Cubs extend to 10 straight wins

The Cubs are doing the loudest thing a good baseball team can do in early May — they keep winning, and they keep making it feel repeatable. Friday night’s 7-1 win over the Rangers gave Chicago 10 straight victories again, which is wild enough on its own. The bigger point is that this is already their second 10-game streak of the 2026 season. That pushes the story past “hot stretch” and into “something serious might be happening here.” ### Why does a 10-game streak matter this much? A single long streak can be weird baseball math — a few bounces, a soft patch of schedule, a bullpen heater. Two separate 10-game streaks by May is different. Chicago became the first Cubs team since 1935 to post two 10-game winning streaks in the same season, and it did it before the middle of May. That is the kind of stat that cuts through the normal “small sample” warning label. (apnews.com) ### What happened in this one? The game itself was not especially dramatic, which is part of the point. Ian Happ drove in a run in the first inning and extended his on-base streak to 29 games. Michael Busch then landed the big swing — a three-run double that gave Chicago breathing room. The Cubs did not need a miracle or a late ambush. They got ahead, added on, and handled the game. Good teams make ordinary wins pile up. (apnews.com) ### How strong has Chicago looked beyond the streak? Pretty complete. Two days earlier, the Cubs finished a four-game sweep of the Reds with an 8-3 win at Wrigley. Michael Conforto homered, Shota Imanaga gave them six strong innings, and the club pushed its home winning streak to 15 games — its longest at Wrigley since 1935. So this run is not just about one lineup going nuts. The offense has depth, the rotation has been steady, and the home-field edge has started to feel real. (apnews.com) ### Is this really a contender signal? Basically, yes — at least more than the usual early-May noise. Chicago entered this stretch tied for the best record in baseball at 26-12, then kept adding to it. When a team wins this often in different ways — close games, blowouts, home games, road games — the case gets easier to make. The Cubs are not just surviving variance right now. They are stacking evidence. (espn.com) ### So where does Jacob Misiorowski fit in? He doesn’t fit the Cubs story directly — he’s a Brewers pitcher — but he does fit the bigger NL Central story, and that matters. On the same day Chicago kept rolling, Milwaukee’s Jacob Misiorowski lit up radar guns against the Yankees with 10 straight first-inning fastballs over 102.4 mph, topping out at 103.6. MLB’s pitch-tracking era has not seen a starter do that before. So while the Cubs are grabbing attention with wins, the division is also producing the kind of pitching spectacle that keeps the race interesting. (chicagotribune.com) ### Why is that worth mentioning here? Because it sharpens the stakes. The Cubs are not building a cushion in a vacuum. Their own division still has impact talent and reasons to believe. Misiorowski’s outing was a reminder that Chicago’s path is not “everyone else fades.” The Cubs look real, but the NL Central still has teeth. (mlb.com) ### What’s the bottom line? The Cubs’ real news is not just 10 straight. It’s that 10 straight has happened twice already, with everyday contributors like Happ and Busch driving games that don’t require hero-ball. That’s what changes the vibe — Chicago no longer looks like a team on a heater. It looks like a team setting the season’s terms. (mlb.com)