BOX SCORE

It was a tough road trip for the Cubs (49-35) that concluded with a 2-0 loss to the Houston Astros (50-34) in Sunday’s series finale.

Now with their lead in the NL Central dwindling, the Cubs will gladly regroup when they head back to Wrigley Field on Tuesday.

Here are three things we learned in Sunday’s rubber match loss at Daikin Park:

Welcome home, Jamo

It’s been a series chock-full of homecomings for both the Cubs and Astros, with the aftermath of the Kyle Tucker trade taking center stage throughout the weekend. 

While Jameson Taillon was never an Astro himself, he enjoyed a homecoming of his own when he took the mound on Sunday. 

As a Houston-area native, Taillon had pitched at the Astros’ home three times in his career entering Sunday: 2021 in the regular season and 2022 in the postseason, both when he was with the New York Yankees, and in 2023 with the Cubs. His start two years ago was less than ideal, allowing four earned runs on seven hits in 4.2 innings as the Cubs would fall and the Astros completed the sweep. 

This time around, Taillon had his work cut out for him in a crucial rubber match. And through four scoreless innings, he was virtually matching Houston ace Framber Valdez, allowing three hits and striking out four while issuing just one walk. However, the Astros were making Taillon work much harder: his pitch count after the fourth was at 90 compared to Valdez’s 51. 

In the fifth, Taillon was one out away from getting out of the inning unscathed and recording his first scoreless start of the year. 

But the Cubs made a decision to leave him in the game with Jose Altuve coming up to bat, and it backfired — Altuve sent Taillon’s 107th pitch into the Crawford Boxes to break the deadlock and put the Astros up 2-0. 

June gloom 

After a scorching May in which the Cubs went 18-9, June saw them treading water by the end of the month, while their NL Central rivals heated up. Sunday’s loss to the Astros capped off a 13-13 stretch and a fourth straight series matchup without a series win. Some of the numbers are eye-opening — let’s take a look: 

Runs per game

• April (24 games): 5.88
• May (27 games): 5.56
• June (26 games): 4.58

Team ERA: 

• April: 3.61
• May: 3.63
• June: 3.91

Team slash line

• April: .267 AVG/.341 OBP/.453 SLG (.794 OPS)
• May: .258/.338/.443 (.771 OPS) 
• June: .245/.302/.444 (.746 OPS) 

The only metric that the June version of the Cubs had over its previous iterations was home runs — the team slugged 45, compared to 37 in May and 32 in April. But the long ball isn’t always enough to win games, and that was apparent as the Cubs struggled to string together series wins. 

Stifled by the southpaw

The Cubs are now 11-13 against left-handed starters this season after Valdez took the win and shut out Chicago hitters.

Valdez struck out six over five innings, and even when he exited the game with 0 outs and two runners on, the Cubs couldn’t cash in. They finished the game 1-for-9 with runners in scoring position, leaving seven men on base, including four of them with two outs in an inning.

It was a stark contrast to Saturday’s offensive explosion in which the Cubs scored 12 runs to blow out the Astros, and it highlighted the Cubs’ struggles against opponents’ aces this season.

The Cubs will head back to Chicago for an off day Monday before welcoming the Cleveland Guardians to Wrigley Field for a three-game set commencing on Tuesday at 7:05 p.m. CT. 

Cubs lefty Matthew Boyd (7-3, 2.65 ERA) is slated to start opposite Cleveland right-hander Gavin Williams (5-3, 3.68 ERA) in the series opener. Coverage begins at 6 p.m. CT on Marquee Sports Network.