Rizzo’s presence a plus
Do the math. Cubs manager Dale Sveum has.
“I’ve said all along, four games and he’s got 2 game-winning hits,” Sveum said after Saturday’s 3-2 victory over the Houston Astros at steamy Wrigley Field.
Sveum was talking about rookie first baseman Anthony Rizzo, who hit a 2-run homer to put the Cubs ahead in the fifth inning. It was his second big-league homer; he hit his first with the Padres last season.
In his Cubs debut last week, he hit a double to put the Cubs ahead for good against the Mets.
That got Sveum to doing, if not some differential calculus, at least some fancy figuring.
“The formula for winning close games is not just having a third hitter, but a 3-4-5 that accumulate 3 runs a game,” he said. “When the year is over, that’s 600 runs they accumulate, and that’s the difference between winning a lot of 1-run games.
“You can talk what you want about pitching sometimes, but big-time teams and winning teams have 3, 4 and 5 hitters that accumulate 600 runs a year. Those 1-run games turn into wins instead of losses.”
The 22-year-old Rizzo is now 4-for-15 with 2 doubles, the homer and 3 RBI. The home run Saturday for the left-handed hitting Rizzo came off Astros lefty J.A. Happ.
The ball was a high drive that carried into the right-field stands and scored Starlin Castro with two outs.
“It feels good to get that win and get that monkey off my back, hitting the home run and this and that,” Rizzo said. “It’s another thing I worked hard on this year, hitting lefties, and I feel comfortable, whether it’s a lefty or a righty.”
Rizzo and the offense made a winner of starter Matt Garza (4-6, 4.01 ERA), who ran his pitch count up to 53 after 3 innings and wound up throwing 104 in 5 innings.
“It’s more of day we had to battle our own elements,” Garza said. “It was a warm one. I felt like in the second inning, I was just wearing a just a suit made out of water. It’s pretty awesome. We battled. I definitely didn’t have my best location today, but you count on the guys. They came and picked me up and made the plays. We had a lot of double plays (3) today. It was awesome.”
The other thing not to be overlooked was the scoreless performance turned in by the Cubs bullpen. Lefty Scott Maine gave up a walk and a single in the sixth, but he got help from some bad baserunning as left fielder Alfonso Soriano cut down Chris Johnson trying to go from first to third on Jason Castro’s single.
Manny Corpas came in and bailed out Maine. The Cubs’ 1-2 setup punch of James Russell and Shawn Camp was perfect, setting the stage for Carlos Marmol to earn his seventh save.
“The bullpen was outstanding again,” Sveum said. “Like I said 10 days ago, get the bullpen a little more stable, with Marmol going back in the closer role. You’ve got Russell and Camp being able to mix and match in the seventh or the eighth innings. Corpas has done a nice job against right-handers.
“You’ve been able to mix and match now from the sixth through the ninth inning.”