The Cubs, hopefully, will right the ship soon or any postseason play they do qualify for — and yes, there’s now a chance they won’t make it at all — will be short.
They lost to the Brewers 8-6 Wednesday evening in Milwaukee, and the game wasn’t that close. That’s a series sweep for the Brewers and the Cubs’ fourth straight loss. How was your Wednesday?
Let me get straight to the first Craig Counsell managerial choice I disagreed with.
The Brewers took a 3-0 lead in the first inning on a three-run homer
by Christian Yelich. Yelich is not the player he was a few years ago and that was just the second home run he’d hit in his last 19 games. Both of those homers are off Cubs pitching.
Anyway, Kevin Gausman, who was so good against Milwaukee last week at Wrigley Field, clearly didn’t have it on this night. He gave up two more hits after the homer and threw 33 pitches in the first inning.
Javier Assad is available. He last pitched Friday in Miami, that’s four days rest after an 88-pitch outing. Surely, Assad could have given the Cubs four or five innings. Right? (Also, there’s an off day today, a perfect time to use a pitcher like this.)
Wrong. Gausman was sent out for another inning, and another home run was hit, this one by Jackson Chourio, and the ball was last seen heading down I-94 toward Chicago. (Not really, but it went 436 feet at 109 miles per hour, yikes.) A walk followed, and then William Contreras launched one and this game was pretty much over.
BCB’s JohnW53 described this to me as a “brutal” fact:
The third home run off Kevin Gausman was the 221st surrendered by the Cubs this season, the most they ever have served up through 147 games of a season.They allowed 219 in 20o0.
Gausman was left in for four innings and 94 pitches and I’m still picturing Assad, sitting forlorn in the Cubs bullpen, wondering if he’ll ever get to pitch again. Hey, Iowa’s season has a week and a half to go! Can’t waste that option, right, Jed Hoyer?
You’ll pardon the sarcasm, but…
Oh, yes. More on Gausman’s start from John:
Kevin Gausman’s start was the fifth this season by a Cub of four or fewer innings in which he allowed at least seven runs.
Edward Cabrera had two of them: eight and seven runs, both in 3.2. Jameson Taillon gave up seven in 4.0, the same as Gausman. David Peterson surrendered 10 in 3.2. One runs off Gausman was unearned. All the others were earned.
Anyway. After Nico Hoerner made a rare throwing error in the third, the Brewers scored yet another run to make it 7-0, that one unearned off Gausman.
Meanwhile, Logan Henderson retired the first nine Cubs. Pete Crow-Armstrong singled for the first Cubs hit leading off the fourth and went to second on a passed ball. He took third on a fly to right by Seiya Suzuki and scored on this ground out by Michael Busch [VIDEO].
Trent Thornton relieved Gausman in the fifth and threw a scoreless inning. The Brewers scored a run off Daniel Palencia in the sixth, unearned due to another throwing error, this one on second baseman Pedro Ramirez. That made it 8-1.
Caleb Thielbar and Colin Rea added scoreless innings, one each, in the seventh and eighth. Assad sighs and sits in the bullpen with the rest of his teammates.
Then the Cubs put together a rally in the ninth, which, unfortunately, came up a bit short.
PCA led off with a walk, advanced to second on a throwing error on an attempted pickoff by Brandon Sproat, and then Sproat threw a wild pitch, sending PCA to third.
Sproat then walked Suzuki and Busch to load the bases with nobody out. Hmmm. Could something actually happen here?
Alex Bregman then struck out, but Sproat then walked Ian Happ to force in a run [VIDEO].
At that point Brewers manager Pat Murphy had seen enough of Sproat and brought in Abner Uribe. Nico then singled to left to make it 8-3 [VIDEO].
The bases remained loaded for Ramirez, who grounded out, with a run scoring to make it 8-4 [VIDEO].
So now the Cubs are down by four, with runners on second and third. Both runners scored on this double by Michael Conforto [VIDEO].
Well.
Now it’s 8-6 and the tying run is going to step to the plate. You don’t suppose…
Here’s where I take issue with another Counsell choice. Carson Kelly was the next due hitter. Counsell sent B.J. Murray Jr. up to bat for Kelly, I suppose to get the platoon advantage with Murray, a switch-hitter, batting left-handed.
Sometimes managers overthink the platoon advantage and I think Counsell did so here. Kelly had that key two-run double on Tuesday and was 1-for-3 in this game. Murray’s a rookie with nine MLB at-bats in which he’d gone 1-for-9.
Now which guy would YOU have had take that at-bat? Me, I’m picking Kelly 100 times out of 100.
But Counsell chose Murray. Credit to Murray for running the count full, but Uribe struck him out to end the game [VIDEO].
Here are Counsell’s postgame comments [VIDEO].
The Cubs didn’t lose the game just because of those two decisions, still, I would have chosen otherwise.
The worst part of this defeat wasn’t just the loss, it was the Phillies win over the Astros, which put the Cubs 1.5 games behind Philadelphia for the top wild card spot. The Cubs lead the Padres by 2.5 games and the Diamondbacks by three. The latter two teams will play their last three games against each other in San Diego and that series might make or break the Cubs’ postseason chances.
Is this a collapse? Not yet, fortunately, but the Cubs are going to have to right the ship quickly.
The Cubs return to Wrigley Field Friday after an off day today to open a three-game series against the Pittsburgh Pirates. Shōta Imanaga will start for the Cubs. Braxton Ashcraft will go for Pittsburgh. Game time Friday is 1:20 p.m. CT and TV coverage will be via Marquee Sports Network (and MLB Network outside the Cubs and Pirates market territories).
