Cubs-Yankees Game 3: What a waste
Nobody probably noticed it because Jay Cutler was being treated like the New York Giants personal pinata, but that same night last October the Cubs beat Houston for their second straight series win.
Keep that moment tucked away for safekeeping.
And count Sunday as yet another Cubs opportunity lost.
The Cubs had burly Yankees ace CC Sabathia on the ropes seemingly all evening at Wrigley Field, but never could apply the knockout punch to the 6-foot-7 Sabathia in front of 41,828 fans.
Nick Swisher took care of that, tagging a tie-breaking 3-run homer off Cubs rookie reliever Chris Carpenter in the top of the eighth in the Yankees 10-4 win.
Swisher came in hitting just .173 left-handed, but with Kerry Wood on the DL and Jeff Samardzija unavailable it was Carpenter who got the call to relieve Sean Marshall with two on and nobody out in a 4-4 game.
Swisher drilled a 2-0 fastball well up into the right field bleachers.
“It's an opportunity (for Carpenter),” said Cubs manager Mike Quade, “and sometimes roles get extended. I was asking for a little more, and Carpenter's going to be a good reliever. I told him ‘We're going to be on this mound some day celebrating,' and I believe that.”
The Yankees tacked on 3 runs in the ninth, the second coming on Alex Rodriguez's towering RBI double that — and this can only happen at Wrigley — dropped into the ivy in front of Cubs leftfielder Alfonso Soriano.
The 41,828 capped a record Wrigley attendance for a three-game series.
“It was a fun series to be a part of with the atmosphere around the ballpark,” said Cubs starter Randy Wells, lifted for a pinch-hitter in the sixth inning of a 4-4 game. “As a team you have to hold your head high. We hung in there with one of the best teams in baseball for three nights.”
Quade knew the opportunity ahead of his team Sunday. The Cubs, on the heels of taking three of four against the Brewers, had a shot at winning back-to-back series for the first time since Sept. 27-Oct. 3, 2010.
“What we did against Milwaukee was fantastic,” Quade said before Sunday's game, “and to win another series against the Yankees would be another big step.”
Instead the Cubs dropped to 1-10 this season on Sundays. Quade's Cubs have indeed treated Sunday like a day of rest in his brief tenure. The Cubs have won just 2 Sunday games since he replaced Lou Piniella last August.
Ex-Yankee Soriano turned around a 93 mile-per-hour Sabathia heater for a 3-run homer, his 14th, in the bottom of the third inning for a 4-1 Cubs lead.
The Cubs beat up on Sabathia for 8 hits over the first five innings, but never could muster the big hit. The Cubs went 1-for-7 with runners in scoring position over the first five innings, 2-for-13 for the game.
The Yankees got within 4-3 in the fourth, 2 runs perhaps gift-wrapped by a Starlin Castro mental error. After a Rodriguez one-out walk, Robinson Cano hit a tapper in front of the plate. On the throw to second Castro didn't keep his foot on the bag, both runners were safe, and Swisher promptly banged a single to score Rodriguez. Cano eventually came around to score on a fielder's choice.
“You can talk about the eighth and the ninth inning,” Quade said, “but I think the game was decided as much as anything in the fourth inning.
“He (Castro) was just too quick, quick and greedy. Every so often greedy is OK. I know darn well he thought we were going to get a (double play) there. We just needed to make sure of the first one. A young mistake, but an aggressive mistake.”
Sabathia (9-4), who won his AL-leading ninth game, was the fourth former Cy Young award winner the Cubs faced during this homestand, joining Roy Halladay, Cliff Lee and Zach Greinke.
“CC didn't have his best stuff tonight,” Rodriguez said, “and I think he'd be the first person to admit that. But he knows how to win games. He kept us in the game and we know if he could get us into the sixth or seventh inning we'd get enough runs for him, and Swish got the big blow.”
The Yankees, leading the bigs in homers this season with 103, were held homer-less by the Cubs the first two games of the series. Brett Gardner changed that with a homer to lead off the game, and Swisher's blast gave the Yankees 105 for the season.
Sabathia and the Yankees trailed 4-1 after three innings, but he shut out the Cubs the rest of the way in throwing seven innings for the 10th time in 16 starts.
“It doesn't matter how many runs he gives up,” Swisher said, “it just seems like he's going to go seven, eight, nine innings for us every time.”