Half the Cubs' roster will become free agents at the end of the season. Lefty reliever Andrew Chafin is having a great year as well, and should be coveted. All of them will be free agents at the end of the season. The Cubs have played meaningful baseball games since but began to underachieve after winning the World Series in They faded at the end of the , losing the division and then the wild-card game on consecutive days at Wrigley Field.
After falling out of postseason contention late in the season, the Cubs rebounded to win the division in the pandemic-shortened campaign, but they were bounced from the postseason by the Miami Marlins in two games.
The Cubs' offense has been inconsistent for years, and this season the starting pitching staff has been an issue -- especially after Hoyer traded Cy Young runner-up Yu Darvish last winter. When we've struggled, we've struggled more than we should have given our talent level. That's been a source of frustration and confusion at times. The Cubs' struggles at the plate led former team executive Theo Epstein to declare the offense broken back in Not a lot has changed since that declaration, leading to Hoyer's coming overhaul.
Belt's 23 homers are the most by a Giant since Hunter Pence hit 27 in , and given how Belt tends to pick them up in bunches, he has a shot at reaching that mark with 20 games to go.
The Giants have had just a dozen players reach 20 homers over the last decade, including three this season -- Belt, Brandon Crawford and Mike Yastrzemski. With his next blast, Belt will tie Buster Posey 24 in for the second-most home runs by a Giant since they won the title. The Cubs put two runners in scoring position with no outs in the first, but Kevin Gausman held them to one run.
Some bad luck pushed a couple more runs across in the third. Ian Happ hit a two-out fly ball to the track in center that Yastrzemski misjudged on a windy day, allowing it to drop for a triple. Happ scored a batter later on an infield single. That was it for the home team, though. Gausman made it through six on a hot day in Chicago, walking none and striking out nine.
He joined Zack Wheeler and Max Scherzer as the only pitchers in the National League to reach strikeouts, and he became the only Giant other than Madison Bumgarner and Jeff Samardzija to do it in the last decade. It's been awesome so far. Perhaps a future where Heuer, who as a kid watched and looked up to Kimbrel, is locking down the ninth inning for the Cubs. Or at least a significant role in the late innings. Click here to follow the Cubs Talk Podcast.
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