Ok, it's official. I'm never going back to norcal again. In the four days I was gone, the Dodgers got swept by the St. Louis Cardinals in a four game series. In a series that saw Nomar go 1 for 13 (.077), Odalis Perez posted a 19.29 ERA, and Albert Pujols went 9 for 18 (.500) with 2 homers, 4 doubles, and 6 RBI as the Dodgers' offense exploded for 6 runs in 4 games. Now, we've been bitch-slapped right back to the .500 mark at 46-46, dead even with the wretched Giants and trailing the Padres by 2.5. Not too long ago, when the Padres' lead seemed to always hold steady, I wondered to myself, "How do the Padres win?" Now I know the answer. They don't. The Dodgers just always lose.

The Baseball Tonight guys think that the Dodgers will still win this division. The Baseball Tonight guys are on crack. The Dodgers are buried too deep in mediocrity to be a division winner. The pitching is horribly inconsistent, so it makes it hard to win when the offense doesn't put up early runs, putting us in early holes. We always seem to sweep the terrible teams, i.e. Pirates, D-Backs, but always seem to get swept by the good teams, i.e. Mets, Cards, and break even with the mediocre teams, i.e. Padres, Giants. These are not the characteristics of a division champ. While there's still a slight brim of hope, this is definately not the way any of us wanted to start out the second half. Oh yeah, the Cardinals get to come back to town next weekend. Their fans are probably happy they'll be able to pad their division lead.