No-no, no, no-no, no-no-no-no...

The phrase "first time since" has come up a lot for the Cubs this year, and tonight was one that I've been waiting to fall by the board for a long time.

I was a fetus when Milt Pappas threw the Cubs' last no-hitter, and I get the feeling that the generation that lived and died with Leo Durocher's Cubs doesn't understand what it's like hanging your definition of a low-hit game on Chuck Rainey, who fell short at the end, and Kerry Wood, who fell short at the beginning. They got to see Milt Pappas do it. And Burt Hooton do it. And Kenny Holtzman do it twice. And if they're a little older, Don Cardwell and Toothpick Sam Jones.

My generation, or speaking for myself at the very least, wondered for years who was going to be the guy to do it. For a long time there wasn't an obvious choice. We haven't even seen them lose a no-hitter. Then Woody came along, but he never got one. And Mark Prior, but that didn't pan out.

But there was always something special about Carlos Zambrano. Keeping a team hitless into the middle innings was something he'd do a couple times a year, but there was always a question of Big Z keeping his cool and keeping his head in the game long enough to take it through nine innings.

I held my breath when he struck out in the eighth inning, holding his bat over his head like he was about to break it over his knee, like we've seen before. But when he paused and changed his mind it became that one moment where you no longer believe it's going to happen, you just know it's going to happen, and you can sit back and enjoy the ride.

Any Cub fan knows Z takes great pride in his hitting, and to see him go back to the dugout and laugh about it instead of letting it get to him, well, I hope when he finally hangs up his spikes we look back at it as the moment where he turned a corner. Not just as a pitcher and as a staff ace, but as a man.

Tonight, Carlos Zambrano, you are the man.