Almora beat Nats with 9th-inning double as Cubs keep eyes on arms

WASHINGTON – If Nationals ace Max Scherzer offered a look into October for the Cubs on Monday, then almost everywhere they looked Tuesday was a glimpse down the road to get there.

In both cases it was all about pitching.

Even before the teams with the top two records in baseball faced off in a 4-3 Cubs win decided by the bullpens Tuesday, the Nationals were forced to put All-Star closer Jonathan Papelbon on the disabled list with a rib-cage strain.

The Cubs meanwhile continued a monthlong, ongoing effort to build bullpen inventory for an inevitable need, signing former top-five pitching prospect Brian Matusz, a left-hander, to a minor-league deal.

“That’s why [you add],” Cubs manager Joe Maddon. “You always have to anticipate something’s going to go awry. It just does. And that is such a hard spot to get people you really like just by snapping your fingers.”

The Cubs scored in the ninth off a Papelbon-less Nats bullpen for the win Tuesday – rookie Albert Almora Jr. entering defensively in the eighth and driving home the game winner with a double in the ninth.

But the ninth-inning drama was created by the Cubs’ own bullpen issues in the eighth, when Bryce Harper’s leadoff walk against Travis Wood eventually led to closer Hector Rondon’s first blown save of the season – as Maddon went to the well rested Rondon for a five-out save.

After taking over with one out, Rondon gave up a single to Ryan Zimmerman that sent Harper to third. And he scored the tying run on Anthony Rendon’s ensuing sacrifice fly.

Whatever Tuesday’s game – or Monday’s loss to a dominant Scherzer — might suggest about how the Cubs match up against the Nationals in a potential playoff series, Tuesday’s events on and off the field said a lot more about how either one might get there.

Last month the Cubs signed former All-Star closer Joe Nathan to a big-league deal as he continues a Tommy John rehab program that should have him ready to contribute after the All-Star break. And in the past week they picked up a pair of big-league veterans on minor-league deals: right-hander Joel Peralta and Matusz – a one-time Orioles rotation mate of Jake Arrieta, who found success as a reliever in recent years before struggling this year.

Matusz, 29, was released by both Baltimore and Atlanta in a 10-day span before the Cubs acquired him.

“All these guys you expect them to play a significant role at some point during the year,” Maddon said.

Meanwhile, the Cubs continue to watch the pitching market for the big fish between now and the July 31 trade deadline – the ideal prize potentially coming in the form of Yankees’ left-hander Aroldis Chapman.

One major-league source monitoring the same market said he doesn’t believe lefty Andrew Miller will be made available even if the Yankees become deadline sellers for the first time in four decades under Steinbrenner ownership – because Miller’s under contract through 2018, and the Yankees aren’t looking at a multi-year rebuild under any circumstances.

Whatever the Cubs can stockpile over the next six weeks, the “significant roles” figure to only get more significant as the games get deeper into the summer, much less into the fall.

Maddon likened this series to last year’s four-gamer at home against the Giants in early August, when he shifted into a going-for-the-throat mode of managing his pitching staff – leaning harder on the bullpen.

“The Giants at that time were the team that we had to earn our stripes against,” said Maddon, who went to eighth-inning man Pedro Strop in the seventh Tuesday night to limit a second-and-third, nobody-out jam. “The Nationals are the same kind of team. They’ve got a bunch of gamers out there, man. They’re just like us; we’re just like them. Every pitch matters.”

And then in the ninth somebody like Almora – on his eighth day in the majors – hits the only one he sees in the game into the left-center gap for a go-ahead double against a pitcher, Sammy Solis, he remembered from Arizona Fall League.

“I gave him a little nod,” Almora said of stepping into the box. “After that it’s go time.”

Said Maddon: “A guy that has been up here for five minutes, and he goes up there and he’s not passive. I love it.”

And then Rondon went back out in the bottom of the ninth for a 1-2-3 finish to a five-out win.

“That’s the way they work in October most of the time,” said starter John Lackey, who pitched strong again into the seventh inning before settling for the no-decision. “These [games] are good testers. You don’t see a whole lot of runs. Usually tight games, low scoring. When it comes time for them to really count – it was a good test.”