On Friday afternoon, the videoboard in the Cubs (77-67) clubhouse displayed a wild rethinking of the Cubs lineup. Both Cody Bellinger and Jeimer Candelario were listed as playing first base.
This was revealed to be a typo.
Before Sunday’s 5-2 victory over the Diamondbacks to avoid a four-game sweep, the Cubs made a slightly more substantive change to warm up an ice cold offense. A slumping Christopher Morel hit leadoff for his first start in three days, a red-hot Seiya Suzuki batted third while Ian Happ slid down to the No. 6 slot.
Manager David Ross professed his preference for lineup consistency before the game, but hardly needed to. Happ had not batted anywhere other than third in over a month, and not batted lower than fifth in the order since mid-June.
“Most of the lineups revolve around the starting pitcher that day,” Ross said. “They’re starting an opener. Just making sure they face our three best to start.”
In a switch away from their initially listed probable starter, the Diamondbacks deployed lefty Joe Mantiply as an opener to shield scuffling rookie Brandon Pfaadt from a gantlet of left-handed Cubs hitters in his eventual first inning of work.
“You just have the same at-bat,” Happ said. “With the lefty opening it up, you get Morel a chance to swing it early and Seiya has crushed lefties all year, so it made a ton of sense.”
Morel quickly deflected any skepticism that he still is one of the Cubs best options by slicing a triple off Mantiply in the first — though he was caught in a rundown a batter later — and launching the first of three Cubs solo homers that greeted Pfaadt in the third. Suzuki’s first inning RBI double off Mantiply redeemed Morel’s blunder. And with Bellinger and Dansby Swanson going back-to-back behind Morel, the Cubs third inning exceeded their scoring output of their past two days in around 10 minutes time.
The order change might be a one-off. Ideally for the Cubs, the breakout is more long-lasting.
“We’ve been honestly grinding away at it the last couple days and nothing really to show for it,” Swanson said. “So many times you can overthink it and get robotic, so I just trust the ability God gave me and just go play.”
Pfaadt is now up to 20 home runs allowed in 802⁄3 career innings, whether the Cubs offense is recharged or they ran into a homer-prone rookie is a ‘chicken or the egg’ debate irrelevant to a team scratching for their playoff lives. Or in this case, it’s an offense that felt their team approach was fine even as they were being shut down by Diamondbacks pitching the last few days, and just wanted to see some results amid a weekend of the Wrigley Field winds blowing in.
“I saw [Corbin] Carroll and thought ‘Maybe not today,” Bellinger said of what seemed like a no-doubter off his bat barely clip the right field seats after fighting the wind. “Our pitching staff did an unbelievable job this whole series keeping us in games. We tried to pick it up a little bit and do our part.”
Whether it was a blip or a return to the top-3 offense the Cubs have been since the All-Star break, it only took a little to shift toward the type of game this team is built to win, because their defense is too sharp for 4-0 deficits to be easily scratched away.
Mike Tauchman’s running catch on a liner to the left-center gap eased the burden on Julian Merryweather, who spelled Adbert Alzolay for the save while working for a third-straight day himself. Nick Madrigal had a banner day at third base, and Ian Happ’s sliding catch in left before popping up to double off Emmanuel Rivera in the fifth deflated Arizona’s best rally against starter Kyle Hendricks.
“I’ve gotta remind some of these guys that haven’t seen me play infield,” Happ said with a wry grin. “You don’t lose that.”