Three up, three down: An update on the Cubs, August 11 edition

Yahoo

3 days ago

The Cubs have now lost three of their last four series and are 10-11 since the All-Star break. That's not awful — good teams have stretches like that all the time — but it can't compete with the Brewers' 17-4 mark over that same span.
Now we have to be concerned that the Cubs might fall behind the Padres in the wild-card race. As of Monday their lead is just 1.5 games over San Diego.
Here's who's hot and not for the Cubs over the last week.
Three up
Could Cade Horton be the ace the Cubs are looking for?
Horton's scoreless-inning streak reached 23.2 innings with his outing against the Reds last Wednesday. Over that streak he has allowed eight walks and 11 hits (0.761 WHIP). His strikeout rate (18 percent) isn't quite what it was in the minor leagues (31.7 percent) but perhaps that will come in time.
Matt Shaw has completely turned his season around
Shaw batted .333/.375/1.067 (5-for-15) over the week with a triple and three home runs. Since the All-Star break Shaw is batting .328/.349/.770 (20-for-61) with four doubles, a triple, seven home runs, 15 RBI, three stolen bases and 12 runs scored in 20 games (17 starts). He's raised his season OPS from .556 to .683 in that span. He and Horton might yet get into the Rookie of the Year conversation.
Here's his game-tying home run in Sunday's contest.
Andrew Kittredge made up for a bad game in a spectacular way
Honestly, it was hard to find a third Cubs player for 'three up' this week. Most of the hitters had quiet weeks. None of the relievers did very well.
And Kittredge was one of those who didn't when he allowed four hits and four runs to the Reds last Tuesday.
He atoned for that with an immaculate inning Wednesday. Here are the three strikeouts:
And this was accomplished with the same pitches to all three hitters:
Not only did Kittredge strike out Austin Hays, Gavin Lux and Tyler Stephenson, but he did it using the same sequence of pitches.
'We went sinker, sinker, slider,' catcher Carson Kelly said. 'Sinker, sinker, slider. Sinker, sinker … slider? It was pretty cool to be a part of that.'
Kelly paused for a second recalling the notion that maybe he should change up that last pitch — but the slider did the trick as all three batters struck out swinging.
It was the Cubs' first immaculate inning since Hayden Wesneski did it Sept. 22, 2022 at Pittsburgh, and the first one at Wrigley Field since LaTroy Hawkins had one against the Marlins Sept. 11, 2004.
Three down
Where have you gone, PCA? A fanbase turns its lonely eyes to you
Pete Crow-Armstrong went 2-for-21 (.095) over the six games with six strikeouts. He did steal one base, but then got picked off.
And that was after going 1-for-12 against the Orioles, so in August PCA is batting .091/.118/.121 (3-for-33) with one double, no walks and 13 strikeouts.
This is so far out of character with the rest of his 2025 season that you'd have to figure he'll break out of it sooner or later. Sooner would be good.
Even with the slump, PCA is still leading the NL with 31 doubles and also has posted an NL-leading 6.1 bWAR.
Kyle Tucker's power outage continues
Tucker batted .167/.286/.167 (3-for-18) over the week with no extra-base hits. In fact, he has homered just once since June 28 (a solo shot vs. the Red Sox July 19), a span of 113 at-bats.
Let's put to rest, incidentally, the idea that the minor finger injury Tucker suffered June 1 has anything to do with this slump. After the injury, Tucker sat out one game completely and pinch-hit the game after that. In the 22 games after that, Tucker hit .313/.406/.578 with seven doubles, five home runs, 13 RBI and 17 runs scored.
It's not the finger. It's something else. The run-scoring slump that's affected almost the entire team (except, apparently, Shaw) is the culprit. The Cubs batted .256/.325/.446 and averaged 5.33 runs per game before the All-Star break. Since then: .244/.310/.399, 4.14 runs per game. If you can figure that out, please let Craig Counsell know.