Missed any action from the first three Cubs spring training games? No worries, we have you covered. But first, Craig Counsell’s roast session started on Friday and Marquee Sports reporter Taylor McGregor was his target.
Fans got to see the ABS challenge system in full effect as the Cubs hosted the White Sox at Sloan Park to open up spring training this year. Both teams challenged balls/strikes calls, which led to Cubs play-by-play man Boog Sciambi jokingly suggesting to Counsell to use the head-tapping motion that players will now use to challenge a call during press conferences after a bad question from a reporter.
Counsell liked the idea and then roasted McGregor.
Only main takeaways from Friday’s Cactus League opener were Seiya Suzuki’s power being present and will need to be with Kyle Tucker gone and unfortunately a rough start for Porter Hodge, who is battling for a bullpen spot. Read more about that here. Jameson Taillon got hit around, but there’s no reason to worry.
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Moving on Saturday’s 3-2 loss against the Texas Rangers, the top headline was top-10 Cubs prospect Jonathon Long suffering an elbow sprain. The right-handed hitting corner infielder had a stellar 2025 season at Triple-A and was set to participate in this year’s World Baseball Classic. However, the arm injury now has Long’s status questionable on the Chinese Taipei roster.
Meanwhile, Matt Shaw made his first start in right field for the Cubs and while the team was hoping he’d get more action as he learns a new defensive position, Shaw only had one fly ball hit at him in five innings.
Not the best rep, but Shaw recovered a made the play.
He has plenty of athleticism to help any shortcomings as the outfield is obviously not his natural position.
Daniel Palencia made his spring training debut and he was already pumping 100mph on the radar gun. The 26-year-old led the Cubs with 22 saves in 2025, after taking over as the team’s closer in May. Palencia will begin this year as the closer once again. The hard-throwing righty will be pitching for Venezuela in the 2026 World Baseball Classic.
Not sure why, but there have been some issues with the ABS challenge system so far in spring training.
Better get that figured out before Opening Day.
Sunday’s game against the San Francisco Giants was in one word chaotic. Before the embarrassing triple play that ended the first inning there was confusion inside the stadium as an emergency announcement went off, alerting fans to evacuate immediately.
That happened during the middle of Alex Bregman’s at-bat.
Luckily, it appeared to be a false alarm and there was no emergency in the stadium after all.
I still have no idea what was going through Shaw’s head here.
Left-handed reliever Riley Martin looked great in his first inning of work on Sunday. The 27-year-old was added to the team’s 40-man roster heading into the offseason after putting up big strikeout numbers in Triple-A. The Cubs have a pair of veteran relievers in the bullpen with Caleb Thielbar and Hoby Milner this year, but Martin along with Luke Little are around in case of emergency if the team needs a lefty reliever to step up.
We might have already seen the closest challenge of the year.
Looking ahead to the next week of spring training action fans won’t be able to watch any of it live as the Cubs won’t have a broadcasted game until Saturday, when the Los Angeles Dodgers will air the game on their network. As a matter of fact, after the first three spring training games were available to watch, the first two on Marquee and then Sunday’s game on the Giants’ TV partner, the Cubs will only have 13 more spring training games shown on TV between Marquee and the opposing team’s broadcasts.
