{"id":781605,"date":"2026-05-08T08:58:14","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T08:58:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/781605\/"},"modified":"2026-05-08T08:58:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T08:58:14","slug":"rangers-host-the-cubs-to-begin-3-game-series","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/781605\/","title":{"rendered":"Rangers host the Cubs to begin 3-game series"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chicago Cubs<\/a> (26-12, first in the NL Central) vs. Texas Rangers<\/a> (17-20, third in the AL West)<\/p>\n

Arlington, Texas; Friday, 8:05 p.m. EDT<\/p>\n

PITCHING PROBABLES: Cubs: Ben Brown<\/a> (1-1, 2.10 ERA, 1.01 WHIP, 24 strikeouts); Rangers: Kumar Rocker<\/a> (1-3, 4.71 ERA, 1.47 WHIP, 24 strikeouts)<\/p>\n

LINE: Cubs -137, Rangers +116; over\/under is 8 1\/2 runs<\/p>\n

BOTTOM LINE: The Texas Rangers host the Chicago Cubs on Friday to open a three-game series.<\/p>\n

Texas is 7-8 at home and 17-20 overall. The Rangers have a 9-5 record in games when they did not allow a home run.<\/p>\n

Chicago has an 8-7 record on the road and a 26-12 record overall. Cubs hitters have a collective .353 on-base percentage, the highest percentage in the NL.<\/p>\n

Friday’s game is the first time these teams match up this season.<\/p>\n

TOP PERFORMERS: Josh Jung<\/a> has 12 doubles, four home runs and 19 RBI for the Rangers. Ezequiel Duran<\/a> is 10 for 29 with three doubles, a triple, a home run and five RBI over the past 10 games.<\/p>\n

Nico Hoerner<\/a> has 11 doubles, four home runs and 28 RBI for the Cubs. Seiya Suzuki<\/a> is 12 for 38 with two doubles, three home runs and seven RBI over the last 10 games.<\/p>\n

LAST 10 GAMES: Rangers: 3-7, .226 batting average, 4.40 ERA, outscored by 15 runs<\/p>\n

Cubs: 9-1, .244 batting average, 3.76 ERA, outscored opponents by 19 runs<\/p>\n

INJURIES: Rangers: Carter Baumler: 15-Day IL (ribs), Robert Garcia: 15-Day IL (shoulder), Josh Smith<\/a>: 10-Day IL (glute), Wyatt Langford<\/a>: 10-Day IL (forearm), Cody Freeman<\/a>: 10-Day IL (back ), Chris Martin: 15-Day IL (shoulder), Cody Bradford<\/a>: 60-Day IL (elbow), Luis Curvelo: 15-Day IL (biceps), Jordan Montgomery<\/a>: 60-Day IL (elbow)<\/p>\n

Cubs: Ethan Roberts: 15-Day IL (finger), Matthew Boyd: 15-Day IL (knee), Jordan Wicks: 15-Day IL (forearm), Riley Martin: 15-Day IL (elbow), Hunter Harvey: 15-Day IL (tricep), Porter Hodge<\/a>: 60-Day IL (elbow), Caleb Thielbar: 15-Day IL (hamstring), Shelby Miller<\/a>: 60-Day IL (elbow), Justin Steele<\/a>: 60-Day IL (elbow), Christopher Austin: 60-Day IL (knee), Cade Horton<\/a>: 60-Day IL (forearm)<\/p>\n

——<\/p>\n

The Associated Press created this story using technology provided by Data Skrive<\/a> and data from Sportradar<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026 ESPN Internet Ventures. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Chicago Cubs (26-12, first in the NL Central) vs. Texas Rangers (17-20, third in the AL West) Arlington,…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":125354,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[319827,1271,5723,1266,62,1278,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-781605","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-319827","9":"tag-chicago-cubs","10":"tag-espn","11":"tag-mlb","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-texas-rangers","14":"tag-united-states","15":"tag-unitedstates","16":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116538134149083225","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/781605","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=781605"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/781605\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/125354"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=781605"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=781605"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=781605"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}