Nats welcome the red hot cubs, Series Preview

The Chicago Cubs (15-7) will visit Nationals Park for the first time this weekend to try and keep their hot streak alive. The Cubs have won nine out of their last eleven games, eight of which have come since the injury of all-star outfielder, and former National, Alfonso Soriano. Their winning streak has been spurred by doing all the right things; their starting pitching has been great (aside from Ted Lilly), six regular players batting over .300, and the team is getting on base .368 percent of the time.

The Washington Nationals (7-16) on the other hand have been playing much better baseball over the last week, but still have a long way to go. They have won three out of their last seven, which is an improvement on the nine game losing streak earlier in the year. The Nats line up seems to be finally producing with Lopez returning to old form, which is something baseball fans in Washington desperately need.

Cubs Last Series

The Cubs come to Washington coming off of a split two game series in Colorado which saw them end a six game win streak. The Cubs pitching cooled down a little bit in the Rocky Mountains as they let up 10 runs in two games after only allowing nine runs in the four games prior. The Cubs also recorded their 10,000 career win in the first game of the series.

Who’s Hot: Geovany Soto:5-8, 1 HR, 1 2B, 1 R, 0 K

Who’s Not: Reed Johnson: 0-5, 1 R, 0 BB, 0 K

Starting Pitchers
Rich Hill – 5 IP, 3 H, 3 ER, 4 BB, 3 K
Jason Marquis- 7 IP, 8 H, 2 ER, 3 BB, 5 K

Probable Starters

Ryan Dempster (3-0, 3.00 ERA) vs. Odalis Perez (0-3, 3.37 ERA)
Carlos Zambrano (3-1, 2.67 ERA) vs. Matt Chico (0-4, 6.04 ERA)
Ted Lilly (1-3, 7.30 ERA) vs. John Lannan (1-2, 3.42 ERA)

No Free Passes

The Cubs have the third best on base percentage in the Major Leagues right now, getting on base as a team at .368. If you take away Alfonso Soriano’s .230 OBP from when he was healthy, the Cubs would probably take over the Red Sox as having the best in the bigs. With top three in on base percentage in the league being the Red Sox, Cardinals and Cubs (all well over .500) it’s getting tough to ignore the importance of the stat. (The nationals are 5th to last with a .311 on base percentage).
What’s scary about the Cubs is not only are they getting on base at a high level, they have the bats to hit them in. If the Nationals want to be successful against them, they need to cut down on the walks they let up. Free passes lead to easy losses. To beat the Cubs, the Nats need to make them earn their runs.

What to look for

Everything seems to be in place for the Nats to break out in a good way. The Nationals batters have all had good games in the past week, just not at the same time. The defense has clamped down and the pitching has always been in place. While the Cubs are a great team this season, the Nats can really turn it around if they take 2 out of 3 at home.