If Kris Bryant really is back like he showed in World Series Game 5, so are the Cubs
Bryant broke out of his slump in a big way for the Cubs to stay alive
By
Bill Reiter
•
2 min read
CHICAGO -- Welcome back, Kris Bryant.
Throughout the Chicago Cubs' march to this World Series, Bryant had been a constant: a 24-year-old wunderkind and burgeoning MVP who despite his age was the keystone of a Chicago offense as potent as any in baseball.
This regular season, only his second in the big leagues, saw Bryant put up a slash of .292/.385/.554 while hitting 39 home runs, logging 102 runs batted in and scoring 112 runs. He was nothing short of spectacular, and he kept it going as the Cubs romped through the playoffs. He hit .333 in the NLDS and NLCS, doubling five times, adding a homer, six RBI and five runs. He was great -- as expected by the Cubs, and absolutely necessary to their success.
Until the World Series.
The Cubs entered Game 5 of their World Series showdown with the Cleveland Indians in a 3-1 hole for a lot of reasons, but Bryant was a big one. Whatever the issue -- statistical anomaly, the pressure of the moment, some of both -- he had gone from one of the game's most dangerous hitters to a man lost at the plate and beyond it.
He was 1 for 14 against Cleveland pitching entering Sunday night's must-win game. His on-base percentage in the World Series was a brutal .235. He had struck out in five of his 17 at bats, and he had crossed home plate only once. Runs batted in? Not a one.
He was also awful on defense. His two throwing errors in Game 4 were painful to watch and the extension of just how severely the Cubs' most important player -- and the National League's likely Most Valuable Player -- had regressed.
Then came the bottom of the fourth inning in the Cubs' 3-2 win Sunday at Wrigley.
Bryant stepped to the plate, and you can forgive those fans who moaned it was damned-past time that this guy do something. Which Bryant did, driving a ball on a line to left-center as part of the Cubs' crucial, season-saving three-run fourth inning. Bryant's blast didn't just help extend the series. It sent it back to Cleveland with the Indians leading 3-2 but the Cubs' most important player having found his groove.
Baseball is a funny game, and sometimes it just takes one swing of the bat for a player to find himself, and a team to ride that shifting self-confidence and momentum. In the Cubs' NLCS series agains the Los Angeles Dodgers, slugger Anthony Rizzo was -- like Bryant here in the World Series -- a disaster at the plate.
Entering Game 4 of the NLCS, with the Dodgers leading the series 2-1, Rizzo was a big part of the problem: He was hitting a paltry 2 for 26, and he didn't have a single RBI. Then he whacked his own home run and, voila, the Cubs went on to win the game, that series and reclaim their second-best hitter. The old Rizzo returned.
It is hard to win a World Series, harder still if you're the Chicago Cubs, and it can feel impossible if your best player vanishes during your first shot at a championship in 71 years.
But if Bryant is back, so, too, are the Cubs' chances, however slim it feels trying to be only the third team in baseball history to come back from a 3-1 World Series deficit by winning their last two games on the road.
Bryant went 1 for 3 on Sunday, hit the homer, stole a base and was able to throw to first base without it becoming a defensive crisis.
If he's back, so are the Cubs.
