The Cubs put the show on for the home folks Tuesday, and it was a rerun. They blew it again, 5-3 to the Florida Marlins, who are off to a running start in the National League East.
The revitalized Marlins are 6-1, the Cubs 0-7, equaling the modern club record, set in 1962, for the most consecutive losses to start a season.
The ’62 club, not that it made much difference, was without a full-time manager. It was the second and final year of the memorable experiment by the late Philip K. Wrigley, then the Cubs’ caretaker who said he looked up manager in his dictionary and insisted it was a synonym for “dictator.”
So Wrigley initiated a system of rotating head coaches. Elvin Tappe, of fond memory, was the head coach during the seven-game swoon. Dick Ellsworth, who had the distinction of losing 20 games one season and winning 20 the next, broke the streak with a 10-inning victory over Houston, achieved with the aid of Ernie Banks’ 300th career home run.
The ’62 Cubs finished ninth (next to last) and lost 103 games, an all-time Chicago record. They also subsequently had two more seven-game losing streaks and another of 10. The rotating head coaches experiment then was abandoned, with Bob Kennedy serving as the permanent head coach in 1963-64.
This isn’t to suggest the current Cubs will be confronted with another such disaster. But they could be headed in that direction despite the laudatory postgame comments of Florida manager Jim Leyland, who in a burst of fellowship said, “They have a good club. They’re going to do well.”
They didn’t do well Tuesday before a surprisingly large Opening Day paid attendance of 35,393. Temperature at gametime was 29 degrees, with a windchill factor of 1 above zero. Before the game, Leyland, while hitting grounders to his infielders, acknowledged the frigid climes.
Said Leyland, with a frozen chuckle, “This is one day even Ernie Banks wouldn’t say `Let’s play two!’ “
One game was more than enough. Trying hard, the Cubs twice held the lead, both times for two innings. They went ahead 2-1 in the third on an RBI double by rookie Doug Glanville and took the lead again in the fifth when Sammy Sosa walked with the bases loaded.
Had they had a more potent attack, they could have broken the game open in the fifth and possibly knocked out Al Leiter. The rally began with singles by Brian McRae and Glanville with two out. Walks to Ryne Sandberg and Sosa followed. Leiter was having control problems, and it was an opportune moment for Shawon Dunston to take a few pitches, but Dunston couldn’t resist. He swung at Leiter’s first delivery and bounced into an inning-ending force play.
The Cubs had nothing going thereafter and sent the minimum 12 batters to the plate in the last four innings. Included in this stretch was Dave Hansen’s seventh-inning pinch single. Making his Chicago bow, Hansen immediately was picked off by Charles Johnson, the Marlins’ Gold Glove catcher.
Johnson also threw out two runners attempting to steal and delivered the winning hit, a two-out, two-run, seventh-inning double off starter Steve Trachsel, who was looking good. Before Johnson’s double, Trachsel had struck out Jeff Conine, the league’s leading hitter.
Gary Sheffield shared the hero honors with Johnson and, in the fourth inning, by himself, manufactured a run with superb baserunning. After opening with a double, Sheffield, running on his own, tagged up and took third on Bobby Bonilla’s flyout and, again running on his own, scored when third baseman Kevin Orie temporarily lost the handle on Moises Alou’s grounder.
“I just try to be aggressive,” said Sheffield, who recently was awarded a huge contract extension. “If you have an all-around game, you can help the team win.”
There was little, if any, aggressive play by the Cubs.
Manager Jim Riggleman, summing up, said, “If you don’t play well against a good team, they’re going to beat you.”
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Catcher Scott Servais agreed.
“We’re just going to have to play better,” he said. “We’re not an 0-7 club.”
Whatever, the Cubs must play the Marlins again Thursday and have three more games against the Atlanta Braves this weekend. If they don’t play better, the losing streak is likely to continue.