CHICAGO — The fourth-inning pitch from Edward Cabrera was a hanging curve, arriving in a light rain over Wrigley Field, and Matt Chapman turned on it with the sort of authority that resets a ballgame entirely. The ball cleared the left-center basket for a grand slam, his fourth of a career now in its tenth major league season, and the only real uncertainty that remained was how large the margin would grow.
It grew to 15. The San Francisco Giants pounded the Chicago Cubs 18-3 on Friday afternoon at Wrigley Field, slugging seven home runs and sending six Chicago pitchers in succession out to absorb the damage. Chapman finished with two homers and a sacrifice fly for a career-high eight RBIs — a figure that placed him in the company of Willie Mays, Orlando Cepeda, and a short list of other Giants who had driven home eight or more runs in a single game since the franchise relocated from New York in 1958.
The historical footnote was not lost on Chapman, who said after the game he did not know the eight-RBI total was a career best until reporters told him. “That was awesome,” he told NBC Sports Bay Area. “It was great to, obviously, hit that grand slam and kind of get us out in front a little bit there. I feel like everybody just kept piling it on from there. So that was a lot of fun.”
The Giants entered the series opener having scored 12 or more runs in consecutive games, a run of offense so improbable given their 26-38 record that it raised a question the afternoon’s box score only deepened: how much of this is real, and how much of it is the Cubs’ pitching staff having a historically bad stretch against the long ball? Chicago has now surrendered 95 home runs this season, more than any other team in Major League Baseball, and the Giants took full advantage of that vulnerability from the first at-bat.
Willy Adames led off the game’s scoring with a 427-foot shot in the first inning that cleared the bleachers entirely, the kind of contact that leaves outfielders watching rather than running. San Francisco built a 2-0 lead into the fourth, when Cabrera — making his first start back from a blister on his right middle finger — unraveled. By the time the inning ended, the Giants led 8-0. Cabrera had allowed eight earned runs on eight hits in 3 2/3 innings, his line including the Chapman grand slam and a two-run homer by Casey Schmitt.
The sixth inning was, if anything, worse for the Cubs. Adames went deep for a second time, stretching the lead to 13-0, and then Chapman stepped in and launched a three-run shot that made it 16-0. Hoby Milner, one of five Cubs relievers deployed after Cabrera, allowed six runs in a third of an inning. Chicago catcher Carson Kelly, pressed into service as a position player designated hitter, threw a ninth inning in which Jonah Cox hit a 446-foot no-doubter to center and Schmitt added his second homer of the game.
Schmitt finished 4-for-6 with three RBIs and the team-leading 15th home run of his season. Adames collected two homers and four RBIs. Three different Giants — Chapman, Adames, and Schmitt — hit two home runs each, a convergence of individual production that underscored just how thoroughly San Francisco exposed Chicago’s pitching depth.
According to the Associated Press, San Francisco’s six grand slams this season have all come in the last 18 games, making the Giants the sixth team in MLB history to hit six slams in 20 days or fewer — a streak that would be remarkable on any team, let alone one that spent most of the spring mired near the bottom of the National League West.
Robbie Ray earned the win, allowing no runs on two hits over five innings despite five walks — a performance that, on most Friday afternoons, would have been the headline. On this one, the pitching line was nearly invisible. Ray improved to 4-6 on the season.
What Chapman’s afternoon represented, beyond the history, was the kind of recent offensive surge that has made the Giants harder to dismiss than their record suggests. Since May 17, he is hitting .303 with a .927 OPS in 18 games, with three home runs in his last five contests. “I feel like I’ve been doing a good job with runners in scoring position and I’ve been having a lot of opportunities with guys on base,” he said.
The Cubs (33-31) have now lost 19 of their last 25 games, a collapse that has erased an early-season lead in the NL Central and raised harder questions about the team’s pitching construction. The series continues Saturday at Wrigley, with Giants right-hander Landen Roupp (5-6, 4.22 ERA) facing Cubs righty Ben Brown (2-2, 1.92). What remains unresolved is whether Friday’s explosion represents a genuine shift in San Francisco’s offensive identity, or whether it says more about a Chicago staff that cannot stop the bleeding.
