Nobody Else Drove In a Run

Atlanta had nine hits at Wrigley Field on Tuesday night. Three were home runs, each with exactly one runner on, each off a different pitcher, in the sixth, seventh and ninth innings, and between them they account for every run in Atlanta 6, Chicago 3. The other six hits, two singles by Matt Olson, one each by Mauricio Dubón, Drake Baldwin and Ozzie Albies, and a Brewer Hicklen double, drove in no one.

That is the shape of the second game of three, the series now even, a two-game losing streak ended. Chicago led 3-0 after four. Kevin Gausman, who made 26 starts for Atlanta in 2018 and 2019, retired ten in a row after Olson's two-out single in the first. Atlanta finished 1-for-5 with runners in scoring position, and the one was the last of the homers.

Ronald Acuña Jr., the designated hitter and batting second, hit the first, one out in the sixth, Baldwin on first by a single: the third pitch of the at-bat, a 1-1 fastball from Gausman, over the wall in left-center, his 18th of the season and the tenth since August 1. Albies hit the second with one out in the seventh, Austin Riley on first by a walk, off Jacob Webb, who pitched 78 games for Atlanta from 2019 to 2021. Webb's fourth pitch was a 2-1 changeup, and Albies hit it to right-center, his 22nd and his first since September 1. Walt Weiss had him batting eighth, which Mark Bowman noted followed 11 hits in 71 at-bats over the previous nineteen games. By MLB's tracking the three balls left the bat at 105.8, 103.2 and 107.6 mph; Albies's travelled the farthest, 396 feet, and Baldwin's was struck the hardest.

Baldwin's came in the ninth, and the ninth is one sentence. Mike Yastrzemski grounded out; Albies singled on Edward Cabrera's first pitch, stole second on a 1-1 count and took third on a 3-2 wild pitch during Hicklen's walk; Cabrera picked Hicklen off first, safe on the field and out when Chicago's replay challenge overturned it; and with two out and Albies on third, Baldwin hit an 0-2 fastball on a line to right, his 24th, two runs batted in, 6-3. Cabrera, whom the Cubs returned from the injured list on September 12 as a reliever, was making his first relief appearance of the season. The run that scored was the one on third, and it did not need the runner who was picked off first.

Martín Pérez pitched six innings on 90 pitches: five hits, four walks, which ties his most in any appearance this year, two strikeouts, three runs, two earned. The unearned one, by the scorer's reckoning, is Matt Shaw's on Miguel Amaya's sacrifice fly in the fourth, not Michael Busch's on the play where Dubón's throw went wide; the book charges that one to Pérez. On September 10 I wrote, "Every time Martin Perez has finished a sixth inning this season, he has allowed one earned run or none," and on Tuesday he finished a sixth and allowed two, so the sentence is no longer true. The decision made him 9-9 and, by MLB's career count, was his 100th win, in his sixth start since the 99th on August 11.

Didier Fuentes, 21, threw the seventh and eighth, six up and six down on 35 pitches, his 17th hold and the twelfth of his 55 appearances to run two innings or more. Raisel Iglesias threw the ninth for his 33rd save, the ninth in a row he has converted since the last one he did not, on August 7.

Atlanta is 89-63. Philadelphia lost at Washington and is 83-68, five and a half back, with ten to play for Atlanta and the magic number at five by MLB's count. Chicago is 84-68, on the first wild-card line, with no berth secured yet. Earlier Tuesday the club placed Reynaldo López on the 15-day injured list, the posting reading "Right shoulder inflammation," and recalled JR Ritchie, who is listed to start Wednesday against Shota Imanaga.

On Monday I said one night was not an answer to whether the offense travels, and two nights are not either, so Monday's runs are not added to Tuesday's here; the sum would say less than the shape. The shape is three swings with a runner on apiece and everything else, Olson's two singles, Dubón's steal in the eighth, Hicklen's double, coming to nothing on the scoreboard. A lineup that does that at Wrigley in September has had a good night. It has not said what it does on Wednesday.