Don't make Carlos take off his belt

The Fightin' Cubs were at it again over the weekend. Cubs-Padres, Derrek Lee-Chris Young, two mighty swings-two strikes. Pretty conventional fare as far as baseball brawls go.

Until Carlos Zambrano got involved. While the rabble around home plate was busying itself with looking like a fight without actually fighting, third base coach Mike Quade was seen walking Carlos away from the scrum. Still not that interesting until you saw that Zambrano had his belt unbuckled and half-way off. (The full video is here, Zambrano's appearance is about 55 seconds in.)

Seeing that confirmed for me why Zambrano is still my favorite player in the game. What was he going to do once he got the belt off? Wield it like a medieval flail? Strangle somebody? Bend Khalil Green over his knee?

Thanks to Quade we'll never know and Carlos won't be sitting out any starts, but it's the thought that counts. When faced with the Cubs second dust-up in the past two weeks, Zamrano's response was: I need a weapon. Nobody else on the field, including Derrek Lee who threw the first punch, seemed that interested in actually brawling. Most came out of the dugout because they had to then quickly found somebody else to "hold back."

Not Carlos, he was ready to inflict damage. He treated it like a prison brawl in the yard at San Quentin, and I'm perfectly okay with that. While the Cubs are so often punchless, it's nice to know that at least one player on the squad definitely is not.

Of course the Cubs lost that game 1-0, and Sunday's game as well but I'm not throwing in the towel yet. Fighting is how Sweet Lou's squad motivates itself. After their last bench-clearer, the Cubs won 6 of their next 7 games.

Let's hope that's the case again. Chicago has its first off day in the month of June today. They went 9-8 over that stretch which, while certainly an improvement over their early season form, still won't be enough int he second half of the season. They'll have to start turning these 2 game winning streaks and 5-4 homestands into sweeps if they're going to narrow the gap in the Central.

Good news is, they've got the Rangers up next. That's a series you have to win.

Odds Sosa will hit number 600 against his former club? I'm laying 3-1.