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Out since July 5 with a bruised left heel, Danby Swanson said he was getting “stir crazy.”
After a game that was simply crazy, the Chicago Cubs celebrated Swanson’s return Saturday with a big win against the rival St. Louis Cardinals.
Swanson had two of the team’s 15 hits and Cody Bellinger stayed hot with four RBIs as the Cubs rallied from three deficits and, after two rain delays, emerged with an 8-6 victory in front of 40,425 fans at Wrigley Field.
“The game can be played so many different ways,” Swanson said. “I think it’s being able to prove to ourselves that no matter how the game goes, we still have a good chance to win. (Saturday) we did a really good job of that.”
The Cubs (47-51) scored three times in the sixth inning for the final answer in a back-and-forth game. Bellinger produced a two-run single with the bases loaded and Seiya Suzuki followed with the second of his three hits to drive in another run.
Bellinger continued to boost his stock as the Aug. 1 trade deadline approaches, while his teammates certainly hope he stays around.
“Cody is a great player,” Swanson said, “I’ve always been a fan of his from afar, playing against him for the last five or six years. To be able to witness it every day is awesome. He’s a guy who has a lot of confidence and a lot of belief, and you couple that with the baseball ability he has and it’s fun to watch.”
Nico Hoerner went 3-for-4 with three runs and Ian Happ was 2-for-3 with three runs.
Daniel Palencia (2-0) picked up the second win of his career by recording just one out, the final one in the top of the sixth, despite allowing two walks and two wild pitches, the latter scoring a run that briefly gave the Cardinals (39-60) a 6-5 lead.
Adbert Alzolay struck out the final two hitters in a scoreless ninth to earn his ninth save.
Swanson was activated from the injured list before the game, with Jared Young optioned to Triple-A Iowa. Young hit .171 with a home run, two triples and five RBIs over 13 games.
Swanson doubled in his first at-bat, singled in his second and made a sharp defensive play on Tyler O’Neill’s hard-hit grounder in the seventh.
“Dansby’s really important to our success,” manager David Ross said. “His play has been missed. Having him in the lineup with his leadership on the field and defensively, his hardware speaks for itself. He’s worked really hard and been itching to get back.”
Ross said Swanson spent a lot of his time on the bench trying to help teammates.
“He’s tried to be manager, hitting coach, infield coach,” Ross said. “He just can’t turn it off. It’s been fun watching him interact in the dugout and the clubhouse. We’ve had a lot of good conversations since he went down.”
Swanson did his best to give guys pointers as he was able to watch the game from a different perspective.
“You can take a little bit of a step back and it’s easier to see things,” Swanson said. “You get so in it and you’re focused on the game and being able to win. When you can’t play, the emphasis is a little more on looking around and thinking things like, ‘What can we do better?’ ”
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Ross said he’d use Swanson as a third-base coach if he weren’t an All-Star player. So is that type of role in Swanson’s future?
His wife, Mallory — a star player for the Chicago Red Stars and U.S. women’s national team who is currently injured — thinks so.
“My wife tells me I’m for sure coaching,” Swanson said. “I don’t know. That’s far down the line. But I do enjoy helping other people.”
The Cubs used reliever Michael Fulmer as an opener Saturday, Fulmer making his first start since 2021 and giving Drew Smyly a chance to come on in relief.
Smyly had struggled mightily in his previous four starts, allowing 19 earned runs over 17 1/3 innings.
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The plan backfired early as Fulmer allowed a home run to Lars Nootbaar on the first pitch of the game before settling in to get through the two innings without allowing another run.
“Just go get outs,” Fulmer said. “It’s like riding a bike from just a few years prior. We just had to win. That’s the only thing that mattered, so obviously the strategy paid off.”
Smyly entered in the third and ended up facing the top of the lineup anyway, and Nootbaar doubled to start a two-run inning.
Smyly made it 3 2/3s innings, allowing five runs — four earned — on six hits. He struck out five and walked one.
The opener strategy was a new one for Ross.
“It was just lining up best matchups, trying to give Smyly a bit of a softer landing to start,” Ross said. “It turned out they loaded all the righties at the bottom, so we let Fulmer roll (in the second inning). You try to plan some things out that make sense number-wise and then you’ve got to go play the game. The first pitch of the game gets hit out of the ballpark by a lefty. Nootbaar gets a double off Smyly.
“Things didn’t really go our way pitching-wise, but I think that’s the resiliency of this group. They just continue to fight no matter what’s thrown at them.”
