Chicago Cubs Lineup (6/12/26): PCA Leads Off, Bregman Bats Second, Assad Starting
One win isn’t enough to coax me back into a detailed game preview, so we’re sticking with the quick and dirty for now. That’s for the best anyway, what with tonight’s game starting so late. The only good thing about a West Coast first pitch is that there’s that much less of a desire to torture yourself by watching any more bad baseball than you have to. And that’s the thing: You don’t have to.
The Cubs’ bats came alive yesterday afternoon at Coors Field, so maybe they’ll maintain a little momentum in this one. That would sure help Javier Assad, who looked great on Sunday as an emergency replacement for the injured Jameson Taillon. The Ass Man figures to stick around with Taillon expected to be out until after the All-Star break, and he’s only given up one run in his last four MLB outings.
Pete Crow-Armstrong has been the Cubs’ best hitter over the last few weeks, and he’s back in the leadoff role. Alex Bregman bats second at third base, Michael Busch is next at first, and Ian Happ is in left. Seiya Suzuki handles right, Nico Hoerner is at second, Moisés Ballesteros is the DH, Carson Kelly does the catching, and Dansby Swanson plays short.
Giants starter Landen Roupp isn’t likely to do the Cubs any favors, as he’s only surrendered four homers in 69.2 innings. One of those homers came in 5.2 innings last Saturday as the righty held this same team to just one run on three hits. The low-slot sinker specialist gets grounders and avoids hard contact with the best of them, and he uses his super-slurvy breaking ball for a fair number of strikeouts.
I hated this matchup last week, and I still hate it tonight, but Roupp has experienced some control issues in his last two starts. He’s pitched to relatively even platoon splits, but that’s an average of wildly different home/road numbers. Roupp pitches much better at home, where he has dominated left-handed hitters to the tune of a .155 average and .224 slug. Righties have fared much better, though they have only drawn one walk against him at home.
This game is the latest in a series of litmus tests for the Cubs, and I’m hoping to see a positive outcome when I check the score in the morning.
