Joe Musgrove continued his improbable streak, as the Padres have now won 7 of their last 9, beating the Cubs 6-4.
Musgrove has allowed only 2 or fewer earned runs in each of his 12 starts this season. Musgrove was nails allowing only 5 hits across his 7 innings of work. He struck out 9 and had 16 swings and misses, 7 of which came on his slider. The others came on his mix of curveballs, cutters, changeups, and 4-seamers. Musgrove’s entire arsenal has been elite, every pitch he throws has a negative run value except for his changeup. He only throws his changeup 7.5% of the time. Musgrove has improved his ground ball percentage to a career best 49.3% this year, that is mostly due to the effectiveness of his slider. His slider which he throws 28.3% of the time has a launch angle of only 9 degrees. Luis Garcia pitched the 8th inning, striking out 2 and only allowing an unearned run. The 2021 All-Star, closer Taylor Rogers pitched the 9th allowing a run but still picking up his 20th save of the 2022 season.
The Padres offense had a 46.4 hard hit percentage, they had 5 extra base hits, 2 of them homers. Those came off the bats of leadoff hitter Jurickson Profar and right fielder Nomar Mazara. The other 3 XBH were all doubles, Mazara also had one of those, Austin Nola and Jake Cronenworth had the other 2 doubles.
Matt Swarmer had quite the opposite start that Musgrove had. Swarmer failed to reach 4 innings pitched, going only three and two thirds surrendering 4 hits, 4 earned runs, and 5 walks. His ERA is up to 5.23 on the season. Scott Effross struck out 1 to finish the 4th inning. Brandon Hughes and David Robertson both allowed a run in their appearances. Mychal Givens and Daniel Norris both had scoreless appearances.
The Cubs offense had 3 extra base hits, a double from DH Ian Happ, triple off the bat of Jonathan Villar, and a homer hit by standout rookie Christopher Morel. Morel’s homer was on the 5th pitch he saw, a 93 mph fastball. Morel is hitting .329 against fastballs in his rookie campaign.