MILWAUKEE — After Game 2 of the 1935 World Series, Chicago Cubs manager Charlie Grimm walked inside the clubhouse and let out what the Tribune reported as a “blood-curdling yell.”
The Cubs had lost 8-3 to the Detroit Tigers, and starter Charlie Root failed to retire a hitter before being removed after putting the team in a 4-0 hole.
“That’s the way to get beat,” Grimm told his players, according to the Tribune report. “Get the hell kicked out of you and have it over with.”
There were no reports of current Cubs manager Craig Counsell letting out any blood-curdling screams Saturday after their 9-3 loss to the Milwaukee Brewers in Game 1 of the National League Division Series.
But no one would’ve blamed Counsell if he had. The Sausage Race, won by the Chorizo, was more competitive than the much-anticipated opener of the two I-94 rivals, which turned into a laugher on a sweltering, 85-degree afternoon at American Family Field.
Staked to a quick lead on Michael Busch’s leadoff home run, Cubs left-hander Matthew Boyd was pulled after retiring only two batters of the eight he faced in a six-run first inning.
“They just stacked ’em up,” Boyd said. “And that’s on me. They had a good approach. I’ll be ready for the next one.”
Michael Soroka was equally ineffective in his one inning of work, allowing three runs on five hits and two walks, and it was all downhill from there. Leading 9-1 and sending 20 men to the plate in the first two innings, Brewers fans even tired of booing Counsell.
It was that kind of day.
“Obviously they’re going to punch, and it’s just counterpunching and don’t stop punching until that final out, and I think we did a good job of that today,” Busch said. “We obviously fell short, but we just continue to fight.”
The Cubs have an off day Sunday to take their minds off the drubbing. Maybe they’ll hit the Harley-Davidson Museum or go on the Miller Brewery tour. Anything to take their mind off Game 1.
But not all is lost. If they win Game 2 on Monday, the Cubs can be satisfied coming away with a road split with Games 3 and 4 at Wrigley Field. They have to win three of four against the Brewers but won three straight against them as recently as Aug. 18-20, with Boyd, Jameson Taillon and Colin Rea starting.
“We’re a hungry group,” Boyd said. “We’re all excited to get back out here and even up the series.”
Counsell wouldn’t name his Game 2 starter, but Shota Imanaga will have his usual rest by then, and Taillon would be pitching on three days’ rest, as Boyd did Saturday.
Counsell said the day off “could change how we think about it and give us some time too” to make a decision. He likely knows his plan, but as we’ve learned this postseason, he probably won’t reveal it until he feels like it. So the guessing game begins again.
Meanwhile, Boyd became the fourth starter in the Cubs’ storied postseason history to last less than one inning, joining Root, Guy Bush and Hank Borowy. With this game out of hand early, there was ample time to enter the Wayback Machine and compare and contrast Boyd’s performance with his historical peers from Cubs staffs of the olden days.
Bush’s outing came in the Cubs’ 13-6 loss to the New York Yankees in Game 4 of the 1932 World Series, in which he hit Babe Ruth with a pitch in his brief performance and saw the “Sultan of Swat” dismissively wave it off to let him know it didn’t hurt. This came one game after Ruth’s “called-shot” home run off Root at Wrigley Field in Game 3.
Bush allowed only one run before leaving with a finger injury that he had concealed for two weeks. According to the Tribune, the Yankees already had booked a 6 p.m. train back to New York and brought their suitcases to the ballpark, confident of sweeping the Cubs and getting out of town.
“The entrance of the Cubs clubhouse after the final play wasn’t the entry of a score of athletes bubbling over with joy,” the Tribune’s Irving Vaighn wrote. “Neither was it a funeral march, as some might expect. The boys knew they had been beaten by a superior foe and that was sufficient consolation.”
In Borowy’s drubbing, the Cubs pitcher gave up singles to the first three Tigers hitters he faced in Game 7 of the 1945 World Series, before Grimm gave him the quick hook after only nine pitches. Boyd got to throw 30, but it wasn’t a win-or-go-home affair.
Borowy left with the Cubs trailing 1-0, but was charged with three runs in the five-run first as the Tigers coasted to a 9-3 win at Wrigley to win their second championship. Borowy was pitching in his third straight game, with a five-inning start in Game 5 and four innings of relief to finish off an 8-7, 12-inning win in Game 6 only two days earlier. Grimm said after the loss that his starter was affected by the short rest and that they’d all get over the brutal Game 7 loss.
“I’m not going to hang myself,” Grimm said with a smile.
There was also an 11-3 loss to the San Francisco Giants in Game 1 of the 1989 National League Championship Series, in which manager Don Zimmer had Greg Maddux intentionally walk a batter to load the bases for slugger Will Clark. With left-hander Paul Assenmacher warming up, Zimmer went out to chat with Maddux before letting him stay in to pitch to the left-handed-hitting Clark, who responded with a grand slam to put the game out of reach.
“I got the right answers to questions, but not the right results,” Zimmer said of his chat.
Decisions on pitchers in the postseason are always prone to second-guessing, especially when you don’t get the right results, whether you’re Grimm, Zimmer or Counsell.
Boyd was pitching on three days’ rest after throwing 58 pitches in the Cubs’ 3-1 win over the San Diego Padres in Game 1 of the wild-card series. Counsell shot down the narrative that the short rest was a factor.
“He pitched. It didn’t go well,” he said. “We’ve got to make decisions. We went with Matt. We’re very comfortable. I was very comfortable putting Matt Boyd on the mound today.”
Boyd served up three doubles on three consecutive pitches in the first to give the Brewers a 2-1 lead, before a walk, a Nico Hoerner error and an RBI single by Blake Perkins to cap an 11-pitch at-bat ended his day.
Boyd said it was his job to pick up Hoerner. Obviously he didn’t do that, and Counsell had seen enough.
“Hats off to Perkins, he battled me there,” Boyd said. “And that ultimately was it for me. You never know what run is going to win or lose a ballgame, so you just keep throwing. It’s unfortunate it was such a big inning, but that was the difference in the game today.”
The Cubs got the hell kicked out of them and now it’s over.
Time for a primal scream and then move on to Game 2.
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