The Cubs have one of the best records in baseball. Are there areas to be concerned about? Yes

Even with one of the top-four records in Major League Baseball, there always seems to be cause for concern these days with the Cubs. Wednesday offered another example, as they dropped the finale of a nine-game road trip in Philadelphia 7-2.

Ben Brown had been brilliant in his previous two starts, while Phillies left-hander Jesus Luzardo gave up 20 earned runs in his previous two outings. Both pitchers made turnarounds. Luzardo struck out 10, while Brown lost command and surrendered 3 runs in the first inning.

So the Cubs finished the road trip with a 4-5 record. Now they'll return home for 10 straight at Wrigley Field, facing Pittsburgh, Milwaukee and Seattle.

Concerns? Yeah, there are a few:

• Trouble against quality starters

The Cubs drew some quality starting pitchers on this trip — Washington's MacKenzie Gore; Detroit's Tarik Skubal and Jack Flaherty; then Philadelphia's Zack Wheeler. They lost all four games and scored a combined 2 runs off that quartet.

Sure, it's not easy facing the best pitchers in MLB. Most teams don't do well against those guys, but a long playoff run will require beating the top arms.

This topic also requires some big-picture adjustment. After the loss to the Phillies, the Cubs still had four of the top 23 players in MLB in OPS — Kyle Tucker (No. 13), Michael Busch (18), Seiya Suzuki (19) and Pete Crow-Armstrong (23).

The Cubs are neck-and-neck with the Yankees for the MLB lead in run differential and have a legitimate argument for the best lineup in baseball. Do better when facing the best arms in October.

• The offense has become too home-run reliant.

During the past eight games the Cubs have scored 17 of their 27 runs off homers and tallied 3 or fewer runs in five of those contests.

Naturally, this is going to evoke memories of years past, when too many Cubs swung for the fences, struck out frequently and couldn't manufacture runs. But in this case, it seems to be an outlier; maybe a byproduct of facing all those good pitchers.

As of Wednesday afternoon, the Cubs ranked fifth in home runs, second in runs scored and 19th in strikeouts. Think about how many times the wind has been blowing in at Wrigley this season. The Cubs have been very good at manufacturing runs. This is probably just an odd week.

• Starting pitching isn't good enough.

Well, just when Brown was starting to look like he had staff ace potential, the regress in Philadelphia was discouraging.

This might be the most legitimate complaint. Over the full season, the Cubs rank 20th in starting pitcher ERA at 4.00. Since May 15, it's 22nd at 4.39.

Besides losing Justin Steele for the full season and Shota Imanaga with a hamstring strain, the main problem here is inconsistency. There isn't really a weak link in the rotation, but all of them can look fantastic one day and get knocked around the next time out.

Imanaga made his first rehab start on Monday in the Arizona Rookie League and should be less than two weeks from returning to the Cubs. The X-factor to this entire season might be Javier Assad, who has been out since the spring with an oblique strain. Will the long layoff keep him fresh for September?

• The bullpen won't hold up.

This is anyone's guess, but former starters Drew Pomeranz, Chris Flexen and Brad Keller turning into relief stars has been the pleasant surprise of this Cubs season. Daniel Palencia's resurgence has obviously also helped.

The Cubs have the best bullpen ERA in the majors since May 1. And that's with Porter Hodge on the injured list, Ryan Pressly getting off to a rough start, and Julian Merryweather being DFA'd.

The Cubs have done a nice job of cobbling together successful bullpens the past few years. The question is, how long can this last?

President of baseball operations Jed Hoyer talked with reporters in Philadelphia on Wednesday about his mindset roughly seven weeks before the trade deadline.

“Right now, the focus would be on adding pitching depth,” Hoyer said. “I think that would be the clear thing. There's no finish line on the bullpen. There's going to be injuries, guys are going to struggle and you're going to need that kind of depth. We need to continue to look for the next group because that's how baseball's played now.”