A Tip of the Recap – May 4th

The Cubs completely blew a game that they should have won because of some pretty terrible pitching. They lost game to the Cardinals by a score of 10-9.

The Good

The game started so well, as the Cubs hung a 5-spot on Carlos Martinez to start the game. But Travis Wood followed that up by allowing the Cardinals to score 4 in the bottom half of the first (all 4 via a grand slam to Mark Reynolds).

Anthony Rizzo hit his 4th HR of the season in the 2nd inning to give the Cubs a little more breathing room.

Kris Bryant reached base all 5 times at the plate tonight, 1 single and 4 walks to bring his OBP up to a robust .458. He also scored a couple runs and made some decent plays at 3rd.

Miguel Montero drove in 3 with a couple timely hits and is now tied for the the team lead (with Castro) in RBI with 13.

Chris Denorfia had a couple hits and an RBI before he left the game with a tight hamstring. Considering he missed a bit of spring training and parts of the early regular season, he has been performing very well. It does appear that he will be put on the DL and Matt Szczur will get the call bag to the big leagues.

Addison Russell had a two-hit day, including his 2nd HR in the top of the 9th to bring the deficit to 1, but that was where the rally ended.

The Bad

Pedro Strop and Zac Rosscup imploded in the bottom half of the 7th to give up the lead for good to the Cardinals. Strop didn’t retire a single batter of the 3 he faced, but Rosscup allowed all 3 inherited runners to score as well as 1 of his own.

The Ugly

The bullpen obviously didn’t do their job as they couldn’t protect the lead, but Travis Wood did not do what you would think a veteran pitcher that had just been staked with a 5 run lead would do. In the bottom of the first he hit the leadoff guy, gave up a double, walked a couple, then gave up the grand slam to Reynolds.

In total he went 5 innings and was charged with 6 runs (all earned) on 6 hits (1 HR), 2 walks and 5 Ks. It is rough to see a pitcher pretty much give up the entire lead in one inning like that and the Cubs definitely had Martinez on the ropes early and often. This has to be one of the most frustrating games that I have watched so far this season.

On Deck

The Cubs will look to even up the series tomorrow night with another 7:15 PM (CST) game. Kyle Hendricks (0-1, 5.23) will get the start against Tyler Lyons (0-0, 0.00) for the game that will be shown on MLB Network.