Chicago Cubs vs. Cincinnati Reds preview, Thursday 9/8, 1:20 CT

Thursday notes...

• ATTENDANCE WATCH: The Cubs have sold 2,219,095 tickets through Wednesday’s game. They must average 29,300 for the remaining 13 games to finish with 2.6 million tickets sold. The last time a Cubs team sold fewer than 2.6 million tickets in a full-capacity season (2021 excluded) was 1997.
• LOTS OF HITS, BUT NO WINS: The Cubs have lost their last four games when recording at least 12 hits since August 9, and with Wednesday’s loss fell to 38-19 this season when outhitting their opponent.
• HE’S HOT: Yan Gomes, last five games since August 31: 8-for-20 (.400) with a double and only one strikeout.
• SO IS HE: Franmil Reyes, last nine games since August 28: .333/.421/.576 (11-for-33) with two doubles, two home runs, five walks and six runs scored.

Here are today’s particulars.

Cubs lineup:

Reds lineup:

Adrian Sampson, RHP vs. Luis Cessa, RHP

USA TODAY NETWORK

USA TODAY NETWORK

Adrian Sampson seems to have a knack of working himself out of trouble, as he did last Friday in St. Louis, turning a bad first inning into a halfway-decent start.

He last faced the Reds August 13 in Cincinnati and struggled through four innings in that outing, throwing 87 pitches in only four innings. I’d like to see better tonight.

Luis Cessa has been mostly a reliever for the Reds this year, but was put in the rotation August 22 and has made three starts since then. The results have been ... okay, I guess. five runs in 11 total innings. He’s working his way up to a higher pitch count, he threw 69 pitches his last time out.

Against the Cubs this year: four relief appearances, 13.50 ERA, 2.700 WHIP, two home runs in 3⅓ innings (Ian Happ, Willson Contreras). Hoping for more long balls by Cubs hitters this afternoon.

Statcast

Statcast

Today’s game is on YouTube. This article is from May when the Cubs were last on YouTube, but it will explain how to watch today's game. (It’s free and you don’t have to register or sign up for an account.)

Here is the complete MLB.com Mediacenter for today.

MLB.com Gameday

Baseball-reference.com game preview

Please visit our SB Nation Reds site Red Reporter. If you do go there to interact with Reds 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 2022 Game Thread procedure will be like last years, 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.