D'backs relish 'fun' atmosphere at Wrigley

The Diamondbacks have the Cubs right where they want them.

And not only because they own a 2-0 lead in the best-of-five NLDS, which the D'backs could wrap up with another victory today in Game 3 at Wrigley Field.

The D'backs have many of the Cubs' best players looking frustrated.

In Game 2 alone on Thursday at Chase Field, the D'backs saw Ted Lilly slam his glove to the ground in disgust after surrendering Chris Young's 3-run homer in the second inning.

They watched Alfonso Soriano throw his helmet to the dirt after striking out in the sixth inning, and Derrek Lee angrily flip his bat away after popping out to short an inning earlier.

In the first two games, the spunky young D'backs made the Cubs look like a team that wanted the whole experience to be over. Arizona got all the clutch hits and made all the difficult defensive plays.

The Cubs haven't hit when it counted and haven't caught the ball well, either.

"We've put ourselves in a good position, but you can't look at that," said D'backs first baseman Conor Jackson.

What the D'backs are looking at is playing the next game and possibly a second at Wrigley Field, where the scene promises to be nuts in the first playoff baseball there since Game 7 of the 2003 NLCS.

Arizona left fielder Eric Byrnes predicted the atmosphere at Wrigley would be "off the charts," and his teammates agreed.

"It's going to be a fun atmosphere," said catcher Chris Snyder. "It's going to be rowdy. But on the other side of that, we thrive off that. We enjoy playing in front of that kind of crowd and that atmosphere. I mean, it's a baseball atmosphere."

The D'backs won two of three at Wrigley in late July, and it seemed to jump-start them to great things. Those 2 wins in Chicago started a stretch that saw Arizona win eight in a row and 21 of 26 games.

But that was then, and this is now.

"We've got to go into Chicago, into a hostile environment, hostile crowd, and we're going to have to scrap like we always do to try to come out with another win," Jackson said.

D'backs manager Bob Melvin seconded Snyder's comment about his team relishing the opportunity to play in what many consider the best environment for baseball in the National League.

"It's always an experience going to Wrigley Field," said Melvin. "And this time of year you can talk about what potentially is going to go on there, and it's always kind of a zoo and great atmosphere. This is going to be over the top."

D'Backs second baseman Augie Ojeda certainly is looking forward to playing again in Wrigley, where the fans treated him well when he played for the Cubs off and on from 2000-03.

"It's pretty special here," Ojeda said. "The fans kind of took me under their wing."

Ojeda is 4-for-7 against his former teammates in the series as the fill-in for the injured Orlando Hudson.

"Augie has come up big for us," Melvin said. "He's really rising to the occasion. He understands how to hit in the eight hole, is getting big hits for us and making plays defensively for us."

Ojeda spent the entire 2006 season with the Class AAA Iowa Cubs and played with today's starter, Rich Hill, among others.

"I'm not going to lie, I've got a lot of friends out there," Ojeda said. "It feels good as a ballplayer to play your ex-team and ex-teammates. You want to do well."