{"id":157141,"date":"2025-09-14T23:00:12","date_gmt":"2025-09-14T23:00:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/157141\/"},"modified":"2025-09-14T23:00:12","modified_gmt":"2025-09-14T23:00:12","slug":"nico-hoerners-3-rbis-lead-cubs-to-4-3-win-over-fading-rays","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/157141\/","title":{"rendered":"Nico Hoerner’s 3 RBIs lead Cubs to 4-3 win over fading Rays"},"content":{"rendered":"

CHICAGO — – Nico Hoerner<\/a> had three RBI, including a go-ahead, two-run double in the seventh inning that sparked the Chicago Cubs<\/a> over the fading Tampa Bay Rays<\/a> 4-3 on Sunday.<\/p>\n

Ian Happ<\/a> homered and Michael Busch<\/a> doubled for the Cubs, who have won four of five and lead for the top NL wild card.<\/p>\n

Tampa Bay has lost seven of nine, dropping to 73-76.<\/p>\n

Junior Caminero<\/a>, the Rays’ 22-year-old emerging star, hit his 44th homer.<\/p>\n

Javier Assad<\/a> (3-1) scattered two hits in 2 1\/3 scoreless innings for Chicago and Andrew Kittredge<\/a> struck out Junior Caminero with a runner on first for his fifth save in six chances..<\/p>\n

Ian Happ cut Chicago’s deficit to 3-2 in the sixth with his 22nd homer.<\/p>\n

Hoerner had a two-out double off Edwin Uceta<\/a> (9-3) for a 4-3 lead in the seventh after Willi Castro<\/a> and Matt Shaw<\/a> singled.<\/p>\n

Yandy D\u00edaz and Caminero hit back-to-back home runs for the Rays starting the game off Shota Imanaga<\/a>, who allowed three runs and seven hits in five innings with nine strikeouts and no walks.<\/p>\n

Christopher Morel<\/a>, who played for the Cubs from 2022 to 2024, exited in the sixth with an abdominal bruise after he was hit by a foul ball.<\/p>\n

Key moment<\/p>\n

Tampa Bay lost a run in the seventh that would have increased its lead to 4-2. With runners at the corners, Jake Mangum<\/a> hit a ground ball to Hoerner at second, who threw to shortstop Dansby Swanson<\/a> for a forceout as Mangum beat the return throw to first and Caminero crossed the plate. A video review determined Lowe violated the slide rule by bumping into Swanson, giving the Cubs an inning-ending double play.<\/p>\n

Key stat<\/p>\n

Hoerner is batting .299, second in the NL to Philadelphia’s Trea Turner<\/a> (.305) among qualified hitters.<\/p>\n

Up next<\/p>\n

Rays: Tampa Bay opens a series Monday at Tampa Bay, which starts RHP Trey Yesavage in his major league debut.<\/p>\n

Cubs: RHP Jameson Taillon<\/a> (9-6, 4.15 ERA) starts Monday at the Pirates and RHP Braxton Ashcraft<\/a> (4-2, 2.47).<\/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":"CHICAGO — – Nico Hoerner had three RBI, including a go-ahead, two-run double in the seventh inning that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":157142,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[95866,479,352,363,99,974],"class_list":["post-157141","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-95866","tag-chicago-cubs","tag-espn","tag-mlb","tag-sports","tag-tampa-bay-rays"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157141","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=157141"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157141\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/157142"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=157141"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=157141"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=157141"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}