Cubs Bats Explode on Historic Night for Jon Lester

The Cubs defeated the Diamondbacks by a score of 16–4 on Tuesday night

Wil Perez Jr./ Via Flickr.com

After a day off on Monday the Cubs and Lefty Jon Lester were looking to continue their hot start to the 2nd half. The Cubs would waste no time in getting their offense rolling and Lester would waste no time at working towards 2000 K’s.

Jon Lester entered the night with a chance at a personal historic feat. He entered just 9 K’s shy of 2000 on his career. In the top of the 1st inning he would pick up 2 K’s in a 1–2–3 inning.

The offense would waste no time in giving Lester some run support too. After Ben Zobrist and Kris Bryant singled and a Willson Contreras walk, Albert Almora Jr. singled to plate Zo and KB and jump out to a 2–0 lead.

In the 2nd inning Lester recorded 3 more K’s by striking out Brandon Drury, Jeff Mathis and the opposing Diamondback pitcher Patrick Corbin. In the bottom half of the 2nd inning the Cubs offense would continue.

Cubs Rookie Ian Happ was the first to go yard on the night when he lead off with a solo shot to left-center to give the Cubs a 3–0 lead.

Lester would follow with a single and Ben Zobrist reached on fielding error to put runners on the corners. Kris Bryant drove in the Cubs 4th run with a Sacrifice fly to left field that scored Jon Lester. Anthony Rizzo then got in on the action when he drove one over the Ivy in left-center field for a 2-run shot. The Cubs would fail to score any more in the 2nd, but entered the 3rd with a 6–0 lead.

In the 3rd inning Lester would notch up 2 more K’s, but not before the D-Backs were able to push across 1 run on a Paul Goldschmidt single that drove in J. Pollack making the score 6–1 in the Cubs favor.

Everyone expected the next great thing out of Lester would be him possibly recording 2 more K’s to reach 2000 K’s on his career. However, Lester decided he wanted in on the offensive action. Lester would deliver in the bottom half of the 4th when he launched his 1st career Home Run on an opposite field dinger to left-center to give the Cubs an 8–1 lead.

Lester would then deliver in a place he feels a little more comfortable. After striking out Daniel Descalso earlier in the inning, Lester struck out Jack Reinheimer to end the inning and to reach the 2000 K milestone.

In the 5th inning Jon Lester entered with an already high pitch count to this point of 94 pitches. Lester was hoping to get through the 5th so he could be eligible for the win, but after a hit batter, a single and a run scoring double, Cubs skipper Joe Maddon was forced to make a move to the bull pen. Lester finished the night with 4 IP, 5 H, 3 ER, 3 BB and 9 K’s. Hector Rondon would come on and escape the inning allowing only 1 more run.

After the game Lester discussed his big night.

In the top of the 6th Rondon and Brian Duensing would prevent the Diamondbacks from narrowing the gap and then the bottom of the 6th happened.

A walk by Kyle Schwarber, a single by Ben Zobrist and an error by shortstop Adam Rosales on a grounder from Kris Bryant allowed Schwarber to score and make it a 9–3 lead. Rizzo followed with a single to load the bases for the red hot Willson Contreras. Contreras continued his hot streak with a double to centerfield that scored Zobrist and Bryant.

With the Cubs now leading 11–3 Albert Almora Jr. was able to push another run across on a slow ground out to 1st base making the score 12–3. The Cubs were still not finished just yet, Addison Russell walked which brought up Javy Baez. Baez connected for another Cubs home run on a 3-run blast to left-center to extend the Cubs lead to 15–3 through 6 innings of play.

Just for good measure the Cubs would add on one more run in the 7th inning when Anthony Rizzo sent his 2nd homer of the night and 26th on the year sailing over the center field wall. The Cubs now lead 16–3 after 7 innings.

The Cubs bull pen remained sharp after being named NL bull pen of the week last week. Rondon, Duensing and Mike Montgomery combined for 5IP, 3 H, 1 R, and 2 K’s to close it out. Mike Montgomery recieved the save after 3 innings of 2 hit ball to end the game.

After the game manager Joe Maddon discussed the night by his team.

The Cubs are now off to a 14–3 start to the 2nd half and hope to continue the good pitching and the explosive offense again on Wednesday. The Diamondbacks send righty Zack Godley who was actually drafted by the Cubs and traded to the D-backs in the Miguel Monterro trade in 2015. Godley currently is 4–4 on the season and has a 3.06 ERA.

The Cubs send Jake Arrieta to the bump on Wednesday. Arrieta is coming of a month of July where he went 3–1 with a 2.25 ERA in his 5 July starts. He is also on a 13 game streak of allowing 6 or fewer hits per game.

With a Milwaukee win on Tuesday the Cubs still hold a 2.5 game lead in the Central Division. Wednesday’s game will be another night game at Wrigley with game time scheduled for 8:05 pm ET.

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