I feel your pain, my friend.

What even, guys. What. Even.

Ryan Dempster threw an absolute gem today. He lasted eight innings and held the Reds to three hits and no runs, while striking out six. He was backed up in grand fashion by his batters: Starlin Castro, Bryan LaHair and Geovany Soto (!) each had a solo shot to put the Cubs up 3-0.

Then. Oh, then. Carlos Marmol happened.

Marmol came in to close out the game in the ninth, hoping to collect his third save of the season. But Good Marmol was nowhere to be found. Instead we got someone who looked an awful lot like our friend Carlos, but may in fact have been some guy from the stands.

Three walks, a hit, and an error by the beleaguered Ian Stewart later, Whoever That Was Pitching The Ninth had allowed two runs. He was promptly lifted, without having recorded an out, in favor of Rafael Dolis, as the entirety of Cubs fandom screamed “NOT BETTER.”

Dolis then induced a double play, but since there were no outs in the inning, it allowed Brandon Phillips to score the tying run.

The Cubs of course did nothing in the top of the tenth. Dolis came back out for the bottom half, and gave up a leadoff single to Zack Cozart. Chris Heisey tried to advance him with a sacrifice bunt, and got more than he bargained for when Dolis flubbed the throw to first, allowing him to reach safely and sending Cozart to third. Scott Rolen then launched a sac fly to end it all.

Ugh.

The Cubs come back to town tomorrow, and will face the Dodgers at 1:20. Paul Maholm squares off against Chad Billingsley. Let’s hope Good Maholm shows up; although after today’s performance, I’m not sure how much good that would do.