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CHICAGO — The Chicago Cubs wrapped up a dreadful May in fitting fashion Friday afternoon. In a 5-4 loss to the Cincinnati Reds at Wrigley Field, an aggressive send with one out in the ninth inning led to the potential tying run getting cut off at home plate. One pitch later, Cody Bellinger flew out to right field to end the game as the floundering Cubs (28-30) fell to two games under .500 for the first time since they started the season 0-2.
The ninth inning started with the Cubs down two runs. Pete Crow-Armstrong singled to start the frame and pinch hitter Michael Busch took a walk to put the tying run on first. Manager Craig Counsell decided to send Nick Madrigal up in place of Patrick Wisdom, explaining after the game that he liked the matchup better against Alexis Díaz, who pounds four-seamers up and breaking balls away against righties.
Madrigal nearly got hit by a pitch — he said he believed it did catch his hand first — but the ump ruled it a foul ball, leading to a review that confirmed the outcome and led to Counsell getting thrown out. Madrigal eventually reached on a fielder’s choice, putting runners on the corners with one out for Seiya Suzuki.
Suzuki lifted a ball into the left-field corner that easily scored Crow-Armstrong. Third-base coach Willie Harris watched left fielder Jacob Hurtubise cut it off before it reached the wall and still decided to send Madrigal home. Hurtubise threw it to cutoff man Elly De La Cruz, who is known to have an incredibly strong arm, and the shortstop fired to home, getting Madrigal at the plate with room to spare. Bellinger ripped the next pitch at 107.3 mph but hit it too high in the air, allowing right fielder Jake Fraley to make the catch just short of the warning track.
“Look, Willie has been fantastic,” Counsell said of his third-base coach. “His aggressiveness has got us a lot of runs this year. It didn’t work this time.”
93.3 MPH MISSLE FROM ELLY @ellylacocoa18 pic.twitter.com/aA6Cqv7knW
— Cincinnati Reds (@Reds) May 31, 2024
After Counsell had wrapped up, media members lingered in the news conference room. With the starting pitcher not needed, Harris was eventually made available. It’s never a good sign for a team when a base coach needs to speak publicly.
“I’m watching the ball,” Harris said. “I know who the outfielder is, I know his arm strength isn’t plus-plus. I took a chance in trying to score right there. It didn’t work out for us, unfortunately for me and for the team. But you have to be aggressive, you have to try and score runs. I know Belli was coming up next and my mindset was they’re probably going to walk him. If he’s safe, it’s a different story, but they made a play. Tip your cap to ’em and come back and play tomorrow.”
But knowing that De La Cruz, who unleashed a 93.3 mph strike to home, was the cutoff man, does it change the thought process at all?
“After the fact, no, I wouldn’t do it,” Harris said. “As we go, we all learn from our mistakes. Moving on, I’ll be better than that. I think I’ve been doing a pretty good job as the year has gone on so far. Today was a bad send. He was out and today’s on me. Hopefully the guys pick me up tomorrow.
“The only way you win is if you score runs. This is the major leagues, guys make plays. Today they made a play on us. Moving forward, I’ll be less aggressive with one out knowing the situation a little better.”
“Off the bat I saw that he wasn’t going to catch it,” Madrigal said. “I saw him going towards the line and I wasn’t sure how hard he hit it, if it was going to the wall or what. But I put my head down immediately and felt like I got a good break on it. Felt like it was going to be bang-bang.”
It wasn’t as close as Madrigal felt it was going to be, certainly not how Harris expected it to go. De La Cruz made a perfect throw and made sure Madrigal was never close to being safe.
Harris wore the loss, but like all games, losses always come down to more than one play. Drew Smyly gave up a two-run home run that gave the Reds a 4-3 lead in the seventh. Héctor Neris allowed a run in the ninth pushing the Reds lead to two.
There was also an odd play in the bottom of the fourth. The Reds had just tied the score at two, and with two outs, Dansby Swanson doubled. Crow-Armstrong came up and rolled a ball into short right field that second baseman Jonathan India was able to keep from getting too deep into the grass with a sliding stop. Instead of trying to get the speedy Crow-Armstrong, India fired to third and was able to get Swanson, who had aggressively turned hoping to have a chance to score.
Again, Harris took the blame.
“That was a really tricky play right there,” he said. “On that play, that’s my fault as well, I guess. Coming around third, if that ball scoots through or he bobbles it a little bit, we’re safe at home. But he made a play.”
“You gotta give (India) a lot of credit for that play,” Swanson said. “It’s a tough one for all parties. Being behind me you can’t really run with looking backwards. Just kind of came around the base a little too far. In those situations there’s a chance you’re going to be scoring because you’re off at the crack of the bat. He was able to make a good play and make a throw behind me.”
The two outs on the bases gave the Cubs 27 on the season, the most in baseball. But good teams can make a lot of outs on the bases because being aggressive is necessary at times. The Philadelphia Phillies are third with 22 outs on the bases and the Cleveland Guardians are sixth with 20. The Cubs’ offensive woes can mean that coaches push the envelope at times trying to make things happen.
“We’ve sent runners aggressively and that’s gotten us runs,” Counsell said. “The play at third with Dansby, that’s a tricky play. I thought India made a hell of a play throwing accurately from his knees from about 100 feet. That’s what I saw with that one. There’s been some others throughout the season. Yeah, we made some mistakes for sure.”
When a team is struggling like the Cubs are, every bad moment gets magnified. When the margin for error is so thin, the inability to do the little things can be extremely costly. With an already shaky bullpen and an offense that’s now gone a month without producing consistently, the Cubs can’t afford to give teams extra outs on the bases.
That they’re just two games under .500 instead of significantly worse is one of the few positives one can take from this stretch of play. But this is a critical point in the season for this team as it starts a stretch of 25 games against teams that are either hovering around or well below .500. The Cubs can either feast on these weaker opponents and build up their confidence or fall further down into mediocrity.
At 10-18, the Cubs just wrapped up their worst month since last May, when they went 10-18. The optimist can look at the calendar and hope things will shift for the better in June.
“There’s months in seasons where this happens,” Swanson said. “At the end of the day, all you can do is respond to it. We have a great opportunity tomorrow going into a new month to be able to do that.”
(Photo of the Reds’ Tyler Stephenson tagging out the Cubs’ Nick Madrigal at home in the ninth inning Friday: Michael Reaves / Getty Images)
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Courtesy : https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5533241/2024/05/31/cubs-tough-loss-reds-awful-month/