Michael Busch has been in a season-long slump.
Hopefully, his bases-l0aded two-run single that broke a 1-1 tie in the sixth inning will help him get back to who he was last year. The Cubs also got home runs from Nico Hoerner and Seiya Suzuki and rode yet another outstanding outing from Shōta Imanaga to a 7-4 win over the Phillies on a warm April evening at Wrigley Field. It was the team’s seventh straight win, their longest winning streak since an eight-game run from July 21-29, 2023. It was also the Phillies’
seventh consecutive loss.
Let’s begin at the beginning. Imanaga breezed through the first four innings, allowing just a leadoff walk to Trea Turner and a fourth-inning single to Félix Reyes. Help came, as usual, from the defense. Matt Shaw made this nice grab in foul territory in the first [VIDEO].
The Cubs, though, could not break through in that four-inning stretch, despite having multiple baserunners in multiple innings. They stranded two runners in the second and had the bases loaded in the third with one out when Alex Bregman and Ian Happ walked and Suzuki was hit by a pitch. But Carson Kelly popped up and Busch grounded out.
Stranding runners was going to become a theme in this game.
Dansby Swanson led off the fourth with a walk and one out later was on third after a single by Pete Crow-Armstrong. But he ended the inning right there, on third base.
The Cubs finally got on the board in the fifth. Another walk to Happ was followed by a single from Suzuki. The next two Cubs were routine outs, but they loaded the bases on a walk to Swanson.
Moisés Ballesteros was sent up to bat for Shaw. With the crowd standing, he walked to force in a run [VIDEO].
Look how close that pitch was! (Pitch 7)
Ballesteros, who won numerous ABS challenges while catching during Spring Training, clearly has excellent strike zone judgment.
Scott Kingery was sent in to run for Ballesteros. This move would come back to hurt the Cubs, a bit, later in the game. Craig Counsell was making moves in the fifth inning that a team wouldn’t normally make that early.
PCA, unfortunately, grounded out to end the inning and the Cubs left the bases loaded for the second time.
Kyle Schwarber homered off Imanaga with one out in the sixth to tie the game. It was Imanaga’s only real mistake in seven strong innings. Shōta has allowed just three home runs in 29 innings so far this year, a huge improvement over 2025. He also currently has the best WHIP in MLB at 0.724 and 32 strikeouts in the 29 innings. Imanaga struck out just one in this game, but got 11 ground-ball outs. Here’s more on Shōta’s evening [VIDEO].
A few more notes on Imanaga’s start, from BCB’s JohnW53:
Imanaga is just the fourth Cubs pitcher in the Live Ball Era to start each of his first 59 career games. The first three were Kerry Wood, in 1998-2001; Mark Prior, in 2002-04; and Kyle Hendricks, in 2014-16.
Prior had the lowest ERA of the three, 2.99. Imanaga’s is 3.19. Hendricks’ was 3.31; Woods’, 4.06.
…..
Prior’s also is the lowest among 18 Cubs who made at least 50 starts among their first 59 career games. Rick Reuschel is second, at 3.10 in 56 starts, then Imanaga, Hendricks, Burt Hooton (3.39 in 55), Mike Harkey (3.47 in 58) and Moe Drabowsky (3.50 in 52).Greg Maddux (55 starts) is tied with Dick Ellsworth (50) for 13th, at 4.05. Jamie Moyer had the highest ERA, 5.01 in 56 starts.
The Cubs broke the tie in the bottom of the sixth. Nico led off with a single. Bregman hit a line drive right at Turner for the first out. Happ singled, but Suzuki struck out. Another walk, drawn by Carson Kelly, loaded the bases.
That brought up Busch [VIDEO].
Busch has actually started to hit, a little, over the last week or so. He’s 8-for-30 (.267) over his last eight games, with four walks giving him a .353 OBP in that span. There’s no power, unfortunately — all eight hits are singles. Hopefully the power will come soon.
Anyway, after Busch’s single, Swanson walked — for the third time! — re-loading the bases. Kingery flied to right to end the inning. If you’re counting, that’s the third time the Cubs left the bases loaded in this game.
The Cubs broke the game open in the seventh. Nico led off with his fourth home run of the year [VIDEO].
Bregman walked and Happ followed with a fly ball to right.
That brought up Suzuki, who had not hit much so far this year. In this at-bat, he absolutely crushed one — to Waveland! [VIDEO].
That ball was hit really hard and went a long, long way:
Here’s where Seiya’s ball went:
Bryce Harper hit a two-run homer off Riley Martin in the eighth, the first runs Martin has allowed since he came to the Cubs. I still like what Martin brings to the team; no shame in giving up a home run to Harper. That made the score 6-3.
The Cubs extended the lead to 7-3 in the eighth. Busch led off with a walk. That was the 10th walk drawn by the Cubs in this game. From John:
The Cubs’ 10 walks were their most since they had 11 at home vs. the White Sox in a 7-3 win on May 17 of last season. Their last game with exactly 10 was on March 31 of last year, while routing the Athletics, 18-3, in the first big league game played in Sacramento.
One out later, Kingery singled — his first hit as a Cub — and PCA laid down a nice bunt to load the bases yet again. A wild pitch scored Busch to make it 7-3. After that, Hoerner was hit by a pitch to re-load the bases, but Bregman hit a line drive comebacker and Happ flied to center to end the inning, so the Cubs left the bases loaded for the fourth time on the evening. They had 12 hits, 10 walks and two batters hit by pitches for a total of 24 baserunners, stranding 17 of them. About that, from John:
Since 1901, the Cubs had played only one previous game in which they had left at least 17 runners on base in a nine-inning game, as they did Tuesday.
They stranded 17 while beating the Reds, 3-1, at Wrigley Field on July 3, 2010. The Cubs made 10 hits, received nine walks and had a batter hit by pitch.
It should be noted that in both those games, since they were both at home, the Cubs left 17 runners while batting in only eight innings! The MLB record for LOB in a nine-inning game is 20, by the Yankees Sept. 21, 1956 against the Red Sox. The Yankees lost that game 13-7 — the Cubs won both the games in which they stranded 17.
Anyway, with the game not in a save situation, Jacob Webb entered to finish. And he might have, if not for the second throwing error of the game by Kingery. This was the risk Counsell took by removing Shaw from the game after just five innings. With a four-run lead in the ninth, I think Counsell should have taken Bregman out of the DH spot and put him at third base for defense.
In any case, the Phillies were thus able to score on a sac fly to make it 7-4, and when Brandon Marsh followed that with a single, Counsell had to call on Caleb Thielbar to finish up. He got Edmundo Sosa to pop up and ended the game with another popup, by Turner [VIDEO].
Here are some postgame comments from Counsell [VIDEO].
And Taylor McGregor talks to Suzuki about his first home run of 2026 [VIDEO].
During the seven-game winning streak, the Cubs have outscored the opposition 51-18 and the 51 runs are the most in MLB over that span. (And they scored seven in the game before the winning streak in a 13-7 loss to the Phillies.) Everything seems to be working well right now so, at least for this game:
Tuesday’s victory also gave the Cubs four wins over the Phillies this year, which clinches the season series. Who knows, maybe that will be important come October. Also with this win and the Pirates loss Tuesday, the Cubs are tied with the Cardinals for second place in the NL Central at 14-9, 1.5 games behind the Reds.
The Cubs will go for eight straight wins, as well as a win of this series, Wednesday evening at Wrigley Field. Matthew Boyd will be activated from the injured list to start Wednesday’s game. The Phillies are starting left-handed reliever Kyle Backhus, likely as an opener with Taijuan Walker set to follow at some point as the “bulk guy.” Game time is 6:40 p.m. CT and TV coverage will be via Marquee Sports Network.
