It ain’t over, but it sure feels like it is
A defending World Series champion getting beaten in the playoffs is one thing. Getting embarrassed is quite another.
The Dodgers made their National League pennant celebration a matter of when, not if, after Tuesday night’s one-sided 6-1 victory over the Cubs in Game 3 of the NL Championship Series that carried the feeling of finality.
A chorus among the Cubs will keep telling us that they were down 2-1 to the Dodgers in the NLCS last year and trailed the Indians 3-1 in the World Series and still rode in a championship parade down Michigan Avenue. But nothing about this NLCS feels like 2016. This felt more like 2015, when the Mets swept the Cubs.
The Cubs have given us no reason to expect a miracle. You know what would qualify as miraculous for the Cubs, at this point? A rally against the Dodgers bullpen.
“I’ve got the little wristband on, ‘We never quit,’ ” Cubs manager Joe Maddon said. “Something we’ve talked about the last three years. Not easy. Obviously. It’s been done before. Theo [Epstein] saw it [with the Red Sox]. So we have to figure out a way. There is nothing inspirational I could possibly say that’s going to make a difference. We’ve just got to go out and play our normal game.”
This was not an elimination game for the Cubs. It only seemed that way. This was one of the quietest sellout crowds never heard at Wrigley Field.
This was all about Yu, as in Darvish. The Dodgers starter confused Cubs hitters through 6 innings, mixing speeds and snapping sharp breaking balls that made their knees buckle. The right-hander gave up six hits, struck out seven and walked only one. On a night when the flags indicated the wind was blowing straight out, Darvish forced the Cubs into manufacturing runs — and that assembly line has been broken since the postseason began. Darvish committed one mistake, in the first inning, and Kyle Schwarber made him pay in memorable fashion.
Schwarber got all of Darvish’s cut fastball and deposited it 408 feet in the left-center bleachers, opposite-field power Maddon loves to see from his left-handed slugger. For a brief second, Schwarber admired his first postseason home run since the 2015 National League Championship Series, and who could blame him? Two batters into the game, the Cubs had a 1-0 lead and hope had returned to Clark and Addison. But the Dodgers promptly showed it the door, the way they typically respond. In all three NLCS losses, the Cubs scored first.
“It’s weird,” Kris Bryant said. “The team that scores first usually wins and we’re 0 for 3.”
Conditions were ideal for October baseball — perhaps too ideal for visitors who play half their games in Southern California. The 67-degree temperature at first pitch and slight breeze made the Dodgers and Darvish feel right at home. All that was missing was the mountainous backdrop. What the Cubs needed was a blustery 48degree night and wind cold enough to make Darvish blow on his hands to keep them warm. What the Cubs could have used was a little Bear weather. But only their bats were cold, again.
The dominant Dodgers pitching “speaks for itself,” Anthony Rizzo said, and added, “They shut us down again.”
In an attempt to stimulate a sleepy offense, Maddon mixed up his batting order and inserted five left-handed hitters against Darvish. Ben Zobrist led off and Schwarber slid up to the second spot, moving Bryant and Rizzo to third and fourth, respectively. Nothing worked.
The most disciplined team the Cubs have faced, the Dodgers were dialed in against Kyle Hendricks, who fooled nobody. The guy who re-established himself as the Cubs ace against the Nationals regressed into fifth-starter form, surrendering four runs and leaving in the sixth after 82 pitches. If Hendricks had a gas gauge on the back of his jersey, it would be on E. In the second, Andre Ethier drilled a 374-foot shot over the right-field wall that was a pin to the balloon of enthusiasm in the ballpark. The crowd only grew quieter after Chris Taylor crushed a sinker 444 feet into center field for a homer in the third.
“I wouldn’t say anybody’s out of gas,” Russell said. “Maybe some things here or there, there’s a little bit of fatigue.”
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts gambled in the sixth by letting Darvish bat with the bases loaded and two outs — and got away with it because of Carl Edwards Jr.’s wildness. Edwards walked Darvish on four pitches, making Roberts’ ridiculous decision not to pinch hit and put the Cubs away look like genius. When Edwards struck out Taylor to retire the side, he heard a city’s pent-up frustration unleashed in a chorus of boos. Of all the things that happened in Game 3, the loud booing of one of the Cubs’ best relievers all season will be one of the few people will remember most as time passes. The rest of it was forgettable.
“I don’t care if they boo me,” Edwards claimed. “They came to see me play.”
If you thought Game 3 tickets were affordable on the secondary market, wait until you start shopping for Game 4. If you can stomach it.