Cubs conclude spring with loss to Cardinals |
MESA - After seven grueling weeks of preparing for the regular season, things are finally about to get real as the Chicago Cubs concluded their spring schedule on Tuesday and will shift their focus to the regular Season. Before that could happen, the Cubs had one last spring (exhibition) game remaining as they took on the St. Louis Cardinals for a second straight day.
Shota Imanaga made his last tune-up before the regular season, as this was a very important start for him. Imanaga has been very impressive all Spring and has ranked among the league leaders in strikeouts since the beginning. With this being as close to a real game as can be, all eyes were on the left-hander to see how he would handle adversity. The overall numbers weren't great as he allowed four runs (three earned) in three innings, but like most of his starts, he struck out six as he continued to pile up the strikeouts. Opposing him was one of the Cardinal's free agent acquisitions Kyle Gibson, who picked a great time to have his best outing of the Spring. Despite going just five innings, Gibson was dominant from start to finish as he scattered four hits and allowed one run with nine punchouts. It took four batters for the Cardinals to grab the lead, and they never looked back. That started with a one-out Paul Goldschmidt double before the Nolan Gorman single gave the Cardinals a 1-0 lead. Willson Contreras added a single of his own a few pitches later, but Imanaga was able to escape without further damage. That first inning was only the beginning for the Cardinals' offense, which came out aggressive from start to finish. With Michael Siani picking up a two-out single to keep the second inning alive, Brendan Donovan's double pushed the Cardinals' lead to 2-0. Donovan scored on an error later in the inning, as the Cubs put themselves in a massive 3-0 hole early. What looked to be a strong start to the third, with Imanaga striking out the first two hitters he faced, Jordan Walker showed great patience and took a walk to keep the inning alive. That may have been the only walk Imanaga allowed, but it was costly. Alec Burleson doubled home Walker to push the lead to 4-0, and it proved to be the end of the line for Imanaga. Immediately after surrendering that fourth run, the Cubs offense finally seemed to solve Gibson after Ian Happ had the lone hit of the game in the first inning. Mike Tauchman made it two hits as he connected for the solo shot to end the shutout bid 4-1. Tauchman sends one out! pic.twitter.com/f8A9wqj1wb Two batters later, Miles Mastrobuoni and Happ picked up a pair of singles to have the Cubs in business, but nothing further came of that, as those were the final hits of the game for the Cubs against Gibson. With Siani and Victor Scott opening the top half of the fourth with a pair of singles, Imanga was lifted from the game in favor of Joe Nahas. Nahas recovered nicely to get out of that jam and kept the Cubs in the game for now. Things remained close until the sixth when Frankie Scalzo Jr. was called on to pitch. After retiring the first two batters, which was a common theme most of the game, Scalzo started to labor as the Matt Carpenter double kept the inning alive while the RJ Yeager single pushed the lead to 5-1. One inning later saw the lead grow to 6-1 as Michael Arias surrendered an Ivan Herrera double before a wild pitch brought him home. In desperate need of some offense quickly, Christian Franklin delivered with a home run in the bottom half of the seventh. Unfortunately, it was a solo shot, as the Cubs still trailed 7-2 and wouldn't score the rest of the way. Herrera's afternoon was just getting started as he did add a solo shot in the top half of the night to put the Cardinals in front 7-2 as the Cubs were down to their final outs of the Spring. Chicago went down quietly in their half of the ninth and will now head into the regular season on a two-game losing streak. Things will now count from here on out. While the overall result wasn't great, there were plenty of positives to take from this loss. Imanaga continued to make things look easy at times, Happ appears ready to go with two hits, and the long ball looks to be a more critical piece of the offense this season. The Cubs also received a late spring boost as Nick Madrigal returned to the lineup after nursing a lower back injury the last few weeks. Expected to battle Christopher Morel for the third base job at the start of spring, Madrigal must settle for a bench role for now, but did come away with a double in his final spring appearance. The Cubs will now head to Arlington to take on the defending World Series Champion Texas Rangers to begin their 2024 campaign. Justin Steele is expected to make that start after taking a comebacker off the knee last time out as he will face off against Nathan Eovaldi.
