I hate the Cardinals. All they do is bitch and moan about everything, all of them, they’re little bitches, all of ‘em. I really hate the Cardinals. Compared to the Cardinals, I love the Chicago Cubs. Let me make this clear – I hate the Cardinals.

Well he’s obviously my new favorite Cincinnati Red.  And he is right on target.  They are a bunch of whiny bitches and I’m glad someone is finally saying what we’ve all been thinking.  Unfortunately the Cubs are kind of bitches too, but that’s a conversation for another day.

Oh by the way, a bench-clearing brawl between the Reds and Cardinals erupted after Phillips and Cardinals catcher Yadier Molina started jawing in Tuesday night’s game.  Nice work Brandon.

You know, it was fun at first.  I just watched a game here and there, and I was always enjoying myself.  It was only April, there was no pressure, I just wanted to have a beer or two, enjoy the green grass and the beautiful sunset against the grandstand.  But then I became more and more obsessed.  All of a sudden I needed to watch every inning of every game.  Sometimes it wasn’t too bad, Marmol might pitch a good inning, or when Derrek Lee started to heat up in June.  Sometimes it was miserable, when the Cubs offense shorted out and Milton Bradley turned on himself, the team, and even the fans.

Then August rolled around.  It started off decently, with the Cubs winning 3 out of 4 and sitting only 2 games behind the Cardinals.  And then things went south.  Not to say they had been going great all season until that point, but there was still a lot of hope.  Things were very precarious, however, and one weak link could trip up the whole operation.

Meet Kevin Gregg and an extremely inconsistent bullpen.  Sure, Gregg and the bullpen aren’t necessarily responsible for the position the Cubs are now in (if you ask me its a combination of terrible hitting and terrible coaching), but Gregg’s meltdowns in the 9th inning turned the tide on this season.  All of a sudden I was screaming at my girlfriend for no good reason.  Some days I would just be in a bad mood all day and not even know why.  I had to kick the habit, it had become self-destructive.  I think I’m much happier this way.

Now it is August 26th, the Cubs are 9 games behind the Cardinals in the NL Central and 8.5 back in the Wild Card.  Also, according to a box score I noticed this morning (I swear I didn’t fall off the wagon and watch the game!), the Cubs lost 15-6 to the Nationals (arguably the worst team in baseball) last night.  I had clearly made the right decision.

So that is why I have decided to quit drinking Cubsahol.  Obviously I will be back on the sauce come Spring Training 2010 (or possibly even Cubs Convention), but for now I’m just trying to get my life back together.  Football season cannot come soon enough.

Now it’s on to St. Louis for a three game series against the Cardinals.  Pujols and company are just a half game behind the Cubs for second in the division with Chris Carpenter coming back.  The Cards’ ace will pitch the middle game of the series against Ryan Dempster.

The Cubs and Cards should set up to be a great match-up being so close in the division.  The teams have exactly the same amount of runs scored and runs allowed, so I’m predicting three ties.

Really though, the Cubs are lucky to be where they are considering some of the rough times they’ve gone through thus far.  With Soto, Lee, and Bradley struggling at the dish and all missing time with injuries, the run production should have plummeted.  With Ramirez spending time on the DL it should have gotten worse.  Worse is a word that would not describe a lot of bullpens in their relation to the Cubs pen.

Injuries and slumps are more common in baseball than rotund relievers or scrawny hitters with no power for the Giants, but the Cubs have had more than their share to start the year.  Still, winning seven of ten has gotten them back to six games over .500 in a short time and with Zambrano likely to return this week a series win against the Cards would be huge.