Zambrano good friends with Brewers' Sheets

MILWAUKEE - They met on Opening Day, and each pitched scoreless ball into the seventh inning.

They were teammates as National League all-stars.

Tonight at Miller Park, two aces will be face to face again as the Cubs' Carlos Zambrano takes on the Brewers' Ben Sheets in this showdown series.

"I think he's a good friend of mine," Zambrano said. "We always say hi, and we joke about it every time we see each other. . . . As soon as we cross those two lines, he knows he's my enemy, and I'm sure he knows that (I'm his enemy). It's all about pitching. It's all about me trying to win for my team, and he's trying to win for his team.

"We don't only have to worry about the Brewers. We have to worry about St. Louis. We have to worry about Houston."

Zambrano is 9-8 with a 3.87 ERA against the Brewers. Sheets is 10-7 with a 3.76 ERA against the Cubs.

"Not only here, but I think every time I go to the mound I get excited to pitch," Zambrano said. "It doesn't matter where it is, Milwaukee or someplace else.

"I've known him since I've been in the big leagues. We face them a lot during the year. We always say hi. He's a good guy. Tomorrow we both have business to take care of."

A fine mess: First-base coach Matt Sinatro was suspended two games and fined an undisclosed amount for allegedly inciting the Wrigley Field crowd Saturday, when he was ejected for arguing and slamming his helmet.

Manager Lou Piniella was fined but not suspended for arguing with first-base umpire Rob Drake, who also tossed Sinatro.

"I was held responsible for the trash that was thrown on the field," Piniella said. "There wasn't trash before I went on the field. There was trash after I left. I don't know."

Sinatro and Piniella argued Drake missed the play when he called Mark DeRosa out on a close play. Drake tossed Piniella earlier this year during a game at U.S. Cellular Field.

Xs and Os guy: Rookie reliever Jeff Samardzija watched plenty of film in the minor leagues - of himself, other pitchers and hitters. As a former football player at Notre Dame, he was used to that.

"I'm pretty familiar with watching film," he said. "When it comes to breaking things down, I've done a lot of it. Obviously, it's a different type of breaking it down, but it's just to get the idea of hitters and what their approach at the plate is, how they're swings are, if they're aggressive earlier, if they're aggressive later. It's good to see."

Samardzija said he "got pretty comfortable" starting in the minor leagues the last two years. He's a reliever now, and it'll be important to continue the trend of walking fewer batters as he did when moving from Class AA Tennessee to Class AAA Iowa.

"Looking at my season as a whole, I'm very happy with how it went," he said. "There were 3 starts in a row where I walked five or six guys and gave up 5 or 6 runs in 3 innings in those starts. I kind of took those out of my mind.

"I think it was a conscious decision, first pitch of the game, first pitch to every batter to make a conscious effort, to really think about throwing a strike."