The Chicago Cubs continued to be one of baseball’s most dangerous home teams, as they beat the Milwaukee Brewers at Wrigley Field on Saturday afternoon.
Albert Almora Jr. went 3-for-3 with a pair of RBIs and a home run, his 12th of the season. Javier Báez also drove in a run and scored a run, and Nicholas Castellanos had a pair of base hits and a run scored as he continued his strong debut push with the North Siders.
In his first game back from the injured list, Cole Hamels had a solid game on the mound, throwing five scoreless innings and giving up just four hits while striking out six Brewers batters.
As he’s done so often this season, Báez got the Cubs on the board with a couple of impressive feats of baserunning. After reaching with a stand-up triple in the second inning, the shortstop got a great read on a wild pitch that bounced away from Manny Pina, scoring the game’s first run.
After Hamels exited the game after five innings of work, David Phelps gave up an earned run in the sixth as the Brewers tied the contest. Ryan Braun looped a single into center field, scoring Lorenzo Cain and knotting the contest at 1-1.
That score stayed in place until the seventh, when Almora managed to poke a home run just over the wall in left field to put the Cubs in front by a 2-1 margin.
Unfortunately for the Cubs, catcher Willson Contreras was forced to leave the game in the seventh with an apparent leg injury. He was replaced in the lineup by Victor Caratini.
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The Cubs added a pair of runs in the eighth inning, as Báez drove in Nicholas Castellanos with an RBI single and Almora continued his hot-hitting game with a sacrifice fly to right field, scoring Anthony Rizzo and giving the Cubs a 4-1 lead.
From there, it was Craig Kimbrel’s turn to shine, as the closer worked a scoreless ninth inning to shut down the Brewers and give the Cubs their second straight win over their divisional rival.
The Cubs will go for the sweep on Sunday afternoon at Wrigley Field, with Yu Darvish taking the ball. The game will get underway at 1:20 p.m.
