The Chicago Cubs once more discovered themselves holding a lead late towards the Atlanta Braves.
And once more they have been on the unsuitable finish of an important recreation Wednesday at Truist Park, dropping 6-5 in 10 innings after twice failing to take care of a one-run lead within the ninth and tenth innings.
Marcell Ozuna slugged the tying solo house run off right-hander Mark Leiter Jr. with one out within the ninth within the right-handed reliever’s first look in per week. José Cuas cleaned up the site visitors in aid of Leiter, retiring each Braves batters to strand the successful run in scoring place.
The Cubs reclaimed the lead within the tenth on Ian Happ’s sacrifice fly, however their one-run lead didn’t maintain. Ronald Acuña Jr. tied it with an RBI single, swiped second base for his seventieth stolen base of the 12 months, and scored on Ozzie Albies’ single off Daniel Palencia to finish it.
“We’ve got to do some little things a little bit better,” supervisor David Ross stated. “Try to get runners in from third less than two outs hasn’t been our strength this month. Guys are laying it all out there. Just a really good team. We’ve got to figure out a way to win a baseball game.”
The Cubs (82-76) are tied with the Miami Marlins for the third and ultimate National League wild-card spot coming into Thursday, nonetheless, Miami owns the tiebreaker. The Cubs flip to Marcus Stroman in Thursday’s sequence ultimate to stop a sweep in Atlanta.
“We believe in the group, and we’ve got four games left to get this thing done,” Happ stated. “We’re nonetheless tied for the final spot, we’re nonetheless in it. Everybody on this clubhouse believes in that.
“We were 10 games under and really far out of it at one point so to be in this spot isn’t too bad.”
Wednesday’s painful ending marked the Cubs’ fifth loss after main within the eighth inning or later throughout September, tying for his or her most such losses in a month over the franchise’s final 50 seasons (June 1991 and September 1992), according to ESPN Stats & Info.
Since his transfer to the bullpen in mid-August, Drew Smyly steadily earned supervisor David Ross’ belief in high-leverage spots. Ross went to Smyly with two runners on and no one out within the seventh following Nico Hoerner’s throwing error. Hoerner tried to make a backhanded toss to Dansby Swanson at second base, however the excessive throw allowed a run to attain and runners at first and second base to achieve safely to trim the Cubs’ result in 3-2.
“The outs that we left on the field, both tonight and yesterday defensively, obviously those sting,” Hoerner stated. “But as an offense even though we did score some runs tonight those middle innings we felt like as a group we could have put some more up there. But obviously those are both games that can go either way.”
The error sequence ended Jameson Taillon’s ultimate regular-season begin, however Smyly ensured the sport didn’t get away from the Cubs in that scenario. Smyly retired the following three Atlanta hitters — Michael Harris II (floor out), Sean Murphy (strikeout) and Kevin Pillar (come out) — to flee with the Cubs’ one-run lead intact.
Taillon had been on cruise management a lot of the night time. He held the explosive Braves offense to 2 runs on three hits, together with a house run by Albies that gave Atlanta a first-inning lead. After a dreadful first three months to his Cubs profession, Taillon posted a 3.53 ERA over his ultimate 15 begins (86 2/3 innings).
The Cubs caught a break to tie the sport within the second. A ball was clearly fouled off Jeimer Candelario’s bat, however house plate umpire Shane Livensparger missed it and whereas play was dwell Cody Bellinger scored from third. The umpires met to debate it, however the name stood as a handed ball and the run scored. The play couldn’t be reviewed. Braves supervisor Brian Snitker was ejected for arguing the decision.
Home runs by Mike Tauchman, his first since Aug. 8, and Happ within the third off Braves starter Darius Vines had initially put the Cubs forward 3-1.
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