Jesse Rogers, ESPN Staff Writer 8y

John Lackey after yet another Cubs loss: 'We need to play better'

ST. LOUIS -- Chicago Cubs manager Joe Maddon refuses to believe his team is playing poorly, even after it dropped another game, this time to the St. Louis Cardinals 4-3 on Monday. His players, however, are starting to express some exacerbation as the great start to their season is turning into a mediocre second month.

"It is frustrating a little bit," second baseman Ben Zobrist said after the game. "It's still so early. We weren't thinking too high of ourselves. We know it's a long season. We just have to get back to the grind again."

For a while on Monday it looked like the Cubs would grind out a win. But their 3-1 lead evaporated when starter John Lackey threw his only bad pitch of the night, a curveball to pinch hitter Matt Adams, who hit a two-run home run to tie the game in the seventh inning.

"When you're playing tight, low-scoring games like that, one pitch can be the difference," Lackey said. "It was tonight, for sure."

It was actually two pitches that did the Cubs in, as Randal Grichuk took Adam Warren deep with two outs in the ninth. Heartbreak has been the norm lately for the Cubs, which brings us back to Maddon's point. Eight losses in 12 games isn't fun, but the Cubs aren't getting blown out, and in his estimation, it has come down to one thing: not getting the timely hit.

"We worked good at-bats, we played really well in the field, we ran the bases well, and we lost the game," Maddon said. "That's what I saw."

Some of that is true, though Dexter Fowler got doubled off third base in the top of the ninth inning on a soft liner by Anthony Rizzo. We can give him the benefit of the doubt, as it was a tough read, so are the Cubs playing as well as their manager insists?

  • On Monday, the Cubs outhit the Cardinals nine to five.

  • The Cardinals struck out 11 times to the Cubs' six.

  • The Cubs earned four walks to just one by St. Louis.

  • The Cubs went 3-for-9 with runners in scoring position -- that's not bad -- while the Cardinals had just one at-bat with a man in scoring position all night, and they weren't successful getting him home.

How did the Cubs lose this game?

"We've slowed down offensively, and we're just having a harder time squaring the ball up," Zobrist said. "That's the way it goes sometimes. We have to work for it."

He's not wrong, but neither is Maddon. The Cubs' past seven losses have gone like this: 1-0, 2-1, 4-2, 5-3, 5-3, 1-0, 4-3. That doesn't scream awful baseball. Of course, the final scores don't matter -- giving back a huge lead in the division does. After Monday, the Cubs lead the Pittsburgh Pirates by just five games, and St. Louis closed to within six.

"We have to worry about ourselves," Lackey said. "They're kind of irrelevant. If we play our game, we'll be OK."

Lackey was asked if he is worried about the slide the Cubs are experiencing.

"We need to play better, 100 percent," he said. "But worry is a strong word. I think we're doing OK."

That's Maddon's ultimate point.

"We did so many things well tonight but lost the game," he said. "I'd say the biggest thing was our inability to get hits with runners in scoring position. If you keep playing like that, the wins will show up. You don't change your course when you're playing that well.

"It's inevitable. Things like this have to happen over the course of the baseball season."

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