Jeff Samardzija was absolutely fantastic in this one, allowing just three hits and two walks over nine innings. He allowed no earned runs and struck out seven. His stuff looked better as the game went on.
(I’ll save my grousing about the handling of Samardzija at the end of the game for later. I’d like to hear what Ricky Renteria has to say before coming out both guns blazing. Suffice it to say, in the moment, I was not very happy to see Samardzija out there and allowed to throw 126 pitches.)
The problem? As it always is when Samardzija starts? The Cubs’ bats were mostly silent all night long, even as the game marched on into free baseball. They had some chances, though.
There was a rough missed call in the 9th on a Starlin Castro should-have-been single, where the throw to first pulled Adam Dunn off the bag – you can see it pretty clearly on replay – as Castro arrived. The only argument would be that Dunn somehow caught the ball before jumping, which doesn’t really make a lot of sense. Instead of first and second with one out, it was a man on second and two outs, and Welington Castillo struck out to end the frame.
The game went to extras, and, unfortunately, Justin Grimm imploded in the 12th inning, and the Cubs lost.