NL Central

JJ Hardy has recently become the center of attention lately in regard to trade talks for the Milwaukee Brewers.

Hardy may very well be the "Golden Boy" of Wisconsin sports. He's the player that all the men want to be and all the women want to be with. If you doubt that, take a good listen at Miller Park the next time the starting lineup is announced.

Never in the history of baseball has a career .265 hitter been so adored by fans. To hear some fans talk, you would think that a young Robin Yount was taking the field at short.

Two years ago, the Chicago Cubs made a bold decision. The one-time face of the franchise, the future of the starting rotation, the hope of the city of Chicago, Kerry Wood, was going to move to the bullpen.

The decision was partially made to give Wood a career. He had a longer laundry list of injuries and surgeries than he did pitching successes. But he always busted his tail to get back on the bump for the Cubs, so, out of respect for that, the team moved him into a role that would use his arm and shoulder more conservatively.

I was going to spend some time today talking about the current situation with Bill Hall, but it seems as though there is much more to talk about than just Hall. I will get to his situation in a bit.

First off, Dave Bush is ALL man! I know he lost the game last night and gave up a Ruthian home run to Marlins pitcher Josh Johnson, but the toughness Bush showed after taking a line drive off his pitching arm was outstanding.

Bush continues to be a very important part of the Brewers' rotation and he continues to give the Brewers a chance to win every game he pitches.

The biggest topic of debate for Milwaukee Brewer fans lately has been whether or not the team should trade for Jake Peavy.

While the majority of fans seem to be against the trade, there are many that would love nothing more to see Peavy suit up for the Brewers. I fall on the side of staying away from Peavy, but I do have a thought on which pitcher the Brewers should bring in.

Continuing his steamroll to the overall lead in votes received for the All-Star Game, St. Louis Cardinals Albert Pujols is one of two players to have received more than 1 million votes so far, according to the latest poll results released by Major League Baseball on Monday afternoon.

Pujols has received 1,240,395 votes, more than twice as many as the second-place first baseman in the NL.

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The Mariners started off the 2009 red-hot and gave us all a glimmer of false playoff hope when they were a top the AL West at one point with a 15-10 record. We seemed to forget this was a team that was supposed to be in a full-blown rebuilding mode.

This time, it's the Dodgers feeling blue as the Cubs win 7-0.

Last season, the Dodgers spoke almost boastfully of how well they scouted Ryan Dempster, using advanced reports to help beat the Cubs 7-2 in Game 1 of the NLDS. Apparently, they've lost the playbook, as Dempster and the Cubs bullpen combined on a five-hit, 7-0 shutout of the Dodgers on Saturday afternoon.

Look, there are a lot of reason why one might say that the Cubs won this game, and frankly, why they looked so completely different than we've seen them over the last month.

Filed:May 28th, 2009

Click here for the photo gallery of Thursday's game

They're deep. They have a real good pitching staff. They're athletic; even balanced. And they're the best team in the National League.

They're the Dodgers, and they're everything the Cubs were supposed to be this year once, you know, they got more left-handed.

When Alfonso Soriano was acquired by the Washington Nationals prior to the 2006 season, the club wanted to convert him from a second baseman to an outfielder. The Nats already had a second baseman in Jose Vidro, but Soriano wanted no part of the switch and sat out a few spring training games as a protest.

Eventually, Soriano gave in to the wishes of his manager (so as not to forfeit any salary) and made the All-Star Game as a left-fielder.