CHICAGO – Facing elimination for the second consecutive night, the Cubs’ longest-tenured player took matters into his own hands on Thursday at Wrigley Field.
Ian Happ crushed a three-run homer off Brewers right-hander Freddy Peralta in the first inning of a 6-0 victory in Game 4 of the National League Division Series. The Cubs, who once trailed the best-of-five NLDS two games to none, have forced a winner-take-all meeting on Saturday night in Milwaukee.
“It felt great,” said Happ, who turned on a 94.8 mph four-seamer for his third career postseason homer. “The guys have been carrying me all postseason, so to contribute in that moment and give us the lead was awesome for me. It was a really cool moment at Wrigley.”
Now 31, Happ made his Major League debut as a 22-year-old on May 13, 2017. As a rookie, he recorded a 113 OPS+ for a Cubs ballclub that fell short in its pursuit of a second consecutive World Series championship.
During that era, Happ learned from a core that cemented its status in Cubs lore by breaking the Curse of the Billy Goat in 2016. The script has since flipped, with the veteran Happ guiding the younger players. Since 2017, only José Ramírez (Guardians, 1,277) and Jose Altuve (Astros, 1,147) have appeared in more regular-season games with one team than Happ.
“So cool,” Pete Crow-Armstrong said. “I felt like I needed to tell him after the Wild Card that so much of what’s driving me personally is just his place in this organization, wanting to win these ballgames for him.”
Happ’s clutch knock woke up a slumbering bat. He had been 1-for-10 with two walks and five strikeouts in the NLDS, with his lone hit a solo homer against another Peralta four-seamer in the sixth inning of a lopsided Game 1 loss in Milwaukee.
Peralta, who will likely receive NL Cy Young Award votes, has had Happ’s number over the years. Including Thursday, Happ is just 4-for-37 all-time (regular season and postseason). But three of the hits have been home runs, with two of them in this series.
“I’ve had a ton of at-bats against him,” Happ said. “He’s had my number quite a bit. But I got him in Milwaukee on a fastball, so I knew he was going to go changeup to start the at-bat, and it was probably going to be a lot more soft stuff. I was able to get a fastball in that at-bat to hit.”
Added Peralta: “It was just a pitch that he was able to hit. He hit it exactly how he wanted it. For me, it wasn’t a mistake. It was the pitch we wanted, but he was just able to hit it really hard.”
The big swing made it 21 combined runs in the first inning of the Cubs/Brewers NLDS – three more than in the first innings of any other series in postseason history. Chicago has accounted for 11 of them, with at least one run scored in each of the four games.
The last time the Cubs scored in the first inning of at least four straight postseason games was in 2003. The Cubs are the first team in MLB history with a home run in the first inning in four straight playoff games within the same postseason (Michael Busch, Seiya Suzuki, Busch, Happ).
Chicago is also the first team to hit a first-inning homer in any four games in a best-of-five series, and the first to do it in four straight games, per the Elias Sports Bureau.
“I’m just so happy for Ian,” manager Craig Counsell said. “I think it was great for Ian to have the playoff moment that he deserved. It was a huge swing, a huge swing.”
