Bregman keeps swinging
Alex Bregman came a triple short of the cycle on Friday afternoon and drove in two runs with his 25th homer of the season. The Cubs banged out 16 hits and buried Pittsburgh 12-2 to snap a four-game skid.
Sixteen of those 25 home runs have landed since the All-Star break, a split his manager keeps coming back to.
“It’s kind of been a tale of two halves for him. And that’s just the way it is this year,” Craig Counsell said. “We’re glad the second half is going this way, and we have some games to go with him playing like this. He’s had an Alex Bregman season.”
Michael Busch drove in three. Seiya Suzuki matched Bregman with three hits and crossed the plate three times. At 82-66 the Cubs sit level with Philadelphia at the top of the National League wild-card race.
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Skenes has unfinished business with Chicago
Paul Skenes takes the ball this afternoon carrying a 10-11 record and a 3.83 ERA, a line that says more about the run support behind the reigning National League Cy Young winner than about how he has thrown.
He scattered four hits across 5 1/3 scoreless innings in a 1-0 win over the Angels on Sunday. That ended a seven-outing winless run and gave him his first victory since July 19.
The Cubs have given him trouble. Skenes is 0-2 with a 5.06 ERA against Chicago this season, and 2-4 with a 3.45 ERA across nine career starts at their expense.
Holmes lines up against his old club
Clay Holmes answers for the Cubs at 6-7 with a 2.83 ERA. He had strung together four consecutive strong outings before Miami tagged him for eight runs on six hits in 4 1/3 innings of a 10-3 defeat last Sunday. Holmes pitched for Pittsburgh earlier in his career and carries a 4.22 ERA into his sixth appearance against them.
Pittsburgh sits at 74-74 and arrives short-handed. Rookie right fielder Esmerlyn Valdez left Friday’s game in the sixth inning with discomfort in his left hamstring. Ryan O’Hearn came off the 10-day injured list that same day after six weeks out with a quad problem and went 0-for-2 as a pinch hitter. Rookie shortstop Konnor Griffin tripled and singled on Friday, and catcher Rafael Flores Jr. brings a career-best six-game hitting streak into the middle game of the series.
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