It's a different year, but the same story -- the first week of June has not been kind to the Cubs.
They were 0-4 in June games heading into Tuesday's series opener against the Brewers after getting swept by the Giants over the weekend.
In the finale in San Francisco on Monday, Starlin Castro caught a feed from Darwin Barney at second base for a force out and started running off the field, unaware that was only the second out of the inning. Nobody knows if he would have completed the double play, but his no-throw led to a run and a rant from manager Dale Sveum saying Castro's mental gaffe was "the last straw."
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Exactly a year ago Tuesday, Carlos Zambrano launched into his epic "we stinks" rant after Carlos Marmol and the Cubs handed a game to St. Louis Cardinals.
Theo Epstein and the new regime cleaned house by trading Zambrano, but that didn't stop Cubs players from feeling "embarrassed" as the team struggles through another bad stretch.
There are differences in the two cases, of course. Sveum was calling out just one player and Castro was apologizing to his teammates while Zambrano was calling his entire team out.
Ironically, both issues came against Ryan Theriot teams. The former Cubs sparkplug and fan favorite was with St. Louis last year and doubled off Marmol to drive in the game-tying run in the ninth before Albert Pujols hit a walk-off homer.
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Theriot, who has hit .345 against his former team, totaled as many hits in the series in San Francisco as the Cubs had runs (6).
When the first week of June rolls around in 2013, tune in. Who knows what will happen then.