Anthony Rizzo's slide still looming, Cubs lose 3-2 to Padres

Anthony Rizzo’s slide still looming, Cubs lose 3-2 to Padres

By Patrick Finley

Chicago Cubs relief pitcher Koji Uehara wipes his face Wednesday. (AP)

Anthony Rizzo’s slide hung over the Cubs’ three-game homestand like fog. He slid into Padres catcher Austin Hedges on Monday, was found to have violated Rule 7.13 but not punished Tuesday and was not retaliated against the rest of the series.

Then the three-game series came to an appropriate end Wednesday, but not with a Rizzo walk-off winner. Padres catcher Luis Torrens, playing only because of Hedges’ thigh injury, drew a bases-loaded walk against Koji Uehara with two outs in the eighth inning to break a tie and lift the Padres to a 3-2 win.

Torrens shepherded a surprise bullpen day — starter Miguel Diaz left after 2⅓ innings with tightness in his right forearm — in which six Padres pitchers combined to allow two hits.

“We have to do more than two runs, especially when you get into the pen that early,” manager Joe Maddon said.

Ian Happ provided the only scoring for the Cubs, hitting a two-run homer in the fourth.

“Most of the balls I’m hitting hard are leaving,” said Happ, who has 10 home runs in only 113 at-bats.

Padres long reliever Craig Stammen led off the fifth with a double over Kris Bryant’s head in right field and scored on Jose Pirela’s single to chase starter Eddie Butler. In the sixth, Brian Duensing gave up a game-tying solo home run to Erick Aybar.

No one will remember the series for Aybar or Torrens or even Happ. Or even the hitting of Rizzo, who had his seven-game streak of reaching base as the leadoff man in the first inning snapped. Later, his career-high 14-game hitting streak came to an end.

He was the only player in the last 60 years to reach in his first seven career games hitting first and the first Cub to do it since Richie Ashburn in 1960. Maddon will keep Rizzo in the leadoff spot for now, saying that until someone else gets hot, “I’m just going to leave it alone for a bit.”

The controversy surrounding Rizzo’s slide has lasted for days, with Padres manager Andy Green making starter Jhoulys Chacin promise Tuesday not to plunk Rizzo and then, one day later, defending himself against accusations of being soft. Giants manager Bruce Bochy slammed Maddon, though not by name, after he claimed Buster Posey’s 2011 injury, which precipitated Rule 7.13, was the result of bad fundamentals.

Were it up to Miguel Montero, though, there would be no clear-path slide rule for the Padres — or anyone else — to complain about.

“It’s the heat of the moment — it’s baseball,” Montero said. “That’s why I think that rule is a terrible [expletive] rule. The game [has been] played that way for a long time, and nobody ever bitched about it.”

Montero doesn’t believe the rule should exist. He scoffed when he was told it was designed to protect catchers.

“Yeah, but I don’t care,” he said. “I don’t need the protection. I got plenty of protection. That’s why I don’t agree with that rule. I think it’s just b.s. because as a catcher you like those.”

Montero believes that Rizzo was “caught in-between” Monday and that it was “a little too late to slide.”

Rizzo, however, caused the week’s most talked-about baseball play, one that figures to follow him when the Cubs start their 11-game, 11-day road trip Thursday.

“Terrible [expletive] rule,” Montero said. “Simple as that.”

Follow me on Twitter @patrickfinley.

Email: pfinley@suntimes.com