Feb 28th First Cactus League Game

The Chicago Cubs begin their 2008 championship season today in a spring game against the Bondsless San Francisco Giants.  Ryan Dempster gets the starting nod today in an attempt to make his way from closer to the starting rotation.  Kosuke Fukudome also gets a look at his first (American) major league pitching.   Aramis Ramirez will sit this game out replaced at third by Ronnie Cedano.  This spring training season will give manager Lou Pinella the ability to play around with the lineup and try to figure out which combination will produce the most base runners and ultimately the most runs.  He has stated over the past couple of weeks that he is looking at batting Fukudome in the number three spot followed by Derrick Lee and Ramirez at five.  This will be a huge opportunity for Ramirez to drive in runs.  Lee is an incredible hitter and good at hitting doubles.  With Fukudome's speed and OBP, we should see good RBI/run production out of these three.  The ... [link]