Crap Defense Leads to Another Nauseating Cubs Loss

Justin Steele was the losing pitcher Friday night for the Chicago Cubs and it was another example of why the win/loss record for starting pitchers can sometimes be complete bullshit. The lefty was charged with three earned runs as the Cubs lost 3-2 to the Cincinnati Reds, but if you actually tuned in to watch another nauseating game you know that the real culprit was the crap Cubs defense.

Steele retired the first 10 batters he faced on Friday before surrendering a one-out walk in the fourth inning to Elly De La Cruz. The Cubs lefty then made quick work of Jeimer Candelario, who lined out to right field for the second out and then it looked like Steele got out of the inning with no damage after he appeared to have picked off De La Cruz.

Well, Steele did everything right, but first baseman Michael Busch bounced a throw to David Bote at second base that allowed De La Cruz to slide in safely.

But hey, no big deal because Steele then proceeded to strike out Spencer Steer to end the fourth inning.

Oh wait, no, I guess not. Struggling Cubs catcher Miguel Amaya whiffed on Steele's nasty slider that Steer swung and missed at, which allowed the inning to continue on Amaya's passed ball. That surely wasn't going to hurt the Cubs, right? They can get away with giving teams extra outs, right?

Tyler Stephenson's two-run double came after Steele picked off a runner and struck out a batter that each could have ended the inning at a 0-0 tie.

Amaya also had a throwing error in the seventh inning, but Steele was able to work around that mistake and left TJ Friedl stranded in scoring position.

Amaya almost tied the game with a two-run homer in the ninth inning, when he doubled high off the left field wall to make a 3-2 game. Still, despite some recent success at the plate, the Cubs are very much in the market for a catcher and have reportedly engaged in active trade discussions with the Colorado Rockies for their All-Star catcher.

Defense, which was supposed to be the strength of the 2024 Cubs, has been shit and even with all the other struggles if the defense was as good as promised they’d have a much better record so far this season.

It has to be so annoying if you're a Cubs pitcher right now because the defense has been bad all year. For Steele, that's now two straight games against the Reds in which bad defense directly led to multiple runs scoring and making his start look worse than how he actually pitched.

The Cubs began play on Friday tied with the Tampa Bay Rays and Oakland A's at -19 defensive runs saved, ranked 28th in MLB. The Cubs have a -13.6 defensive rating on FanGraphs, which ranks 26th and they're 24th in outs above average at -12. Embarrassing performance all around the diamond from the Cubs and things might get worse in the next few weeks because Nico Hoerner might be out if further tests on his injured hand come back negative.

This season has been beyond infuriating.