When is NL Wild Card Game?

The Cubs will face Pittsburgh in the wild-card game Wednesday, and they must win their final two games and have the Pirates lose their last two for the contest to be played at Wrigley Field.

Gerrit Cole isn’t going to miss the NL wild-card game this time around.

The emergence of several young players helped turn the Cubs into one of the best teams in baseball even though they finished third in their division.

“We’re going to the ‘Burgh”, manager Joe Maddon proclaimed following his team’s 3-1 win Sunday over the Brewers in the regular season finale.

The Cubs led off the first with a three-run inning, thanks in large part to Anthony Rizzo’s two-run double. Travis Wood pitched one complete inning, and Carl Edwards Jr. got in on the action in the bottom of the ninth getting the last two out.

The Pittsburgh Pirates will take on the Chicago Cubs.

But Cubs starter Kyle Hendricks outperformed Wagner, allowing one hit and striking out eight through six innings in the 1-0 victory over Milwaukee on Saturday night.

“We didn’t swing the bats well”, Counsell said.

Now 21-6 in 2015, Arrieta has a 1.82 ERA with 229 punch outs and a 0.88 WHIP over 32 starts.

First Star: Jake Arrieta has had, to me, the best season of any Cub in 2015. Ernie Banks was one of my favorite non-Cardinal players of all times and I enjoyed listening to Ron Santo do the color commentary on Cubs games. His ERA of 1.77 would lead the majors if it wasn’t for Zack Greinke’s 1.68 ERA. In order for you to have an immediate place to discuss all Cubs postseason games right after they end, Josh is going to write a brief, just-the-facts recap of the game, similar to how he summarizes Cubs minor-league games during the season. The only run for Milwaukee scored on a Shane Peterson ground-rule double. It also put Rizzo over the 100-RBI plateau for the first time in his career.

His next start will likely come against Pittsburgh in the NL wild card game.

But the bevy of Chicago fans at Miller Park went home happy again.

“We had a couple opportunities this year where we’ve had extra rest, and I thought we’ve used those to our advantage quite well”. But that was the biggest rap, publicly, that a few people thought I was too positive. Following along with the scores on my phone, I found, was enough for me, especially since the Reds forgot to bring their offense to Pittsburgh Sunday afternoon.

Brewers: The team is already looking forward to next year, with pitchers and catchers scheduled to report on February 19 at the spring training complex in Phoenix.