The Chicago Cubs won 9-1 against fierce rivals St Louis Cardinals in London with 55,000 fans watching at West Ham Stadium
The Chicago Cubs claimed bragging rights on foreign soil against their fierce rivals, the St Louis Cardinals, with a crushing 9-1 win in Game 1 of the 2023 London Series.
It was MLB’s second trip across the pond after the New York Yankees swept a two-game set here against the Boston Red Sox in 2019, and the first of 2,495 meetings for the Cubs and Cardinals in 140 years of playing performing outside the United States. .
Among the festivities for the London crowd of 54,662 was a mascot race which saw Henry VIII trap Winston Churchill at the finish line just ahead of Freddie Mercury, Ashes cricket stars Jimmy Anderson and Nathan Lyon throwing the ceremonial first pitches and actor Nick Offerman sings Take Me Out to the Ballgame in the seventh inning.
The Yankees-Red Sox games in 2019 were slugfests with New York running out of winners 17-13 and 12-8, and even with the walls seven feet further this time, Cardinals starter Adam Wainwright, playing his 18th and final season before retiring. , got a taste of that offensive environment as he allowed 11 hits over three innings.
Batting outfielder Ian Happ took Wainwright to center and right field on his first two hits outside of North America as part of the Cubs’ seven-point outburst against the 41-year-old right-hander.
The Chicago Cubs defeated the St Louis Cardinals 9-1 at London Stadium on Saturday afternoon
There were just under 55,000 fans in attendance at West Ham’s Premier League stadium
But the football field had been converted to a baseball field with MLB heading to town
Dansby Swanson celebrates with Trey Mancini after hitting a home run for the Cubs
Happ was Wainwright’s chief hangman again, hitting six homers against him and passing Cincinnati’s Joey Votto for most of all the St Louis pitcher’s players.
Nick Madrigal, Christopher Morel, Yan Gomes, Mike Tauchman and Seiya Suzuki all added RBI hits as the Cubs knocked Wainwright out of the game with just nine outs to his name.
His opposing starting pitcher Justin Steele kept the Cardinals bats quiet until the fifth inning, when rookie Jordan Walker finally hit the Redbirds’ first hit of the day past diving shortstop Dansby Swanson.
In the sixth inning, the Cardinals woke up, landing three straight hits to start the inning, including Paul Goldschmidt – the first MLB player to play in five different countries – hitting Tommy Edman with an RBI single.
But with runners in second and third, Steele cleared the jam by striking out Dylan Carlson who was fetching with his 89th and final pitch of the day to wrap up six innings of one-running, with eight strikeouts.
And in the top of the ninth inning, Cubs’ $177 million shortstop Dansby Swanson homered a two-run homer off Cardinals reliever Drew VerHagen to complete the rout — Chicago’s biggest on his rivals since May 2021.
London’s opener of 2019 lasted four hours and 42 minutes, just three minutes short of the longest nine-inning game in MLB history, but with the clock in action this year, that contest went down in two hours and 40 minutes. .
The win makes it four in a row for the Cubs to take them to 37-38 this season, 6.5 games ahead of the Cardinals who are now 31-45.
