Chicago Cubs vs. San Diego Padres preview, Sunday 7/21, 1:20 CT

Sunday notes:

• The Cubs have won seven of eight since the All-Star break. The only other year in Cubs history where that happened was 2007. (H/T: Ed Hartig)
• The announced crowd of 40,314 Saturday put the Cubs over the two million mark for the season (2,001,816). That’s an average of 37,770 per date, a pace for 3,059,379. That would be about 122,000 fewer than 2018. However, the average for the eight games on the homestand is 39,268, and with an upcoming Wrigley weekend against the Brewers next month, the overall average should increase.
• Javier Baez has hit safely in 20 of his last 22 games and over that span: .326/.333/.598 (30-for-92) with seven doubles, six home runs, 19 RBI and 17 runs scored.
• Anthony Rizzo has an 11-game hitting streak in which he’s hitting .487/.563/.769 (19-for-39) with six doubles, a triple, a home run, 11 RBI and 10 runs scored.
• Robel Garcia has begun his MLB career by going 9-for-27 (.333). Of those nine hits, two are doubles, two are triples, and three are home runs... he has just two singles. That’s a slugging percentage of .889.

Here are today’s particulars.

Cubs lineup:

Padres lineup:

Kyle Hendricks, RHP vs. Adrian Morejon, LHP

Jayne Kamin-Oncea-USA TODAY Sports

Andy Hayt/San Diego Padres/Getty Images

Kyle Hendricks has allowed two runs in each of the three starts he’s made since returning from the injured list.

The good news is that he’s increased his inning count in each one, from three to four to six, and ramped up to 94 pitches in his last outing, last Monday against the Reds.

In two starts last year vs. the Padres he had kind of weird numbers: 5.06 ERA, but a WHIP under one and no walks in 10⅔ innings. The Cubs won both games.

Hopefully Kyle is back to the form that had him posting solid outings almost every time out before he had the minor shoulder issue.

Adrian Morejon, who is just 20 years old, was signed out of Cuba by the Padres in 2016 and given an $11 million signing bonus. He is being called up to make his major-league debut today.

Here are his minor-league numbers, which look middling to me. He’s made just 16 starts above A ball, all of them this year at Double-A. He’s posted a 4.25 ERA and 1.222 WHIP in those starts — and only thrown 36 total innings. Looks like he’s been used quite a bit as an “opener,” based on these game logs.

He’s obviously never faced the Cubs or anyone on the Cubs’ active roster, and looking at those game logs — he hasn’t thrown more than 41 pitches in any outing since April — he’s likely to only go a couple of innings before giving way to another Padres hurler (possibly righthander Cal Quantrill, who was originally listed as the starter for this game). Should be interesting, if nothing else. Here’s his Fangraphs page — looks like he’s a groundball guy.

Today’s game is on WGN.

Here is the complete MLB.com Mediacenter for today.

MLB.com Gameday

Baseball-reference.com game preview

SB Nation game preview

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The 2019 Game Thread procedure will be the same as the one used in previous years. Here’s how it works.

You’ll find the game preview posted separately on the front page, two hours before game time (90 minutes for some early day games following night games).

At the same time, a StoryStream containing the preview will also post on the front page. The First Pitch Thread and all the overflow threads will be published in that stream, as well as the recap. The recap will also live on the front page as a separate post, and at the time I write the recap I will rename the stream “Cubs vs. (Team) (Day of Week) Game Threads” so you can go back and find every thread related to that particular game.

You will also be able to find the preview, First Pitch Thread, all the overflow threads and recap in the box marked “Chicago Cubs Game Threads” at the bottom of the front page (you can also find them in this section link). They will also appear in the game’s StoryStream as noted above.

The First Pitch thread will post at five minutes before game time, then an overflow thread at one hour, two hours and 2:45 after the scheduled game time.

Discuss amongst yourselves.