Two clubs that came into the season with high payrolls and matching expectations will try to better their postseason chances on Saturday in a matchup of two hot pitchers at Wrigley Field. Hope is not lost for either club. The Phillies and Cubs each trail in their respective divisions -- though Philadelphia is a whole lot closer -- but it just so happens that over the past few years, they've been two of the best second-half clubs in baseball. The Phillies, who have dropped the first two games of this series, were six back of the Braves in the National League East and 2 1/2 games behind in the Wild Card race after Friday's 4-3 loss. Chicago, meanwhile, has a much longer climb ahead. Despite winning six of its past nine, the Cubs still sit a rather distant third in the NL Central and found itself 8 1/2 games back of the first-place Reds heading into Friday night's slew of games. But their manager, Lou Piniella, has seen a club overcome worse. "I managed a team in Seattle that was [12] 1/2 out in mid-August, and we won a division and went to an American League Championship game," Piniella pointed out about the resurgent 1995 Mariners. "You never know." If recent history serves as any gauge, we pretty much know one thing about these two trailing clubs: They'll make it interesting. http://chicago.cubs.mlb.com/mlb/gameday/index.jsp?gid=2010_07_17_phimlb_chnmlb_1&mode=preview
