Seriously, the headline tells pretty much the story of the Cubs’ 6-0 loss to the Rangers, a defeat that ended their 10-game winning streak, the second such Cubs streak this season.
Well, not the entire story. Here’s most of the reason for the loss:
I’m not going to complain too much about this, because the team has done so well and this game was an aberration compared to many of the games during the winning streak. Yes, they have had RISP issues at times this year, but not during the streak. Nevertheless,
the Cubs did have plenty of baserunners in this game, four hits, six walks and one runner reaching on an error, but they simply could not capitalize. At all. This despite again forcing the Rangers starter, this time Jack Leiter, to throw 28 pitches in the first inning, and got him out of the game before the fifth inning had ended.
These kinds of things happen, all the time, even to very good teams. I don’t think this is going to start some sort of trend.
Edward Cabrera had an easy first inning, then didn’t really have much the rest of the way. He served up a pair of solo homers and five runs overall in five innings. It wasn’t a terrible outing, but it wasn’t really a good one, either. Jacob Webb and Ethan Roberts finished up, throwing three innings combined and allowing one run. That saved the higher-leverage arms for the series finale Sunday.
Usually, even in a loss like this, I sometimes have good defensive highlights to show you. Not from this one, there was nothing out of the ordinary. So here, let me break up this wall of text with a summary of Cabrera’s start [VIDEO].
Ian Happ’s on-base streak remained alive when he drew a walk in the first inning. That puts his streak at 30 games, if you’re keeping track of such things. The Cubs’ only hits were singles by Seiya Suzuki and Michael Busch, and doubles by Michael Conforto and Dansby Swanson. Moisés Ballesteros got a couple of innings behind the plate, so I suppose that’s useful.
A couple of notes from BCB’s JohnW53 on the end of the streak:
This was the 11th winning streak by the Cubs since 1901 that ended after 10 games. The loss to the Rangers was the fifth in which the Cubs were beaten by at least six runs.
The previous two were by eight: 8-0 at Minnesota in 1998 and 12-4 at Los Angeles vs. the Dodgers on April 25.
They fell to the Giants at home by seven runs, 7-0, in 1906 and by nine runs, 18-9, in 1910.
The Cubs also were shut out, 3-0, at home vs. the Superbas, today’s Dodgers, in 1909, so four of the 11 streaks ended in a shutout defeat.
Two of the losses were by one run and two more by two. A 1938 streak was halted by a 7-7 tie at St. Louis.
And more from John regarding interleague competition:
Last night’s loss was the 42nd in which the Cubs were shut out by an American League team. It was their 586th interleague game. They have won 304 and lost 282, for a winning percentage of .519.
None of the earlier shutouts had been against the Rangers. In the 28 previous games between the teams, the Cubs had averaged 5.18 runs, while winning 15 and losing 13.
They had scored one run in two of the losses, at Texas in 2010 and at home in 2016.
The only AL team that has not shut out the Cubs at least once is the Orioles, whom the Cubs have played 25 times.
Oddly enough, during the three-game losing streak that came in between the 10-game winning streaks for the Cubs, one of the losses was by this same score, 6-0, to the Dodgers on April 26.
So, as the saying goes: Flush this one and move on, and hopefully start another winning streak Sunday afternoon.
It will not be an easy task, as the Cubs will be facing Jacob deGrom. Jameson Taillon gets the start for the Cubs. Game time is 1:35 p.m. CT and TV coverage will be via Marquee Sports Network.
