Reds 3, Cubs 0: Here’s to next year, starting in Tokyo

The Cubs fielded a spring training split-squad lineup against the Reds on Sunday at Wrigley and held them 0-0 after nine innings.

Then in the 10th inning, after Ethan Roberts picked off the placed runner – something I don’t think I’ve seen in the few years we’ve had the Manfred man – he couldn’t contain the Reds’ offense and They struck out a few hits, combined with a walk, to lead to a 3-0 victory in 10 innings over the Cubs, the 16th time the Cubs have been shut out in 2024. With the loss, the Cubs finish with an identical record to last year, 83-79, and are tied with the Cardinals for second place in the NL Central.

Sigh.

In any case, some good things happened in this game.

Your bingo card for the final game (or any game!) of 2024 didn’t say “Caleb Kilian will throw five shutout innings,” but that’s exactly what he did and actually looked pretty good doing it. He allowed three singles and a pair of walks and struck out four.

Here are these four C’s (VIDEO).

Here is a look back at Kilian’s trip (VIDEO).

I will still say that I think Kilian should be worked into a leverage relief, middle relief, or setup. He can reach speeds of 98 mph, and I think if he hadn’t gotten injured in spring training this year, he probably would have made the Opening Day roster in that role, and the bullpen to start the season would have been better . Kilian finished the year with a reasonable ERA of 4.22 and today lowered his career ERA from 11.28 to 9.22. Baby steps. Maybe next year he’ll show us more of the good things he did in this game.

The Cubs couldn’t do anything against Hunter Greene with just one hit in four innings and three walks. They managed to get a runner to third base twice in the first four innings, but were unable to score.

Hayden Wesneski pitched two good relief innings, and Drew Smyly made what was probably his last appearance as a Cub, allowing a single while recording two outs and walking Keegan Thompson.

Unfortunately, Thompson was injured during his performance (VIDEO).

It looks like he landed awkwardly and may have sprained his ankle. He had to be helped off the field. Hopefully he’ll be back to 100 percent by spring training in 2025.

Nate Pearson came in and ended the inning with a pitch, a nasty slider and also threw a scoreless ninth pitch.

But the Cubs couldn’t score in an inning. They put Nico Hoerner in scoring position in the eighth with a single plus a stolen base, but nothing worked and they fell 1-2-3 in the ninth.

Continue to the extras. Here is the Manfred Man selection from Roberts mentioned above (VIDEO).

But Roberts couldn’t hold the Reds from there, even with the bases empty and one out. He then allowed a single and a walk, and Elly De La Cruz tripled in both runs and then scored on a single by Tyler Stephenson. At 3-0, that was too much for the Cubs, although multiple runs often scored in Manfred Man’s extra innings. First, Jonathan India made this beautiful play on a grounder by Ian Happ (VIDEO).

They got a two-out walk from Seiya Suzuki in the bottom of the 10th and brought Michael Busch to the plate for the game-tying run. Busch had reached the plate all four previous times in this game, but he hit a lazy fly to left and the Cubs’ 2024 season came to an end (VIDEO).

FWIW, before today, the last Cub to walk four times in a game was Jason Heyward on May 23, 2019.

A few more things to pack for this day and this year. After the game, Cubs players came out of the dugout and bullpen and applauded the fans (see above), a nice touch. Sunday’s paid audience was 33,792, for a season total of 2,909,755, the first time the Cubs reached the 2.9 million mark since 2019. The total ranked sixth in the MLB this year and was up 134,606 from last year.

And some historical facts about this game from JohnW53 of BCB:

Because the Reds scored in the 10th inning, the Cubs were denied a team-record fourth straight shutout at home.

Before runs were scored, Cubs pitchers had recorded 39⅔ consecutive scoreless innings at home, surpassing their previous best of 35⅓ set in 1909.

This is only the second time the Cubs have shut out the same opponent for nine or more innings in three consecutive home games. They defeated the Padres 1-0, 4-0 and 10-0 from July 5-7, 1976.

The Cubs were sidelined for the 16th time this season, tied with the Reds for third-most. The Nationals had 18; the White Sox, 19.

A big thank you to John for all the research and facts he gave me and posted here at BCB throughout the year.

ICYMI, this is what many grandstand season ticket holders and regulars do on the last day of the home season:

As much food as you think there is, there’s probably more. It’s an amazing selection of food brought to you by people who truly care about each other. I’m happy to be a part of it.

Now the work begins to improve the Cubs for 2025. Of course, we’ll be covering this as the offseason progresses, and there will be plenty more offseason content here, including game threads for every postseason game and, of course, more detective photos – and if you have any you’d like to investigate, send them along!

The Cubs will open the 2025 season against the Dodgers on Tuesday, March 18, in Tokyo, Japan. It is widely believed that Shohei Ohtani will return to pitching next year and that this will be his first start – most likely against Shōta Imanaga, and that will be a fantastic matchup. I’m planning on traveling to Tokyo to watch the two Cubs/Dodgers games, so I’ll be reporting to you from Japan.

In the meantime, we wish the Cubs a great offseason. Thank you to all BCB readers for being here all year round and for having a great winter too. As is my custom here, I conclude this final review of 2024 with the words of the late Baseball Commissioner A. Bartlett Giamatti from his work “The Green Fields of the Mind”:

It breaks your heart. It should break your heart. The game begins in spring, when everything else begins again, and in summer it blooms, filling the afternoons and evenings, and as soon as the cool rain comes it stops, leaving you to face autumn alone. You rely on it, rely on time to pass, the memory of sunshine and high skies to stay alive, and then, when the days are all twilight, when you need it most, it stops.