A pitcher making an improbable run for a National League All-Star berth will go up against the San Francisco Giants on Saturday night for the second time in eight days.
That’s right-hander Ben Brown (2-2, 1.74 ERA) of the Chicago Cubs, who held the Giants to one hit over 5 1/3 scoreless innings on June 6 at Wrigley Field. The Cubs won 3-2 in 10 innings.
Now, Brown will face the Giants on Saturday in the second contest of a three-game weekend series in San Francisco. After dropping two of three when they hosted the Giants last week, the Cubs opened the rematch series with a 5-1 victory Friday night behind a three-run homer from Michael Busch and a strong pitching effort from Javier Assad.
Brown tentatively had been scheduled to start the series opener, but Cubs manager Craig Counsell elected to give him an extra day off by inserting Assad into an injury-plagued rotation.
Brown has looked like an All-Star since getting promoted back into the starting rotation on May 8. He has made six starts since then, going 1-1 with a 1.44 ERA while helping the Cubs win four times.
Making the All-Star team with the big-name pitchers in the NL might seem like a bit of a long shot, but Brown will take the mound Saturday with one of the best earned run averages in the majors. Pitchers at the top of that category are Shohei Ohtani of the Los Angeles Dodgers (1.06), the Milwaukee Brewers’ Jacob Misiorowski (1.34) and the Philadelphia Phillies’ Cristopher Sanchez (1.54).
Brown tried to remain level-headed as he fielded questions from reporters about the All-Star Game, which will be played a month from now in Philadelphia.
“I try not to think about it too much,” said Brown, in his third season. “Just to think about the arc over the last two months, to see that? It would be crazy. But I’m just gonna keep my head down and just keep throwing the ball.”
His most recent outing came last Saturday at home against the Giants, when he threw 5 1/3 innings of shutout ball, allowing just one hit, in a 3-2 win. He did not get a decision, leaving him at 0-1 with a 2.61 ERA in two lifetime starts against San Francisco.
In that game, Brown had his first experience facing young Giants slugger Bryce Eldridge, striking him out and getting him to pop up.
Few pitchers have had that level of success against the 21-year-old recently. After a 3-for-4 performance with a homer in Friday’s series opener, Eldridge has gone 8-for-16 on the current homestand with two doubles, three homers and seven RBIs.
Four of those RBIs came on one swing Wednesday at the end of an 11-10 win over the Washington Nationals.
Interestingly, Giants manager Tony Vitello lamented the fact that his team didn’t get an opportunity to ride the emotion of that win, in which San Francisco rallied from a 9-1 deficit in the final two innings, because of an off day Thursday.
“The outcome could very well have been the same,” he told reporters after the Friday game. “But it would have been nice to carry that momentum over to the next day.”
Trevor McDonald (2-3, 4.15) is the Giants’ scheduled starter Saturday. He worked the first five innings of a 2-1, 10-inning win at Chicago on Sunday, allowing one run in his first career meeting with the Cubs.
– Field Level Media
