game capped off a potentially awesome Chicago sports day that didn’t live up to its promise.
Hawk Tawk
On the ice, the home team outplayed the Red Wings for much of regulation with Detroit scoring in the second period despite managing all of three shots on goal. Another fortunate score gave the visitors a 2-1, third-period lead, but then Colin “Goal Machine” Fraser came through for the Hawks a few minutes later. Fraser has only seven goals this year but he has earned the moniker by scoring five of those tallies in the last five games.
Unfortunately, the Hawks seemed to run out of gas in overtime and Detroit pulled it out before a shootout was necessary. That left the locals one point behind San Jose in the final Western Conference standings. They will face seventh-seeded Nashville in the first round of the NHL playoffs starting Friday.
In the end though, the best thing for the Hawks may have been that they had something to fight for until the last day of the season. Just this past week we’ve had another example of a genius team deciding not to play hard until the end of a season.
After years of NFL teams clinching playoff positioning and then embarrassing themselves by not playing hard at the end of their regular seasons (and then often suffering letdowns in the playoffs because once a team has stopped giving its all it oftentimes can’t turn it back on), the Cavaliers decided to follow suit.
Coach Mike Brown has had LeBron James sit out Cleveland’s last three games because the team has already locked up home court advantage throughout the postseason. He damages the integrity of the game by doing this and he also damages his team’s chances.
I’m sure the Blackhawks would have still played hard even if they had clinched everything earlier but still, it was great that there was no chance to ease up. And the team responded as well to the challenge as they have everything else this season. They won six in a row before coming up just shot Sunday.
Long and short playoff runs for the Hawks and Bulls will clearly be satisfying in their own right. But it is quickly becoming apparent we’ll need them just to keep us from focusing everything on local baseball any time soon.
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Jim Coffman rounds up the sports weekend every Monday in this space. He welcomes your comments.
Posted on April 12, 2010