👋 Good morning!
It’s that wonderful time of the year again.
We’ve got playoff baseball, regular season hockey, preseason hoops and Thursday Night Football all on the TV tonight.
And yesterday marked the beginning of a 49-day stretch with football — FBS and NFL — every single night.
Only 48 days to go. See you on the other side — the day before Thanksgiving.
🏈🍺 WATCH PARTY 🍺🏈
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• CHGO Bears Pre & Post Shows
• Bears at Ravens (noon)
• Brick By Brick w/ Briggs & Azumah
Where: Joe’s on Weed St.
When: October 26th at 10:30 a.m.
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The More You Feel Like a Busch
Backs against the wall. Live to fight another day. Any sports cliché is applicable.
It wasn’t pretty last night but there will be another baseball game at Wrigley Field today.
You Go, We Go: For the second time in the NLDS, Michael Busch led things off in the Cubs’ half of the first inning with a home run.
It’s the first time in MLB postseason history that a player has hit leadoff homers in multiple games in the same series (h/t Sarah Langs).
It was also the seventh time Busch has hit a leadoff home run in just 54 games in the top spot in the batting order.
Craig Counsell on Busch: “You can just tell by the way [the Brewers] manage the game, [Busch has] become the guy in the lineup that everybody is thinking about, and they're doing their pitching around him, and that's a credit to the player. It really is. It's not easy to do, and he's put us off to a great start in a whole bunch of these games.”
Busch on his HR: “It doesn't always go that way, but just try to have a good at-bat. From the moment I was placed in that spot, they put me there, and I thought, why change what I do, and just having a good at-bat, staying aggressive, trusting my eyes.
“From there, it's just kind of one of those things where I just try to have my at-bat. Sometimes it goes well, sometimes it doesn't. I was happy to kind of get it going, and that first inning was fun and it was good for us.”
Early, Not Often: In three games against the Brewers, the Cubs have scored just 10 runs total. Eight of those have come in the first inning.
Wednesday night’s win marked just the second time in 16 postseason games since the 2016 World Series that the Cubs eclipsed three runs of offense. The last time was Game 5 of the 2017 NLDS against the Washington Nationals.
Counsell joked: “I'm going to tell our guys it's the first inning every inning [Thursday]. I think that's our best formula right now offensively.”
Do It Again: Backs against the wall, live to fight another day—yada, yada, yada. Just like last night, it all comes down to tonight.
With the season on the line, the Cubs will likely send Game 1 starter Matthew Boyd back to the mound for a shot at redemption.
Boyd will be on normal rest this time, after he allowed six runs (two earned) in just 0.2 innings pitched on three days’ rest last Saturday.
Counsell on the Cubs’ do-or-die situation: “It's fun and stressful in the same sentence, in the same light, and I think you feel both emotions a lot. But you're playing to play tomorrow, and that can't help but give you something else. It has to.”
Tonight’s lineup construction should be an interesting one.
Aside from having Justin Turner lead off in Game 2 on Monday, Counsell hasn’t made many significant changes this postseason, only shuffling the middle of the order between the wild card and NLDS.
But Matt Shaw is somewhat of an automatic out in the nine-spot right now. This postseason, Shaw is 0-for-12 at the plate with seven strikeouts. He’s also worked four walks.
The same goes for Ian Happ, who’s 2-for-21 with 11 strikeouts.
Counsell already moved Happ down in the lineup this postseason. He can’t move Shaw any further. Maybe it’s time Willi Castro gets a chance to start.
Cubs 4, Brewers 3
CALEB VS. JAYDEN PART II: When the Bears and Commanders come together on Monday night, it’ll be the second meeting between 2024 No. 1 pick Caleb Williams and No. 2 pick Jayden Daniels.
Ben Johnson on the two QBs: I thought it was a really strong class coming out. It's probably one of the stronger in recent history. Caleb, [I] obviously felt highly about him — that is part of the reason why I wanted to come here, and I haven't been disappointed with him whatsoever. He continues to get better, elite arm strength, the ability to extend plays.
“I don't think a whole lot differently for Jayden. Jayden's an extremely accurate thrower of the football — something that I think is overlooked when you look at him because he is so dynamic with his legs, and he hurts teams so much on the ground as well. I think there are probably a lot of similarities. I think these are two ascending quarterbacks in this league and I think we're going to be talking about them for a long time in the future.”
SIGNED (reportedly): The Bulls are signing former Kentucky Wildcat and NBA journeyman Kevin Knox, according to Michael Scotto (HoopsHype).
Knox, 26, last played for the Golden State Warriors after signing a 10-day contract last February. He averaged 3.3 points in 14 regular-season appearances.
No. 1 Cake in the No. 1 City
Beautiful @portilloshotdog sunset in the Chi
— #Luke Stuckmeyer (#@LukeStuckmeyer)
11:03 PM • Oct 8, 2025
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