OAKLAND – Patrick Wisdom had already extended his streak to four straight games with a home run when he got a hold of an outside sinker.
The two-run blast in the Cubs’ 10-1 win Monday was Wisdom’s eighth home run of the season and put him in rare company. He became the fourth Cubs hitter in the modern era with eight or more homers in 15 games to start the season – joining Lee Walls, Hank Sauer and Gabby Hartnett – and the first since 1958.
“Big part of the field, the ball is jumping, his bat’s in the zone a really long time, he’s deep into counts, taking really aggressive swings, he’s got a lot of confidence in himself right now,” manager David Ross said. “And that’s a good thing for us.”
Wisdom entered play Tuesday tied with Pete Alonso for the most home runs in MLB. And hot streaks from Wisdom and Cody Bellinger, who entered Tuesday on a seven-game hitting streak, have powered the Cubs offense lately. Though Monday, the Cubs were a Top-10 team in scoring.
No hitter maintains the kind of streak Wisdom is on for an entire season. But he has made an adjustment to his approach that should be sustainable.
“A huge thing is pitch selection on what I do damage on,” Wisdom told the Sun-Times in spring training. “Instead of trying to be stubborn and ego-driven and beat the pitcher on his best pitch — it might not be something that I hit well, but I want to prove data and everybody wrong.”
Pitch selection has continued to be a theme in Wisdom’s postgame interviews during his home run streak. He’s given the hitting coaches credit for “putting [his] blinders on.”
“The more consistently I can swing at pitches that are in my damage zone, the better off I think we’ll all be,” Wisdom said.
Stop signs
Ross said he didn’t feel the need to talk to Nick Madrigal about running through third base coach Willie Harris’ stop sign Monday.
In the fourth inning of the Cubs’ 10-1 win, Madrigal doubled to put runners on second and third for Nico Hoerner.
Hoerner hit a short line drive single in front of A’s left fielder Brent Rooker, whose arm the Cubs had been testing with aggressive base running. The Cubs’ Yan Gomes scored from third, and Madrigal tried to go from second to home, even as Harris held up a signal to stay at third. The throw beat Madrigal home.
“We’re grown men, been playing the game a really long time, all these guys know when they mess up,” Ross said. “He knows he messed up, was apologizing before he even got in the dugout to me, and he talked to Willie and said, ‘My bad, my bad, my bad.’ That’s enough.”
It starts with pitching
The Cubs’ three straight series wins against the Rangers, Mariners and Dodgers had as much to do with their starting pitching as it did their hot bats.
The Cubs rotation entered Tuesday with a combined 2.95 ERA, the best in the National League and third in MLB. With the bullpen included, Cubs pitchers had a combined 3.41 ERA, the second-best mark in the National League.