TLDR: One night after getting run out of Wrigley Field 17-3, the Brewers turned right around and did the running themselves, riding rallies in 5 different innings to a 9-4 win.
+Blew out Milwaukee with a franchise-record home run barrage Monday
+Boyd has been Chicago's most stable starter of late
−Missing shortstop Swanson (oblique) and 2B Ramirez (back spasms)
−Bullpen thinned by multiple IL arms including Brown and Maton
Robert Gasser (4-5, 4.67 ERA) got the ball for Milwaukee looking to put Monday behind him, while Matthew Boyd (8-3, 3.88) started for Chicago trying to keep the good vibes going after the Cubs' record-setting power show. Gasser's last time out, against Seattle, got away from him early. Boyd had been about as steady as any arm in the Cubs' rotation.
Robert Gasser
(4-5)·4.30 ERA
Aug 20 vs Mariners
ND
3.2IP
4ER
4K
4BB
77P
09/01 Lineup
Matthew Boyd
(8-5)·4.16 ERA
Aug 26 @ Diamondbacks
L
6.0IP
1ER
5K
2BB
94P
09/01 Lineup
Chicago is trying to make this stretch without its shortstop. Dansby Swanson has been out since mid-August with an oblique strain, pushing Nico Hoerner over to short and thinning an infield that was already down second baseman Pedro Ramirez, a late scratch with back spasms. Milwaukee's issue runs deeper on the mound: the Brewers have shipped 6 pitchers to the injured list since midsummer, from Brandon Woodruff's shoulder to Quinn Priester's season-ending surgery, and the board still had Chicago as the moneyline favorite walking in.
None of that mattered once the bats got going. Milwaukee strung together single runs and rallies across the middle and late innings, wearing down a Cubs staff that had looked untouchable a day earlier, while Chicago's own answer, a 3-run 4th, fizzled out almost as fast as it started.
The two sides remain locked into a stretch that doesn't let up. This is the second of 4 straight meetings at Wrigley, with 3 more waiting in Milwaukee the following week. That's 7 division games in 10 days, plenty of time for either side to reshape a race Milwaukee has controlled for most of the summer.
For a Brewers club that got run out of its own building the day before, the response was about as clean as it gets. Milwaukee out-hit Chicago 13 to 6, cleaned up its own mess with just 2 errors against Chicago's zero, and turned a quiet start into a laugher by the middle innings.
Milwaukee heads into the rest of this week still holding the wheel in the NL Central, but with 6 more meetings against the team chasing them still to come.
Brewers 9, Cubs 4: Final Score & Odds Recap — Brewers Answer Blowout Loss With 9-4 Rout Of Cubs
