Big road series

Everyone agrees the team needs to play well on this road trip. This is the type of series if you play well, it doesn't guarantee you anything other than remaining solidly in the playoff hunt. A really bad series would make reaching the playoffs a longer shot than it already is.

Baltimore and Chicago are not pushovers. It seems so logical as to hardly need repeating, but the team needs to put the best players it has on the field and they must produce. I'm not sure we need further experiments ala Vidro at second base. We need Adam Jones on the field because he's the long term and short term upgrade on the field. The coddling of Sexson and Ibanez needs to stop.

It's true McLaren has gotten a lot of grief from fans, not all of it deserved. The lineups over the next few games will determine what he has learned over the past few weeks. We should be seeing Jones and Broussard often in the lineup, and we should be seeing the bullpen used often and intelligently.

If we do those two things, I think McLaren will have done his job.