Cade Horton allowed two hits over five shutout innings to help the Chicago Cubs to an efficient 1-0 win against the visiting Baltimore Orioles in the opener of their three-game series on Friday afternoon.
The game time of 1 hour, 49 minutes tied the fastest in the major leagues this season.
Horton (5-3) struck out three and walked three while extending his shutout streak to 17 2/3 innings over his past three starts.
Orioles left-hander Trevor Rogers (4-2) took the loss despite delivering his best start of the season, allowing one run and four hits in eight innings. He struck out a season-high eight and didn’t walk a batter while throwing just 88 pitches.
Rogers was coming off a solid month of July when he went 3-1 in four starts with a 1.03 ERA, most recently throwing seven shutout innings in an 18-0 win against the Rockies last Saturday.
Rogers had a clean first inning before Carson Kelly singled to lead off the Cubs’ second and Pete Crow-Armstrong followed with a double to center. Rogers struck out Dansby Swanson and Ian Happ gave Chicago a 1-0 lead with a sacrifice fly to right.
Rogers settled in and retired the next 12 in a row before Matt Shaw doubled to lead off the sixth. He bounced back and retired the next three batters, two by strikeout.
Horton walked two of the first three batters he faced before settling in and retiring 11 of the next 12.
He walked the leadoff batter again in the fifth, but got Dylan Carlson to ground into a double play.
Caleb Thielbar took over for Horton and pitched a 1-2-3 sixth, Andrew Kittredge did the same in the seventh, Brad Keller pitched around a one-out walk in the eighth, and Daniel Palencia stranded the tying run on second in the ninth for his 15th save.
Baltimore traded several players leading up to Thursday’s trade deadline, including center fielder Cedric Mullins, designated hitter Ryan O’Hearn, outfielder Ramon Laureano, infielder Ramon Urias and veteran right-hander Charlie Morton.
–Field Level Media
