{"id":693289,"date":"2026-05-08T05:39:20","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T05:39:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/693289\/"},"modified":"2026-05-08T05:39:20","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T05:39:20","slug":"reds-catcher-tyler-stephensons-little-league-mistake-leads-to-7-run-inning-as-cubs-win-their-ninth-straight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/693289\/","title":{"rendered":"Reds catcher Tyler Stephenson’s Little League mistake leads to 7-run inning as Cubs win their ninth straight"},"content":{"rendered":"

When it rains, it pours. The Cincinnati Reds<\/a> entered Thursday\u2019s game against the Chicago Cubs<\/a> riding a six-game losing streak, including back-to-back extra-inning, walk-off losses<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Cincinnati<\/a> catcher Tyler Stephenson<\/a> made a highlight reel blunder that was a perfect encapsulation of the team\u2019s recent struggles.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

Stephenson thought there was a force play at home for an out, but there wasn\u2019t. As a result, he stood by as Ian Happ<\/a> crossed home plate, earning a run for Chicago instead of making a much-needed out for Cincinnati.<\/p>\n

Chicago had the bases loaded with no outs. The Cubs had tallied one run at that point, and shortstop Dansby Swanson<\/a> grounded to third base for a fielder\u2019s choice. Cincinnati\u2019s Ke\u2019Bryan Hayes tagged third for an out and threw home to prevent a run from scoring.<\/p>\n

Stephenson didn\u2019t realize the situation on the base paths had changed and caught the ball while standing on home plate, stepped off and then gave props to Hayes for the good play.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

The catcher failed to realize that Hayes had taken out a force play at home, so Stephenson stood there and didn\u2019t tag Happ, just letting a run score mere inches from him.<\/p>\n

The bottom of the fourth inning started with Cincinnati down 1-0, but then starter Rhett Lowder left the game<\/a> with \u201cright shoulder soreness.\u201d The problems worsened as Stephenson\u2019s mental lapse opened the floodgates. When the dust settled, Chicago went into the fifth up 8-0 and eventually won, 8-3 for the Cubs\u2019 ninth straight victory and 15th straight triumph at Wrigley Field.<\/p>\n

The Cubs secured the four-game sweep of Cincinnati largely on the strength of the seven-run fourth inning.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When it rains, it pours. The Cincinnati Reds entered Thursday\u2019s game against the Chicago Cubs riding a six-game…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":693290,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2400],"tags":[5,24,535,50,4259,733,36,4,536,6967,4271,1868],"class_list":["post-693289","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cincinnati-reds","tag-baseball","tag-chicago-cubs","tag-cincinnati","tag-cincinnati-reds","tag-cincinnatireds","tag-dansby-swanson","tag-ian-happ","tag-mlb","tag-reds","tag-rhett-lowder","tag-the-cubs","tag-tyler-stephenson"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116537351465681546","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/693289","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=693289"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/693289\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/693290"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=693289"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=693289"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=693289"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}