A game that was tight for a while got awfully non-competitive awfully quickly with a five-run sixth inning for the Brewers off of Julian Merryweather in his Cubs debut. (Might’ve been a better time to use Adbert Alzolay, who instead pitched only after it was a blowout for some reason.)
It was easy to watch the run-scoring plays in that one and say the Cubs got dinked and dunked to death, but that becomes a lot easier when the Cubs are walking too many and not striking any out in those innings. With that much free traffic on the bases and that many balls in play, you’re sometimes going to get burned. Cubs did today, and it wasn’t just bad luck.
Jameson Taillon’s Cubs debut was a disappointing and short one, lasting just four innings of three-run ball (just 63 pitches). I don’t think it was a health thing, just a desire, early in the season, not to push things on Taillon and to allow the bullpen to take over in a tight game. Taillon’s command wasn’t awful, but it was also not precise. He’d follow a great pitch with one that missed its spot by just enough to get lifted. Yes, a number of balls fell in off of crummy contact, but then again, a lotta rockets found gloves.
It was a very cutter-heavy day, by the way, and Taillon barely threw his excellent curveball and not his new sweeper at all. Wonder if he just didn’t have the feel.
Offensively, the Cubs didn’t do a lot of scoring until the game was already a borderline laugher. Nico and Dansby paired up for an early run and Patrick Wisdom hit a solo homer. That was it until Wisdom hit a second homer, and the Cubs tried to get a little rally together in the 8th (loaded the bases with no outs, but scored only two on two out-producing plays, the first of which was a Yan Gomes shot that came up a foot short of a grand slam).
Cubs pitchers did one thing today that they simply cannot afford to do this season.