Baffoe: No Reason To Worry About These Cool Cubs

By Tim Baffoe--

(CBS) Silly me, I knew the Chicago Cubs would win Game 3, yet I was bothered most of Monday in anticipation of the matchup against St. Louis Cardinals.

It wasn't anxiety all that afternoon. There were no internal butterflies to be found, much the opposite really.

That I had no doubt the Cubs would win Monday night — that my tummy didn't feel like I'd eaten a bad McRib (as though there was such a thing) — had my head vexed. I wanted nerves. I wanted to fear that infamous Cardinals devil magic that always seems to find a way. I wanted to be a lifelong observer of the Cubs.

Jake Arrieta was pitching, though. Winning those starts was no longer a compelling consideration. Instead, how long would he flirt with a no-hitter is what you watch for when he's on the mound these days.

But when I'm supremely confident, things usually go bad. For example, you could have easily bet me a nice dinner that the Chicago Bears would win each of the last two weeks, and I'd have put my Dave and Buster's gift certificates up against that.

Kyle Schwarber put the Cubs up 1-0 with a home run in the second inning. The game was over, and my worries were about Game 4 at Wrigley Field with the Cubs' clinching hopes hanging on the sketchy arm of right-hander Jason Hammel. My uneasiness with my pregame ease was unjustified.

Then the Cardinals scored two runs with help from two Arrieta walks, snapping his 34-inning scoreless streak. He hadn't allowed two earned runs in a game since Aug. 15. Two runs off him in an inning hadn't happened since July. The record skipped.

Then Starlin Castro tied it with a homer, followed shortly by Addison Russell leaving the game with a hamstring injury. My pupils were dilating.

"I was rounding second and felt a grab," Russell said. "After feeling that, I wanted to be cautious."

Now my tummy was sort of hurting.

After 5 2/3 innings, Arrieta's evening was done, that ace tagged for four earned runs for the first time since June and his team leading by just one run as the game would be shouldered by the bullpen.

"Obviously he kind of lost it a little bit," catcher Miguel Montero said. "I felt like he lost his command. He was really erratic. Nothing was even close.

"It's going to happen. I'm actually happy it happened because I realize he's human. I was a little concerned about it."

Such kidding wasn't funny during the game, Miggy. Those kinds of events aren't supposed to be said about an Arrieta start. Why now? Against the Cardinals? In the playoffs? I knew I should have been uncomfortable before that damn game.

But, see, that's where I was foolish. How quickly Arrieta's greatness and then his sudden mortality both make us forget what the Cubs lineup can do.

At only one point did the Cubs trail in Game 3, down 2-1 in the top of the fourth. The "bad" Arrieta game (that he still got the win for) that had these last few months only manifested in our night sweats was rendered moot by a record-setting six home runs, one each by the Cubs' one through six hitters in the lineup.

The Cardinals — and this is the reason they entered the playoffs with baseball's best record — never went away Monday. They'd get the random single that made you purse your lips just knowing it would bite the Cubs. Twice it did on two-run homers, in the sixth and ninth innings.

But it was never enough because the Cub bats just kept going yard. Again. And again. And then again.

"It's incredible," Anthony Rizzo said. "This is one of those moments here, one of those magical moments at Wrigley that hopefully people talk about for generations and generations."

And those young Cubs, as I should have known since we've seen it repeatedly all season, never had a doubt, never showed a collective nervousness. They exuded a cool that has come to define them.

This was evident as Castro jacked the crowd up as he celebrated his home run, by the curtain calls for Kris Bryant and Jorge Soler and the mock curtain call by Dexter Fowler after the team Twitter account trolled the Cardinals and their overly sensitive fans.

For the Cubs, despite their ace not having his best stuff, the game was never in doubt. They pounded the ball, and when the Cardinals made an attempt to get the game interesting, they pounded again until there were no more outs left. Any worries otherwise were silly apparently.

See? I knew they'd win.

Tim Baffoe is a columnist for CBSChicago.com. Follow Tim on Twitter @TimBaffoe. The views expressed on this page are those of the author, not CBS Local Chicago or our affiliated television and radio stations.