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CHICAGO -- With the All-Star break upon us let's take a look at some of the highlights and lowlights of the first half for the 47-40 Chicago Cubs. Highlights 5) Beating Kershaw/Greinke: It wasn't necessarily a turning point in the season but when the Cubs beat the Los Angeles Dodgers -- in games started by Clayton Kershaw and Zack Greinke on back-to-back nights in June -- it provided a big confidence boost. “How can you not recognize that?” outfielder Chris Denorfia said afterwards. This would get a better ranking if not for the fact the Cubs lost their next five games. 4) Cardinals doubleheader sweep: After dropping 8 of the first 10 against St. Louis this season the Cubs took advantage of several Cardinals' mistakes to score a total of seven runs in the seventh and eighth innings of a doubleheader sweep on July 7. For once it was the Cardinals that were left scrambling after pitchers in both games made throwing errors. 3) Mets season sweep: After taking four games at home in May the Cubs took three more in New York in early July. While much has been made of the Mets pitching staff it was the Cubs who threw the ball better, giving up just a single run in the road sweep. It put some distance between the teams in the Wild Card race. 2) Rookie debuts: At the end of spring training it was hard to imagine Kris Bryant, Addison Russell and Kyle Schwarber all making their debuts in the first half of the season -- but they did. Each has provided a glimpse of what they might become. From Bryant's keen eye at the plat,e to Russell's cat-like reflexes in the field, to Schwarber's raw ability at the plate. When it all comes together for the trio it could be a scary sight for the opposition. 1) Anthony Rizzo: His at-bats were must watch, especially when there was a lefty on the mound. In fact, he's hitting .338 with a .479 on-base percentage off lefties this year. Those are video game numbers and Rizzo has nearly as many hit-by-pitches (7) as he does strikeouts (10) off left-handers. That's impressive -- and so is the rest of his game. Lowlights 5) Jon Lester (finally) tosses to first: After so much attention was paid to Lester's unwillingness to throw to first base he finally did it, on April 14 against the Cincinnati Reds. But on his second attempt, to pick-off Reds shortstop Zach Cozart, he threw the ball well wide of first base. It gave teams the confidence to run on Lester as they've stolen 24 bases off him -- already a career high for one season. 4) May 4 loss to Cards: It marked the beginning of the end for Travis Wood as a starter as he was staked to a 5-0 first inning lead but couldn't hold it. He gave back four in the bottom of the inning then got hit again in the sixth before the bullpen eventually gave it all back in a 10-9 win by St. Louis. It was probably the most devastating loss until ... 3) July 8 ninth inning loss to Cards: Maybe it's a little less devastating now that the Cubs have won a game since being a strike away from taking 3- of-4 from the Cardinals last week. Jhonny Peralta's two-run home run off of Pedro Strop felt a lot worse than it should of as it was just one loss in the standings. However, it changed the whole dynamic of the series as the Cardinals were able to split the four games despite getting swept in a doubleheader the day before. Then the rival White Sox took the first two games of their weekend series giving the Cubs a mini 3-game losing streak 2) The strike zone: There's no two ways about it. More and more players are complaining about balls and strike calls. Many don't want to put their name to a beef but the consensus is umpires are calling more low strikes -- and a lot aren't in the zone. It's caused players to change who they are at the plate and the ripple effect has even caused problems with good umpires: There are so few of them -- say the players -- that hitters still tend to extend their strike zone even when the game is being called the right way, as they're expecting a strike even on the bad pitches. It's a growing problem in baseball and it's affected the Cubs at the plate this season. 1) Castro/Fowler: Starlin Castro and Dexter Fowler grossly underachieved in the first half based on their usual career numbers. Fowler is down about 60 points in on-base percentage while Castro is hitting ground ball after ground ball -- his ratio to flies is the worst of his career, and that includes line drives. There was a thought going into the season that Castro simply needed to be on a good team to excel but that theory has been blown up. His slash lines at the break aren't pretty: .247/.283/.603. Fowler has been frustrated by that moving strike zone more than most as it looks different to him than in years' past. Both players have looked uncomfortable at the plate.
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