I know, I know. You’re expecting me to say “Ben Brown should be a reliever” or something along those lines.

Nope, not gonna say that. Brown threw reasonably well in the Cubs’ 3-1 loss to the Giants, though with a high pitch count of 103. From BCB’s JohnW53 on that:

Brown’s 103 pitches were a career high, surpassing the 100 he threw on April 19 in a four-inning start at home against the Diamondbacks. This was Brown’s 23rd career start.

What bothered me more about Brown’s outing were the two leadoff walks, one in the first, one in the fourth. Both of those walks came around to score, and right there is the difference in the game.

More on the leadoff walks from BCB’s JohnW53:

Two of the Giants’ runs were scored by leadoff batters who walked. Another was stranded. That leaves the season total against the Cubs to 20 of 36 who have scored, which is 55.6 percent. Cubs leadoff batters who walked are 11 of 28, 39.3 percent. The historic average for all teams and seasons is right around 40 percent.

This wasn’t a bad start for Brown. He struck out nine [VIDEO].

It’s just that those walks got him in trouble and each was immediately followed by a hit. In fact, Brown might have given up more runs if not for this really nice throw by Pete Crow-Armstrong to nail LaMonte Wade Jr. at the plate [VIDEO].

That play went to review, but it didn’t take long for the review crew to overturn the “safe” call at the plate.

One thing I do wonder about Brown: What’s up with his home/road splits? He now has an 8.10 ERA in four starts at Wrigley and a 1.59 ERA in three road starts covering 17 innings. Small sample size, to be sure, but is something up there?

Anyway, all of that gave the Giants a 3-0 lead going to the bottom of the fouirth. With two out, Nico Hoerner doubled and PCA dumped this little pop fly to left [VIDEO].

Heliot Ramos misjudged the wind on that one and the ball dropped untouched. If you were watching this on TV, it looks like a gorgeous afternoon, but it was very windy. The game time wind was reported at 16 miles per hour and honestly it seemed stronger than that. Kyle Tucker had a fly to right knocked down by the wind in the first inning that might have been a home run on another day. It was so cold in the shade that by the middle innings the grandstand and upper deck had mostly emptied out.

After PCA’s hit, which went for a double, the Cubs didn’t have another baserunner until Dansby Swanson walked with two out in the eighth. He was stranded.

So the Cubs went to the ninth in the same situation they found themselves in Tuesday night: Down by two runs. And Carson Kelly led off with a single, bringing the tying run to the plate in Justin Turner.

My friends, let me tell you that I think Turner is toast. He hit into a double play, and then Hoerner grounded to third to end the game. Turner went 0-for-4 and is now batting .170/.270/.170 (9-for-54) with no extra-base hits and 15 strikeouts. Maybe it’s time to recall Matt Shaw and let Turner go.

I’m kind of rambling here, I know, but this was a rambling kind of game. The Cubs again got some good relief work from Gavin Hollowell, Drew Pomeranz, Julian Merryweather, Brad Keller and Chris Flexen, who combined for four shutout innings with three hits and three walks allowed.

Hollowell got himself in trouble, loading the bases with nobody out in the sixth, but got out of it with a 5-2-3 double play. Hollowell re-loaded the bases by walking Christian Koss, but Pomeranz came in and struck out Mike Yastrzemski to end the inning [VIDEO].

That’s it, really. The offense was silent with only four hits and nobody past first base after the fourth inning. This sort of thing does happen to teams, even teams who have hit as well as the Cubs so far this year. Hopefully it doesn’t last long.

Here are Craig Counsell’s postgame comments [VIDEO].

Final thought: With Flexen throwing an inning of relief both Tuesday and Wednesday, it seems unlikely he’d take Shōta Imanaga’s rotation slot Saturday. That leaves two likely choices: 1) Skip the turn and punt the decision to next week, or 2) Call up Cade Horton to make the start. As always, we await developments.

In the meantime, the Cubs will have Thursday off before opening that series against the Mets Friday evening in New York. Jameson Taillon will start for the Cubs and Clay Holmes will go for the Mets. Game time Friday is 6:10 p.m. CT and TV coverage will be via Marquee Sports Network.