The Los Angeles Dodgers’ seven-game road trip reached Chicago on the Memorial Day holiday for the start of a four-game set with the Cubs. Chicago entered the series opener riding a five-game winning streak.
Jason Hammel opened the game with back-to-back strikeouts of Chase Utley and Corey Seager. After Justin Turner reached on a sun single to shallow center field, Adrian Gonzalez drew a walk to extend the inning.
Hammel then got Joc Pederson to foul out to end the inning. Alex Wood was squeezed a bit and issued a leadoff walk to Ben Zobrist in the bottom of the first. Wood stranded the runner by retiring the next three batters faced.
Hammel set the Dodgers down in order in the second inning, picking up his third strikeout of the game in the process. The Cubs loaded the bases with one out in the bottom of the second behind an Addison Russell base hit, Javier Baez bunt single and David Ross base hit.
However, all three were stranded as Wood struck out Hammel and Zobrist. Hammel went down with an injury while warming up for the third — later said to be cramping in his right hamstring. Travis Wood took over and bookended a 1-2-3 inning with strikeouts.
Alex Wood worked around a one-out Kris Bryant single and two-out walk to throw another scoreless inning in the bottom of the third.
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The Dodgers didn’t find any success in the fourth inning, with Turner, Gonzalez and Pederson going down in order. Ross drew a one-out walk in the bottom of the fourth, but was later thrown out on his stolen base attempt to end the inning.
Travis Wood continued to sail through the game, keeping the Dodgers off the bases in the fifth. Zobrist extended his hitting streak to 16 games with a leadoff single in the bottom half of the inning. Zobrist was left standing on third base on Puig’s two-base fielding error.
Alex Wood again was slow to cover first base on a softly hit ball toward Gonzalez, which left the first baseman without a play and allowed Zobrist to score.
Jason Heyward then raced around to score from first base on an Anthony Rizzo double to right field. Travis Wood again set the Dodgers down in order, extending the Cubs’ streak of consecutive batters retired to 16.
Louis Coleman entered in the bottom of the sixth and threw a 1-2-3 inning to keep the Cubs’ lead at 2-0. Pedro Strop struck out Grandal and Puig en route to throwing a 1-2-3 eighth inning. Hector Rondon shut the door in the ninth inning, completing six scoreless innings for the Cubs’ bullpen.
What’s more, the Dodgers’ lone hit was Turner’s blooper in the first inning, with Gonzalez’s walk that inning representing their last baserunner. Cubs pitchers combined to retire 25 consecutive batters to end the game.