The Cubs Way

by Tom Verducci

  The hit moved Maddon to replace Lester, who had thrown 55 pitches on two days’ rest. It was time for Chapman, who now was being asked to pitch in multiple innings for the third time in four days—after doing so only four times in the entire regular season.

  At a time like this, the questions about his extended use in Game 6 seemed more pertinent than ever, as did Maddon’s blithe appraisal of Chapman before Game 7:

  “I believe he’s going to be fine tonight. I do.”

  It quickly became apparent that Chapman was not fine. He threw seven pitches to Brandon Guyer, all of them fastballs. Six of them were below his average velocity of 101.3 miles per hour. Guyer ripped the last one, which was clocked at “just” 99.2 miles per hour. He drove the ball into the right-centerfield gap, sending Ramírez home, and bringing the potential tying run, Rajai Davis, to the plate.

  “Guyer worked a good at-bat,” Maddon said. “That was the key to that thing. And he hit an elevated fastball, to his credit, to right-center. That was pretty big.”

  Davis stepped in next. Not much of a power threat, Davis had not hit a home run since August 30. Chapman had faced 158 batters since joining the Cubs and had not allowed a home run. He threw another fastball, one that missed outside. It was clocked at 99.9 miles an hour. Then two more fastballs, both down and in, each one slower than the last: 99.2 and 98.4 miles per hour. Davis fouled off both of them.

  Hoyer and Epstein began to grow nervous about what they were seeing from Chapman. Hoyer was alarmed that Chapman had neither the usual zip nor the location on his fastball.

  “The thing with Chappy was I always felt when he got that ball up and away to a righty he was pretty much untouchable,” Hoyer said. “Those at-bats, if he threw the fastball in the zone early, then once he went up and away I almost felt like it was automatic he got you out.”

  Hoyer’s intuition was exactly correct. In the regular season, Chapman threw 207 up-and-away fastballs to right-handers. Nobody managed a hit off any of those pitches. Against such pitches that ended at-bats, hitters went 0-for-34.

  But it was clear this version of Chapman was nothing like that one. Guyer, a right-handed hitter, smashed his ringing double off what used to be an unhittable Chapman pitch, the up-and-away fastball. Now, against Davis, Chapman could not even get the ball there. Worse, with his fastball leaking down and in to right-handed hitters, and especially losing about three miles an hour off the pitch, Chapman was flirting with his most dangerous zone.

  Among all pitchers with at least 300 career innings, Chapman is the toughest pitcher to hit all time, yielding just a .155 batting average. But he does have his own kryptonite. He becomes extremely hittable when he throws his fastball down and in to right-handed hitters. They batted .500 against that pitch in the regular season, with 6 hits in 12 at-bats. The two fastballs Davis fouled off tempted fate.

  Something else troubled Epstein. He remembered Game 4 of the NLCS, when he noticed the Cleveland scouts scribbling notes as Chapman, in one of his rare games with Ross behind the plate, threw 13 pitches, all of them fastballs. The next time Chapman and Ross worked together, Game 1 of the NLCS, Chapman threw 17 pitches—and all of those pitches were fastballs. This was their third postseason game together, and Chapman so far had thrown 10 pitches—all of them fastballs.

  Chapman’s next pitch was another fastball, this one well off the plate. At 2-and-2, Chapman threw two more fastballs, and Davis fouled off each one.

  The seventh pitch to Davis was yet another fastball, this one matching the least velocity of the inning, 98.4 miles per hour, nearly three full ticks below his average fastball. Worse, it was Chapman’s kryptonite pitch: a down-and-in fastball to a right-handed hitter. It was the 44th pitch Chapman threw to Ross in the postseason. All 44 were fastballs, including 14 in this game.

  Davis, choking up on the bat, took a short, violent swipe at the baseball. The pitch ran right into his barrel. The ball jumped out of the park so fast—it smashed against the lens of a television camera atop the high wall in leftfield—that there was no time to process what had just happened.

  “For an instant I thought, Okay, we’re still up,” said Bryant.

  No. Just like that, the game was tied.

  Owner Tom Ricketts, also seated in the stands, but not with Epstein and Hoyer, stood up in disbelief as the ball left the park. An Indians fan, unaware that the man standing near him owned the Cubs, threw his arms around Ricketts in celebration. Ricketts wrested himself from the hug and, shouting in anger and frustration, had to remove himself from the crowd and into a suite to calm himself.

  Hoyer, as if hearing the screeching tires that preceded a crash, had anticipated trouble.

  “Chappy just couldn’t get [his fastball] to that place up and away,” Hoyer said. “Nothing was above the zone. Even the ones away were middle, height-wise. The ball he hit was down and in. There were four balls in that sequence in that same area. He had seen four balls in roughly that same spot.”

  But a home run? By Davis? Off Chapman? Who saw that coming? It ranked, because of its timing and the likelihood of its protagonists, as one of the most stunning home runs in World Series history. It matched a home run hit by Hal Smith of the Pirates against the Yankees in 1960—also hit four outs from elimination—as the latest home runs in Game 7 history to wipe out a deficit.

  “There was absolutely no place in my psyche where I was thinking home run right there,” Hoyer said. “I was completely stunned. Chapman hadn’t given up a single home run as a Cub. This was a great battle, but I wasn’t thinking it was a battle that would be won by a home run. Maybe a single, a double, or a walk. But there was no place in my mind I was thinking about a homer.

  “I was in total shock. Off the bat I thought it was a double. I think I was in shock because never was I thinking home run. It wasn’t a hitter you expected a homer from.

  “We joked after the game, Theo and I, that for a couple of seconds after that ball went out I let myself go to the darkest possible places. Then I convinced myself the game was only tied.”

  Epstein, too, visited that dark place when Davis’s home run went out.

  “You blow a three-run lead with four outs to go…” Epstein said. “I’m thinking five years of sacrifice and hard work by so many people is about to go by the wayside…”

  After the ball went out, Maddon turned to his bench coach, Dave Martinez.

  “Davey, who do we have coming up?”

  Martinez told him the Cubs had their bottom three hitters due to bat: Ross, Heyward, and Baez.

  “I started thinking about the next inning,” Maddon said. “Who do we have coming up? The other thing was okay, let’s get through this inning, going into the next inning, if Chappy was okay I wanted him to go back out there. Had to. He’s there for a reason. He’s been there for a reason since the beginning of August.”

  Crisp followed the Davis home run with a single—off another fastball. Chapman would start the next hitter, Yan Gomes, with two more fastballs, running the streak to 48 consecutive fastballs with Ross behind the plate. Finally, Chapman broke off a slider for a swinging strike and then another, for another swinging strike. He finally ended the inning with a fastball he threw past Gomes.

  “I hadn’t caught him much,” Ross said. “It was kind of a little uncomfortable for me just because I hadn’t caught him since [NLCS Game 1]. Willy had caught him most every game. It’s one of those things where this guy throws a hundred, so when in doubt I’m just going to throw a fastball.

  “I’ll tell you Guyer was one of the tougher at-bats in their lineup. He threw a really good at-bat on him. He hit that double in the gap. And obviously Rajai. We threw him a shit-ton of fastballs. I was hesitant to throw him a slider and speed up his bat. If he connects with a slider I’m not going to be able to live with myself.

  “With a guy like Chappy, who throws that hard, I’m thinking, If I give up a homer on a slider to tie this game I’ll never be able to forgive myself. And everybody would be asking m
e why I called a slider when this guy throws 105. He threw a fastball down and in, and he was choked up so much…the wind just went out of our sails. When that thing went over it was a bad feeling.”

  Ruminating again about the string of 48 consecutive fastballs, Ross explained, “That’s kind of where my unfamiliarity and my comfort level was. I wasn’t locked in where I wanted to be. I’m not calling a slider. Those guys hit breaking balls good, from the scouting reports—Rajai and Guyer. I could have gone for chase, but…you don’t know.

  “That’s the nightmare of being a catcher—the second-guessing. You don’t want to get beat with a secondary pitch. Those are the things I grew up with: don’t get beat in a big situation with a guy’s second- or third-best pitch. So I’m like, ‘It’s Game 7. The closer’s out here. We need one out. Surely someone is going to pop up a fastball or swing and miss at one.’ I think he was just out of gas, too.”

  Maddon had reached the ninth inning using the only three pitchers he wanted to use, Hendricks, Lester, and Chapman—straight off his script. But a cascade of events turned the story into a horror tale. The trouble began with a missed 2-and-2 call with Hendricks on the mound, which led to a walk, which led to Maddon forcing Lester and Ross into the game in the middle of an inning, which led to two sloppy runs, which led to Chapman, fatigued from his work the night before, making another early appearance, and throwing for a rare time to Ross, which led to a 44th consecutive fastball being slammed over the wall.

  Maddon harbored one major concern as his team trudged off the field: Chapman’s state of mind.

  “He was really distraught when he came off the field,” Maddon said. “That was the only concern I had: over how upset he was.”

  Maddon approached him on the bench.

  “Are you okay? Can you go back out there?”

  “I’m okay. I can do it.”

  Maddon heard enough to be convinced that Chapman would stay in the game to pitch the ninth—not that he was eager to make a change regardless of what Chapman had told him.

  “But I knew it had to be him for the next inning,” Maddon said. “I thought he had the best chance of getting them out. I knew that would be it for him, too.”

  —

  The ninth inning began, and so did a light rain. Ross drew a walk against a tiring Cody Allen. Maddon sent Chris Coghlan to pinch-run for Ross. Montero began to put his gear on to catch Chapman in the bottom of the ninth.

  Coghlan quickly was erased when Heyward reached base on a groundball that forced out Coghlan at second. Francona brought in Shaw to throw his 95-mile-per-hour cutter against Baez. Heyward stole second base and continued to third when Gomes threw wildly trying to catch him. The Cubs had the potential World Series–winning run at third base with one out. Francona removed Crisp, his outfielder with the worst throwing arm. He moved Guyer to Crisp’s spot in leftfield and put Michael Martinez in rightfield.

  The count on Baez went full, 3-and-2, after Baez swung through a cutter. Maddon decided Baez had no chance against Shaw, not against that cutter, not when throughout the series Baez had been nearly an automatic out chasing and flailing at two-strike pitches. So Maddon relayed to third-base coach Gary Jones the sign for a safety squeeze. Jones gave the sign to Baez, who, out of uncertainty, disbelief, or both, called time to talk to Jones.

  “Horrible matchup,” Maddon said about why he asked Baez to bunt with two strikes. “He was striking out over 80 percent of the time when he got to a full count. He’s going to swing. Okay. So I also thought if he’s going to bunt, he might take a ball. Because you don’t have to bunt the pitch if [the safety squeeze] is on. So I thought, He may take it, and he has a much better chance of moving it.

  “The other thing, Jason is the runner at third base. Perfect guy. You don’t do that if Rizzo is up. Everything has to happen. To me, he had a higher chance of doing that than moving the baseball. I thought if he’s bunting he might take. If he’s swinging, he’s not taking. Because he’s proven that he doesn’t.

  “Those are the things you think about before the game begins, and I did. When the opportunity presents itself you have to be ready to enact. The only bad part is he didn’t get the sign and he had to go talk to Jonesy. I should have just taken it off, I don’t know.

  “They weren’t expecting that at all. If he gets that down at all, Jason walks home. That was the best way I thought to score. The other thing with the two-strike bunt most people don’t understand is that most guys—their two-strike batting average is abysmal. It’s beyond abysmal against certain pitchers. It’s nonexistent. I would like for some of our guys to do that with two strikes once in a while. Lester won a game with a two-strike safety squeeze. Lester’s the best bunter on the team.”

  Shaw threw a 95-mile-per-hour cutter down the heart of the plate, the fattest of the six pitches in the sequence. Baez squared late, stabbed awkwardly at the pitch, and fouled it off. Strikeout. Two outs.

  “I still feel really good with Dexter at the plate next,” Hoyer said. “I’m thinking we might take the lead. I’m sitting behind the plate. He hits the ball and off the bat it looks like it’s going up the middle. My wife screamed and grabbed me.”

  Lindor, the Cleveland shortstop, ranged far, scooped up the ball and threw to first base.

  “Dexter gets thrown out by three feet.”

  —

  The game moved to the bottom of the ninth. Chapman, distraught and weary, returned to the mound. Montero was his catcher. Montero practically creaked with rust on his way behind the plate. He had caught only two games in the past 32 days. The Indians’ top of the lineup was due up: Santana, Kipnis, and Lindor. Chapman was poor at holding runners and Montero was poor at throwing. With stolen bases in order, Cleveland seemed one baserunner away from winning the World Series.

  “They had all that momentum and three really good hitters to start the inning,” Hoyer said. “I thought, This is unbelievable. How is Chapman, on total fumes, going to get through these guys?

  “It is the untold story of the World Series.”

  Chapman had thrown 83 pitches in the past three games over four days, plus the approximately 60 pitches he threw warming up to pitch in eight different innings. He fell behind Santana 3-and-1.

  Oh my goodness, Hoyer thought, if he walks him here, all of a sudden this place is going to be so loud.

  Chapman threw his worst fastball of the night: 97.8 miles per hour and in the upper half of the strike zone. Santana took it for a strike. At 3-and-2, Montero called for a slider and set his target low. The pitch hung in the middle of the plate with no bite to it—a worse pitch than the previous one. Santana popped it up into leftfield. One out.

  Kipnis was next in what would be another at-bat that reached a full count. Chapman threw him six consecutive sliders. Montero, going heavy with sliders, was calling a completely different game with Chapman than Ross did the previous inning. What was going on?

  “To be honest,” Montero said, “I hadn’t been out there behind the plate in so long, and catching a guy throwing a hundred is not easy when you haven’t played. I didn’t feel comfortable about catching his fastball.”

  Chapman was unable to throw a hundred. His fatigue showed not just in his diminished velocity on his fastball, but also on the lack of tilt on his slider. He hung three of the six sliders to Kipnis: one on the first pitch that Kipnis took for a strike, one on 1-and-1 that he fouled hard and fairly deep down the rightfield line, and one at 3-and-2 that he fouled straight back, causing him to whirl around in anger, knowing he had missed his chance at a fat pitch.

  “The truth is, I thought Kipnis had ended the game when Chapman hung a slider to Kipnis,” Hoyer said of the 1-and-1 pitch. “He put a really good swing on it and hit it foul. I give Chapman so much credit. He was clearly tired. He was right there in the middle of the plate, and he just kept coming back with another one. Then the 3-2 slider up. Every pitch was 86, 85 upstairs.

  “That at-bat was terrifying. That was an amazing at-bat. Kipnis
was so good the whole series. And the story line is too easy if he beats us: the kid from Chicago who grew up on the same street as Bartman beats the Cubs.”

  With the count full, Montero called for a fastball. He set the target down and away. Chapman threw whatever he had left—it was 99 miles per hour—and missed badly above the strike zone. But Kipnis, after seeing six straight sliders, chased it and missed. Strikeout. Two outs.

  Next: Lindor. Chapman started him with a fastball. It was his 97th pitch over three games in four days. It was another dangerous fastball in his kryptonite zone: down and in. Lindor popped it up to Heyward in rightfield. Three outs.

  Game 7 was one of the most frenetic Game 7s in World Series history. The Cubs and Indians combined to put 34 runners on base. The only Game 7 with more baserunners was played 104 years earlier, in 1912, when the Red Sox and Giants put 38 runners on. Chicago and Cleveland put at least one runner on in 16 of their 20 turns at bat.

  But the most amazing half inning of all might have been one of those four half innings when “nothing happened.” It was the bottom of the ninth. Facing Cleveland’s three best hitters, when one run would have ended the World Series—and one baserunner might easily have led to that run—Chapman threw 14 pitches: 10 sliders and 4 fastballs. At least 6 of the 14 pitches were full-blown mistakes in the strike zone. Somehow, Chapman got away with all of them.

  “People don’t give him enough credit for going out there the next inning [after losing the lead] and getting three outs,” Maddon said. “That’s pretty large. Nobody even talks about that. I know there were a lot of breaking balls. But that’s also the thing…even if his breaking ball is not a good breaking ball, coming off the fastball it’s a good pitch a lot of times.

  “No, listen. That was very fortuitous. Nobody talks enough about that, because that kept Montgomery and C.J. out of the game for the next inning. Most of the time I like Contreras in there with Aroldis. That was a concern when I put Jon in and put David in. Because I knew I wouldn’t have Contreras to catch Aroldis. Not to say that he can’t. I’m just saying Willson and Aroldis had built a nice rapport. That was part of my concern also.