The Rundown: Cubs Narrow Gap on Brewers, Bregman Has Career Night, Netflix Broadcasting Field of Dreams Game

“Fires dance the shadows. Winds whisper the trees.” – Surprise Valley by Widespread Panic

Don’t look now, but the Cubs are sneaking up on the Brewers. May I paraphrase a quote from one of my favorite movies before moving on?

“Well, boys, we got three [starting pitchers] out, we got more holes in us than a horse trader’s mule, the radio is gone and we’re leaking fuel and if we was flying any lower why we’d need sleigh bells on this thing… but we got one little budge on them [Brewers]. At this height why they might harpoon us but they dang sure ain’t gonna spot us on no radar screen!”

Craig Counsell deserves as much credit as anybody for navigating this team through its many injuries. Jed Hoyer deserves a nod and a tip of the cap, too. Things are going swimmingly in Chicago just as Milwaukee is facing adversity for the first time this season. Alex Bregman is doing his thing, too. He’s been more of a player-coach this season than one of the game’s best third basemen, but the three-time All-Star broke out yesterday with a three-homer game. Bregman has 16 home runs on the year, with 12 coming since June 1. Unsurprisingly, the red-hot Cubs are 9-2 (.818) in August and 39-22 (.639) since the first day of meteorological summer.

The Brewers, meanwhile, were just swept by the Padres and will next travel to Los Angeles for a four-game set with the Dodgers. Milwaukee is hitting just .219 over its last seven games while also posting a meager .681 OPS. The juggernaut Cubs, on the other hand, have now scored 10 or more runs 17 times this season after last night’s 12-6 win, and they’ve gained three games on the Brewers in three days. The two teams are traveling at warp speed in opposite directions, which makes Chicago’s upcoming homestand something to really look forward to. How fun would it be to host the White Sox on Monday with both teams in first place?

Let’s not put the cart before the horse, though. The Cubs need to keep winning so they can maintain pressure the Brewers. It’s okay to scoreboard watch, or to look ahead to both teams’ schedules, but the focus must remain on the task at hand. Just win, baby, and everything will take care of itself. We hoped a few days ago that the Cubs could gain one game on the Brewers each week. It’s time to tighten those screws just a little and set the goal to one game per series. The North Siders must also protect their lead in the Wild Card race. San Diego is charging hard, and the Diamondbacks and Phillies are right there, too.

Kevin Gausman takes the bump today, and we can thank Hoyer for that. It’s only been five weeks since the Cubs traded for David Peterson because they didn’t have enough starters to fill their rotation. Now they can compete with anybody on the Brewers except Jacob Misiorowski. That said, Chicago’s offense and defense narrow that gap considerably. Home field advantage provides a big boost, too, and that’s got to be the goal going into this season’s final stretch. The Cubs are within striking distance of winning the division with the best record in the National League. It’s time to seize that opportunity.

Cubs News & Notes

• Bregman looks like a completely different hitter after making a subtle adjustment to his swing.
• You know you’ve made league or team history when Sarah Langs of MLB.com mentions you.
• The Cubs are No. 5 in ESPN’s latest power rankings. The sports and entertainment behemoth is underestimating this team.
• Hoyer was very reluctant ($) to trade Pedro Ramírez at the deadline, according to Sahadev Sharma of The Athletic. Ultimately, there wasn’t a deal that made sense.
• The Cubs could promote catcher Owen Ayers in September.
• Jaxon Wiggins might be an option, too, though he could work as a reliever with Chicago.
• Reliever Jacob Webb has quickly become Counsell’s preferred choice to protect late-inning leads or to close out wins.

Ball Four

Somewhere… Harry Caray is smiling.

Budweiser has released a new beer that is made with baseball bats 🤯

Called Beechwood Reserve, the limited edition brew is aged with actual Beechwood baseball bats pic.twitter.com/uGGhvOuKdN

— MLB (@MLB) August 13, 2026

Central Intelligence

• Milwaukee (74-47): First baseman Jake Bauers said the struggling Brewers are too tight and “need to f**king chill.”
• Chicago (71-50): In the game before the All-Star break, Bregman went 3-for-5 with a homer and four RBIs to raise his season OPS to .696; it’s now .758, thanks to batting .327/.397/.644 with eight of his 16 homers in the last 25 games. He’s now a well-above-average hitter for the year at third, and combined with his defense, has already accumulated 3.6 wins above replacement despite the slow start.
• St. Louis (61-60): Hunter Dobbins will remain in the Cardinals’ rotation, replacing Dustin May, who was traded to the Brewers. Dobbins is one of five players attempting to earn a guaranteed spot on next year’s roster.
• Cincinnati (57-62): The Reds announced that Hunter Greene will miss 12-18 months after his second Tommy John surgery. Green will probably not pitch again until 2028.
• Pittsburgh (58-64): Retired ace Curt Schilling said he predicted before this year’s World Baseball Classic that Paul Skenes would struggle.

How About That!

You’ll need a Netflix subscription to watch tonight’s Field of Dreams Game between the Phillies and Twins.

Kyle Schwarber is “excited to see the corn.” Spoken like a true Hoosier.

The Red Sox have gone from being the hottest team in baseball to the coldest. They’ve lost five straight, and to put that into perspective, they only lost five of their previous 44 games before hitting the skids.

The Rays just won nine straight games in the Pacific time zone. The only other team to do that was the 1977 Red Sox.

The Padres leapfrogged six teams since the trade deadline to take a one-game lead over the Phillies and Diamondbacks for the second Wild Card spot.

Newly-minted White Sox starter Luis Castillo led Chicago to a 5-0 win over the Reds. He struck out 10 Cincinnati batters in his home debut and will next face the Cubs on Monday.

Apropos of Nothing

“I have observed that baseball is not unlike a war, and when you come down to it, we batters are the heavy artillery.” – Ty Cobb

The Dodgers have lined up Rōki Sasaki, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Justin Wrobleski, and Tarik Skubal to face the Brewers. Milwaukee will counter with Shane Drohan, Robert Gasser, Misiorowski, and Logan Henderson. That’s some explosive counter munitions.

Extra innings

That’s one way to lead your troops into battle.

Alex Bregman Explodes for 3 Home Runs and 7 RBIs Against Washington 💣🔥

3-for-3, 3 HR, 7 RBI, 3 R, 12 TB

All Home Runs: pic.twitter.com/9jDtTFQ7TX

— Baseball Performances (@MLBPerformances) August 13, 2026

They Said It

• “The last month or so has been a step in the right direction, but really, the last two days have been a real step in the right direction. I’ve had days this year when it’s gone all right, I had a few extra-base hits, and then the next day, you wake up and you get to the ballpark and it feels completely different. We went through the archives for this, like way back in the day, all the changes … throughout my career. We were watching Corpus Christi Double-A video two nights ago in my room at 1 o’clock.” – Bregman
• “The one thing he’s brought so much is being able to help guys navigate through things, whether it’s other guys and their at-bats, pitchers and their approach to getting other teams out. He’s best when he’s got his hands in everything.” – Dansby Swanson
• “The guys show up every day to the ballpark excited … This team is extremely focused on playing deep into the postseason.” – Bregman

Thursday Walk-Up Song

Let’s get that sweep, and then it’s home to face the Cardinals.