Chicago Cubs Lineup: Bote and Hoerner Hit the Bench, Kipnis and Souza Grab the Start

The Chicago Cubs have won 8 of their first 10 games, including 4 in a row. Tonight, they’ll go for the quick two-game sweep against the Royals … or is it the second win of a four-game series split between two series? Ah, anyway, here’s how David Ross will line them up against righty Brady Singer and the Royals:

Chicago Cubs Lineup: 

1. Kris Bryant, 3B
2. Anthony Rizzo, 1B
3. Javy Baez, SS
4. Kyle Schwarber, DH
5. Willson Contreras, C
6. Jason Heyward, RF
7. Steven Souza Jr., LF
8. Jason Kipnis, 2B
9. Ian Happ, CF

In the second game of the series, the Cubs have drawn right-handed Brady Singer, who’s making just the third big league start of his career. He’s lasted 5.0 innings in each of his first two games, surrendering 2 earned runs a piece with 4 walks, 10 strikeouts, and 2 homers allowed combined. Without much of a big league track record, there aren’t many insights to glean from his history.

So let’s focus on the Cubs.

Immediately, you can see that Kyle Schwarber and Willson Contreras have switched back to their usual spots in the lineup after flip-flopping yesterday against a lefty. Meanwhile, Schwarber gets another crack as the DH as Victor Caratini gets another day off. His slash line has fallen a bit and he’s going to be out there with Yu Darvish tomorrow, so no issues here.

With Schwarber out of left field and Kris Bryant back at third base, Steven Souza Jr. gets what I expect will be a pretty rare early-season start against a right-hander (not exactly his strength). Meanwhile, Nico Hoerner takes a seat against the righty in favor of the southpaw Jason Kipnis. All in all, this is another quality lineup for David Ross, who’s done very little to rile us up through the first 11 games.

In case you missed it, we discussed the offensive starts of Heyward, Happ, and Hoerner earlier today:

As usual, we’ll have your full Pre-Gamin’ post closer to game time (7:15 CT).

written by

Michael Cerami began covering the Chicago Cubs for Bleacher Nation as a part-time contributor in 2015. One year later, he joined Bleacher Nation full-time, covering the Chicago Cubs and Major League Baseball. Today, Michael runs Bleacher Nation, contributing as a writer (Cubs, MLB) and an editor for all sections of the site, including the Chicago Bears, Bulls, and Blackhawks, as well as MLB, NBA, NHL, and NFL. In 2019, Michael was the co-host of NBC Sports Chicago's Cubs Post-Game Show Outside the Ivy. You can find him on Twitter/X @Michael_Cerami

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