Ivy, Cubs get best of Padres in walk-off loss

Kevin Acee, The San Diego Union-Tribune on Jun 30, 2026

Published in Baseball

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CHICAGO — The temperature was sweltering. The wind was ripping straight out to the bleachers. The starting pitchers seemed vulnerable.

Shota Imanaga, who has allowed more home runs per nine innings than any pitcher in the major leagues over the past three seasons, started for the Chicago Cubs. Griffin Canning, who had allowed multiple runs in 20% of the innings he began this season, started for the San Diego Padres.

Because baseball is even more unpredictable on a day-to-day basis than even the Midwest weather, a pitchers’ duel unfolded at Wrigley Field on Monday night.

The Padres’ 3-2 walk-off loss to the Cubs was about missed opportunities, bungled baserunning and extra outs.

The Cubs scored the winning run on a double after the inning began on a ground-ball single that Manny Machado turns into an out 99 times out of 100.

The Cubs scored their first run in the fourth inning when Samad Taylor did not head back far enough and had a wind-blown fly ball by Seiya Suzuki that became a leadoff double.

Without that run, Mason Miller would have begun the ninth with the intention of protect a 2-1 lead.

Instead, Jason Adam took the loss when Miller got two outs but could not get a third.

The bottom of the ninth began with Dansby Swanson grounding a ball to the hole at shortstop and stumbling out of the box. Machado fielded the ball, spun and lost the ball as he transferred it from his bare hand.

After Pete Crow-Armstrong flared a single into left field to move Swanson to second, Padres manager Craig Stammen went to Miller, who yielded a single to Alex Bregman and before getting a fly ball to left field that Jase Bowen turned into a double play by throwing out Swanson at home.

But Suzuki then sent a fly ball just beyond the reach of a leaping Bowen at the ivy-covered wall in left field to score Crow-Armstrong.

What the Padres gave away conspired with what they didn’t take advantage of.

Their leadoff batter reached base in five different innings and scored just twice, and they finished 2 for 11 with runners in scoring position.

The Padres scored a run in the third and another in the fourth to take a 2-0 lead. But it felt like they had not made the most of three singles and a sacrifice bunt in the first of those innings and failed to capitalize fully on two doubles and a single in the other one.

That hurt when the Cubs scored in successive innings to tie the game 2-2 in the fifth.

Thanks to Bradgley Rodriguez striking out two batters and Adrian Morejón getting the final out with the bases loaded in the bottom of the sixth, the Padres survived a play in which Machado tagged a runner already standing on second before making what turned out to be a tardy throw to first base.

There was also the failure in the sixth when the Padres made three consecutive outs after singles by Miguel Andujar and Ty France began the inning.

Coming off a 4-2 homestand against two division leaders, the Padres are here playing what might prove to be a more consequential series.

They began the day a half-game out of the National League’s final wild-card spot and 1 1/2 games behind the Cubs, who sat in the fifth of the NL’s six playoff positions.

The feel of a lost opportunity was increased by the fact the Padres got a better, though not entirely good, version of Canning in his first start after two turns working behind an opener.

He was charged with two runs and pitched into the fifth inning, which lowered his ERA to 7.09 (from 7.38).

The second of those runs scored after he departed the game having allowed a lead-off double to Dansby Swanson and, with one out, walked Bregman on four pitches.

Kyle Hart immediately walked the bases full and yielded a sacrifice fly to Suzuki that tied the game.

After Andujar led off the second inning with a single but was picked off first base, the Padres again got a leadoff single in the second inning and turned it into a 1-0 lead.

Xander Bogaerts’ single to start the second was followed by a Freddy Fermin single, and both runners moved up on Jake Cronenworth’s sacrifice bunt. Bogaerts scored on a grounder to shortstop by Fernando Tatis Jr. that resulted in Fermin being thrown out at third. That rendered inconsequential the single by Taylor that followed.

Andujar began the third inning by sending a line drive to left field that disappeared in the ivy, giving him a double. He moved up on France’s single and scored on Bogaerts’ one-out double before Fermin and Cronenworth made outs.

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