Chicago Cubs vs. San Francisco Giants preview, Saturday 6/5, 6:15 CT

Today’s roster moves: Here and here.

Saturday notes...

• JOC POP: Joc Pederson has homered in each of the first two games of this series, as well as the last game he played in San Francisco in 2020. He looks to become just the third visiting player to homer in four straight games at Oracle Park since it opened in 2000. The others: Dan Uggla (2009-10) and Ryan Braun (2010-12).
• WHAT A RELIEF: Dan Winkler has posted a 0.44 ERA (one earned run in 20⅔ innings) in his first 23 relief appearances to start the season. That is the lowest ERA for a Cubs pitcher in his first 23 outings in season since the earned run was created in 1912, surpassing Brian Duensing’s 0.54 ERA in his first 23 outings of 2018. (H/T: Ed Hartig)
• HOME RUN NEWS: Cubs outfielders have combined for 28 home runs this season, tied for fourth-most among any MLB outfield behind the Reds (40), Rangers (32) and Athletics (30).
• CATCHING HELP WANTED: Willson Contreras leads the majors with 49 games, 47 starts and 399 innings at catcher. Christian Vazquez of the Red Sox is second with 375⅓ innings caught.

Here are today’s particulars.

Cubs lineup:

Giants lineup:

Kohl Stewart, RHP vs. Kevin Gausman, RHP

USA TODAY Sports

USA TODAY NETWORK

You all know about Kohl Stewart’s solid first Cubs outing last Monday vs. the Padres, five innings, one unearned run. He threw 64 pitches. Possibly, he could go more than five innings today.

He has never faced the Giants and the only Giant who has ever seen him — Mike Tauchman — is just 0-for-1. Perhaps that will be to his advantage.

He’ll have to be on his best game, because Kevin Gausman has been nearly lights-out in 11 starts this year. Gausman was always a decent starter, but nothing like this, a 1.40 ERA and 0.807 WHIP in 70⅔ innings. He’s allowed one or no runs in 10 of the 11 starts and currently has a 17-inning scoreless streak. One more note about Gausman:

You’ll certainly remember Jake Arrieta’s run in 2015. The Cubs were involved one of the other two streaks mentioned — they were shut out by Bob Gibson June 20, 1968 as part of that 11-start run.

Historically, though, the Cubs have done well against Gausman. He has made four appearances (three starts) against them with a 12.00 ERA, 1.750 WHIP and eight home runs allowed in 12 innings.

Current Cubs are a small-sample-size 12-for-42 (.286) against Gausman with three home runs (Javier Báez, Willson Contreras, Joc Pederson).

So maybe this will be the Cubs’ night.

Today’s game is on Fox-TV (regional — coverage map). A reminder: If you subscribe to MLB.TV or MLB Extra Innings, you can watch this game on those services if it’s not on the Fox-TV affiliate in your market. Fox announcers: Aaron Goldsmith and Mark Sweeney.

Here is the complete MLB.com Mediacenter for today.

MLB.com Gameday

Baseball-reference.com 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 2021 Game Thread procedure will be a bit different than previous years. It will be similar to what we’ve used for Spring Training.

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, titled “Cubs vs. (Team) (Day of week/date) game threads.” It will contain every post related to that particular game, including the First Pitch Thread and the overflow thread, as well as the recap when it’s published. The recap will also live on the front page as a separate post.

You will also be able to find the preview, First Pitch Thread and the overflow thread in the box marked “Chicago Cubs Game Threads” at the bottom of the front page (you can also find them in this section link). The StoryStream for each game can also be found in that section.

The First Pitch thread will post at five minutes before game time, then an overflow thread at 90 minutes after the scheduled game time.

Discuss amongst yourselves.