Chicago Cubs Baseball

So this is it. The six-month marathon called the major league baseball season is in its final week.

And wonder of all wonders, Chicago Cubs baseball heads into the regular season home stretch atop the Central Division standings with a magic number of four.

Six games to go. A three-and-a-half game lead. This is the veritable no-man’s land in the world of baseball playoffs. Too much baseball to be played to be comfortable. Far too much baseball to be played to celebrate. No lead is safe. No lead is insurmountable.

A final week Cub collapse? Unthinkable.

These are days of scoreboard watching and sleepless nights. Restless dreams filled with Bartman bogeymen, black cats and Curses of Billy Goats. This is the stuff that gives paranoia a bad name.

Collectively, Cubdom holds its breath and hopes its Cubs end their season with their first-place hold intact. For we all know this is no time for the Cubs to be looking over their shoulder. This is no time to stub a toe.

Or worse yet. This is no time Chicago’s Cubs to choke.

The Chicago Cubs finished their regular season, final Wrigley Field homestand with a script Hollywood would have turned away. Winning five of six in the heat of a division race, the Cubs capped the homestand with a three-game sweep of the Pittsburg Pirates.

Perhaps nothing was sweeter than today’s 8-0 blanking and shellacking of the Pirates. It was as complete a game as Chicago Cubs baseball has put together this entire season. Carlos Zambrano looked the staff ace, tossing a three-hit shutout before leaving with cramps in the sixth. The bullpen support of Kerry Wood and Michal Wuertz completed the shutout and the offense mashed with Derek Lee collecting his 20th homer of the season.

Before any of us in Cubdom gets carried away, the maestro of Chicago baseball had a few words of sage advice.

“I thought in September we’d get hot and we have,” Chicago manager Lou Piniella said, following Sunday’s win. “Let me tell this. We still have our work cut out for us.

“It’s a special year. Let’s just finish it off the right way.”

We, in Cubdom, are with you Lou.