Chicago Cubs vs. Seattle Mariners preview, Friday 6/20, 1:20 CT

The Cubs open a series against a team from the AL West.

Friday notes…

• THE LEADOFF MAN: The Cubs’ leadoff batter in the ninth inning walked yesterday but did not score. The first Cub has reached base in 51 innings this season. The runner scored in 19 of them, 37.3 percent. Cubs pitchers have issued 55 leadoff walks and 24 of the runners scored, 43.6 percent. Cubs have walked 89 total times with nobody out and 35 scored, 39.3 percent. Opposing batters have walked 79 times with nobody out and 34 scored, 43.0 percent. (Courtesy BCB’s JohnW53)
• AFTERNOON DELIGHT: Today is the second of four consecutive days that the Cubs will play in the afternoon at Wrigley Field. This is the only such stretch of the season. The Cubs have played three straight home games in sunshine four times so far and will do so six more times before the season’s end. (Courtesy BCB’s JohnW53)
• DOING IT TOGETHER: Pete Crow-Armstrong now has 20 home runs and Seiya Suzuki 18. The fewest team games for two Cubs to reach 20 HRs in a season is 80, in 2016 (Kris Bryant and Anthony Rizzo). PCA and Suzuki are also the first duo to record 15+ homers and 55+ RBI through the club’s first 73 games of the season since KB and Rizzo in 2016.
• PUTTING UP ZEROES: The Cubs are the only team in the majors with three pitchers that have an active streak of at least 15 games without allowing an earned run: Drew Pomeranz (21 games since April 25), Caleb Thielbar (17 games since May 5) and Ryan Pressly (16 games since May 9). Those streaks are the longest, second-longest and tied for the third-longest active streaks this season, respectively.

Here are today’s particulars.

Cubs lineup:

Mariners lineup:

Matthew Boyd, LHP vs. George Kirby, RHP

Matthew Boyd has been just outstanding this year. He has allowed three or fewer earned runs in all but one of his 14 starts, and has an excellent walk rate of 5.8 percent. Can’t say enough about how good a signing this has turned out to be.

Boyd hasn’t faced the Mariners since 2023 and only Jorge Polanco (14-for-47, .298, three home runs) has seen much of him career-wise.

Just keep on doing what you’ve been doing, Matthew.

George Kirby had put together three really good years and then suffered some shoulder issues that forced him to miss much of the early part of this season. He’s made just five starts this year, and the first two were pretty disastrous. The last three have been better (3.18 ERA, 1.118 WHIP, 2.71 FIP).

This is Kirby’s first-ever start against the Cubs. A handful of Cubs have faced him elsewhere. Kyle Tucker is 5-for-15 (.333) with two walks.

Baseball Savant

Baseball Savant

Today’s game is on Marquee Sports Network. You can find out if Marquee is available via a provider in your area here. It’s also on MLB Network (outside the Cubs and Mariners market territories).

Here is the complete MLB.com live streaming page for today.

MLB.com Gameday

Baseball-reference.com game preview

Please visit our SB Nation Mariners site Lookout Landing. If you do go there to interact with Mariners fans, please be respectful, abide by their individual site rules and serve as a good representation of Cub fans in general and BCB in particular.

The 2025 Game Thread procedure will be identical to last year’s.

You’ll find the game preview posted separately on the front page two hours before game time (90 minutes for some early day games following night games).

At the same time, a StoryStream containing the preview will also post on the front page, titled “Cubs vs. (Team) (Day of week/date) game threads.” It will contain every post related to that particular game, including the First Pitch Thread and the overflow thread, as well as the recap when it’s published. The recap will also live on the front page as a separate post.

You will also be able to find the preview, First Pitch Thread and the overflow thread in the box marked “Chicago Cubs Game Threads” at the bottom of the front page (you can also find them in this section link). The StoryStream for each game can also be found in that section.

The First Pitch thread will post at five minutes before game time, then an overflow thread at 90 minutes after the scheduled game time.

Discuss amongst yourselves.