The Chicago Cubs didn’t just beat the San Diego Padres at Wrigley Field. They turned the game into a home run parade and tied a franchise record in the process, blasting eight homers in a 23-3 rout that completed a sweep.
Dansby Swanson was the headline act, launching three home runs and finishing with a grand slam in the eighth inning after the Padres had already thrown in the towel and turned to a position player on the mound. Swanson has been on a ridiculous tear, with nine home runs in his last 13 games. That stretch includes three multi-homer games and two straight against San Diego, a team that was outscored 35-12 during the series at Wrigley Field.
The barrage started right away. Seiya Suzuki opened the Cubs’ day with a three-run homer in the first inning off Walker Buehler, and it marked the 100th home run of Suzuki’s Cubs career. That made him the fourth Japanese-born player to reach 100 home runs in MLB history.
Swanson kept hammering Buehler, too. He followed with a solo shot in the second and then sent another one 434 feet to center field in the third.
The turnaround has been stunning after he went 43 games without a homer and even got a brief mental reset in early June. Now he’s on pace to clear 30 home runs, and he still leads the Cubs with 57 RBI, which ranks 10th among all hitters in baseball.
Michael Conforto got in on the fun as well, hitting two home runs of his own. Those blasts came around Pete Crow-Armstrong’s 19th homer of the season, which came off left-handed reliever Kyle Hart. That wasn’t a cheap shot in a runaway either - Hart hadn’t allowed a home run all year before the Cubs tagged him.
By the time the eighth inning rolled around, the Padres were using catcher Rodolfo Durán on the mound. Swanson made them pay with the grand slam, and Michael Busch followed by tying a Cubs team record with the eighth home run of the game against the position player.
It’s been a wild ride with the 2026 Cubs. They spent one month with the best offense in baseball, then stumbled into the worst stretch right after.
Now the bats are scorching again at Wrigley, the ball is flying, and the Cubs suddenly look dangerous in the National League. The pitching staff is still hanging on, but the bullpen has shown some encouraging signs, and this kind of surge should give the front office even more reason to go after help for the starting rotation before the trade deadline.
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