The Cubs didn’t just beat the Reds on Saturday - they kept swinging until the game turned into a full-on home run parade, rolling to a 17-5 win that evened the series and pushed the two-game total to 40 runs.
Chicago got the party started immediately. After Cincinnati went down in order in the top of the first, Pete Crow-Armstrong jumped on the second pitch he saw from Andrew Abbott and sent it into the seats for a 1-0 lead. Seiya Suzuki followed with a single, and Alex Bregman then launched the second homer of the inning to stretch the cushion to three.
The Reds answered in the second. Tyler Stephenson doubled off the wall for a ground-rule double, and Eugenio Suarez cashed it in with a two-run shot.
But that brief comeback feel disappeared fast, because the Cubs went right back at Abbott in the bottom of the inning. Two straight singles opened the frame, a fly ball to right moved both runners up, and then the throw to third was cut off by Elly De La Cruz, who tried to nail the trailing runner at second and instead threw the ball into the outfield, letting a run score.
Crow-Armstrong followed with his second homer of the day, and Chicago had pushed it to 6-2.
Cincinnati kept hanging around in the third. De La Cruz worked a one-out walk, then scored four pitches later when Sal Stewart crushed a 431-foot home run to cut it to 6-4.
Chicago had a run taken off the board in the bottom of the inning when Tyrone Taylor’s double bounced into the ivy and got lost, forcing the baserunner back to third. A walk and an inning-ending strikeout left the score unchanged.
Abbott’s night was done in the fourth after a leadoff single, and Julian Garcia inherited the mess. He opened with back-to-back singles, and the second one brought in Chicago’s seventh run. The Reds did get one back in the fifth on a JJ Bleday sacrifice fly, but the Cubs answered right away when Carson Kelly drilled a three-run homer in the bottom of the inning to make it 10-5.
From there, the game kept slipping further away from Cincinnati. Sam Moll worked a scoreless sixth, but Tony Santillan ran into trouble in the seventh.
After getting the first out, he issued back-to-back walks on just nine pitches, setting the table for Crow-Armstrong, who crushed his third homer of the game - a three-run blast that made it 13-5. Santillan then walked the next batter on four pitches, hit the next one, got a popout, and watched Nico Hoerner drive in another run with a single to make it 14-5.
Chicago wasn’t finished. In the eighth, the Reds turned catcher Jose Trevino into a pitcher and moved Will Banfield behind the plate.
Trevino gave up three more runs as the Cubs kept piling on. Cincinnati managed only a walk from Hector Rodriguez in the ninth after that, and Chicago closed out the 17-5 win.
Crow-Armstrong finished with three home runs, while Stewart and TJ Friedl each had two hits. Elly De La Cruz went 1-for-2 and walked twice.
Sal Stewart also hit a notable milestone, becoming just the 14th rookie to ever hit 30 home runs and drive in 100 runs in the same season.
Jose Trevino’s ERA now sits at 16.50. It’s probably a good thing that he’s a catcher.
Sunday August 30th, 7:20pm ET
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It also fits into a broader player-development picture for Cincinnati, with the club still sorting through the next wave in its Dominican Summer League and keeping an eye on prospects who could be headed stateside soon. For Vu, the assignment is less about a setback than a chance to rediscover the approach and production that pushed him forward in the first place, even if the road back to Double-A now looks a little longer. [Read more 🡒]