CHICAGO — Two innings and just 31 pitches into his first start with the Cubs, a game the team would eventually lose 3-2 to the Cincinnati Reds, Michael Soroka was pulled in favor of Ben Brown. Was this the plan all along? Was manager Craig Counsell really leaning into his “out-getter” mantra and using Soroka for just eight batters?

It wasn’t managerial ingenuity.

Instead, a rotation that’s suffered three injuries to its Opening Day staff and a fourth in Javier Assad, who has yet to make a big-league pitch this season, has suffered another blow. Not long after he exited the game, the team announced that Soroka had right shoulder discomfort.

“He said he let a pitch go in the second inning and it just didn’t feel good,” Counsell said. “Came in the dugout and said the shoulder was not feeling good. It’s an IL (stint) and we’ll see what the next steps are.”

Soroka was acquired from the Washington Nationals on July 30 for a pair of prospects. For the trade to go through, he had to get cleared medically. But there were signs that perhaps something was off. Through July 11, Soroka was averaging 94.1 mph with his four-seam fastball. In his three starts after the All-Star break, he averaged 91.3 mph on the four-seamer. That’s a pretty dramatic drop in velocity and did ring some alarm bells.

That led to Soroka getting an MRI before his final start with the Nationals on July 29 against the Houston Astros.

“That’s kind of what we did for my peace of mind before my outing against the Astros,” Soroka said. “We looked at some avenues mechanically, some other things as to where the velocity went. We decided to check that other box off and there was nothing that presented to be an issue at the time there.

“I didn’t have any discomfort, I didn’t have any pain. There was no reason to believe there was anything wrong. We cleared that. Unfortunately, that changed a little bit in the second inning today.”



Soroka said he “went to go put a little extra on a fastball and it grabbed me a little bit.” When he continued to feel the pain the rest of that inning, he knew something was wrong and decided to say something once he got back in the dugout.

The 28-year-old has a long injury history, with multiple Achilles tears that waylaid his career after a breakout 2019 season. He’s dealt with shoulder issues multiple times as well, most recently in July 2024. That issue kept him sidelined for over two months.

“There’s difficulties in this game,” Soroka said. “I’m no stranger to them. Unfortunately, this is another one. I’m going to be working with the staff day and night to get back out there.”

The hope has to be that this is a short stint on the IL. But even upon his acquisition, there were calls from many that team president Jed Hoyer and his front office needed to do more to supplement a team that entered the deadline with the second-best record in baseball. Soroka was looked at as a solid depth addition to the rotation.

The assumption by many was that Hoyer would spend the next 24 hours before the trade deadline adding one more starter, perhaps one with more of a track record of success and less concerning injury history.

But that never happened. Hoyer pointed to the lack of starters who were moved and the exorbitant prices being asked by sellers. He may not be wrong. But his team still looks a starter short.

The good news for the group is that Assad and Jameson Taillon are both working their way back. Assad will make another rehab start on Tuesday and his next steps will be determined after that. Taillon will pitch again on Friday with Triple-A Iowa, his second start with them since his calf injury. Brown also looked strong in his four innings of work Monday night, giving up just one run while striking out five.

In actuality, Chicago’s pitching doesn’t seem to be its biggest concern at the moment. It certainly wasn’t on Monday, with Brown’s lone run given up coming on an Elly De La Cruz double that Ian Happ wasn’t able to field cleanly and Ryan Brasier giving up the third Cincinnati run on a series of soft-contact singles.



“Everybody pitched very well,” Counsell said. “Ben Brown did a heckuva job. He had bad luck on the run he gave up. He gave us a chance to win. The bullpen pitched well. We just didn’t hit. Simple as that. We had three hits. Not going to win many games with three hits.”

While the offense as a whole has been incredible this season, they’re in a stagnant stretch, struggling to stack up runs like they had been capable of for much of the season. Monday marked their fourth-straight low-scoring game, with their only runs coming on Dansby Swanson’s two-run homer.

Swanson seemed to have tied the game up with a two-out infield single in the seventh. But replays showed that as he stretched for first, his toe came up just short. He dragged the foot, but it touched the bag just after the ball was caught by the first baseman.

“I don’t know if I’ve ever done that in my baseball life, to be honest,” Swanson said. “Just pretty unfortunate timing on the night.”

Timing has not been on the Cubs’ side of late. They have been unable to pull away in close games, leading to Counsell leaning on his high-leverage relievers. A group that’s been stout for much of the season has suddenly coughed up some leads. But an offense that needs to tack on to keep the group fresh has struggled to keep up its end of the bargain.

In his last 15 games, Seiya Suzuki has one extra-base hit and no home runs. Kyle Tucker has just one home run and five extra-base hits since June 29. Pete Crow-Armstrong is in a mini-slump with eight strikeouts in his last 10 plate appearances. Michael Busch has a .516 OPS since July 10. Since a five-homer barrage on the Saturday following the All-Star break, the team as a whole has not shown the power it displayed for much of the season.

Others can step up, but the Cubs need that group to slug so the offense can be the behemoth they know it can be.

“I like the lineup we throw out there every day,” Counsell said. “I’m very optimistic that we’re going to score runs. Absolutely. The other team’s trying to prevent it. Sometimes they do a pretty good job of it. They did a good job of it tonight. We’ll score runs.”

The bats will have to turn soon because the Milwaukee Brewers don’t seem to be slowing down. A 6 1/2 game division lead for the Cubs has become a three-game deficit in just a month-and-a-half. There’s still plenty of time left for the Cubs to make sure this is just a blip. But the stars have to start looking like the best players on the field and take a little pressure off everyone else. Otherwise, Milwaukee may be celebrating its third straight division title.

(Photo: David Banks / Imagn Images)