He had just thrown the first no-hitter of the season Thursday night in a 16-0 rout of the Reds in Cincinnati. The Cubs are 13-4 to start a season for the third time in franchise history and first since 1970.
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As Cubs pitcher Jake Arrieta launched nearly unhittable pitches toward the next Cincinnati Reds batter, a man sat in the Cubs dugout who understood exactly what it took to hurl a no-hitter.
Five pitches later, Schebler launched his first homer as a member of the Reds. Straily, who pitched for the Cubs briefly in 2014, gave up two runs in 2 1/3 innings of relief against his former team April 13.
Nolan Arenado and Ryan Raburn homered for the Rockies. But Cincinnati scored two runs in each of the next two innings – including two-run homer by Joey Votto in the seventh – to make it 13-5. The Cubs have outscored them 24-1 so far in this series and 46-7 in the first five meetings this year. He threw seven innings at St. Louis for a 5-0 win on Monday. “We all love to see home runs when we’re hitting them”, Reds manager Bryan Price said.
Cincinnati has won 44% (4-5) of its games when leading after seven innings. No teams do that.Samardzija (2-1), who signed a $90 million, five-year contract, left to a standing ovation when he walked off in the eighth. Lester allowed a run on five hits with one walk and four strikeouts.
It was the first time the Reds hit three homers in an inning since May 21, 2012. Jean Segura had three hits and an RBI and Brandon Drury and starting pitcher Patrick Corbin had two hits and an RBI for Arizona. I’ll take my chances given the value of the line. He had given up some hits but had an easy fifth inning before things quickly changed over the course of the first seven pitches in the sixth. He flied out in the sixth. They had a couple of two-strike hits.
YANKEES 6, RAYS 3: Jacoby Ellsbury stole home, a daring dash that seemed to startle most everyone at Yankee Stadium and helped NY rush past Tampa Bay.
Justin Bour added two hits for the Marlins, who were outhit 14-8.
Moustakas hit a two-run homer in the first inning and a run-producing double in the second. Ben Zobrist and David Ross added solo shots, and Anthony Rizzo had a three-run homer. What do Arrieta and his teammates think of his recent performance, and his no-hitter in particular?Check this out: Because Arrieta walked four Reds and struck out “only” six, his game score – a measure of a pitcher’s effectiveness in any given start – ranks only third among his starts of just his last three months of regular-season pitching. Khris Davis replied with an RBI single in the ninth. John Lackey couldn’t hold a 3-2 lead in the sixth inning on Saturday night.
Myers was 3-for-3, including his fourth homer of the season. He also stymied the Dodgers 2-0 on August 30, a highlight of his Cy Young season. DeSclafani is scheduled to pitch on Thursday for Single-A Dayton.
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Not content with just tying the game for the Yankees against the Rays, Gardner went and won it when he struck a walk-off homer at the bottom of the ninth. Machado then hit a fly ball that dropped between two fielders, scoring Rickard.
