For the second consecutive season, Colin Rea got the call.
Injuries in the Cubs’ rotation has meant the righty Rea – signed ahead of last season to provide a capable rider on the starter-to-bullpen shuttle – has once more been frequently called upon as a member of the starting staff.
After beginning the year in the relief corps, Rea has made 11 starts and ranks second on the team with 74 innings pitched.
“I feel like I’ve been doing this, even when I was in Milwaukee,” Rea told the Sun-Times earlier this month. “So I guess I’m somewhat used to it. But I still go [through it] in the offseason, train as a starter, get my volume up. That way when I get to spring training and into the season, whatever happens, I’m ready for it.”
Rea has been ready, something of a savior for a Cubs team that’s been hammered with starting-pitching injuries.
But unlike last year, when Rea stepped up and posted the best statistical season of his career – a 3.95 ERA in 32 games, 27 of them starts – he has struggled to this point in 2026, watching his ERA jump to 5.35 after allowing a quartet of runs and putting too many guys on base in Sunday’s loss to the Giants.
That outing followed a disastrous game in Denver, when he allowed seven runs and a pair of homers. Only 16 pitchers in baseball have allowed more homers than Rea, who’s coughed up a dozen of them in his 15 appearances.
“We need a little better, honestly,” manager Craig Counsell said of Rea after Sunday’s game.
Rea concurred.
“Just not getting it done, really. I just need to be better,” he said. “I’m not seeming to be making pitches when I need to.”
With lefty Matthew Boyd working his way back from the injured list, could Rea be on his way back to the bullpen?
Boyd has to make it back first. The Cubs’ Opening Day starter was supposed to return last weekend, but the team slowed down his comeback after he experienced shoulder soreness.
“I don’t know what that’s going to look like,” Rea said earlier in the month, when the Cubs’ rotation was seemingly getting healthier. “If that does happen, it speaks to the position that we’re in. If we’re making moves like that, it shows our rotation is strong.
“I guess we’ll cross that bridge when it comes.”
Bridge ahead?
Suzuki returns to lineup
Right fielder Seiya Suzuki was back in the Cubs’ lineup Monday, as the designated hitter, after being scratched ahead of Sunday’s game.
Suzuki left Saturday night’s game with right knee discomfort, and the Cubs opted to be conservative in removing him from the lineup a day later.
“He’s improved,” Counsell said before Monday’s game. “I don’t think it’s gone, but he feels comfortable enough. And with [him playing] DH, I think this will give him the confidence that it’s going to get better and he’s going to be fine.
“It’s the same knee [Suzuki injured during the World Baseball Classic]. So you expect [him] to feel this over the course of the season.”
Ballesteros the backstop
Slugger Moises Ballesteros hasn’t caught a ton this season, but he’s getting more frequent assignments. He’s caught three times this month, including Monday, all with lefty Shota Imanaga on the mound.
What have the Cubs thought of Ballesteros’ catching?
“We don’t talk about Moises after the game, in terms of what happened behind the plate,” Counsell said. “And that’s a pretty good indication that he’s doing a good job.”