Electric Wrigley Field gets the W as Cubs dominate Game 4 of NLDS vs. Brewers

Before Thursday’s game, Milwaukee Brewers manager Pat Murphy joked, “I read a lot of Shakespeare and things like that.”

As it turns out, the Bards of Milwaukee might be writing their own tragedy while the Chicago Cubs are penning a made-for-Hollywood comeback story.

After losing the first two games of this series in lopsided fashion, the Cubs are surging after two wins at home: a one-run nail-biter in Game 3 on Wednesday, followed by a 6-0 beatdown Thursday in front of the biggest, loudest crowd of the season at Wrigley Field.

If you were here, your ears would still be ringing and your heart would be full. If you’re a Cubs fan, that is.

Maybe the Cubs are inevitable, and they’re going to roll over the Brewers on Saturday in Milwaukee. Or perhaps this series will be decided by home-field advantage, which the Brewers earned by winning 14 consecutive games while the Cubs wilted during the summer.

We’ll find out the answer soon enough, but one thing I’m sure about: American Family Field is going to be rocking for Game 5. The winner of Game 5 will go on to play the Los Angeles Dodgers, an unenviable task, but one worth fighting for.

This game was a breakthrough of sorts for the Cubs, who won the season series against Milwaukee but lost the battle for the NL Central crown.

Chicago hadn’t scored more than four runs in a playoff game since beating the Washington Nationals 9-8 in Game 5 of the 2017 NLDS. That’s eight years and two managers ago.

They had scored three or fewer runs in 13 consecutive postseason games until their 4-3 victory in Game 4. However, this is a team with offensive firepower; the Cubs scored 793 runs during the regular season, the third most in baseball behind the Brewers and Dodgers.

“It’s something you can’t force,” Murphy said after the game. “Momentum in baseball happens based on what’s on the field. The Cubs earned it. They had their backs against the wall, and they played great these last two games.”

In the first four games of the series, the Cubs scored eight of their 10 runs in the first inning, and they continued that trend Thursday when Ian Happ hit a three-run homer in the first.

However, while they left some scoring opportunities on the table, going 2 for 11 with runners in scoring position and stranding 11 runners, the Cubs tacked on runs when Matt Shaw hit an RBI single in the sixth and Kyle Tucker and Michael Busch hit solo shots in the seventh and eighth, respectively.

Except for Busch, who leads all playoff hitters with four home runs, those performances were a bit surprising and, for the Cubs, certainly encouraging.

Before the first inning, Happ was hitting .095 with 11 strikeouts in the playoffs, with a homer and a double as his only hits.

“It was great for Ian to have the playoff moment he deserved,” Cubs manager Craig Counsell said. “And it was a huge swing. A huge swing.”

Shaw was hitless in his first six playoff games until the second inning of his seventh, when he singled. Tucker’s homer was his first extra-base hit of the playoffs and just his 12th, and sixth home run, in 48 games since the All-Star break.

It was an almost team-wide redemption story.

After failing to get through the first inning in an ill-advised, short-rest start in Game 1, Matthew Boyd looked like the Cubs’ All-Star from the first half, pitching 4 2/3 scoreless innings. He gave up two hits, struck out six and walked three.

“Boyd was fantastic,” Murphy said. “He made pitches. How much money did they give him? He earned it tonight.”

Boyd, who got paid $29 million on a two-year deal, teared up before the series, talking about his late grandfather, a Cubs fan. He got a standing ovation as he walked off the field.

Every ovation was a standing one Thursday night because no one sat down.

“Tonight was another level,” Boyd said of the fans. “That was super special.”

“How ‘bout those fans?” is usually a teed-up soundbite for an RSN interview immediately after a win. But man, how ’bout those fans at Wrigley Field? The stands were packed, and the 41,770 in attendance seemed locked in.

“The crowd was incredible tonight,” Counsell said. “I’ve never seen a baseball game like that.”

During the summer, Wrigley Field is best enjoyed during the day, but the energy of an evening playoff crowd can seemingly power the city. The crowd is so close to the action that, when everyone is standing and cheering, the ballpark can feel like a bandbox.

They chanted “Fred-dy” at Brewers starter Freddy Peralta in the first inning, reminiscent of the way Pittsburgh Pirates fans unnerved Johnny Cueto in the 2013 wild-card game. They stood and screamed all night. Wrigley can be a tense place, but every crowd shot on the videoboard was fans mugging and chugging.

There was no reason to be nervous on Thursday as the Cubs took control of the game early and, unlike the other games in this series, never wavered. Milwaukee finished with just three hits. The Cubs bullpen allowed just one hit and one walk in 4⅓ innings.

The announced crowd was the largest of the season. It looked like no seat was unoccupied. And when the fans erupted, the press box started swaying like a skyscraper in the wind.

Only Happ had been on a real Cubs playoff team before (Nico Hoerner was on the 2020 squad that played in an empty stadium), but everyone got the best kind of Wrigley postseason experience these last two games. These were the kinds of games you sign up for in the winter.

For one night, the lingering cynicism of a good but not great season washed away. No one cared about Tucker’s impending free agency, the failures of the trade deadline, the prospect of a penny-pinching winter, Counsell’s decisions or anyone’s slump.

It was just the game on the field and the unique energy of the Wrigley Field experience. If you could bottle what it felt like to be here Thursday night, you could live forever.

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