Brewers 9, Cubs 3: Hey, Jed! Time to bring in the reinforcements

And Ian Happ is headed to the injured list.

This is not the way we had hoped this series would go.

After an uncharacteristic bad outing from Matthew Boyd Monday, there was at least hope that Colin Rea could put together a good one Tuesday.

Welp. Didn’t happen, and the Cubs also got poor relief work and some unusual bad defense from Pete Crow-Armstrong, Matt Shaw and Nico Hoerner. All of that added up to a 9-3 loss to the Brewers, dropping the Cubs two games out of first place in the NL Central. They hadn’t been this far out of the top spot since March 30, when they lost to the Diamondbacks and were 2½ games behind.

Sigh.

Things started off all right, though. In the first inning, Rea picked off Jackson Chourio [VIDEO].

Then in the top of the second, PCA walked and Hoerner singled him to third.

PCA scored on this force out by Dansby Swanson [VIDEO].

The Brewers tied it up in the bottom of the second and took a 2-1 lead in the third, both runs scoring on sacrifice flies. The Cubs had a decent scoring chance in the top of the fifth when Matt Shaw led off with a double and one out later, Kyle Tucker walked. But Seiya Suzuki hit into an inning-ending double play and then in the bottom of the inning Rea, who had run up a high pitch count, fell apart. Chourio tripled and had to leave the game with a leg injury. William Contreras doubled in pinch runner Blake Perkins.

At that point, Drew Pomeranz replaced Rea, and got Christian Yelich to fly to center… but PCA dropped it. A single by Andrew Vaughn made it 4-1, and a walk loaded the bases. One out later, a sac fly made it 5-1.

Nico’s fourth home run of the year in the sixth brought the Cubs to within three [VIDEO].

5-2, sixth inning, still 11 outs left, this team has made some nice comebacks this year, maybe… ?

The “maybe” turned into “nope” in a big hurry, thanks to Ryan Pressly. Pressly retired the first Brewers hitter in the bottom of the sixth. Then: Walk, error by Nico, walk, grand slam by Vaughn.

I don’t know who the Cubs might acquire in the next two days to help out in the bullpen, or who they might want to call up from Triple-A Iowa. What I do know is that I do not want to see another pitch thrown by Ryan Pressly in a Cubs uniform. His last five appearances: five innings, five hits, four walks, four home runs, eight runs (seven earned). That’s a 12.60 ERA and 1.800 WHIP and just about anyone from the system could do better. Last year, the Cubs did not hesitate to move on from Hector Neris when he had a run of games like this and I think it’s time to do the same with Pressly.

In the eighth inning, Ian Happ fouled a ball off his ankle [VIDEO].

Unfortunately, that’s going to result in an IL stint for Happ:

It seems likely that Suzuki will play left field and Moises Ballesteros will DH, for a while, anyway. This points out the need for Hoyer to improve the bench.

Vidal Bruján replaced Happ and struck out.

Craig Counsell had begun emptying his bench when it was 9-2. Justin Turner batted for Michael Busch and wound up going 0-for-2. And Jon Berti batted for Kyle Tucker in the ninth and grounded out to end the game.

The combined line for Turner, Bruján and Berti this year is .211/.268/.267 (57-for-269) with two home runs (both by Turner) and 57 strikeouts. That’s just… bad. Granted that your bench players aren’t going to be as good as your starting players, because if they were… they’d be starting players somewhere. But that line is basically like having your entire bench be Miles Mastrobuoni. It’s got to be improved, along with the bullpen and starting rotation. Jed Hoyer, you’ve got work to do, and you have less than two days to do it.

The Brewers had a moment of silence in memory of Ryne Sandberg before the game, which was a nice thing to do [VIDEO].

And one last note on this game from BCB’s JohnW53:

Cubs pitchers walked six batters tonight. That was their most in 85 games, since they walked seven at San Diego way back on April 16. This was their first game of the year with six. They walked seven in three games, eight in two and nine in one. The game with nine was on March 30; the pair with eight, on March 18 and April 6.

That kind of makes it feel like the pitching staff is regressing, not improving. Thus the need for Hoyer to make moves — now.

The Cubs will try to salvage the final game of this series Wednesday afternoon in Milwaukee. Shōta Imanaga will start for the Cubs (and let’s hope he has a better game than last time!). Freddy Peralta will go for Milwaukee. Game time is 1:10 p.m. CT and TV coverage will be via Marquee Sports Network. The BCB game preview will post at 11 a.m. CT.