A Tip of the Recap – 5/27 (Cubs 6, Phillies 2)

Cubs Record: 32-14 (1st in NL Central; 5 games ahead of Pittsburgh)

W: Jon Lester (6.1 IP, 1 ER, 6 H, 2 BB, 7 K)

L: Adam Morgan (4.0 IP, 6 ER, 8 H, 1 BB, 3 K)

MVP: Adam Morgan for throwing some quality batting practice

Not even the rain could extinguish the fire in the Cubs’ bats. Then again, they were hitting against Phillies hurler Adam Morgan, who’s not exactly a great pitcher with overpowering stuff.

The Good

Jorge Soler was awesome at the plate today. He saw a lot of pitches and, more importantly, didn’t swing at any bad pitches. He’s laying off even borderline stuff and being more selective than we’ve seen in the past. If he keeps this up, he’ll be a feared hitter in this already deadly Cubs lineup. He launched a long bomb in the 4th inning that hit the video board, and I’m frankly surprised the board didn’t suffer any permanent pixel damage or collapse from the impact.

Grandpa Rossy hit his 100th home run in this game. It came in the bottom of the 4th inning on Morgan’s 69th pitch with 1 out and runners on first and second and extended the margin to 4 runs. He’s one of the most lovable guys on the team and has been having a great year so far. Hopefully his excellent play continues for the remainder of the season.

Kris Bryant massacred a pitch from Morgan that ended up on Waveland, promptly ending th pitcher’s day. He also played good defense at first base in place of Anthony Rizzo, who probably needed the day off to recalibrate.

Ben Zobrist continued the tear that he’s been on so far this season, going 2-4 with a double and a run scored. He’s currently riding a 13-game hitting streak.

Jon Lester pitched beautifully today, and only ran into trouble in the third when the defense let him down. He had the Phillies offense off-balance all day long with his excellent pitching repertoire, but left in the 7th inning after giving up a one-out double to Odubel Herrera.  The game was promptly delayed by a torrential downpour that came outta nowhere.

Trevor K-hill came into the game and pitched 1.2 innings of quality relief. He only allowed the runner that Lester was responsible for to score and struck out a few Phillies batters. He would have pitched the rest of the game if a second rain delay hadn’t stopped the action in the top of the 9th with no outs and a 0-2 count on Peter Borjous.

The Bad

Living in the Houston area has made me hate the rain with a passion because of all of the flooding we’ve had to deal with here recently. Thankfully I’m north of the part that floods horribly so I don’t get directly affected, but I’m not a fan of the rain ruining anything, which includes baseball. Do better, Mother Nature, and do your best to avoid being a nuisance to Cubs baseball any more this season. Because of you, Pedro Strop was only able to throw one pitch in the game, and it was fouled off by Galvis.

The Ugly

Dexter Fowler and Javier Baez both made errors on a play in the top of the 3rd that led to a run. Freddy Galvis hit a fly ball to center that Fowler couldn’t snag, for whatever reason. The ball went into his glove and popped right out. When Fowler got the ball he threw it to Baez. The ball rolled to Javier and, for some reason, went right between his legs and hit third base to go into foul territory. This allowed Peter Bourjos to reach third and Galvis to reach second. Bourjos immediately scored on Maikel Franco sacrifice fly.

Coming Attractions

Kyle Hendricks (2-4, 3.30 ERA, 1.06 WHIP) takes the mound against rookie right-hander Jared Eickhoff (2-6, 3.86 ERA, 1.19 WHIP), who will make his first ever start at Wrigley Field. First pitch is at 1:20 central time.