Before tonight's 6-3 win over the Marlins, the Cubs officially disabled Kerry Wood. After the win, the Cubs officially summoned righthander Jeff Samardzija from Iowa.

Though Samardzija appeared to be a candidate to share in middle-inning relief duties while Wood was out and Carlos Marmol slipped into the closer's role, Gordon Wittenmyer writes in the Sun-Times that Samardzija might start one of this weekend's games against Florida, which would allow Lou Piniella to give Rich Harden an extra day's rest. As Wittenmyer points out,

A Saturday start would push back Rich Harden's scheduled start to his sixth day -- a schedule that produced good results for Harden with Oakland earlier this year.

In fact, with the A's this season, Harden started seven times on five days rest. In those seven starts, he went 4-0, 1.43, with 60 strikeouts in 44 innings. Which is nice.

As for Thursday night's game, it was more "Fun with Carlos" as Marmol walked three men in just an inning-and-a-third on the way to his fourth save.

The save opportunities may end soon for Marmol, however, as the start of Wood's DL stint was backdated to July 14th, which means he will be eligible to return to the Cubs next Tuesday, when the team will play the second of four games against the Brewers.

— Call me a cockeyed optimist, but I found no fewer than eight positives in the concluding game of the Cubs' mostly miserable 2-4 road trip.

— According to the Sun-Times, Tribune Company has pared the field of potential purchasers of the team and the ballpark down to five, with all of those parties having bid at least $1 billion. Mark Cuban is among the five; John Canning, Milwaukee businessman and friend of Bud Selig, is apparently not.

— In light of Kerry Wood's ongoing blister problem, the S-T's Gordon Wittenmyer became the first reporter covering the team to utter those two words, one of which is virtually impossible to spell correctly: Jeff Samardzija.

The blister on [Wood's] right index finger hasn't come close to healing the way the club expected by now, and Wood could be facing another trip to the disabled list after seeing a specialist in Chicago [Thursday]. That might open the way for hard-throwing prospect Jeff Samardzija to make his major-league debut.

Since his recent promotion from Double-A ball, Samardzija has started six games for the I-Cubs, going 4-1, 3.13, fanning 40 and walking 16 in 37 1/3 innings. This past Monday, the former Notre Dame football star held Nashville to 2 hits and 1 run over 6 innings while striking out 9.

— I'll be out of town next week, when manager Ryne Sandberg leads his Class-A Midwest League Peoria Cubs into battle against the Kane County Cougars in the special "Road to Wrigley" game right there at Clark & Addison, but it sounds like it's going to be a lot of fun. The Cubs have decided to open the upper deck for the contest, with some of the seats going for as little as $5. All in all, a brilliant promotional idea. Hard to believe the Cubs could have come up with such a thing in the absence of former marketing genius-in-residence John McDonough, now President of the Blackhawks, speaking of which...

— Having lived my entire life in the Chicago area, I am at peace with the idea that the weather here will be completely inhospitable to human life from November 1st through April 30th every year, without exception. However, this year on December 31st, I'm really, really, really going to pray that the high temperature on New Year's Day, 2009 hits about 85 degrees.

The Cubs won their second game of the Spring on Monday, nearly coughing up a 6-2 ninth-inning lead against the Mariners, but holding on to win 6-5.

Jon Lieber was tagged for two runs and three hits in two innings of work as he returned to Cub pinstripes. Jeff Samardzija pitcher two scoreless relief innings and was credited with the victory.

At the plate, DH Jake Fox (double and a triple), Ronny Cedeno (3-for-5), and Ryan Theriot (2-for-3) led the way. Kosuke Fukudome went 0-for-2 and is now 1-for-7 in Cactus League play. Lou Piniella is considering letting Fukudome hit second to see if he is "more comfortable there."

Speaking of Fukudome, Chris Jaffe of the Hardball Times offered this note on Monday, which, in case you needed it, serves as a handy reminder of why the Cubs pursued the Japanese star so relentlessly over the winter:

"The 2007 Cubs had an historically large split between their righty and lefty bats. The former posted an impressive sOPS+ of 112, while the latter floundered at a replacement-level mark of 74.

"That 38-point edge in sOPS+ for right handers is the seventh-greatest in the last half century. In two-thirds of the team's at-bats, righties went .283/.345/.453 while their counterparts poked an ineffectual .248/.309/.358. Righties had an OPS similar to Miguel Tejada's 2007 while the southpaws hit as badly as Craig Biggio did in his swan song.

"Could be worse though—the 2005 Cubs had the fifth-biggest gap favoring righties."

– Cubs pitchers and catchers report for duty in Mesa on Wednesday. When they arrive, they'll find new security measures around the team's spring training complex.

That's because three young players already in camp, Jeff Samardzija, Jake Fox, and Tyler Colvin, had a variety of personal items stolen from their lockers a couple of weeks ago. The alleged thief, one Todd Robert Smith, was arrested on Saturday and charged with going on a burglary rampage that included the thefts in the Cubs complex.

– Pat Hughes was named Illinois Sportscaster Of The Year on Tuesday and dedicated the award to his constituents, Cubs fans, whom Hughes called "the greatest fans in the world."

Milo Hamilton, who lives in Texas, wouldn't have been eligible for the award, but I bet he's still bitter he didn't win.

– My favorite Baseball Prospectus writer, Joe Sheehan, offered his Spring Preview of the NL Central on Monday, and of the Cubs, Sheehan wrote:

The Cubs return the good players from the division titlist of 2007, and have upgraded in right field as well as added some depth. The middle infield is pretty lousy for a contending team, which is why the pursuit of (Brian) Roberts, even at a cost of (Felix) Pie, has made sense. It will be harder to hold off the Brewers this season, and even the Reds could make some noise if things break right. Still, you’re looking at the favorites, part of the cluster of teams that can lay claim to being the second-best in the league behind the Mets.

Nice to read the Cubs being referred to as favorites to win anything, isn't it?

Interesting to read mention of the Cubs pursuing Brian Roberts. Strange--I really hadn't heard anything else about that.