Soler
Drives in Two More Runs as Cubs Beat Brewers
CHICAGO
— Sep 3, 2014, 11:33 PM ET
By
JACK CASSIDY Associated Press
Associated
Press
Rookie
Jorge Soler had a two-run double to become the second player in Cubs
history with as many as 10 RBIs in his first seven games as Chicago
beat Milwaukee 6-2 on Wednesday night.
Soler
joined Mandy Brooks, who had 12 RBIs in 1925, as the only Chicago
players to accomplish that feat.
Kyle
Hendricks pitched five-plus innings to hear his fifth straight win.
Hendricks (6-1) allowed two runs on nine hits in 5 2-3 innings. The
right-hander did not walk or strike out a batter.
With
five rookies in the lineup, the Cubs completed their first three-game
sweep of the Brewers since Aug. 23-25, 2004.
Milwaukee
concluded a 1-8 road trip with its eighth straight loss to fall three
games behind St. Louis in the NL Central race.
Chicago
never trailed after Chris Valaika hit a two-run homer off ex-Cub Matt
Garza to put it ahead 2-1 in the second. The blast to deep left field
followed Logan Watkins' two-out single.
In his
first start in 31 days, Garza (7-8) failed to get past the third
inning. The right-hander allowed six runs on eight hits and one walk.
He had been on the disabled list since Aug. 4 because of a strained
left oblique.
The
Cubs batted around in the third, when they scored four times to take
a 6-1 lead.
Soler
began the onslaught with a two-run double, his ninth and 10 RBIs of
the season. Welington Castillo followed with a run-scoring,
ground-rule double, and one out later, Watkins hit an RBI single to
cap the rally.
Milwaukee
took an early lead in the second, when Khris Davis singled, advanced
on a groundout and scored on Logan Schafer's two-out base hit.
The
Brewers scored their final run on Valaika's error at first base in
the sixth.
Milwaukee
was missing Ryan Braun, who was with his wife Larisa in Milwaukee,
where she was expecting their first child.
TRAINER'S
ROOM
Brewers:
OF Carlos Gomez will not take part in physical activity until Sunday
at the earliest. He sat out his third straight game because of a
sprained left wrist and could be out of action until until
mid-September. INF Mark Reynolds and Jason Rogers were available to
play in the outfield if necessary.
Cubs:
Results of X-rays and an MRI revealed SS Starlin Castro suffered a
high ankle sprain on a slide into home during a 7-1 win against the
Brewers on Tuesday night. General manager Jed Hoyer said Castro hoped
to beat the 4-week prognosis to return but his season was likely
over. ... 1B Anthony Rizzo remains out indefinitely with a strained
lower back. ... 3b Mike Olt began a two-game rehab assignment with
Class-A Kane County on Wednesday night. ... OF Ryan Sweeney (strained
left hamstring) was transferred to the 60-day disabled list, which
effectively ended his season. The contract of OF Ryan Kalish was
selected from the Triple-A club.
UP
NEXT
The
Brewers return home to meet St. Louis in a crucial four-game series.
RHP Wily Peralta (15-9, 3.82) and Cardinals RHP Michael Wacha (5-5,
2.79) are the scheduled starters Thursday night. After an open date,
the Cubs will send LHP Tsuyoshi Wada (4-2, 2.79) to the mound against
Pittsburgh RHP Vance Worley (6-4, 3.01) in the first game of a
three-game set on Friday afternoon.
…........
So,
the Cubs suck. They are in last place in the NL Central, are 12 games
under .500, and traded away their ace back in July. But! I am here to
tell you that over these last few weeks of the season, you should
consider watching a few Cubs games, because you might see some cool
shit.
For
example, take a look a this play from last night's game between the
Cubs and Brewers:
That's
Jorge Soler, the Cubs' 22-year-old Cuban prospect who was regarded as
a better prospect than Yasiel Puig not too long ago, doing some
Yasiel Puig shit. I know it's reductive to compare the two players
simply because they are both young and Cuban, but it's hard to think
of another player who could muscle a 94-mph fastball that was headed
toward his back elbow into an open patch of grass, and then stretch
his hit into a double with a ballsy bit of base running.
Soler
was called up a week ago and has played in just seven games, but in
those seven games he's 12-for-26 with three homers and five doubles.
This is what he did in his first career at-bat:
Two
days later, he did this:
Yeah,
yeah, it's just a few games and all that, but those are three
impressive, booming home runs, and you should be excited about any
rookie who can do that in his first week on the job.
Speaking
of young players who can hit the guts out of a baseball, Javy Baez,
who is just 21, is also playing for the Cubs every day. We've already
extolled his power few times before, and over the weekend he showed
that he can also play a little defense:
Baez
is a natural shortstop, but was moved to second this year so that he
could fit alongside Starlin Castro with the big club. Castro's going
to be out with an injury for the rest of the year, though, so Baez
will be the team's primary shortstop going forward. That's good news
for people who like to see fancy defensive plays.
The
only bummer about this month is that it could have been even better
if the Cubs had decided to also call up Kris Bryant, who hit
.325/.438/.661 with 34 doubles and 43 homers across Double-A and
Triple-A this year. But whatever, for now Cubs fans (and you!) will
just have to settle for watching a guy who looks like version 2.0 of
the most exciting player in baseball and Gary Sheffield if he'd
actually been able to play shortstop. And with Bryant due to come up
in 2015, bandwagoning Chicagoans may want to buy next year's tickets
early.
[Chris
Berman sits behind an over-sized Mahogany desk in a large, lamp-lit
office, reading glasses perched just below the bridge of his nose,
writing and crossing out words in a Moleskine notebook with a
Meisterstück 149 fountain pen. There is a steaming San Francisco
49ers coffee mug resting on a cork coaster beside his left hand.
Berman wears a frost-colored silk bathrobe and matching slippers. He
coughs several times. A fleece Buffalo Bills throw is draped over an
Eames Lounge in the corner of the room. It is well past midnight.]
[Berman
writes feverishly in a Moleskine notebook.]
[Writes.]
That
one went Soler.
[Scratches
out the previous sentence.]
[Writes.]
Say
Soler-ong to that one!
[Scratches
out the previous sentence.]
[Writes.]
Solerong,
farewell, auf Wiedersehen, goodbye!
[Scratches
out the previous sentence.]
[Writes.]
Back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back
moon shot! Into the Soler System!
[Speaks.]
"You
still got it, baby!"
…...
Soler,
Cubs promise a fun September
Hey,
why wait for next year when Wrigley youth movement is on display
right now?
Updated:
September 2, 2014, 10:31 AM ET
By Jon
Greenberg | ESPNChicago.com
CHICAGO
-- Those kids you've been talking about were at Wrigley Field on
Monday morning, the first day of September, and there was a special
buzz in the air.
Yes,
the plucky Little League finalists from Jackie Robinson West visited
the Friendly Confines to share their U.S. championship experience
with the promising youngsters of the last-place (but getting better!)
Chicago Cubs.
Could
this town be big enough for two contending teams and the White Sox?
Phil
Velasquez/Getty ImagesOutfielder Jorge Soler doubled twice and scored
a run Monday in his Wrigley Field debut.
I get
chills just thinking about it.
In
related news, the Cubs' newest kid in the spotlight, Jorge Soler --
think of him as a bigger Trey Hondras -- made his home debut and, ho
hum, hit a pair of doubles in their 4-2 victory over Milwaukee.
The
22-year-old Cuban outfielder has at least one extra-base hit in each
of his first five games, making him the first National Leaguer to do
that since Enos Slaughter back in 1938.
That
gives him a slugging percentage of "Holy Cow" through his
first five games. His wRC+ (weighted runs created plus) is 391,
which, if I understand this statistic correctly, means he's creating
291 percent more runs than the league average.
I'll
speak for Cubs fans when I say that's not due to a small sample size.
Soler is just that good.
With
Anthony Rizzo sidelined with a pesky back injury, Soler is
unofficially the second-best hitter in Chicago -- and the second-best
Cuban hitter, following White Sox star Jose Abreu.
Coming
up a few weeks after Javier Baez's debut, Soler is now -- excuse the
pun attempt -- the Cubs' newest bright, shining star and one of a few
reasons to watch this team over the season's final 28 days.
No
reasonable person on either end of town expected the Cubs or White
Sox to be playing meaningful games this month, but, yes, there a few
reasons to pay attention to baseball during Bears season.
Now,
I'm not saying you have to watch all the games, but you can follow me
on Twitter. I'll let you know when the beat writers let me know when
Baez and Soler are hitting.
The
Cubs are letting Baez and Soler sow their royal oats this month,
letting them test their promise against a host of contending teams.
No, Kris Bryant isn't coming up this month, and it has nothing to do
with contractual reasons or his agent, Scott Boras.
Nope,
not all. It's totally because he's not ready yet ... even though he
is, as former Cubs skipper Dale Sveum would say, the best player in
the minor leagues, pretty much.
Waiting
is not an issue on the South Side, where the Sox are expected to
bring up this year's first-round draft pick, pitcher Carlos Rodon,
this month.
While
they stumble through a second consecutive lost season, a future
rotation of Chris Sale, Jose Quintana and Rodon is very promising,
and, like the Cubs, the White Sox don't have much salary committed to
2015. Abreu is an absolute bargain, earning less than $9 million this
season and next in a backloaded contract, and outfielder Avisail
Garcia is a cornerstone, not to mention a fast healer.
The
Sox wisely bade farewell to failed veterans Gordon Beckham, Alejandro
De Aza and Adam Dunn in the past two weeks, with none having a spot
on 2015's team.
Dunn,
a first-ballot man's man, was an abject disappointment since signing
as a free agent in the winter of 2010. Dunn admitted as much when he
was traded to the Oakland A's on Sunday. He'll be missed in the
clubhouse, but not by a dwindling, uninterested fan base that needs
to see some forward progress.
[+]
EnlargeJavier Baez
AP
Photo/Charles Rex ArbogastJavier Baez is striking out at a high rate,
but you wouldn't sense any struggles from his demeanor.
Beckham,
a 2008 first-round pick, showed the danger in rushing a player to the
majors. Of course, Sale shows the flip side: Some guys are too good
to stay down on the farm.
Such
as Soler, for instance, who got only 206 plate appearances in Double-
and Triple-A this season, or 387 fewer than Bryant. Which brings us
back to Monday.
I went
to Wrigley on Labor Day to make sure Soler was a real person and not
some 3-D hologram. After all, he looks too good on TV to be true. How
many defensive ends can hit a baseball like that?
So
far, Soler is 10-for-19 with four doubles and three home runs. He's
struck out only four times and plays a capable outfield.
Naturally,
reporters camped out Monday morning at his locker (Jeff Samardzija's
old digs, right next to the showers) waiting to talk to him.
Speaking
through an interpreter, Soler communicated all of what you'd expect:
He's happy to be here, he'll keep working hard. He said he was a
little surprised at how quickly he started but that he believes more
than ever his words to Cubs president Theo Epstein when he came off
the disabled list: It's his time.
"I
stand by it," Soler said. "I accepted the challenge. I
wanted to be the Jorge Soler I'm showing I am right now."
While
reporters talked to Soler, on the other side of the clubhouse door
was Baez, who quietly dressed for the game with no media fuss.
Could
the future star be yesterday's news? Not quite, though he's certainly
been eclipsed until further notice.
Through
28 games, Baez is hitting .181 with seven homers, four doubles and 50
strikeouts. Ugly numbers, but not really alarming.
Baez
is already Internet famous for slow starts, and the Cubs expect him
to be a boom-and-bust-and-boom-again kind of player as he grows into
a more mature hitter. The talent is evident -- and frightening; he
just needs at-bats.
More
On The Cubs
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get enough Cubs information? ESPNChicago.com has all the latest from
the North Side. Blog
It's
hard to tell if Baez is struggling with struggling. He's very
even-keeled, something he has in common with the Cubs' other rookies,
such as pitcher Kyle Hendricks and outfielder Arismendy Alcantara.
I
tried talking to him, one-on-one, and he offered brief, hushed
platitudes, such as, "I'm going to keep doing what I'm doing and
try to get better every day."
So I
changed the mood of my questions, smiled and asked, "Aren't you
excited about what's going on? Soler's up and September's in front of
you. Strikeouts or not, this is what you dream of. The future is
now." Stuff like that.
"I
am, I am," Baez said, showing the hint of a smile. "I just
don't show too much. But I am, and I'm ready for next year."
Waiting
for next year is so last year (and like 104 before that). It's
September of this year, and I'm ready to see how Baez and Soler hit
right now.
After
all, Jackie Robinson West's season is over. We need some fun baseball
to watch.
