When the Chicago Cubs began the 2026 season 27-12, a stretch that included two 10-game winning streaks, many of us thought, “Hey — maybe this year can be something special.”
Well. You know what happened after that. A 10-game losing streak. Injuries. Guys not producing. The bullpen imploding multiple times. After 27-12, they were just 62-61 — one game worse than the Marlins over that span. Sheesh.
And then, a Wild Card Series in which the Cubs offense pretty much vanished. That’s the story of Game 2,
a 4-1 loss to the Padres that eliminated the Cubs from the 2026 postseason, almost as if they weren’t even there to begin with.
I could end this recap right there, because what more is there to say, really?
Nevertheless, you come here for game recaps and since this was the last Cubs game of 2026, let’s look at what happened.
One pitch into the bottom of the first inning, the Cubs were already ahead of Game 1 because, well, Fernando Tatis Jr. did not hit Kevin Gausman’s first pitch out of the yard. So, progress?
That progress lasted one inning. In the second, Ty France doubled and stopped at third on a single by Jackson Merrill. Xander Bogaerts singled in France, with Merrill stopping at third, where he scored on a sacrifice fly by Ethan Salas. Incidentally, Salas, who won’t turn 21 until next June, became the youngest catcher ever to appear in a MLB postseason game, breaking the record set by Atlanta catcher Bob Didier in 1969.
The 2-0 score is where the game stayed until the top of the fourth, when the Cubs finally broke through onto the board for the first time in this series.
Seiya Suzuki hit a one-out single and Ian Happ walked.
Nico Hoerner’s single up the middle scored Suzuki to make it 2-1 [VIDEO].
So, down by only one run in the fourth inning, with two runners still on base and only one out? Maybe the Cubs offense could get going here?
It was not to be, although after Matt Shaw struck out, Carson Kelly was hit by a pitch to load the bases.
Dansby Swanson flied to center to end the inning.
About that single run, from BCB’s JohnW53:
The Cubs did not score for the first 12.1 innings of this series.
That is the longest they ever have gone without scoring from the start of a post-season series. They were shut out in Game 1 of three previous series.
In the 1918 World Series vs. the Red Sox and 2015 Division Series vs. the Cardinals, they scored with one out in the second inning of Game 2.
In the 2016 World Series, they scored with one out in the first inning of Game 2.
The one-run deficit did not last long. Gausman struck out Merrill to start the fourth, but Bogaerts then doubled. Craig Counsell opted to bring in Daniel Palencia, who struck out Salas.
Then the Padres sent up Gavin Sheets to bat for Austin Hays. Sheets entered this game with career numbers of .297/.348/.484 with three home runs in 69 plate appearances against the Cubs during the regular season. You could have seen this coming all the way from San Diego to Chicago [VIDEO].
Palencia then hit Jake Cronenworth with a pitch, and the San Diego crowd booed as if that had been intentional; clearly, it was not — Palencia was just struggling with command.
The score might have been worse if not for this nice grab by Pete Crow-Armstrong off Tatis to end the inning [VIDEO].
So at least we got a nice defensive memory from PCA from this series, even as his offense was silent — 0-for-7 with four strikeouts in the series.
That fourth inning was basically it. Palencia, David Peterson and Ryan Zeferjahn held the Padres scoreless the rest of the way, four combined shutout innings with four strikeouts. Meanwhile, the Cubs had just three more baserunners after the fourth. Michael Busch walked with two out in the fifth. Tyrone Taylor, batting for Busch, singled with one out in the eighth but was erased when Suzuki hit into a double play. Nico Hoerner doubled with one out in the ninth but was stranded. The Cubs went 1-for-8 with RISP in this game. If they’d hit in those situations would the result have been any different? I’m thinking probably not.
These two games in San Diego were a hallmark of this team, just as the offensive outbursts that had the 2026 Cubs lead MLB in runs also were. It was a real feast-or-famine season — long stretches where the offense could do no wrong, and others where the hitters just did not show up at all.
Here’s PCA on the season-ending loss [VIDEO].
Here are some postgame remarks from Alex Bregman [VIDEO].
Bregman, whose previous postseason performance was one of the reasons the Cubs signed him, went 0-for-8 in this series with four strikeouts.
Lastly, here are Craig Counsell’s postgame remarks [VIDEO].
Would the result of this series have been any different if the Cubs had won two more regular-season games and had home field? Probably not; it’s clear by watching these two games that the Padres were on a roll, which began over the last three weeks of the regular season and carried over into this series. Further, it’s very likely that weather would have been a major factor. It rained all day and evening in Chicago Wednesday and it’s still raining here early Thursday morning, which could have thrown scheduling for this series into chaos. In the end, this Cubs team just wasn’t good enough to move on, and you know the reasons, mostly pitching — injuries and ineffectiveness from both starters and relievers. The offense was great — until it wasn’t.
More on the offense from John:
In the two games of this series, the Cubs were 8 for 62, a batting average of .129. That is lower than in any of their 22 previous post-season series since 1901.
They batted .140 in the one-game Wild Card loss in 2018 and .145 in their two-game WC loss in 2020.
Other seasons below .200:
.168 in 2017 (10 games)
.181 in 1998 (3 games)
.194 in 2007 (3 games)
.196 in 1906 (6 games)They batted .233 in 17 games when they won the World Series in 2016.
These are things that Cubs President of Baseball Operations Jed Hoyer will have to address this offseason, and that brings me to the upcoming uncertainty. Normally when a Cubs season ends, I’d tell you the next date we will see a Chicago Cubs team on the field the following year. They are scheduled to take the field Friday, Feb. 19, 2027 against the A’s at Ho Ho Kam Stadium in Mesa, Arizona. But with a looming owners’ lockout likely happening when the current MLB/MLBPA collective bargaining agreement expires Dec. 1, there’s no guarantee that the 2027 Spring Training schedule — or regular season schedule — will be played as currently listed.
And so we wait. For developments, as is often said here.
In the meantime, stick around. We’ll have game threads here for all the remaining postseason games, including tonight’s decisive Phillies/Braves Game 3, which will begin at 7 p.m. CT (game thread will post at 6 p.m. CT). And of course, we’ll cover all the MLB offseason labor news and other baseball news here.
As is my custom, I will wrap my last game recap of the year by quoting from the late Commissioner Bart Giamatti’s “The Green Fields of the Mind” — quite appropriate today with the Chicago area weather.
It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone. You count on it, rely on it to buffer the passage of time, to keep the memory of sunshine and high skies alive, and then just when the days are all twilight, when you need it most, it stops.
