Cubs Run Themselves Into a Triple Play on a Wild Cactus League Afternoon

Spring training is supposed to be relaxed. A place for players to find their rhythm, coaches to evaluate, and fans to soak in sunshine while baseball slowly wakes up from hibernation. But when the Chicago Cubs take the field against the San Francisco Giants, normal rules rarely apply. Sunday afternoon in Scottsdale was no exception, delivering one of the strangest sequences of baseball chaos the Cactus League has seen in years — a triple play that unfolded like a comedy of hesitation, confusion, and tangled basepaths.

It started with a fire alarm — literally.
As Matt Shaw stepped in to lead off the game, emergency sirens blared across Scottsdale Stadium and an automated voice instructed fans to head toward the nearest exits. Some in the crowd of 9,408 complied, slowly filtering toward the concourses. Others froze, trying to determine whether the situation was legitimate or a spring-training false start.

Cubs starter Colin Rea summed up the collective uncertainty.
“Everyone was looking around like, ‘What’s going on?’ I didn’t know if we were supposed to keep playing,” he admitted afterward.

Plate umpire Bruce Dreckman ultimately decided the show would go on, and Shaw walked. Moments later, Alex Bregman — the Cubs’ new marquee infielder — walked as well, putting two on with no outs and resetting the afternoon back into baseball mode. For a few seconds, everything seemed normal.

Then normal vanished.

Seiya Suzuki lofted a soft popup into shallow center, a ball that ordinarily results in either a straightforward single or a force play somewhere on the infield. Instead, it became the spark for total mayhem.

Shaw rounded third, hesitated, and retreated as second baseman Luis Arraez fired home. First baseman Rafael Devers cut off the throw and spotted Suzuki, who — in the confusion — tried to stretch the play into a hustle attempt at second. Devers threw behind him and Willy Adames applied the tag for out number one.

But that was only the beginning.

Bregman, caught between instinct and hesitation, had drifted from first to third and then halfway back again. As Adames turned from second base, he found not one but two Cubs standing on third — Shaw, the lead runner, and Bregman, who knew he was likely the trail runner destined for the out. Adames tagged both, and Bregman was ruled out.

Somehow, the play still wasn’t over.

Shaw calmly stepped off the bag, removing his helmet and gloves as if the inning had already ended. Third-base coach Quintin Berry had turned away, assuming the sequence had concluded. Matt Chapman, recognizing the opportunity, simply tagged the unsuspecting Shaw for the final out of what became an improbable 4-3-6-5 triple play — all recorded in about ten bewildering seconds.

Bregman accepted responsibility afterward without trying to deflect.
“I’ve got to do a better job of staying on the base until everything is clear. We’ll learn from it,” he said.

Rea, still trying to wrap his head around the moment, summed up the scene perfectly.
“I was confused by the fire drill, then there were suddenly three outs. I don’t know what happened, but here we go.”

It was, in essence, the purest form of spring training baseball — live mistakes, learning moments, and a clubhouse full of players shaking their heads and laughing at the absurdity of it all.

Triple plays are rare in real MLB action — only 800 have occurred since 1876, according to SABR. They’re even rarer in spring training, where statistics are unofficial and outcomes are barely recorded beyond box scores and beat-writer notes. But for the fans who stayed in their seats after the fire alarm, Sunday’s oddity will live on as a personal souvenir.

The Cubs didn’t post the clip to their team accounts — the marketing department historically avoids spotlighting spring-training mishaps — but the Giants were more than happy to share the moment on social media. That, too, is quintessentially Cubs: the chaos becomes viral, even if the organization prefers to look the other way.

Despite the bizarre beginning, the Cubs eventually settled into a normal game rhythm. They rallied in the ninth inning before a double play ended the contest, sealing a 4-2 loss. Wins and losses mean nothing in February, but moments like these — a mixture of comedy, teaching opportunity, and baseball randomness — are the heartbeat of the Cactus League.

Back in the clubhouse, the team watched the U.S. men’s hockey team defeat Canada for gold in Milan. The energy carried over, with players cheering and reliving their own memories of Olympic moments. Manager Craig Counsell recalled sledding as a kid in Wisconsin when he heard about the 1980 Miracle on Ice.

Bregman, who will represent Team USA in the upcoming World Baseball Classic alongside Pete Crow-Armstrong and Matthew Boyd, said the atmosphere is something he hopes to carry into WBC play.
“Let’s go win,” he said. “USA, baby.”

Sunday’s triple play won’t count for anything statistically.
It will disappear from official records as quickly as it materialized on the field.
But for everyone who witnessed it — players, coaches, media, fans — it was an unforgettable reminder of why baseball’s spring rhythms are unlike anything else in sports.

Strange things happen under the Arizona sun.
And on this particular afternoon, the Cubs proved that even a routine popup can evolve into the kind of spectacle people talk about long after the score fades away.