The Cubs have some pretty incredible outfielders and in 2018 they were not afraid to flash some leather. It made it easy for me to find awesome plays to highlight throughout the season and so, for the ninth day of Cubsmas, let’s take a look back at nine incredible plays in the outfield.
April 22: Albert Almora Jr. is a wizard
I probably could have found nine clips that were just Almora making awesome plays in the outfield, but I wanted to highlight some other players as well. So let’s just take a look at one of the days (yes, he did it more than once) that Almora found a way to save the game multiple times.
On April 22 the Cubs center fielder put on a defensive clinic at Coors Field. He made three outstanding catches [VIDEO].
June 8: Happ has three incredible catches of his own
Sometimes I feel like the young guys on this team are playing a game of “anything you can do I can do better.” So on June 8, Ian Happ had a trio of defensive web gems of his own. This was a close game between the Cubs and the Pirates at Wrigley and anyone one of these plays could have changed the outcome of the game.
Check out what happ-ened with Ian Happ in left field on this particular Sunday afternoon at Wrigley Field [VIDEO].
June 20: Almora and Jason Heyward get it done in the field
There were a lot of great plays on June 20. It was a 4-0 win over the Los Angeles Dodgers, including these two outstanding plays in the outfield by Almora and Jason Heyward. In fact, this game wouldn’t have been a shutout win without these plays.
Let’s start with Jason Heyward’s outstanding throw in the third. This ball has sacrifice fly written all over and and Heyward just disagrees. He throws a perfect rope to Willson Contreras to keep the run from scoring [VIDEO]:
Not to be outdone, Almora follows up with this diving grab at the top of the seventh to keep the Dodgers off the bases [VIDEO].
Sept 11: Ben Zobrist has still got it
Ben Zobrist had an outstanding 2018. The Cubs’ 37-year-old utility man was worth 3.6 fWAR playing all over the field, including 61 games in right. He looked great in the outfield and on September 11 he channeled his inner Jason Heyward to make this outstanding catch in foul territory [VIDEO]:
On the ninth day of Cubsmas my true love gave to me, nine incredible outfield plays, eight runners picked off, a seven game winning streak, six Rizzo steals (and so much more), five comeback wins, four postseason appearances in a row, three epic relief appearances, two walkoff grand slams, and a Javy MVP candidate.