The Chicago Cubs were already stretching their pitching depth to the max, and then Edward Cabrera strained his hamstring against the New York Mets. Yet the Cubs took advantage of a bad team, swept the Mets, and, for a moment, fans could live in bliss, watching the Cubs get back to their winning ways. However, you can’t ignore how dire the starting rotation is now that Ben Brown may potentially miss the rest of the 2026 season.
The right-hander last pitched a week ago in the Cubs’ 16-2 win against the Toronto Blue Jays. Besides Pete Crow-Armstrong reclaiming his star status, Brown’s success as a starting pitcher has been the best storyline for the Cubs this season, and now a neck issue could completely derail the right-hander’s momentum.
The Cubs placed Brown on the 15-day injured list on Wednesday, and between their doubleheader games in New York, manager Craig Counsell gave an ominous update. Brown is dealing with a neck strain, and the team fears it is related to Brown’s 2024 injury.
As a reminder, Brown missed half of the 2024 season after he initially was sidelined because of a neck strain that was eventually diagnosed as an osteoma, a new piece of bone growing as a benign tumor on another piece of bone.
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Brown is once again dealing with pain on the left side of his neck, the same area where the benign bone tumor popped up in 2024. The Cubs are immediately shutting Brown down for the next month.
For the most part, I do try to be optimistic about player injuries, but this year’s taken its toll. Whether it’s the sheer volume of pitching injuries or the setbacks that have already occurred, I can’t help but think the worst, especially when Brown already went through a similar situation that forced him to miss a little more than half of his rookie year.
I guess the only positive is that the Cubs and Brown have already gone through this specific injury, if it is the exact same thing as the 2024 neck problem. Maybe they’ll have a better plan set in place, and Brown will be able to return. But if you look at the calendar, time isn’t necessarily on the Cubs’ side. If, and it kind of seems like a big if right now, Brown is OK after the month of inaction, he’ll have to build back up, which maybe puts his timeline to return in late August or early September. Again, that’s assuming nothing goes wrong in his recovery from now until then.
It sucks for the player, the team, and the fans. A guy who was much maligned because of his inconsistency suddenly turned into the Cubs’ best starting pitcher and was one of the best in MLB since May.
Since moving to the rotation full-time on May 8, Brown has posted a 1.70 ERA in eight starts. That’s the third-lowest ERA among qualified starting pitchers over that stretch, behind only Jacob Misiorowski (0.49) and Cristopher Sánchez (1.27). Now, we’re just hoping Brown can come back before the season is over, and who knows where the team stands by the time he does.
At 44-37, the Cubs remain in the thick of the Wild Card mix in the National League. But it is tough to imagine how they’ll get through the next six weeks, at a minimum, without two more of their starting pitchers. However, if the team can continue to win and avoid long losing stretches, then the front office should be more inclined to make a legitimate deal by the trade deadline.
Jed Hoyer hasn’t sat on his hands, trading for David Peterson this week, but the Cubs will need a lot more help if they want a real shot at making a run in October. Right now, the objective may simply be to find enough arms to even make it there.
