Chicago Cubs Lineup (5/24/25): Happ Leads Off, Swanson Cleanup, Rea Shining
The Cubs exploded their way out of an early hole last night, using a pair of homers from Pete Crow-Armstrong and one each from Seiya Suzuki and Dansby Swanson to bury the Reds. Now they’ve got a chance to win the series and keep the Cardinals at least three games back in the division. They’ll do so behind the undefeated Colin Rea, whose fastball continues to impress.
If we were in 1990, Rea would look like a flamethrower with his 93.7 mph heater. Now, however, he’s nearly a full tick below the average velocity for a righty. He’s made up for that by getting sinker-like characteristics with more depth and run than most four-seams, while also working both sides of the plate to great effect. He’s been better against right-handed hitters and he’s limited homers despite a lot of contact in the air, so there’s a lingering sense that a tough outing is coming.
It helps when the offense is capable of erasing nearly any mistake, as we saw last night. Ian Happ is leading off again in left, followed by Kyle Tucker in right and Suzuki at DH. Shortstop Swanson slides up to the cleanup spot with a lefty on the mound, then it’s Crow-Armstrong in center, Nico Hoerner at second, and Miguel Amaya behind the plate. Justin Turner is at first base doing his best The Dude impersonation, and Matt Shaw plays third.
The Reds counter with their own undefeated starter in Andrew Abbott, a 25-year-old southpaw who looks like a young version of Andrew Chafin. If watching Rea feels like waiting for the other shoe to drop, Abbott may as well be the SNKRS app. He’s gotten incredible results so far with the 92 mph fastball he throws almost 50% of the time, limiting hard contact better than nearly anyone else in MLB and putting up huge strikeout numbers. His expected stats also line up well with his actual numbers, so what gives?
Abbott has given up only three homers, all in his first three starts, despite a 26.5% groundball rate that puts him in the third percentile among his peers. He’s also gotten 87th percentile run value on a fastball that is thrown a tick slower than last year, when it was in the 12th percentile. Not much has changed on the fastball, which has nearly the same rise and only slightly less tail than last season, so I can’t really tell what is behind the big jump in results.
The Reds’ soft early schedule may be a factor, as Abbott’s opponents are a combined 76 games below .500 at this point. He’s only faced two teams with winning records, though his worst start of the season came against the Rockies. Regardless of who he’s faced, giving up just one earned run over 20 innings across his last four starts is pretty solid. Efficiency has been his biggest bugaboo, as he’s only gone six innings twice in seven starts.
There’s not much to go off of, but the Cubs carry a .348/.483/.652 combined slash line in 23 at-bats against Abbott into this game. Though he could continue his torrid early run on Saturday afternoon, it feels to me like the Cubs could recalibrate his numbers just a bit.
We’ll find out at 3:10pm CT on Marquee and 670 The Score.
Running it back with the Reds.
Watch the game live on the Marquee Sports Network App. pic.twitter.com/Jy0qWKPaYj
— Chicago Cubs (@Cubs) May 24, 2025
