September 6, 2011 11:02PM
Reds catcher Devin Mesoraco applies the tag to complete the strikeout of Aramis Ramirez to end the first inning as the Chicago Cubs host the Cincinnati Reds Tuesday September 6, 2011 at Wrigley Field. | Tom Cruze~Sun-Times
Updated: September 6, 2011 11:02PM
September is a growth month for baseball, with rosters allowed to expand beyond the 25-man restriction. It?s a time when minor-league players can be rewarded and given a taste of what the majors are like.
For a team no longer in a post-season race, it can be a time for prospects to showcase themselves, though baseball wisdom reminds never to judge a player by his September play.
For the Cubs ? who lost 4-2 to the Cincinnati Reds on Tuesday night
in 13 innings after Joey Votto?s RBI double was followed by Miguel Cairo scoring Votto with a single ? September can be a no-man?s-land kind of month, too.
Fans will say this is the time to play someone such as Tyler Colvin daily to see if he can recapture his success from 2010. Or someone such as speedy Tony Campana, whose ability to run has been the rarest of Cubs commodities.
With first base a question mark next season, could Bryan LaHair be a possibility if Carlos Pena isn?t re-signed? Already 28, LaHair was the Pacific Coast League player of the year but wasn?t even on the 40-man roster and last played briefly in the majors in 2008.
LaHair will give the Cubs something to consider after his two-out, two-run, pinch-hit home run Tuesday pulled the Cubs into a 2-2 tie against the Cincinnati Reds, sending the game into extra innings.
It was his fourth career homer but first since Sept. 20, 2008, with the Seattle Mariners.
A new pitcher, lefty John Gaub, hiked the Cubs? pitching staff to 14, and the returns of outfielder Lou Montanez and infielder DJ LeMahieu put the total roster at 34.
Manager Mike Quade will find time for each to play, but how much time becomes the question, especially to a manager who believes the players who have been here all year still deserve the bulk of time.
??Those three and [Andrew] Cashner will help,?? Quade said. ??A few more arms and a few more options off the bench. We?ll use them when it?s appropriate.
??But you look at guys like [Jeff Baker] and Blake [DeWitt] and [Campana] and Reed [Johnson] ? those guys have been here working hard all year. You look for opportunities [to play everyone] and mix and match.??
What isn?t likely to change is the rotation of Ryan Dempster, Matt Garza, Randy Wells, Casey Coleman and Rodrigo Lopez. Though Cashner may return to a starting role next season, his lot in the final weeks will be relief stints of no more than an inning after he missed most of the season with a strained right rotator cuff. Dempster, Garza and Wells are all but certain for next season. Coleman has the rest of the month to show if he can be a viable addition.
Lopez? situation may be the most unclear. The 35-year-old veteran was a stop-gap acquisition in late May and has been at least serviceable through 13 starts. His future may not be with the Cubs, but this season has given him a chance to show he may still have value.
His last five starts before Tuesday had lasted into the sixth inning, and he was in the sixth against the Reds before they ended a scoreless tie with two runs.
Lopez escaped a bases-loaded first inning with the help of a strikeout of 2010 National League MVP Joey Votto. He got out of the third when right fielder Colvin threw out Brandon Phillips at home attempting to score from second.
The Cubs had only one hit off Reds starter Mike Leake through eight innings, a single in the second inning by Alfonso Soriano which was quickly erased in a double play. But fortunes changed abruptly for Leake in the ninth when Starlin Castro hit a two-out infield single to third. LaHair followed with his first homer.
Before the ninth, only two other Cubs reached base. In the seventh, Darwin Barney was awarded first base on a catcher?s-interference call. Soriano was hit by a pitch in the eighth but was quickly out again on a double play.
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