Cubs remain stuck in cellar after extra-innings error against Pirates

After settling into the NL Central cellar, the Cubs could hear footsteps approach, along with an attempt to lock the door from the outside.

Are the Cubs trapped, thanks to four small-market teams standing on the escape route?

Check back in a few months for the answer, but the downward trend continued Saturday at Wrigley Field. The Cubs had a great opportunity to scrap out a comeback win, but couldn't deliver when it mattered and lost to Pittsburgh 4-3 in 11 innings.

“We're all, every single day, getting after it, trying to turn it,” third baseman Alex Bregman said. “I feel like over the course 162, the cream will rise to the top and we'll play good baseball. We haven't done that so far.”

Bregman, off to a slow start himself, delivered in the clutch Saturday, lining a two-out single to center that tied the game in the bottom of the ninth.

Daniel Palencia kept the Pirates off the scoreboard in the top of the 10th inning, but the Cubs couldn't get the winning run across. Then in the 11th, the lone run scored on a throwing error by pitcher Caleb Thielbar.

Thielbar was in perfect position for redemption, after giving up the only 2 runs of Friday's loss. He struck out the first two batters, then coaxed a bouncer back to the mound. With plenty of time to complete the play, Thielbar threw wide of the bag as the go-ahead run raced home from second base.

“I work on that play every single day,” he said. “Fielded it nice, came out of the glove nice, I turned and threw it to the wrong person. It makes me sick to throw it away on a play like that.”

Thanks to an earlier pinch-hit and pinch-run, Matt Shaw played first base, for the first time in his professional career, during extra innings. But he had no chance to salvage the wide throw.

“Yesterday, they beat me,” Thielbar said. “I went back to the drawing board, kind of looked at what the problem was, tried to make that adjustment. Felt like I really made that adjustment today. To beat myself like that is just inexcusable.”

There's another issue wrapped up in all of this. First baseman Michael Busch is going through an 0-for-30 slump at the plate and doesn't have a hit since the final game of the Angels series. That's why Carson Kelly pinch-hit for Busch, then Shaw pinch-ran in the ninth.

“Yeah, I mean, Michael's struggling,” manager Craig Counsell said. “We're working at it, trying to figure it out. He's trying to figure it out. But we've got to take maybe a harder look at what's going on.”

Meanwhile, right-hander Edward Cabrera had been virtually unhittable in his first two Cubs starts, allowing no runs and 2 hits in 11⅔ innings. On Saturday he gave up 8 hits and 3 walks in 5 innings, doing well to keep Pittsburgh at 3 runs.

The Pirates took a 3-0 lead in the third, then couldn't add to it against Cabrera and the bullpen. The Cubs collected single runs in the fifth and seventh innings, both on RBI groundouts. Finally in the ninth, Dansby Swanson and Kelly walked, setting the stage for Bregman's tying hit.

In the bottom of the 11th, Pirates pitcher Yohan Ramirez made the exact same error as Thielbar. He picked up Nico Hoerner's soft grounder, looked Swanson back to second, then threw the ball past first base, putting runners at second and third with nobody out.

Shaw was retired on a soft liner to right, not deep enough to tag from third, then Bregman fouled out to first base. Pittsburgh elected to walk Ian Happ to load the bases for Seiya Suzuki. Ramirez threw 3 straight balls, Suzuki took a strike, then hit the 3-1 pitch straight into the air for a foul pop out to the first baseman.

At three hours, 40 minutes, this was the longest game at Wrigley Field in nearly three years.