Following a pair of emphatic wins over their National League Central foes, the visiting Chicago Cubs have an opportunity to post a three-game sweep of the Milwaukee Brewers on Sunday afternoon.
Winners in three straight games and four of their last five, the Cubs picked up where they left off at the plate on Saturday, posting a 6-2 victory following a 10-0 triumph on Friday. The Cubs -- the NL leaders in batting average (.265), runs (208), on-base percentage (.341) and slugging percentage (.462) -- are showing no signs of slowing ahead of the series finale on Sunday.
The weekend star for Chicago and its explosive offense has been center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong, who has three home runs -- including a three-run blast in Saturday's victory. The 23-year-old now is tied with Seiya Suzuki and Kyle Tucker for the team lead in home runs this season with nine.
"The bat speed right now from Pete kind of stands out," Cubs manager Craig Counsell said. "The ball feels like it's just exploding off his bat. ... This is star-level production, no question about it. It's been the power lately, but what great players can do is affect the game in a lot of ways. Pete has that ability. Some days it's the defense, some days it's the baserunning. He's in a good place right now, for sure."
Hoping to help the Cubs finish the sweep on Sunday, left-hander Shota Imanaga (3-1, 2.77 ERA) will get the start. Imanaga, 31, most recently pitched on Tuesday, throwing five scoreless innings in a 9-0 road win over the Pittsburgh Pirates. He gave up six hits, walked one and struck out three.
Imanaga has faced the Brewers once in his career, allowing seven earned runs and eight hits across 4 1/3 innings in a 10-6 loss last May.
Milwaukee will look to salvage the series against its rivals on Sunday and break out of a lackluster offensive stretch. Across a three-game losing streak, the Brewers have just two runs, both coming on Saturday as Brice Turang had an RBI single and Rhys Hoskins hit a solo home run.
"I think the confidence takes a hit when skids like this happen," Hoskins said after the loss on Saturday. "Whether you seem to be doing the right thing, the ball's not bouncing your way or you're just getting flat out beat. ... Luckily this is still early. At some point it's not early, but we've got a lot of baseball to be played, and I think because of the talent in this room, there's no reason why we won't find ourselves where we want to be coming into the summer."
Aiming to pull the club out of its slump, right-hander Freddy Peralta (3-2, 2.52 ERA) will take the mound on Sunday. He is coming off an outing in which he allowed two earned runs and three hits in six innings in a 7-2 victory over the Chicago White Sox on Tuesday.
No stranger to facing Chicago, Peralta owns a 6-2 career record against the Cubs, with a 3.16 ERA across 18 career appearances (13 starts) against them.
More must-reads: