![\"Cubs](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/CTC-Z-CUBS-JAYS_d177fe.jpg\")
Cubs designated hitter Owen Caissie takes the field for warmups ahead of his major-league debut against the Blue Jays on Aug. 14, 2025, in Toronto. (Mark Blinch\/Getty Images)<\/p>\nTORONTO \u2014 Minutes before his major-league debut in the ballpark about 35 miles from his high school against the team he grew up rooting for, Owen Caissie stretched by himself along the right-field line at the Rogers Centre.<\/p>\n
The whirlwind journey to get him from Des Moines, Iowa, to Toronto in time for Thursday\u2019s 3:07 p.m. start was cutting it close enough that Chicago Cubs manager Craig Counsell wanted to make sure he would get there in time before officially locking him in batting fifth as the designated hitter in a 2-1 loss to the Blue Jays.<\/p>\n
Even the Canadian\u2019s parents made it to the stadium from their Burlington, Ontario, home before the Cubs top prospect arrived roughly 90 minutes before first pitch. Caissie had enough time to get some swings in the cage before stepping into the box against future Hall of Famer Max Scherzer. When Caissie called his parents to share the news of the call-up Wednesday night, he mentioned to his mom that Scherzer would be starting for the Blue Jays. That tidbit elicited a look of \u201cgood luck!\u201d on his mom\u2019s face.<\/p>\n
Caissie was 5 years, 9 months old when Scherzer made his MLB debut.<\/p>\n
\u201cI felt good, took a couple good swings, but it was pretty cool,\u201d Caissie said.<\/p>\n
The 23-year-old slugger nearly recorded his first big-league hit on the first pitch he saw. He went the opposite way on Scherzer\u2019s fastball that took an all-out diving catch by Blue Jays left fielder Davis Schneider to rob Caissie of an extra-base hit. Caissie, who finished 0-for-4 with a strikeout, called it a \u201cwelcome to the league\u201d moment.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was surreal,\u201d Caissie said. \u201cGrowing up watching Blue Jays, I\u2019m just super thankful that the Cubs could make my debut happen but not only about my debut but in front of the Canadian people that I cherish so much. I\u2019m super excited and got to keep rolling, hopefully get some more W\u2019s along the road.\u201d<\/p>\n
The series finale quickly turned into a pitchers\u2019 duel between Scherzer and left-hander Matthew Boyd.<\/p>\n
Michael Busch homered in a second consecutive game to put the Cubs up 1-0 in the sixth, though it wouldn\u2019t hold up long. Boyd\u2019s only mistakes came against two of the first three Blue Jays hitters in the seventh. He issued a leadoff walk, his only of the day, and left an 0-2 curveball too much in the zone to Vladimir Guerrero Jr., who slugged it for the go-ahead two-run home run. Boyd allowed only two hits in seven innings, striking out five.<\/p>\n
Caissie\u2019s arrival won\u2019t suddenly cure the Cubs\u2019 continued struggles to come through with runners in scoring position.<\/p>\n
Cubs designated hitter Owen Caissie takes the field for warmups ahead of his major-league debut against the Blue Jays on Aug. 14, 2025, in Toronto. (Mark Blinch\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n
The Cubs (68-52) finished 0-for-8 in such situations Thursday while leaving seven on base. Twice in the late innings they wasted prime scoring opportunities by failing to even put the ball in play. The Cubs got the first two on in the eighth trailing by a run, but with runners at second and third, the next three hitters \u2014 Ian Happ, Kyle Tucker and Carson Kelly \u2014 struck out. All three outs in the ninth also came on strikeouts with Willi Castro and Dansby Swanson whiffing to strand Nico Hoerner.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had a bunch of warning-track balls but just couldn\u2019t get any kind of offense, couldn\u2019t get an inning going, really at all,\u201d Counsell said. \u201cWe just didn\u2019t get the job done, simple as that.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Cubs fell eight games behind the first-place Milwaukee Brewers in the National League Central.<\/p>\n
Caissie\u2019s big-league arrival is the culmination of nearly five years in the organization dating to when he became the standout piece in the multiplayer trade that sent Yu Darvish to the San Diego Padres in December 2020.<\/p>\n
Counsell isn\u2019t sure Caissie will have a big role while he\u2019s in the majors \u2014 their outfielders have remained so healthy this season that this is the first time they brought up an outfielder from Triple A \u2014 but this stretch of the schedule felt like a chance for the Cubs to be more flexible with their roster. Miguel Amaya\u2019s left ankle sprain<\/a> and subsequent move to the injured list Thursday created the opportunity for the Cubs to see what Caissie can do after delivering a .289 average, .389 on-base percentage and .955 OPS in 93 games for Iowa.<\/p>\n \u201cHe hits the ball extremely hard,\u201d Counsell said. \u201cI think he\u2019s going to hit a lot of home runs someday \u2014 he\u2019s not a home run hitter right now. He\u2019s just a good all-around hitter, good plate discipline.\u201d<\/p>\n Over the last six weeks, Caissie\u2019s in-zone contact has improved and with it a notable decrease in his whiff rate. His steady rise through the minors at such a young age, often one of if not the youngest player at the level, meant repeating at Iowa this year. Counsell noted how that\u2019s usually not the typical path for a prospect, but it\u2019s \u201creally a credit because Owen got to Triple A so young and so quickly.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cJust to keep going and for a season to keep getting better is a great sign for his drive and his commitment and dedication and his hunger, really,\u201d Counsell said. \u201cHe\u2019s earned this promotion, and we\u2019re all really happy for him.\u201d<\/p>\n Caissie became the fourth Cub to make his big-league debut this year at 23 or younger, joining right-hander Cade Horton<\/a>, third baseman Matt Shaw<\/a> and catcher\/DH Mois\u00e9s Ballesteros<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cTo be a healthy organization, you need to have young players ready to step up and contribute,\u201d assistant general manager and former farm director Jared Banner said Thursday. \u201cSo I think it\u2019s a sign of our organizational health, and it\u2019s a sign of a player development group that\u2019s doing a really good job getting guys ready.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TORONTO \u2014 Minutes before his major-league debut in the ballpark about 35 miles from his high school against…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":146785,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5124],"tags":[5437,17625,960,1271,1816,5604,5386,1818,5605,30300,5436,5920,5606,67238,86766,1290,86767],"class_list":{"0":"post-146784","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-chicago","8":"tag-cade-horton","9":"tag-carson-kelly","10":"tag-chicago","11":"tag-chicago-cubs","12":"tag-craig-counsell","13":"tag-ian-happ","14":"tag-il","15":"tag-illinois","16":"tag-kyle-tucker","17":"tag-matt-shaw","18":"tag-matthew-boyd","19":"tag-max-scherzer","20":"tag-michael-busch","21":"tag-moises-ballesteros","22":"tag-owen-caissie","23":"tag-toronto-blue-jays","24":"tag-vladimir-guererro-jr"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115030685963447715","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146784","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=146784"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146784\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/146785"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=146784"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=146784"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=146784"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}