- AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin
- Javier Baez watches his fourth-inning shot leave the park yesterday. Jorge Soler homered before him and Kris Bryant after him. That was the good news.
The Cubs are finally turning the corner this season, you’ve probably heard. No, really, they are. Seriously. They’ve got a bunch of great young players! The sky’s the limit! The misery’s over!
So what have the north-siders done thus far in Arizona?
Giants 8, Cubs 6
Reds 5, Cubs 2
Rockies 7, Cubs 5
Rangers 6, Cubs 4
Padres 6, Cubs 3
Indians 10, Cubs 6
The Cubs have also managed a 2-2 tie with the A’s.
I know, I know—it’s spring training, and it doesn’t matter if a team wins or loses. But if it doesn’t matter, couldn’t the Cubs win just once, as sort of an experiment? Or to prove to themselves that it’s possible?
There are 30 teams in big-league baseball. Twenty-nine have won this spring.
Among the reasons for optimism about the Cubs are three young sluggers, Jorge Soler, Javier Baez, and Kris Bryant. In the fourth inning yesterday against Cleveland, Soler blasted a sinking fastball over the wall in left. Baez followed by stroking a cutter to a similar spot. Then Bryant clouted a rising heater out of the park to right. Gordon Wittenmyer, covering the Cubs for the Sun-Times, noted “the immediate and sustained Twitter response” from Cubs fans to the back-to-back-to-back shots.
Billy Williams, Ernie Banks, and Ron Santo, once an impressive meat of the order for the Cubs, never triggered an immediate and sustained Twitter response.
The slugging of their phenoms yesterday allowed the Cubs to lose by only four. They surrendered 16 hits and made four errors that led to six unearned runs.
But today’s another day! The Cubs are in their home park in Mesa this afternoon, entertaining the Dodgers. The north-siders’ new stud free agent, Jon Lester, will start. You can just sense that the team’s about to turn the corner.