Steele's Return, Tauchman’s Sacrifice Leads Cubs Past Orioles

Justin Steele’s return to the mound gave the Chicago Cubs a boost, but it was Mike Tauchman’s sacrifice fly that lifted the Cubs to a 3-2 win over the Baltimore Orioles on Saturday at Wrigley Field.

The Cubs (33-37) had been waiting to get Steele back from injury. But after an effective outing that ended after five innings, it was Tauchman who broke a 2-2 tie in the fifth inning by hitting a sacrifice fly to left field, which scored Yan Gomes.

From there, the Cubs’ bullpen made the one-run lead hold up, with Adbert Alzolay coming on in the ninth inning to get his fourth save.

Steele (7-5) returned to the active roster for his first start since May 31 as Cubs activated him after a stint on the 15-day injured list. Before the injury Steele had a 2.65 ERA and a 1.059 WHIP in 68 innings.

Steele threw 74 pitches and 54 of them were strikes. He’ll likely need another start to get stretched out to where he was before the injury. In four starts between May 5-21 he threw at least 82 pitches in each start.

The Cubs limited him to five innings on Saturday, but he was effective as he earned his first victory since May 10 against St. Louis.

He gave up five hits, struck out four, walked one and allowed the Orioles’ only two runs.

Those runs came in the fifth inning and tied the game at 2-2. Both runs came in on Adley Rutschman’s two-run home run.

Both pitching staffs were effective, limiting the offenses to a combined 11 hits. Orioles (43-27) starter Kyle Gibson (8-4) went six innings, giving up all three Cubs runs and striking out seven.

Nico Hoerner was the only Cub with two hits in the game, as he went 2-for-4 with two RBI. His double in the third inning gave the Cubs a 2-0 lead.

The Cubs and Orioles wrap up their series on Sunday Jameson Taillon (2-4) will start for the Cubs against Dean Kremer (7-3) at 12:05 p.m. central.

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