Chicago Cubs vs. Milwaukee Brewers preview, Sunday 9/1, 1:20 CT

Saturday night’s move activating Ben Zobrist: Here

Sunday’s roster moves: Here

Notes:

• Not much to tell from Saturday’s game, except that Anthony Rizzo, who returned from missing five straight games, has now reached base in 11 consecutive games in which he’s appeared. And, Kyle Schwarber is batting .381 (8-for-21) with two doubles and three homers in his last six games.
• The Cubs completed August with a 16-12 record, matching their 16-12 mark in May, the best calendar months of the year. With 27 games remaining, if they win 16 games again in September they’ll finish 89-73. That might (I repeat, might) be enough to win the N.L. Central. Going 17-10 or 18-9 would likely clinch it for sure.
• Cole Hamels posted a “quality start” Saturday, for whatever that flawed stat is worth. More: Cubs pitchers have turned in 63 quality starts this season, fifth-most in the National League behind only the Dodgers, Nationals, Mets and Braves. Cubs pitchers are 36-6 with a 1.58 ERA (74 earned runs in 421 innings) in their 63 quality starts, with the team posting a 46-17 record in those outings.

Here are today’s particulars.

Cubs lineup:

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

Tyler Chatwood, RHP vs. Gio Gonzalez, LHP

Joe Camporeale-USA TODAY Sports

Jasen Vinlove-USA TODAY Sports

The news in the Cubs lineup tweet isn't good regarding Yu Darvish. Hopefully he'll indeed be able to make his next start, which should be next weekend in Milwaukee.

Tyler Chatwood has made four starts this year. One (vs. the Diamondbacks) was quite good. The other three were fair to middling.

He has a 1.04 ERA in four relief appearances against the Brewers this year and Milwaukee hitters are batting. .133/.257/.267 (4-for-30) against him this year, so there's that.

Hopefully he can step up today.

Gio Gonzalez didn’t get out of the fifth inning against the Cubs August 3 at Wrigley Field, but allowed only one run.

Since that outing: four starts, 6.75 ERA, 1.821 WHIP, five home runs in 18x innings. He also issued 15 walks in those 18x innings, which is much higher than his usual walk rate. So perhaps the Cubs can take advantage of that this afternoon.

The Brewers came into this series under .500 (42-44) in day games.

Today’s game is on NBC Sports Chicago.

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.