Friday's Cubs win was amazing but incredibly, not unique

There have been plenty of nutty games at Wrigley Field over the years. The 23-22 loss to the Phillies in 1979 is the one that immediately comes to mind. But there was also the game in August 1989 when the Cubs trailed the Astros 9-0 in the sixth and came back to win. There was an entire series of them from September 11-13 in 1998 when the Cubs and Brewers combined for 72 runs, the Brewers won the first game 13-11, and the Cubs won the other two games 15-12 and 11-10. Sammy Sosa hit homers 59-62, Orlando Merced hit a three run walk-off homer on Saturday and Mark Grace hit a walk-off homer on Sunday. In 2018, the Cubs scored nine runs in the eighth inning on a miserable April day to come back to beat the Barves 14-10.

But nobody had ever seen what happened in Friday's game against the D'bags.

Right?

Well, let's find out.

On an unseasonably warm April day, everybody expected to see the ball flying out, but through six innings the Cubs led just 2-1 with former Brewers teammates pitching. Corbin Burnes is really good, so it was not a shock that he made it through six allowing just two runs on six hits. But Colin Rea isn't, so it was surprising that he allowed just one run on five hits in 4.2 innings.

In the bottom of the seventh the Cubs appeared to wrap things up. Burnes was out and Ryne Nelson came in to relieve him. So far this year, Nelson is best known for being the only pitcher in either league with a hit. And it was against the Cubs. Of course it was.

The Cubs got their revenge. Nico Hoerner and Petecrow Armstrong singled, then Carson Kelly walked to load the bases. The great Vidal Brujan stood in the on deck circle dancing along to the PA music while the pitching coach chatted with Nelson. Probably something like this.

"Brujan blows, just strike him out."
"OK."

Brujan did strike out. But then Ian Happ hit a grand slam for a 6-1 lead, followed by a Kyle Tucker triple and a Michael Busch single to make it 7-1.

Porter Hodge had been warming up to pitch the eighth, but after the run barrage the Cubs had him sit down. No need for the big guns, now. The bullpen door opened and Jordan Wicks lumbered out, with a big cushy lead.

Wicks had been called up t0 replace Luke Little, who was up for two days and got sent back to Iowa after really pissing off the normally composed Craig Counsell.

In Little's first and only appearance of the season, he came in to pitch the eighth Wednesday, with the Cubs down 3-2, to face a very cushy part of the Padres lineup.

He walked lefthanded hitting Jason Heyward (yikes), after Jose Iglesias bunted Heyward to second, Little walked lefty Gavin Sheets (double yikes), got Elias Diaz to pop up, but then walked Tyler Wade to load the bases and walked Fernando Tatis Jr. to force in a run.

"“We walked the wrong hitters in situations that are good matchups," Counsell said. "You can’t do it on a day when they pitched well. We walked (Jason) Heyward left-on-left. We walked (Gavin) Sheets left-on-left. We walked (Tyler) Wade twice. Those are going to hurt you.”

Little's line was 2/3 of an inning no hits, four walks one run, and a Greyhound ticket to Des Moines.

So, at least Wicks couldn't do worse when he came in to protect a six-run, eighth inning lead in his season debut.

His first pitch to the great Randal Grichuk was a strike. Yay!

His second was lined into left for a single.

His first pitch to Josh Naylor was drilled into right for a single.

His second pitch to Lourdes Gurriel was smacked to left for a single.

Five pitches, three hits, nobody out, bases loaded. For fuck's sake man. Well hey, at least they were all strikes.

Counsell wasn't fucking around, so he had Hodge get back up and he had to bring him in pretty quickly because Wicks got lit up so incredibly fast.

Eugenio Suarez hit Hodge's third pitch about 500 feet to straightaway center for a grand slam.

Sigh.

The Cubs were still up 7-5.

Hodge got Gabriel Moreno to line out to second, so maybe things would calm down?

Next up was Jake McCarthy, batting .081 on the season. Hodge walked him.

Alek Thomas pinch hit for Garrett Hampson. Thomas is a career .229 hitter who hit just .189 last year.

Thomas singled to left. Now the tying runs were both on base for Corbin Carroll.

Before Carroll could do any damage, Hodge threw a wild pitch to advance McCarthy and Thomas both into scoring position.

Carroll struck out.

A-ha! The Cubs are just one pitch away from escaping this with the lead.

Geraldo Perdomo singled in McCarthy to make it 7-6.

OK, still. Grichuk's up again, and he sucks, so one good pitch.

Grichuk hit a grounder right down the third base line and under the gloe of DEFENSIVE REPLACEMENT Tater Workman for a "double" to score both runners and give the D'bags an 8-7 lead.

Hodge stayed in to face Josh Naylor. He walked Naylor on five pitches.

Counsell paused banging his head into the dugout wall long enough to stagger to the mound to take out Hodge and bring in tiny, little Ethan Roberts with his dumb glasses and horrible sleeve of tattoos.

Gurriel took a 2-2 Roberts meatball and blasted it to deep left center. The D'bags had scored ten runs in the inning. TEN! And led 11-7.

Before Wicks threw his first pitch, the Cubs win expectation percentage was 99%. When he left with the bases loaded and nobody out it was 95%. When Suarez hit the grand slam off of Hodge it was still 90%. When Roberts came in with two on and two outs it was still somehow 75%. After Roberts' fifth pitch it was 96%...for the D'bags.

Roberts got Suarez to line out to end the top of the eighth.

Ten runs on eight hits, and an error (on Gold Glover Ian Happ for a lousy throw that allowed Grichuk to go to third on his double).

Hodge entered the game with a 2.00 ERA and had allowed just two runs in his first nine appearances. He left with a 7.45 ERA.

Wrigley Field fans were in shock, the team was dazed and Tommy Hottovy was sitting back safe in the knowledge that for no apparent reason he seems to have a job for life.

A couple of quick outs from D'bags reliever Bryce Jarvis and this one would likely be a cake walk the rest of the way.

Instead, on an 0-2 pitch he hit Nico Hoerner. Then he walked Petecrow. Oops.

Carson Kelly was up next. Carson had already homered once in the game, and he took Jarvis' second pitch deep to left center. Holy crap. The Cubs were down just 11-10.

The decaying corpse of Justin Turner struck out, and D'bags manager Torrey Lovullo decided to go his lefty, Joe Mantiply to turn Ian Happ around to his helpless right side.

Happ singled to left.

That brought up Kyle Tucker, who despite the seemingly daily heroics of Carson Kelly, is the best hitter in the National League.

On the first pitch, Tucker crushed a ball to right for a two run homer and the Cubs, inexplicably, led the game 12-11. The fans were going rightly going nuts. And before they could sit down, Seiya Suzuki homered to make it 13-11.

The runs were Mantiplying out of control!

Busch singled. Dansby singled. Nico singled.

Petecrow was up with the bases loaded.

On Sunday night going into a game against the Dodgers, Petecrow was hitting .197. When he came to bat here, he was hitting .274. Time to let one rip and Ryan Pressly-proof this lead.

Alas, young Petercrow struck out and Babe Kelly grounded to second to end the threat.

The Cubs had a 4% chance to win the game when the inning started. It went to 30% when Kelly homered to bring them within one. Then 86% when Tucker gave them the lead and 94% when Seiya homered.

In the span of just the eighth inning the Cubs went from 99% to win, to 4% to win, to 94% to win.

Pressly seems to be getting his shit together lately, and he got Moreno out on a foul pop to Busch, but then needed a great diving play by Busch to get McCarthy, gave up a double to Thomas to bring Carroll up as the tying run, only to get Carroll to pop out to Dansby in shallow left.

The Cubs won 13-11, somehow.

The combined 16 runs in the eighth were the most runs in any inning in the history of Wrigley Field which only goes back to 1914 (two years before the Cubs moved in). The previous record had been 15, on August 25, 1922.

And check out the craziness in that 1922 game. The Cubs scored 14 runs in the bottom of the fourth inning, and the Phillies had scored one in the top of the fourth. But that's not even the most amazing thing about the game. Because in the second inning the Cubs had scored ten runs.

Ten!

They scored ten runs in the second and 14 in the fourth! Shortstop Charlie Hollocher drove in six runs, left fielder Hack Miller drove in six runs, centerfielder Cliff Heathcote had five hits (but "only" four RBI). Eight Cubs had multi-hit games. They had eight doubles, three homers, and no triples.

Phillies starter Jimmy Ring gave up one in the first, ten in the second and FIVE in the fourth! He was still pitching AFTER he gave up TEN runs in the second inning. I guess Phillies manager Irvin Wilhelm saw him get through the third without giving up a run and thought, "I guess he's settling in."

But...thanks to four Phillies errors, TEN of the 16 runs that Ring gave up were unearned.

The Cubs led 25-6 after the fourth.

And they won 26-23!

The Phillies scored three in the fifth, eight in the eighth and six in the ninth!

The Cubs committed five errors of their own. And the final one almost cost them the game.

In the sixth inning, rookie catcher Gabby Hartnett (ever heard of him?), replaced starting catcher Bob O'Farrell.

In the top of the ninth, after the Phillies had already scored five runs to pull within four, they had the bases loaded and reliever Tiny Osborne was pitching to second baseman Frank Parkinson. With two outs Phillies first baseman Cliff Lee (not that Cliff Lee), ventured a little too far off of the third base bag. Gabby threw behind the batter and had Lee dead to rights at third to end the game, but threw the ball into left field. Lee scored, the other runners advanced to second and third. Oops.

Parkinson walked to bring up the incredibly named Bevo LeBourveau with a chance to give the Phillies the lead.

Tiny struck him out to end the game.

Phew.

The 2025 Cubs became just the seventh team to allow ten or more runs in an inning and still win the game. It last happened in 2006 when the Indians came back from a first inning 10-0 deficit to beat the Royals 15-13. And it's not even the first time the Cubs did it.

On September 26, 1912 they took a 9-0 lead into the top of the ninth against the Reds at the West Side Grounds. The Reds scored 10, including the final FIVE on bases loaded walks (you think Craig got mad at Luke Little, imagine how pissed he'd have been at Fred Toney and Larry Cheney).

Suddenly down 10-9 in the bottom of the ninth the Cubs won without putting a single ball in play.

Heinie Zimmerman walked. Wildfire Schulte got hit by a pitch. Vic Saier struck out but a wild pitch had advanced Heinie and Wildfire to third and second. Johnny Evers walked to load the bases. But Jimmy Archer struck out. Red Downs came up with the bases loaded and two outs, and he walked to score Heinie to tie the game. Then Jimmy Sheckard walked to literally walk it off.

So, in an 11-10 game, the final SEVEN runs of the game scored on bases loaded walks.

That was only the first game that day. It was a doubleheader. The Cubs scored seven in the second inning to take a 9-0 lead, they tacked on a run in the fourth and, lucky for them they didn't have to worry about the ninth. They won 10-0 in six innings because it was too dark to keep going. There were no bases loaded walks in the nightcap, but Vic Saier did steal home in the second, so there was that.

These current Cubs are a lot of fun to watch. But incredibly, even the craziest shit they can pull off has probably already been done before. I guess when you play every year from 1875 to 2025, it's hard to do anything truly new.