{"id":670195,"date":"2026-04-08T12:21:29","date_gmt":"2026-04-08T12:21:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/670195\/"},"modified":"2026-04-08T12:21:29","modified_gmt":"2026-04-08T12:21:29","slug":"cubs-beat-the-rays-9-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/670195\/","title":{"rendered":"Cubs beat the Rays 9-2"},"content":{"rendered":"

By\u00a0\u00a0KRISTIE ACKERT<\/a><\/p>\n

ST. PETERSBURGH, Fla. (AP) \u2014 Alex Bregman broke out of an 0-for13 slump with three hits and Javier Assad worked 5 2\/3 shutout innings to lead the Chicago Cubs to a 9-2 win over the Tampa Bay Rays on Tuesday night.<\/p>\n

The Cubs (5-6) banged out a season-best 16 hits and snapped a two-game skid. The Rays had their three-game winning streak halted in front of an announced crowd of 21,377\u00a0in the second game of their return to Tropicana Field<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Both teams had some rotation chaos.<\/p>\n

The Rays (5-6) were without scheduled starter Drew Rasmussen, whose wife went into labor with the couple\u2019s second child hours before first pitch. Mason Englert (0-1) got the start and allowed four runs on seven hits in 3 2\/3 innings.<\/p>\n

The Cubs announced before the game that\u00a0ace Cade Horton would miss the rest of the season<\/a>\u00a0after an MRI revealed UCL damage in his right elbow.<\/p>\n

Chicago\u2019s Pete Crow-Armstrong had his first home run of the season, a solo shot in the seventh inning, among his three hits.\u00a0Moises Ballesteros\u2019 two-run homer<\/a>\u00a0in the ninth was his first of the season.<\/p>\n

Bregman\u2019s last hit before Tuesday came Friday night. The 32-year-old Bregman, who signed a five-year contract with Chicago last winter, lined a single to left field in the first inning, led off the third with a double and started the fifth with a single.<\/p>\n

Assad (1-0), stepping into the rotation for the injured Matthew Boyd, held the Rays to one hit and two walks into the sixth inning. Assad was recalled on Monday when\u00a0Boyd was placed on the injured list<\/a>\u00a0with a left biceps strain. The Cubs have won six of Assad\u2019s last seven starts dating to Aug. 17, 2025.<\/p>\n

Up next<\/p>\n

Cubs RHP Colin Rea (0-0, 4.26 ERA) will make his first start of the season Wednesday, stepping into Horton\u2019s spot, in the series finale against Tampa Bay\u2019s RHP Joe Boyle (0-0, 3.18 ERA).<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP MLB:\u00a0https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/mlb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By\u00a0\u00a0KRISTIE ACKERT ST. PETERSBURGH, Fla. (AP) \u2014 Alex Bregman broke out of an 0-for13 slump with three hits…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":670196,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2377],"tags":[1769,5,610,4,184,557,297,185,295,2550,68,2551,2549],"class_list":{"0":"post-670195","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tampa-bay-rays","8":"tag-associated-press","9":"tag-baseball","10":"tag-fl","11":"tag-mlb","12":"tag-orlando","13":"tag-professional-baseball","14":"tag-rays","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-tampa","17":"tag-tampa-bay","18":"tag-tampa-bay-rays","19":"tag-tampabay","20":"tag-tampabayrays"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116369063193966334","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/670195","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=670195"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/670195\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/670196"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=670195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=670195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=670195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}