There’s something special about this Cubs team. Do you feel it?
Utterly dominated by Dodgers right-hander Emmet Sheehan for six innings, trailing 4-0 heading to the seventh, the Cubs cut that to 4-3 thanks in part to a triple (!) by Dansby Swanson. Then an Alex Bregman homer tied the game in the eighth, and Swanson’s two-run homer in the ninth gave the Cubs their 10th consecutive victory, 6-4 over the Dodgers
.Did I mention that two relievers who weren’t even on the radar when the season started threw
four innings of two-hit relief against the tough Dodgers lineup?
Let’s begin at the beginning.
Jameson Taillon matched Sheehan for two innings, then gave up a single and walk leading off the third. Taillon struck out Shohei Ohtani and got Freddie Freeman on a line drive to center.
Unfortunately, Will Smith then smashed a three-run homer off Taillon. That’s been an issue for Jamo since Spring Training, when he allowed 10 homers in 13.1 innings. Now he’s allowed seven in 27.2 innings this season. It’s definitely a concern.
Former Cub Kyle Tucker might have made it back-to-back off Taillon, but Seiya Suzuki stole a homer from his ex-teammate [VIDEO].
The Cubs had a chance to score in the fourth. With one out, Michael Busch bounced one into the seats for an automatic double.
I thought that was a bad send by Quintin Berry. The hit by Alex Bregman wasn’t that deep, it moved quickly and Dodgers center fielder Andy Pages charged it. True, it took a perfect throw to get Busch, but if he had stayed at third, the Cubs would have had first and third with one out. Instead, there were two out with Bregman taking second on the throw. Ian Happ popped up to end the inning.
The Dodgers scored in the bottom of the fourth to make it 4-0.
It was still that score in the sixth when Tucker got robbed again by a Cubs fielder, this time Swanson [VIDEO].
And Sheehan continued to mystify Cubs hitters. He struck out 10. More on Sheehan’s night from BCB’s JohnW53:
Emmet Sheehan is the first pitcher to record double-digit strikeouts vs. the Cubs this season. Two did it last year: Jesus Luzardo of the Phillies (10 in 6.0 IP) and Nolan McLean of the Mets (11 in 5.1). Six did it in 2024, five in 2023 and 17 (!) in 2022. The most whiffs by any of them was 12.
The Cubs finally got to him, and Dodgers relievers, in the seventh. Moisés Ballesteros singled off Sheehan with one out and that brought left-hander Alex Vesia in to face Carson Kelly, who flied to right. Then Vesia walked Pete Crow-Armstrong.
That brought up Swanson [VIDEO].
Swanson’s first triple of the year put the Cubs on the board. Now it’s 4-2 and Nico Hoerner made it 4-3 with this RBI single [VIDEO].
Well. Now we’ve got a ballgame! Hoerner likely wasn’t running here, but Vesia threw over to first three times and didn’t get Nico the third time. That’s a disengagement violation and Hoerner was awarded second base. I don’t recall that happening to the Cubs since that rule went into effect three years ago. There were only 35 such violations in all of MLB in 2025. Hoerner was stranded, though, when Busch struck out.
Nico then flashed some glove with this terrific heads-up play in the bottom of the seventh [VIDEO].
That’s not only an excellent play by Nico, but also give credit to reliever Ryan Rolison for alertly getting to first base when it was clear Busch wasn’t going to make it.
Blake Treinen relieved Vesia in the eighth. Bregman sent Treinen’s second pitch into the Dodger Stadium seats to tie the game [VIDEO].
The Cubs had a chance to take the lead later in the inning. Happ singled and one out later, Ballesteros doubled and Happ tried to score [VIDEO].
Now that one, I thought was a good send. You’ve got that chance to take the lead, and it would take two perfect throws to get Happ — and the Dodgers accomplished that. Hat tip to Pages and Hyeseong Kim for those two throws.
So the game remained tied to the bottom of the eighth. Rolison retired the side in order. Can’t say enough about Rolison, who entered 2026 with a 7.02 career ERA. He threw three shutout innings, allowing just two hits.
Then the Cubs scored what would be the decisive runs in the ninth. PCA led off with a single.
Swanson launched this baseball deep into the SoCal night [VIDEO].
Look where that pitch was — right down the middle of the zone. Swanson did not miss it!
That ball was absolutely demolished [VIDEO].
The next three Cubs were retired in order, so they went to the bottom of the ninth with a two-run lead. On to save the game was… Corbin Martin, another reliever with a career ERA north of 6. The Cubs signed him to a minor-league deal in January and assigned him to Triple-A Iowa to start the season. He’s only in the big leagues because, well, you know about all the pitching injuries.
Martin calmly dispatched the Dodgers 1-2-3 on 14 pitches — a strikeout of Teoscar Hernández, a fly ball to PCA by Max Muncy, and this fly ball to center by Pages to end the game [VIDEO].
A note on this comeback from John:
The Cubs now have erased 10 deficits this season, each in a different game. They eventually lost the first two, Opening Day (March 26) vs. the Nationals and April 11 vs. the Pirates. They have won all eight since then, including each of the last three days.
Last year, the Cubs erased 68 deficits in 60 games. Of those 60, they eventually won 32 and lost 28.
Here are some postgame comments from Swanson [VIDEO].
I’ll say it again:
There’s something special about this Cubs team. Do you feel it?
I think the players feel it. Everyone steps up, every single member of the 26-man roster including the guys added to it because of injury. So many Cubs contributed to this win, including Rolison and Martin, neither of whom were on this roster a couple of weeks ago — and Rolison hadn’t pitched in 10 days.
The last time any Cubs team won 11 in a row was July 31-Aug. 12, 2016. This year’s Cubs will try to match that when they take on the Dodgers this evening in the second of this three-game series. Colin Rea will start for the Cubs and Roki Sasaki goes for the Dodgers. Game time is 6:15 p.m. CT and TV coverage will be via Fox-TV (regional — coverage map). A reminder that if you subscribe to MLB.TV or MLB Extra Innings, you can watch this game via those services even if it’s not on the Fox affiliate in your market.
