Chicago Cubs vs. San Francisco Giants preview, Thursday 8/22, 1:20 CT

Quick turnaround day game notes:

• Nicholas Castellanos’ eight homers with the Cubs are tied for the second-most by a Cub in his first 20 games with the club (Wednesday was his 19th game). Mandy Brooks (1925) and Donnie Murphy (2013) each had eight homers in their first 20 games with Chicago, while Hank Sauer (1949) holds the franchise mark with nine homers. With today being his 20th game, he could tie or break that mark.
• Anthony Rizzo has gone 6-for-9 with one double, three homers and eight runs scored in his last three games. The HBP he had Wednesday was his 136th as a Cub. One more will tie the franchise record (Frank Chance, 137).
• Victor Caratini’s stolen base (uncontested!) Wednesday was not only his first career SB, it was his first career SB attempt. (He had three in the minor leagues in seven attempts.)
• Kyle Schwarber’s home run Wednesday was his 29th, one short of his career high set last year. His .491 slugging percentage is a career high, as are his 67 RBI and 18 doubles. He currently has 61 runs, six short of his career high in that category

Here are today’s particulars.

Cubs lineup:

The Giants lineup was not available at posting time. Please check the BCB Twitter feed for the Giants lineup.

Kyle Hendricks, RHP vs. Jeff Samardzija, RHP

Jayne Kamin-Oncea-USA TODAY Sports

Rick Scuteri-USA TODAY Sports

As you likely know, Kyle Hendricks has some of the most bizarre splits of any starting pitcher this year. To wit:

Home games: 10 starts, 68⅓ innings, 1.98 ERA, 0.849 WHIP, six HR
Road games: 13 starts, 68 innings, 4.76 ERA, 1.412 WHIP, 11 HR

Day games: Seven starts, 42 innings, 2.79 ERA, 1.048 WHIP, four HR
Night games: 16 starts, 94⅓ innings, 3.63 ERA, 1.166 WHIP, 13 HR

Given that this is a home day game, that should be good news for Kyle.

Yes, yes, I know, it doesn’t necessarily work that way, but... sure seems like Kyle loves pitching in the afternoon at Wrigley Field. Current Giants are hitting .216 (27-for-125) against him with one home run (Brandon Belt).

Hey, Shark ol’ buddy! How have you been? Long time!

Jeff Samardzija is having his best year as a Giant, in the fourth year of a five-year deal he signed with them before the 2016 season. In fact, since July 1 he’s been very, very good: Nine starts, 2.09 ERA, 0.857 WHIP in 56 innings.

The last time he faced the Cubs was May 25, 2017 at Wrigley Field. Kris Bryant and Jason Heyward homered off him that afternoon. KB and J-Hey have been hitting homers lately, so maybe we’ll have more of that.

Nicholas Castellanos might not be happy to see Shark. Castellanos is just 1-for-12 in his career with four strikeouts against him. Perhaps he can start changing that today.

Today’s game is on WGN. It’s also on MLB Network (outside the Cubs and Giants market territories).

Here is the complete MLB.com Mediacenter for today.

MLB.com Gameday

Baseball-reference.com game preview

SB Nation game preview

Please visit our SB Nation Giants site McCovey Chronicles. If you do go there to interact with Giants fans, please be respectful, abide by their individual site rules and serve as a good representation of Cub fans in general and BCB in particular.

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.