Sometime around midnight, as Tuesday night turned into Wednesday morning, Trent Thornton received a phone call instructing him to report to Wrigley Field for work. In leaving Triple-A Iowa, the bespectacled reliever did not know if he would be immediately activated, but he was told to be ready.
At that point, the Chicago Cubs were preparing to make a roster move to refresh their bullpen. Those plans were quickly altered once Matthew Boyd, the club’s Opening Day starter, reported a flare-up in his left knee, again putting Chicago’s coaches, front office and training staff on high alert.
The way Cubs manager Craig Counsell explained it, Boyd had been hanging out at home on Wednesday and felt something while getting up and down to play with his kids. An MRI showed an issue with his meniscus, the latest trouble spot in a seemingly never-ending cycle of injuries.
Every organization in professional sports talks about the next-man-up mentality. And baseball’s relentless 162-game schedule poses its own particular challenges. But the Cubs — a first-place team that has won 10 games in a row and its last 15 games at the Friendly Confines — are actually making it work.
For the first time since 1880, the Cubs have banked two 7-0 homestands in one season, according to research by team historian Ed Hartig. Until this year’s fast start, the last season the Cubs posted two winning streaks of at least 10 games was 1935, when Charlie Grimm managed the club to a National League pennant.
“It just feels like we’re talking about somebody different every night,” Counsell said in the Wrigley Field interview room, where the manager’s last postgame news conference following a home loss was on April 11.
By Wednesday night, Thornton stepped onto the Wrigley Field mound for his first major-league appearance in nine-plus months. He tore his left Achilles tendon while moving to cover first base for the Seattle Mariners last summer, a severe injury that led him to settle for a minor-league contract this past winter.
There would be no easing into this situation: the 10th inning of a 6-6 game against the Cincinnati Reds, with two runners on base and the remaining crowd of 34,143 waiting in anticipation. Thornton needed only six pitches to induce two ground balls — the first a double play — to hold the Reds scoreless, setting up the offense to complete a 7-6 win, the club’s third consecutive walk-off victory.
“I think I kind of blacked out,” Thornton said, laughing.
The next morning, Boyd underwent a surgical procedure on his left knee that will sideline him for approximately six weeks. Other names currently on the injured list also include budding ace Cade Horton, All-Star pitcher Justin Steele, and late-inning relievers Caleb Thielbar and Hunter Harvey, losses that have stretched the limits of the organization’s pitching depth to the extreme.
In the latest setback, Counsell told reporters before Friday’s 7-1 win over the Texas Rangers at Globe Life Field that Harvey will be shut down for the next four weeks. Thursday’s MRI showed a stress reaction in the area of Harvey’s upper triceps, behind his right shoulder, according to Counsell.
These developments have created opportunities for other pitchers such as Ben Brown, who threw four no-hit innings as Friday night’s starter against the Rangers. The openings give Counsell’s coaching staff a chance to evaluate and better understand the club’s strengths and weaknesses.
“162 is a beast,” Cubs second baseman Nico Hoerner said. “We go into spring training, all of us trying to make perfect lineups and rotations and all that. But, unfortunately, it is never that simple. It takes a whole lot more than the starting nine.”
The adversity also has a bonding effect. With 12 comeback wins and six walk-off victories, the Cubs have consistently maintained a sense of calm and focus in the dugout, before thoroughly enjoying the pass-the-Malört celebrations.
The clubhouse culture and game-planning systems foster such confidence. Bouncing back from a disappointing finish to last season, Shota Imanaga is again performing like a Cy Young Award contender. With the bullpen constantly in flux, seven different pitchers have notched at least one save.
The catching group, anchored by Carson Kelly and Miguel Amaya, entered Friday as a top-five unit in the majors in terms of batting average (.279), home runs (10), RBIs (40) and OPS (.819), all while continuing to support the pitching staff.
In gaining buy-in and identifying good matchups, Counsell has kept Moisés Ballesteros (.870 OPS), Matt Shaw (.791 OPS) and Michael Conforto (1.155 OPS) involved, giving the Cubs an edge in late-game situations.
“It’s been unbelievable,” Cubs center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong said. “You got guys that are constantly ready to go make an impact.”
Timing is everything. The Cubs claimed Ryan Rolison off waivers from the Chicago White Sox in January — after the left-handed reliever had also been designated for assignment by the Colorado Rockies in November and the Atlanta Braves in December.
As Colorado’s first pick in the 2018 draft, Rolison never lived up to that potential at Coors Field, primarily due to injuries. The Cubs hoped good health, a change of scenery and some adjustments to his pitch mix could eventually help unlock his talents.
But it would have been a stretch to think that the Cubs would go 7-0 in Rolison’s first seven appearances out of the bullpen. He wound up being the winning pitcher in a comeback victory at Dodger Stadium and in back-to-back walk-off wins this week against the Reds in Wrigleyville.
When Rolison got only one out in Friday’s game, Javier Assad entered from the bullpen and tossed 3 2/3 scoreless innings to earn the win.
These games aren’t played on computer screens, so even a great team needs lots of good surprises to reach its ceiling. Each season creates its own momentum, and right now the Cubs are riding that wave.
“This is the most fun I’ve ever had, maybe in my life,” Rolison said. “It’s unbelievable coming to work every day with these guys. The team is so close, and we’re just out there having fun. It feels like I’m living a dream.”
