Chicago Cubs Lineup (9/13/22): McKinstry at Short, Sampson on Hill as Cubs Look For Series Win Against deGrom

It’s been a bit of a bumpy ride for the Cubs over the past three weeks, which has seen them post a 7-14 record. Contrast that to the four-ish weeks prior — all following the All-Star break — when they went on a 17-11 tear.

Of course, the competition has been much more, well, competitive lately, with the Cubs facing off against the Cardinals (twice), Brewers, Blue Jays, Reds, and Giants over this recent stretch. The good news is the Cubs have managed to win the first game of their series against the Mets. The bad news is that they face all-world hurler Jacob deGrom in tonight’s contest.

Adrian Sampson will need to be at his absolute best tonight to give his teammates any real chance of winning. He hasn’t allowed more than two earned runs over his last three outings, but the real problem is that he’s turned the game over to his bullpen far too early in those contests and the result in all of them has been a loss for the Cubs. In fact, even though Sampson has a very good 3.76 ERA over 16 starts he only has one win to show for it. That’s not good, folks.

Leading off, once again, for the Cubs tonight and playing short is Zach McKinstry. He’s filling in for Nico Hoerner (the Cubs’ best player this season) who exited Sunday’s game with right tricep soreness. No news on his potential return, but we now know it won’t be tonight. In fact, I would be surprised to see him shut down completely for the season but I guess we’ll see.

Seiya Suzuki is in right, Franmil Reyes is DH, Ian Happ is in left, and Rafael Ortega is in center. Yan Gomes is catching, Patrick Wisdom is at third, Alfonso Rivas is at first, and David Bote is at second.

First pitch is scheduled for 6:10pm CT from Citi Field in Queens, New York.

Here is tonight's #Cubs starting lineup against the Mets. pic.twitter.com/8JdiBHKgyJ

— Chicago Cubs (@Cubs) September 13, 2022