When last we checked in on our 2003 Cubs, things were getting tense. Each team had just 10 games left to play. The Astros held a one game lead. That’s certainly not an insurmountable deficit, but the teams had no head to head games left. And to make matters worse, the Cubs had seven road games left and the Astros had only three.
The only slight edge the Cubs had is that they faced a little lesser competition. The Cubs had seven games left against the Pirates (four in Pittsburgh) sandwiched around three in Cincinnati.