Christopher Morel stood in front of the Cubs dugout, shirtless, his arm raised to the raucous fans in the Wrigley Field Stands.
He’d pulled off his jersey himself on his way to home plate after delivering a three-run walk-off home run to beat the White Sox 4-3 on Wednesday. His teammates swarmed him.
“That’s a moment I can’t even translate into English,” he said through team interpreter Fredy Quevedo.
With one swing, Morel turned what would have been a disastrous two-game sweep at the hands of the White Sox into an electric comeback party.
Javier Assad’s quality start, the bullpen’s gutsy performance, Nick Madrigal’s eighth-inning home run, and two good at-bats in front of Morel all led up to what he identified as the most fun moment of his career. He’d even put it over homering in his MLB debut.
“I definitely want to thank God, I want to thank my teammates for never giving up, kept on fighting,” Morel said. “And just want to go ahead and thank the fans as well.”
The momentum started to turn the Cubs’ way in the top of the eighth inning. Cubs reliever Michael Fulmer entered the game with the bases loaded to strike out Luis Robert Jr., Yoan Moncada and Andrew Vaughn in order.
Then, Madrigal pinch hit in the bottom half of the inning and delivered the Cubs’ first run of the game. His solo homer was only his second home run of the season and the fourth of his career. It cut the White Sox’ lead to two runs.
Lefty Drew Smyly made sure it stayed that way, striking out Gavin Sheets and Yasmani Grandal. Smyly gave up a single to Elvis Andrus, but left fielder Ian Happ threw out Andrus trying to stretch the hit into a double.
In the ninth inning, the Cubs’ Cody Bellinger led off with a double off the left-center field wall. Then, Dansby Swanson walked to put to men on base for Morel.
The Cubs fans were already on their feet, shouting at the tops of their lungs.
Morel’s mind went to something former teammate Willson Contreras told him: “In those moments, just try to stay in the eye of the hurricane,” Morel recounted.
He fell behind in the count, swinging at a 100-mph fastball down and in, and a slider that darted out of the bottom of the zone. But he didn’t panic, watched a ball outside, and then got his pitch. He was just trying to put the ball in play.
“I thought initially off the bat it was too low to get out,” said Madrigal, who was watching from the dugout. “But he hit it probably as hard as you could possibly hit the ball. And it just kept going and going.”
Bellinger evidently wasn’t sure either. He went back to second to tag up.
Morel saw the ball clear the wall and pulled off his helmet as he rounded first.
“I got excited too,” manager David Ross said. “I was high-fiving [bench coach Andy Green]. And he got around the bases pretty fast.”
Then, Ross’ “manager brain,” as he put it, kicked in, and he started watching to make sure Morel touched all the bases.
Morel said the only thing on his mind was: “I hit a homer. Cubs win.”