![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/05\/Cliff-Lee-phillies.jpg\")
<\/a>Chicago was denied its first three-game winning streak Friday night in falling 7-5 to Philadelphia, as its the only team that has not won three games in a row this season.\u00a0 The Cubs will be playing their ninth game (2-6) of a stretch that sees the club play 38 games in 38 days through July 10.\u00a0 Saturday will mark the team\u2019s fifth appearance on FOX Saturday regional broadcasts this year, posting a 2-2 mark in such contests.\u00a0 Facing left-handed starters hasn\u2019t been a bad proposition for the offense, owning a .290 batting average, which is second in the National League and third in the Majors.\u00a0 Chicago is still just 8-7 versus southpaws this season and 51-51 over the last three campaigns.<\/p>\n
Cubs starting pitcher Matt Garza is 2-5 with a 4.07 ERA in 10 starts this season and is coming off an 8-2 road defeat to the Reds.\u00a0 In that particular start, he allowed four runs and six hits over four innings, which was also his first outing since May 17.\u00a0 \u201cPhysically I felt fine,\u201d Garza commented after the start.\u00a0 \u201cI was a little off.\u00a0 That\u2019s not what I wanted.\u201d\u00a0 The right-hander has compiled a losing 1-3 mark and 5.16 ERA in five road starts, surrendering just a single home run in 29 2\/3 innings.\u00a0 Garza has faced the Phillies just once in the regular season, tallying a win by giving up just a single run over eight strong innings as a member of the Rays on June 24, 2009.<\/p>\n
Philadelphia had averaged 2.8 runs per game in its first eight games this month, hitting .207 with a .316 on-base percentage, but exploded for seven runs last night.\u00a0 The Phillies have tallied an impressive 105-75 mark against National League Central division teams since the beginning of the 2007 season.\u00a0 During that same five-year span, the club has gone 60-29 against that particular division at home.\u00a0 A concern for fans leading into the rest of the month is the club\u2019s lack of winning during the month of June in recent years, failing to post a record above .500 since 2007.\u00a0 Philadelphia is 22-12 in home games this year and 127-82 over the last three years.<\/p>\n
Phillies starting pitcher Cliff Lee is 5-5 with a 3.62 ERA in 13 starts this season and has alternated wins and losses over his last three outings.\u00a0 He tallied a 3-1 home win over the Dodgers last time out, tossing seven shutout innings, while issuing just a single walk and compiling 10 strikeouts.\u00a0 Lee has posted a solid 4-1 mark and 2.34 ERA in seven home starts, surrendering just three home runs in 50 frames.\u00a0 In four career starts versus the Cubs, he has a perfect 3-0 record and 1.71 ERA, holding the club to a .231 average.<\/p>\n
Bettors will likely back the Phillies due to their 8-2 record in Lee\u2019s last 10 home starts, while the Cubs are 1-4 in Garza\u2019s last five road contests<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Chicago Cubs and Philadelphia Phillies have split the first two games of their four-game series at Citizens Bank Park Chicago Cubs at Philadelphia Phillies Chicago was denied its first three-game winning streak Friday night in falling 7-5 to Philadelphia, as its the only team that has not won three games in a row this […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":15570,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444],"tags":[180,1752,102,339,98],"class_list":["post-16068","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","tag-chicago-cubs","tag-citizens-bank-park","tag-cliff-lee","tag-matt-garza","tag-philadelphia-phillies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16068","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/181"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16068"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16068\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16070,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16068\/revisions\/16070"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15570"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16068"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16068"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16068"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}