The dominant pitching that defined the first two games of this series ended abruptly tonight — well, for one team at least.
While the Cardinals plated 13 runs on an ungodly amount of hard contact (plus 6BBs and 3 HBPs), the Cubs managed just three runs on seven hits and one walk, bringing their combined scoring total for the first three games of this series to a whopping … five.
Adrian Sampson was rocked early and often. And although he kept the Cardinals scoreless through his first 3.0 innings of work, it all caught up to him in the fourth, when the balls started finding grass … and stands. But it’s hard for me to get too worked up about him, specifically. Generally speaking, Sampson has been pretty solid this year. And the Cubs starters were simply never going to continue containing this red-hot St. Louis squad the way they had through the first two games of the series.
But after that? Oh boy was it a parade of awfulness out of the Cubs ‘pen, highlighted by a wild Anderson Espinoza (3 walks, 2 HBPs, and 4 ER) and a wholly ineffective Steven Brault, who came in with the bases loaded, allowed all the runners to score, and gave up three earned runs of his own. He was lifted without recording a single out. That’ll blow up your ERA fast.
And that was about that.
Except I’m worried I wasn’t quite clear on just how hard the Cardinals were hitting the ball tonight. By the end of the game they had recorded 13 batted balls over 100 MPH in exit velocity and 18 over the 95 MPH “hard-hit” threshold. That is absurd and embarrassing for the Cubs, who had otherwise been pitching so well since the All-Star break. Ugly, ugly game.