Cleveland shuts out Cubs 4-0 in Chicago
The Cleveland Baseball Club continued their road trip through the National League Central, coming out on top against the Cubs 4-0.
After a disastrous weekend in Pittsburgh which saw the Cleveland Baseball Club narrowly avoiding a sweep at the hands of the Pirates, Cleveland traveled to Chicago to take on the Cubs in a short two game series. Cleveland is still climbing their way up the American League Central standings while the Cubs entered Monday as the NL Central leader. If there was any chance of coming away with a victory at Wrigley Field there were going to need some complimentary players to step up, and they did.
Bobby Bradley came up to the plate in the 2nd inning and muscled an opposite field home run off of Adbert Alzolay to take an early 1-0 lead.
Bradley came into Monday going hitless in his last three games with his last hit being. home run against the Orioles last week. Perhaps another power surge is on the way for the young slugger.
Just a few innings later Cleveland saw their lead grow to three as Josh Naylor would clobber a home run of his own with Bradley on first.
Naylor’s bat is heating up as of late, going 8-19 with two doubles and a home run in the past seven days. This could be a great sign for a team that is still waiting on the return of one of their main power threats Franmil Reyes.
In the 8th it was back-to-back wild pitches from Cubs pitcher Tommy Nance which allowed Cesar Hernandez who doubled in the previous at-bat to come around and score, making it a 4-0 lead over the Cubs.
Not everything was good for Cleveland on Monday in Chicago. Aaron Civale started the game but ended up leaving in the 5th inning due to a finger injury. An already decimated pitching staff continues to hemorrhage with no end in sight. Luckily the combination of Bryan Shaw, Nick Wittgren, Emmanuel Clase, and James Karinchak handled the rest of the game, but this can only be sustainable for so long. At some point regular pitching arms need to come back into the fold.
