Matthew Boyd has been a welcome surprise for the Cubs pitching staff this season.

The 34-year-old has made every start and posted a 2.82 ERA in 153.1 innings this season after making just eight starts in the regular season last year, when he returned from Tommy John surgery.

But he hasn’t thrown this much since 2019 (185.1 innings) and has hurled more innings in the majors this season than in the previous three years combined. So after allowing a combined nine earned runs on 12 hits and six walks in 10.2 innings over his last two starts, is Boyd slowing down?

The left-hander doesn’t believe so.

“I know that these guys don’t chase much and obviously Milwaukee has a reputation of – they control the zone really well,” Boyd told reporters in San Francisco after the Cubs’ 5-2 loss to the Giants on Tuesday. “I wouldn’t say it’s anything. I think it’s more a product of where I’m at.

“It’s two outings I just haven’t been as sharp. Those combinations lead to the strengths of the team that we’re playing to put themselves in favorable situations.”

Boyd allowed three walks and six hits against the Brewers on Aug. 19, again lasting just 5.1 innings. Against the Brewers on July 28, he surrendered five free passes and six hits which led to five runs in five innings. The Cubs have lost five of Boyd’s last six starts dating back to that contest at the end of July.

But San Francisco, like Milwaukee, isn’t a team that’s going to go fishing out of the zone. The Brewers have the best chase rate in baseball – they swing at pitches out of the zone just 25.5% of the time and the Giants are eighth at 27.1%.

That creates a smaller margin of error in critical situations – like what happened on Tuesday night.

Boyd allowed a leadoff double in the fifth inning with the Cubs leading 2-1. He induced a popout and a strikeout that put him in a solid position to strand the runner. But Boyd spun a changeup that caught too much of the zone – a mistake pitch – that Heliot Ramos hit for a game-tying double.

“I threw it down and in when I was trying to throw it down-away,” Boyd said. “It’s just the way he swings. If I put that on the outer half, it’s probably a little weaker. When it’s down and in it gives him a chance to do exactly that: hook it down the line.

“In my mind, it’s the pitch I wanted to throw, I just missed with it and that’s what it came down to.”

Then, a bloop single on an inside pitch against Rafael Devers dropped in no-man’s land in left field to give the Giants the lead for good.

An inning later, Boyd walked Wilmer Flores on four pitches – the first two weren’t too far off the zone, but Flores was able to spit on the pitches and take his base.

Then, against Matt Chapman, he threw a fastball up in the zone on a 1-2 count that caught enough of the plate for the veteran third baseman to deposit it for a two-run home run.

“Probably would have liked it maybe a few inches higher, but he was on it, so hats off to him,” Boyd said. “Unfortunately, that was the difference in the game there. Wish I could have been a little better with that, but he’s a pro hitter and kind of hit my mistake there.”

Now, Boyd is focused on making some tweaks and returning to the pitcher that has essentially carried the Cubs’ rotation this season. It’s what he’s done after every outing – he threw seven shutout innings against the Orioles after the July 28 start vs. Milwaukee and spun seven innings of two-run ball in Toronto before these last two clunkers.

“There’s always adjustments when you have the good outings or bad outings,” Boyd said. “There’s adjustments that we’re going to make and there’s adjustments that we made after we [went] seven innings against Baltimore, the shutout. Same thing after Toronto. There’s always adjustments you’re going to make.

“You got to look at it as kind of in just the sense of ‘I made a few mistakes, and they hit them.’ We’ll make the adjustments we need to make and get ready for Sunday.”