Man, that was a long time coming. Playoff baseball is amazing, playoff baseball at Wrigley Field is the best. The Chicago Cubs did what they've done to propel themselves to 92 wins in the regular season against the San Diego Padres in Game 1 of the Wild Card series on Tuesday. The pitching was great, they hit home runs and the defense was stellar. Thanks to 4.2 perfect innings by the bullpen, a pair of home runs and two dazzling plays by Dansby Swanson, the Cubs won 3-1 in front of a sold out crowd on the north side of Chicago.
It didn't always look good for the Cubs as Nick Pivetta shut down the offense through four innings. However, the much maligned Swanson kept Chicago within one run following two gold-glove plays on the field. The first came in the second inning, when he snagged a hard-hit ball, diving to his right. Swanson looked Xander Bogaerts back to third base and threw out the runner at first for the second out.
Matthew Boyd escaped further damager in the fourth inning, when the Padres had runners at the corners with one out. Ryan O'Hearn hit a jam shot to shallow left-center field, where Swanson raced back and made an over the shoulder catch, saving a run and another base runner for the Padres.
After that it was all Cubs.
Nico Hoerner had the only hit against Pivetta through four innings as the Padres' righty retired 11 in a row heading into the fifth. At that point he had six strikeouts and was dominating the Cubs' lineup with his fastball, but Seiya Suzuki and Carson Kelly responded with back-to-back home runs to take the lead in the fifth.
That was the first time the Cubs hit back-to-back home runs in the postseason since Game 1 of the 2016 NLCS, when Miguel Montero and Dexter Fowler did it against the Los Angeles Dodgers.
The big story of the day is the bullpen. Boyd was good, allowing only one run, but he was pulled after throwing 58 pitches through 4.1 innings. With a one-run deficit at the time Craig Counsell brought in Daniel Palencia to face the top of San Diego's lineup with a runner at first base. Palencia quickly got two outs on five and returned to pitch the sixth after the Cubs took a 2-1 lead.
Palencia shut down the middle of the lineup as well, retiring Manny Machado, Jackson Merrill and Bogaerts
Next up was veteran lefty Drew Pomeranz, who got to face three consecutive lefties, which you just don't see all that too often nowadays. The Cubs took advantage of the matchup and Pomeranz got through a scoreless seventh inning on 11 pitches.
Andrew Kittredge took care of the eighth and Brad Keller completed the perfect bullpen performance by picking up his first playoff save with a 1-2-3 ninth.
For all the talk about San Diego's bullpen being a huge factor it was the Cubs' group of relievers that slammed the door in Game 1. Meanwhile, Jeremiah Estrada allowed a run in the eighth inning, giving the Cubs some extra breathing room thanks to Hoerner's sac-fly.
That's playoff baseball. Pitching, defense, dingers. Game 2 on Wednesday, 2:08 pm first pitch.
