Cubs win; Imanaga sharp in debut

Shota Imanaga struck out nine and didn’t walk a batter in his six-inning major-league debut and the host Chicago Cubs shut out the Colorado Rockies 5-0 on Monday.

Christopher Morel had two hits and Cody Bellinger had a two-run single to help Chicago win its home opener.

Colorado was was outhit 9-4 and has lost four of five road games to begin the season.

Imanaga, 30, who signed a four-year deal with Chicago in January after a pitching career in Japan, didn’t allow a hit for the first 52⁄3 innings before Charlie Blackmon and Brendan Rodgers had consecutive two-out singles. Imanaga ended his day by striking out Nolan Jones.

Dakota Hudson was strong in his Colorado debut but was victimized by two errors on one play in the sixth inning. Hudson allowed three runs — all unearned – on four hits and struck out two.

The hitters faced a strong headwind, which helped keep the game scoreless. Blackmon had a deep drive to the wall in center field that might have gone out on a calmer day, and several other drives to the outfield were neutralized by the wind.

The Cubs took advantage of poor fielding to end the scoreless game in the sixth. Ian Happ and Seiya Suzuki led off the inning with singles to put runners on first and second. After Bellinger flew out to center, Morel hit a sharp single to left that rolled under left fielder Jones’ glove to the wall.

Happ and Suzuki scored on the fielding error and Morel went to third, and he then scored on Jones’ throwing error, giving Chicago a 3-0 lead.

Braves 9, White Sox 0: Austin Riley hit a threerun homer for Atlanta during a wet and chilly game in Chicago that was shortened to eight innings because of rain.

Atlanta’s Charlie Morton — at 40 the oldest starter in the majors this season — allowed three hits, walked two and struck out six in 52⁄3 innings in his season debut.

The Braves improved to 3-1 while the White Sox (0-4) remained winless.

Journeyman starter

Chris Flexen, 29, made his White Sox debut. He gave up four runs in 41 ⁄3 innings while giving up six hits and three walks.

LATE SUNDAY

Dodgers 5, Cardinals 4: Max Muncy hit a goahead, two-run home run in the eighth inning and Los Angeles rallied from a four-run deficit over the final four innings.

Teoscar Hernandez also hit a home run in the eighth inning and had two RBI as the Dodgers’ offense came to life late against the Cardinals’ bullpen.

The top three of the Dodgers’ order in Mookie Betts, Shohei Ohtani and Freddie Freeman went just 1-for-11, but the lone hit proved key when Ohtani doubled and scored a run in the sixth inning.

Betts saw his four-game streak with a home run come to an end, missing out on tying the Dodgers’ record of five.