{"id":148714,"date":"2025-09-17T01:58:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-17T01:58:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/148714\/"},"modified":"2025-09-17T01:58:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-17T01:58:07","slug":"cubs-chase-cy-young-favorite-paul-skenes-move-to-cusp-of-playoff-berth-with-4-1-win-over-pirates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/148714\/","title":{"rendered":"Cubs chase Cy Young favorite Paul Skenes, move to cusp of playoff berth with 4-1 win over Pirates"},"content":{"rendered":"

PITTSBURGH — – Michael Busch<\/a> greeted Paul Skenes<\/a> with the fourth leadoff home run of his career and the Chicago Cubs<\/a> moved to the brink of their first playoff berth in five years with a 4-1 victory over the Pittsburgh Pirates<\/a> on Tuesday night.<\/p>\n

The Cubs winnowed their magic number to one by chasing Skenes (10-10) during a rare rocky outing for the NL Cy Young Award favorite. Busch led off with his 29th homer of the season, a shot to the final row of seats above the Clemente Wall in right field, and finished with three hits as Chicago won for the sixth time in seven games.<\/p>\n

Nico Hoerner<\/a> added three hits and Carson Kelly<\/a>, Dansby Swanson<\/a> and Mosies Ballesteros had two apiece for the Cubs in support of starter Cade Horton<\/a> (11-4), who bolstered his NL Rookie of the Year credentinals by limiting the Pirates to one run over five innings. The 24-year-old right-hander is 8-1 with a 0.92 ERA since the All-Star break.<\/p>\n

Brad Keller<\/a> worked a perfect ninth for his fourth save.<\/p>\n

Skenes is a near lock to become the first pitcher to win Rookie of the Year and follow it up by capturing a Cy Young the next season since former New York Mets<\/a> star Dwight Gooden in 1984 and 1985. Yet the 23-year-old’s final start at PNC Park this season was a rare misstep at a place where he has dominated.<\/p>\n

The towering right-hander gave up three runs on seven hits with three walks and six strikeouts and was pulled after 3 2\/3 innings, the shortest start of his career outside of a brief two-inning stint at Yankee Stadium last fall in an appearance that was mostly ceremonial at the end of his breakout rookie season.<\/p>\n

The last-place Pirates have dropped 10 of 11.<\/p>\n

Key moment<\/p>\n

Busch’s 385-foot shot on the game’s fourth pitch was a sign of things to come. Pete Crow-Armstrong<\/a> singled home Ian Happ<\/a> later in the first, just the second and third runs Skenes has allowed in the opening inning all season.<\/p>\n

Key stat<\/p>\n

Skenes has 209 strikeouts, one short of Mitch Keller<\/a>‘s single-season record for most by a right-handed pitcher in the franchise’s 137-year history.<\/p>\n

Up next<\/p>\n

The NL Central rivals meet for the final time this season Wednesday when Chicago’s Matthew Boyd<\/a> (13-8, 3.05 ERA) starts against Johan Oviedo<\/a> (2-0, 2.81).<\/p>\n

——<\/p>\n

AP MLB: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/mlb<\/a>br\/]<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2025 ESPN Internet Ventures. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PITTSBURGH — – Michael Busch greeted Paul Skenes with the fourth leadoff home run of his career and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":148715,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[100247,64,63,5158,794,591,5160,85],"class_list":["post-148714","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-100247","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-chicago-cubs","tag-espn","tag-mlb","tag-pittsburgh-pirates","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148714","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=148714"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148714\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/148715"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=148714"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=148714"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=148714"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}