Cubs stress-free, prepare for NLCS after Game 5 comeback
CHICAGO -- The Chicago Cubs showed up the same time as usual for a game Thursday, doing their normal pregame routine. But as the afternoon stretched on, they saw the most beautiful sight of all at Wrigley Field.
Empty seats.
There was no need for a game Thursday night, as they already had punched their ticket to the National League Championship Series dance beginning here Saturday (8:08 p.m. ET, Fox Sports 1), avoiding a stressful, traumatic Game 5 against Johnny Cueto and the San Francisco Giants.
“Now, we can just sit back and watch the only Game 5 with everyone else,” said Cubs first baseman Anthony Rizzo, who attended the Chicago Blackhawks’ season opener Wednesday against the St. Louis Blues. “We can just relax. No stress.”
Manager Joe Maddon planned to have a steak delivered to his condo, with a little red wine, for when he watched the Washington Nationals take on the Los Angeles Dodgers on Thursday for the right to play the Cubs.
Maddon and the Cubs said they had no rooting interest. A trip to Washington certainly would be shorter, but then again Maddon has a home and tons of friends in Orange County, he said.
Yet they knew their best matchup would be against the Nationals, strictly to avoid all of the Dodgers’ left-handed bats against a primarily right-handed rotation. The extra bonus prize would be that Washington ace Max Scherzer, who pitched Thursday, wouldn’t be able to go again until Game 3.
Then again, playing the Nationals, well, it not only would bring back Washington manager Dusty Baker, who would love to have sweet revenge against the team that fired him, but also second baseman Daniel Murphy.
Yes, Murphy has changed uniforms, but there’s not a soul in Chicago who doesn’t have nightmares about the destruction he caused last October.
Murphy, who was with the New York Mets, hit .529 with four home runs, six RBI, six runs and a preposterous 1.850 on-base-plus-slugging percentage (OPS). Murphy led the Mets to a four-game sweep and was the MVP.
“We couldn’t pitch him worse than we did last year,” Cubs GM Jed Hoyer said. “We talked about in our advance meeting last year. He was red-hot. He killed the Dodgers coming into our series. We made mistakes with him last year. He hit some good pitches; he hit some really bad pitches.
“He really hit everything, pretty much.
“Maybe a chance for revenge, but I know he’s swinging the bat well again, so hopefully we will pitch him a little better.”
Really, there’s no reason for the Cubs to get worked up about their opponent. They already knocked off the Giants, the three-time World Series champion since 2010, in their own ballpark. And all those fears about their lengthy layoff, not playing a meaningful game in weeks, were unfounded.
“Everybody was worried about rust,” Maddon said, “but rust isn’t attached to your starting pitcher. If your starting pitcher in that first game gets you deep into the game, whatever rust there is is shaken off by that time.
“And that’s what Jon Lester did.”
Lester, who will pitch Game 1 on Saturday, threw eight scoreless innings in the postseason opener against the Giants, winning 1-0, and the Cubs’ young core did the rest, helping them score 16 runs in the final three games, with six RBI by their pitching staff.
“That’s pretty impressive, what our young guys have been able to do,” Maddon said. “The numbers of games we won. How we won.
“We’ve won a lot of our games playing baseball properly.”
The Cubs have proved they certainly are as good as the hype. The only difference entering the NLCS is they’ve become even a bigger favorite to win the World Series, now that two American League powerhouses, the Boston Red Sox and Texas Rangers, were upset in the division series.
Let their long-suffering fans worry all they want; the Cubs certainly understand.
“I’m not going to call it anxiety,” right fielder Jason Heyward said, “I’m going to call it a beautiful thing. It’s been an awesome experience to do it with the group, because this city is hungry.”
Besides, why panic when you have the best starting rotation in all of the land, with Lester leading the charge.
The Cy Young candidate thrives on the October stage. He has pitched more postseason innings than any pitcher in baseball since 2007 and was the pitching star of the Red Sox’s 2013 championship run, going 2-0 with a 0.59 ERA in the World Series.
“For me, that was the most rewarding year I’ve ever had, based on the year before,” Lester said. “I struggled (9-14, 4.82 ERA). The team finished in last place. It felt great to come back and do that.”
Yet while he has two $40,000 World Series trophies sitting in his den back home and two World Series rings locked away in a safe, Lester realizes none of it means anything to the Cubs faithful.
The Cubs have waited 71 years just to get back to the World Series, and Lester relishes being the one to take them there.
“This is what you play for,” Lester said. “It’s October.
“It’s been fun to see people’s reactions here. It’s different than it was in Boston. Here, people are more likely to walk by your table and say, ‘Good luck, nice game, we’re rooting for you.’
“In Boston, they wanted to come up and have a conversation. They want to talk to you about baseball. There are pros and cons to both, but this is a little more laid-back compared to the Northeast deal.”
Then again, if the Cubs are back in the World Series in less than two weeks, who knows how crazy their fans will act. But the Cubs are dying to find out.
“I do have a lot of faith in our guys,” Maddon said. “I’d like to believe that just getting to this next moment might chill out everybody a little bit more.”
Maybe.
Then again, after what these fans have endured since the Teddy Roosevelt administration, relaxation disappeared generations ago.
“This is what you play for. It’s October.”
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