You knew this Cubs team wasn’t going to be in a hitting drought forever, and they chose one of the best times to come out of that slump, in front of a packed house on the South Side where close to half the crowd was Cubs fans.
The Cubs went out to an early lead, blew it, then put the game away with a four-run eighth inning and defeated the White Sox 10-5 in the opener of the Crosstown Classic.
The Cubs wasted no time getting on the board. With two out in the first, Alex Bregman singled and moved to
second on a wild pitch by Sean Burke.
Ian Happ singled in Bregman [VIDEO].
Edward Cabrera had an easy first, then served up a home-run ball to Colson Montgomery leading off the second and the game was tied.
The Cubs took a 2-1 lead in the fourth. Happ led off with a single and one out later, Moisés Ballesteros singled him to third. Carson Kelly’s single scored Happ [VIDEO].
Pete Crow-Armstrong batted next [VIDEO].
There are a couple of issues here. First, PCA’s bunt was likely intended to squirt past Burke, and it didn’t. Second, if you’re going to bunt in that situation, you’ve got to have a better baserunner on third than Ballesteros.
The game thus went 2-1 into the fifth. Nico Hoerner led off with a single and scored on Michael Busch’s double to right [VIDEO].
That was not an easy pitch to hit. As you can see in the clip, it was inside, and Busch kind of yanked it down the line, a good piece of hitting. One out later. Happ walked. Seiya Suzuki then doubled, with Happ scoring [VIDEO].
The Cubs now have a three-run lead going to the bottom of the fifth and Cabrera is cruising. What could possibly…
Well, you know the answer if you saw the game. Cabrera got in trouble with walks, something that often plagued him in Miami. He walked the first two White Sox hitters in the fifth, then retired two in a row. One out from getting out of the inning, he served up a two-run double to Drew Romo that made it 4-3. Then Cabrera issued another walk, and that was it for him. Here’s more on all the Cabrera walks from BCB’s JohnW53:
Cabrera walked three batters in the fifth inning. He had walked no more than two in any of his previous five starts, spanning 29.2 innings. He went into yesterday averaging 2.9 walks per nine innings, the lowest in any of his six seasons. He averaged 6.0 in 2023, 4.7 in 2024 and 3.1 last year.
Ryan Rolison got out of the inning with a comebacker, so the Cubs had the lead going to the bottom of the sixth. But Miguel Vargas homered off Rolison leading off that inning and the game was tied.
Rolison then put runners on first and third with a single, walk and wild pitch and so Craig Counsell called on one of the relative newcomers to the pen, Trent Thornton, with nobody out.
Thornton was really good. He retired the next three hitters without incident and had a 1-2-3 seventh. Small sample size — only five innings — but Thornton has looked pretty good so far in a Cubs uniform, retiring 14 of 18 batters faced. Perhaps Jed Hoyer has found yet another useful reliever on the scrap heap.
Thornton had some defensive help from Nico [VIDEO].
While Thornton was doing all that, the Cubs had taken the lead back in the top of the seventh. Bregman singled with one out, and one out later moved to third on a single by Suzuki. Matt Shaw was sent up to bat for Ballesteros and was hit by the first pitch he saw, loading the bases.
Kelly singled in Bregman [VIDEO].
The bases remained loaded for PCA [VIDEO].
I suppose that was a reasonable send, with the team already up two runs and Shaw a good baserunner. But a perfect throw nailed Shaw at the plate.
The Cubs broke the game open in the eighth, thanks mostly to a very wild Jordan Hicks, who you likely remember from his days with the Cardinals. Dansby Swanson led off the inning with a double. He advanced to third on a ground out, then scored on this wild pitch [VIDEO].
Hicks then walked three of the next four Cubs, loading the bases with two out. Then he issued his fourth walk of the inning to Shaw, forcing in a run [VIDEO].
Now it’s 8-4 and the bases are still loaded. Kelly smashed his second RBI hit of the game, a two-run double [VIDEO].
Kelly had three hits on the night and drove in four.
Javier Assad was tasked with finishing up with a six-run lead. He made that five by serving up a leadoff homer to Jarred Kelenic in the ninth, but otherwise wrapped it up without incident. A one-out single in the ninth was erased by this game-ending double play [VIDEO].
The Cubs got the bats rolling big-time. Everyone in the starting lineup had a hit as part of the 14-hit attack. The Cubs also drew six walks and went 6-for-14 with RISP — and could have had a lot more runs, as they left 11 on base. But overall the Cubs hitting performed as we’d seen them most of the year before the first six games of the road trip, where they scored a total of 12 runs.
Here’s Nico on his evening and the team’s [VIDEO].
The Brewers and Cardinals also won Friday, so the Cubs’ lead in the NL Central remains 2.5 games over both those teams. A few final notes from John:
This was the 14th time in the Cubs’ 153-game regular-season rivalry against the White Sox that the Cubs reached double digits in runs.
They are 13-1 in the games: 6-0 at home 7-1 on the South Side. The only loss was by 17-13 on Aug. 27, 2021. The Cubs had won two more such games since then before Friday: 10-8 on the road in 2023 and 13-3 at home on May 16 of last season — one year ago Saturday.
…..
The four wild pitches by the White Sox were the most they have thrown in their 153-game rivalry with the Cubs. The Cubs threw four in a 10-8 victory on the South Side on Sept. 27, 2020.
Lastly, just for fun: Maybe the Cubs should wear the road blue alternate jerseys more often.
Blue alternate: 6-3
Road gray: 5-8
The Cubs will go for the series win Saturday evening on the South Side. Jameson Taillon will start for the Cubs and Davis Martin goes for the Sox. Game time is 6:10 p.m. CT and TV coverage will be via Marquee Sports Network (and CHSN and WCIU-Ch. 26 with the Sox announcers).
