{"id":912739,"date":"2026-09-28T11:16:40","date_gmt":"2026-09-28T11:16:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/912739\/"},"modified":"2026-09-28T11:16:40","modified_gmt":"2026-09-28T11:16:40","slug":"alex-bregmans-huge-day-at-the-plate-in-relocated-season-finale-powers-cubs-to-6-2-win-over-red-sox-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/912739\/","title":{"rendered":"Alex Bregman&#8217;s huge day at the plate in relocated season finale powers Cubs to 6-2 win over Red Sox"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Zak Gilbert, The Associated PressSeptember 28, 2026<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Alex Bregman went 4 for 4 with two home runs and four RBIs in his second game back from <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/cubs-alex-bregman-baseball-769a6dce5aad635a2269386ecafc955f\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">a frightening injury,<\/a> and the Chicago Cubs beat the Boston Red Sox 6-2 on Sunday in a regular-season finale that was <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/cubs-red-sox-schedule-change-659a3eb9c27d345359ad3202404e98eb\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">relocated to Tropicana Field.<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Chicago is the No. 5 seed in the National League playoffs and will play a <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/padres-cubs-wild-card-rematch-2b9e223424a43adde3890ee2f14fd709\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">best-of-three Wild Card Series at fourth-seeded San Diego<\/a> beginning Tuesday night.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Boston is the No. 5 seed in the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wbur.org\/news\/2026\/09\/21\/red-sox-clinch-playoff-wild-card\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">American League playoffs<\/a> and will travel to New York to open its Wild Card Series the same night <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/red-sox-yankees-wild-card-series-93a2b68b3b82932a29844663725c094d\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">against the rival Yankees.<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Major League Baseball moved the Cubs-Red Sox season finale to Florida because of a weekend nor\u2019easter that was expected to batter the Boston area into Monday. Ahead of the storm, the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wbur.org\/news\/2026\/09\/24\/red-sox-doubleheader-noreaster-cubs\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Red Sox swept a doubleheader from the Cubs<\/a> on Friday at Fenway Park.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Bregman <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/bregman-facial-fracture-483183b59fa87faf41685808ea8d00e6\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">went 0 for 4 with a strikeout at designated hitter in the opener<\/a> \u2014 five days after sustaining facial fractures when he was struck in the face by a foul ball while standing in the on-deck circle.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">The three-time All-Star third baseman, who played for Boston last year, was the DH again Sunday and fared much better at the plate in his final postseason tuneup. In addition to finishing a triple shy of the cycle, he drew a walk and scored three times.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large article-image\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Cubs_Red_Sox_Baseball_26270710654197.jpg\"   alt=\"Chicago Cubs designated hitter Alex Bregman (3) celebrates with teammate Michael Busch (29) after hitting his second home run of a baseball game in the third inning against the Boston Red Sox, Sunday, Sept. 27, 2026, in St. Petersburg, Fla. (Chris Urso\/AP)\" width=\"1000\" height=\"717\" loading=\"lazy\"\/>Chicago Cubs designated hitter Alex Bregman (3) celebrates with teammate Michael Busch (29) after hitting his second home run of a baseball game in the third inning against the Boston Red Sox, Sunday, Sept. 27, 2026, in St. Petersburg, Fla. (Chris Urso\/AP)<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">With the NL MVP award virtually locked up, Pete Crow-Armstrong singled to open the game before Cubs manager Craig Counsell immediately removed him for pinch-runner Tyrone Taylor. Bregman launched the next pitch from Tanner Houck (0-1) into the left-field seats.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Adley Rutschman hit a solo homer off Chicago starter Shota Imanaga, who was lifted after one inning with postseason seeding already decided.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Braxton Garrett (1-1) pitched five strong innings in relief for his first win since May 29, 2024. Colin Rea earned his second save.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Played at the home of the Tampa Bay Rays, the game drew 20,411 fans who had less than 48 hours\u2019 notice to purchase tickets.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Chicago finished 89-73, three games shy of its 92-70 mark in 2025.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Boston, which was 89-73 in 2025, ended the season 87-75. The Red Sox fired manager Alex Cora following a 10-17 start and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wbur.org\/news\/2026\/09\/22\/boston-red-sox-manager-chad-tracy\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">replaced him with Chad Tracy<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Under Tracy, Boston became the first team to qualify for the postseason after dropping as many as 44 of its initial 75 games.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Zak Gilbert, The Associated PressSeptember 28, 2026 Alex Bregman went 4 for 4 with two home runs and&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":912740,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[49,48,462,82],"class_list":["post-912739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/912739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=912739"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/912739\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/912740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=912739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=912739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=912739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}