Chicago Cubs Score and Recap (5/25/24): Cardinals 7, Cubs 6 – 9th Inning Rally Falls Short After Bullpen Meltdown

The Cubs slide continued on Saturday night with a blown lead at Busch Stadium against the rival Cardinals. Chicago missed numerous opportunities to expand on their advantage and surrendered four runs in the bottom of the 8th inning to take a painful loss despite a rally in the 9th that got them within one.

St. Louis drew first blood with two runs off of Jameson Taillon in the bottom of the 3rd inning on a groundout by Paul Goldschmidt and an RBI single by Nolan Arenado. Nico Hoerner came through in the 4th with a two-run double against Miles Mikolas to tie the score and Michael Busch followed with a single to give the Cubs a 3-2 edge.

Taillon came out for the 6th inning and was able to get the first two outs before Masyn Winn hit a double that tied the game at 3-3. Chicago went back ahead the next frame when Patrick Wisdom had his own RBI double off of Andrew Kittredge.

The Cubs held that 4-3 into the 8th inning when Mark Leiter Jr. ran into trouble with two on and two out and pinch-hitter Matt Carpenter at the plate. The ever-annoying Carpenter singled to right and Alec Burleson just beat the throw at the plate to even the score. Brendan Donovan then poked a two-run single to left that put the Cardinals on top 6-4.

Lars Nootbaar tacked on an RBI triple against new reliever Porter Hodge that turned out to be pretty important when Chicago rallied in the 9th against St. Louis closer Ryan Helsley. Mike Tauchman and Cody Bellinger each had run-scoring hits but they couldn’t get the tying tally and the home team pulled out the 7-6 victory. (Box score)

Key Moment

Seiya Suzuki had a chance to cut Burleson down at the plate in the 8th with a good throw. Unfortunately for the Cubs, it bounced a couple times and catcher Miguel Amaya had the ball in his hand and not the mitt when he made the tag and the runner was barely safe.

Why the Cubs Lost

The offense was able to produce six runs but numerous chances to add more were missed. The bullpen also failed to protect a lead and let the Cardinals add costly insurance runs.

Stats That Matter

• Taillon pitched well and fell victim to some soft singles in this one: 5.2 IP, 3 R, 9 H, 3 K, and 1 BB.
• Tauchman got on base three more times Saturday with two hits and a walk.
• Hoerner had two hits and the Cubs really need him to get going again.

Bottom Line

Absolutely nothing is going right for the North Siders at the moment and there is a real danger of their poor play snowballing into a big losing skid. A series against the first-place Brewers is up next and could put the Cubs in a pretty big hole. They need to wake up in a hurry.

On Deck

The final game of the series is Sunday night at 6:10pm CT. Javier Assad faces off against Sonny Gray in a contest televised exclusively on ESPN with a radio broadcast available on 670 The Score.