It’s happened. For years, we’ve watched the St. Louis Cardinals benefit from opponents suddenly forgetting how to play baseball, and that wizardry transferred over to the Milwaukee Brewers during the past decade. Now, it’s almost like the Chicago Cubs have stolen that devil magic from the Brewers because in almost every series so far in 2026, teams playing the Cubs look like fools on the field.
Whether it’s dropping pop-ups, forgetting basic rules around the bases, or players crashing into each other, the Cubs have no doubt that they have benefited from some truly hilarious mistakes. In Friday’s series opener against the Texas Rangers, you could hear the Benny Hill theme come on when Nico Hoerner hit a ground ball up the middle. It wasn’t going to be an easy play for shortstop Corey Seager, but it became a clown show when Justin Foscue, who also tried to make a play on the ball, collided with Seager next to second base.
The pair of Rangers crashed to the ground, while the ball comically squirted away, which allowed Hoerner to hustle into second base safely.
There is no denying that the Cubs have gotten plenty of breaks throughout the season, but at the same time, they’ve made teams pay for them afterward.
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After that play to leadoff the seventh inning, the Cubs loaded the bases with no outs, and although they almost botched the scoring threat, Michael Busch came through with a bases-clearing, two-out double that broke the game wide open.
Meanwhile, the other side of the coin is that the Cubs continue to play great team defense. The Cubs rank No. 1 in MLB with 18 Outs Above Average, second in defensive rating according to FanGraphs, and also second in Statcast’s fielding run value.
They’re playing good defense while also taking advantage of their opponents’ poor defense. So, while there’s some luck in play, there’s also a reason why the Cubs have been able to go on these long winning streaks.
