Tell me you weren’t worried — again — about the Cubs after they got runners on base in the first two innings, yet left them stranded. Of course you were. I was, too.

But the Cubs put a run across in the third, taking the lead while Cade Horton was slamming the door on Reds bats. Eventually the Cubs scored five more in the last three innings of this game and defeated the visitors from Cincinnati 6-1, salvaging the final game of this series. The Cubs still have not been swept in a series of three games or more all year.

Horton breezed through the first three innings and would have had nine up, nine down if not for Matt Shaw dropping a routine pop-up in the first. Fortunately, it wound up not mattering.

In the third, Nico Hoerner led off with a single and went to third on a single by Justin Turner.

Nico scored on a sacrifice fly by Seiya Suzuki [VIDEO].

Horton continued to mow down Reds. He allowed a one-out double in the fourth and a one-out single in the sixth — and that was it, two hits and no walks, with six strikeouts. Here are the six K’s [VIDEO].

More on Horton from BCB’s JohnW53:

Cade Horton’s start was the 14th by a Cub this season of at least 5.2 innings with no runs allowed. It was Horton’s fifth, tying him for most with Matthew Boyd. Ben Brown has two; Shota Imanaga and Justin Steele, one.
…..
Horton threw 67 pitches — 56 strikes, 11 balls. Marquee said that 83.6 strike rate is the highest by any MLB starter this season.
…..
This was Horton’s second start with no walks. The Cubs have had 32. Boyd has seven; Imanaga, six; Brown, five; Colin Rea and Jameson Taillon, four; Drew Pomeranz, two (as opener); Ryan Brasier and Brad Keller, one (as openers).

The Cubs extended their lead in the bottom of the sixth on Suzuki’s 27th home run of the year [VIDEO].

Check out the launch angle on that home run — you can’t hit it much lower and get it out of the yard [VIDEO].

Andrew Kittredge entered to throw the seventh. Again, you were probably not happy about this. And what does he do?

Here are the three K’s on nine pitches for Kittredge [VIDEO].

More on the immaculate inning from BCB’s JohnW53:

There had been 19 immaculate innings since 2021 before Andrew Kittredge did it, raising the count to 117 known since 1876. More have been lost to history.

Five Cubs had done it previously:
Milt Pappas, Sept. 24, 1971, vs. Phillies (4th inning)
Bruce Sutter, Sept. 8, 1977, vs. Expos (9th)
Lynn McGlothen, Aug. 25, 1979, vs. Giants (3rd)
LaTroy Hawkins, Sept. 11, 2004, vs. Marlins (9th)
Hayden Wesneski, Sept. 22, 2022, vs. Pirates (5th)

So that was fun, and you know, any pitcher can have a bad outing. Kittredge has been a useful middle reliever/setup guy this year, including two previous outings for the Cubs. He’ll be fine.

The Cubs extended their lead further in the eighth. Dansby Swanson led off with a home run, his 18th [VIDEO].

Two outs later, Turner doubled and Suzuki walked.

Carson Kelly’s single scored Turner to make it 4-0 [VIDEO].

Brad Keller threw a scoreless eighth, three ground outs on just eight pitches, with the last out a slick play by Swanson [VIDEO].

Then the Cubs bats got to work again in the bottom of the inning. With one out, Ian Happ sent one into the bleachers, his 16th [VIDEO].

One out later, Matt Shaw singled and went to second on a wild pitch. That base advance allowed Shaw to score on this single by Nico [VIDEO].

Daniel Palencia entered to throw the ninth in a non-save situation, largely because he hadn’t pitched since Sunday. The rust showed, a bit, as he allowed a pair of singles and a wild pitch that ruined the possible combled shutout. But one run wasn’t too terrible and Palencia K’d Gavin Lux on a nifty slider to end the game [VIDEO].

So the Cubs end a not-great homestand with a 3-3 record, but it was good to see them score six runs, which was twice as many as they’d scored in the two previous games against the Reds. Three home runs, all line drives, but also eight other hits and 2-for-6 with RISP. The complaint department isn’t totally closed, but … they might be taking a break for a while.

The Brewers play tonight in Atlanta, the game starting at 6:15 CT. Hopefully the Braves can also salvage a game out of that series and the Cubs can pull one game closer in the NL Central race.

Meanwhile, the Cubs will certainly enjoy their off day Thursday and then head to St. Louis to open a series against the Cardinals Friday evening. Matthew Boyd will start the series opener for the Cubs and Michael McGreevy will go for St. Louis. Game time Friday is 7:15 p.m. CT and TV coverage will be via Marquee Sports Network (and MLB Network outside the Cubs and Cardinals market territories).

About what you see in this recap and on this site after the redesign — remember, we are a work in progress. Beyond what you see on the site, I have had to learn a completely new content management system to write these articles. Changes are happening on the fly. I would like to ask for your patience while we all figure stuff out. A note about the ads you might see on the MLB videos I have posted here — this is because, for the time being, I cannot embed the non-ad versions of those videos, so I have to use MLB’s version, which have ads. That’s not on SB Nation, that’s MLB. If you don’t want to see the ads, click on the link above the embeds that has [VIDEO] at the end.

Again, thanks for your patience, and go Cubs!