You can read a full report from the game here:
All of the analysis entering Game 2 said the Cubs needed to avoid having to score off the Cleveland bullpen and they did just that: taking the lead in the top of the 1st inning and extending it from there.
Jake Arrieta was at his best through the bulk of his appearance and Cleveland wasn’t able to bridge the gap -- or even get a hit for much of the game.
Game 3 will be Friday night: Josh Tomlin vs. Kyle Hendricks. At Wrigley Field. This is what you’ve been waiting for, Chicago. Good luck.
Updated
Cubs win. Cubs win. World Series tied at 1-1.
Chapman gets Perez to ground out to Addison Russell and 4 hours and 4 minutes after the first pitch -- and before the heavy rains arrived -- the Cubs have won their first World Series game since 1945.
Cubs 5-1 Indians, bottom of the 9th
Chapman gets Crisp to ground out to second. We’re now one out away from the start of perhaps the biggest weekend-long party in the history of Chicago.
Cubs 5-1 Indians, bottom of the 9th
Chapman Ks Rajai Davis to start the ninth and hits 102 mph. He must be struggling to get loose in this cold weather.
End of the top of the 9th inning: Cubs 5-1 Indians
Clevinger goes three up, three down in just 10 pitches. Aroldis Chapman will now try to finish off Cleveland even faster. (Faster in mph, if not in time.)
Cubs 5-1 Indians, top of the 9th
Jason Heyward strikes out. Jason Heyward: proof that Theo Epstein is far from infallible.
Cubs 5-1 Indians, top of the 9th
Mike Clevinger is now in to pitch for Cleveland and he gets Contreras to fly to Rajai Davis in center on his first pitch.
End of the 8th: Cubs 5-1 Indians
Chapman ends the inning with ... you’ll never guess ... a strikeout. His first pitch was only 102 mph. I guess the World Series didn’t give him any adrenaline to really dial it up.
Cubs 5-1 Indians, bottom of the 8th
With two out, Napoli lines a single to center. Maddon is now out to remove Montgomery. Aroldis Chapman will now enter.
And after the shot of Headdress Wearing Indians Fan, the Cubs bring in Chapman. The World Series Of Horrific Optics is officially on!
— Hunter Felt (@HunterFelt) October 27, 2016
Updated
Last @Cubs WS win featured: Skeeter Webb, Dizzy Trout, Jimmy Outlaw, Virgil Trucks, Heinz Becker, Cy Block & Peanuts Lowrey.
— Batting Stance Guy (@BattingStanceG) October 27, 2016
Cubs 5-1 Indians, bottom of the 8th
Montgomery quickly retires Kipnis as the rain begins to fall. Maybe the players decided to end this game quickly. Maybe.
End of the top of the 8th inning: Cubs 5-1 Indians
Otero gets Baez, meaning he’s retired five Cubs tonight on 19 pitches. Cleveland now has six outs to get four runs.
Cubs 5-1 Indians, top of the 8th
Otero gets Schwarber looking. He’s been outstanding tonight. It’s like we’re getting to see Andrew Miller pitch in someone else’s body.
Cubs 5-1 Indians, top of the 8th
Otero remains in the game for Cleveland and retires Zobrist. Schwarber is now up and the people writing his legend await another chapter.
End of the 7th inning: Cubs 5-1 Indians
Montgomery strikes out Santana to end the threat and what may turn out to be Cleveland’s last, best shot of the night.
Cubs 5-1 Indians, bottom of the 7th
Montgomery walks Perez and now Santana is stepping into the box. The crowd has come alive again.
Cubs 5-1 Indians, bottom of the 7th
Guyer lines the ball into right-center for a hit. Roberto Perez is now up. Cleveland could use some of his Game 1 powers here.
Cubs 5-1 Indians, bottom of the 7th
Montgomery remains in the game for Chicago and strikes out Rajai Davis and then Coco Crisp to start the bottom of the 7th. Now Brandon Guyer is up to pinch hit for Naquin.
Joe Buck thought this guy was really funny, in case you're still torn on the Is Joe Buck Good Or Terrible debate. pic.twitter.com/q5v0pxVLWZ
— DJ Gallo (@DJGalloEtc) October 27, 2016
End of the top of the 7th inning: Cubs 5-1 Indians
Rizzo flies out to left to leave the bases loaded. Great job by Otero to keep the score unchanged against Bryant and Rizzo. He’s the savior if Cleveland can somehow claw back.
Cubs 5-1 Indians, top of the 7th
Otero gets Bryant to ground to third, prompting a 5-2 force-out. Bryant beat out the throw from home to first to keep the inning going.
Cubs 5-1 Indians, top of the 7th
Fowler now gets his first hit of the World Series and the bases are loaded with only one out for Kris Bryant. Gulp. So much for ending this one quickly before the rain comes.
Dan Otero will replace Manship on the mound.
Updated
Cubs 5-1 Indians, top of the 7th
Cleveland now has men on first and second with one out. After Jason Heyward was retired, Russell reached on an error credit to Kipnis. Just a sloppy game all around tonight by Cleveland. That usually doesn’t have a good outcome against this kind of competition.
Cubs 5-1 Indians, top of the 7th
Jeff Manship is now in to pitch for Cleveland and he walks Contreras to start. Not ideal.
Based on the radar, Progressive Field is about to get very wet.
Let’s wrap these three innings up in 10 minutes, shall we, boys?
End of the 6th inning: Cubs 5-1 Indians
Montgomery gets a quick out and we’ve got three innings left featuring the bullpens.
Jake Arrieta led the NL with 16 wild pitches this season.
— Katie Sharp (@ktsharp) October 27, 2016
Cleveland scores on a wild pitch by Arrieta.
Cubs 5-1 Indians, bottom of the 6th inning
Cleveland cuts into the lead thanks to Arrieta chucking one to the backstop. And now Napoli has singled.
The Cubs have people warming up in the bullpen ... and Joe Maddon is coming out to replace him with Mike Montgomery.
Cubs 5-0 Indians, bottom of the 6th inning
Lindor chops out to second to quiet a crowd that was awakend by the first Cleveland hit. Two outs, Kipnis now at third and Napoli at the plate.
Updated
Jason Kipnis doubles to get Cleveland's first hit of the night
Can you “lose” a no-hitter in the 6th inning? If so, Arrieta just lost one with a double by Kipnis.
Arrieta is now at 88 pitches, so even if Kipnis didn’t even his bid, Joe Maddon probably would have in an inning or two.
Cubs 5-0 Indians, bottom of the 6th inning
Arrieta retires Santana for the third time tonight and now Kipnis is up.
Updated
Cubs hitters have seen 153 pitches thru 6 innings. If this game gets rain-delayed, do we blame them, Indians pitchers or Mother Nature?
— Jayson Stark (@jaysonst) October 27, 2016
End of the top of the 6th inning: Cubs 5-0 Indians
Baez pops up to end the threat, but that’s okay. Cubs fans just want to watch Arrieta right now anyway. He’ll face the top of the Cleveland lineup to open the bottom of the sixth.
Updated
Cubs 5-0 Indians, top of the 6th
Zobrist singles -- he’s now 2-for-3 with a walk tonight -- to bring up Schwarber ... and Salazar walks him. Progressive Field is dead quiet right now. The kind of quiet that comes when fans realize they spent hundreds of dollars for a ticket to watch their favorite team get killed.
Cubs 5-0 Indians, top of the 6th
Danny Salazar is now in to pitch for Cleveland and he gets Bryant to fly out to center. He hasn’t pitched since September 9th due to injury, but being rusty didn’t seem to hurt Schwarber.
And there’s the second out after Rizzo rips a hard ground ball to first. That’s the first time Rizzo hasn’t reached tonight.
Updated
End of the 5th innings: Cubs 5-0 Indians
Perez drives one to the warning track in left, but it’s caught. And Arrieta has a no-hitter through five.
Updated
Cubs 5-0 Indians, bottom of the 5th
Arrieta strikes out Naquin and he’s now more than halfway to a no-hitter in a World Series game.
Loud noises, etc.
Cubs 5-0 Indians, bottom of the 5th
Crisp leads off with a fly ball out to right. So we’re all just sticking around to see if Arrieta throws a no-hitter, right? Thought so.
Updated
Indians pitchers are trying to prevent a no-hitter by lulling Jake Arrieta to sleep.
— Emma Span (@emmaspan) October 27, 2016
End of the top of the 5th inning: Cubs 5-0 Indians
Shaw strikes out Fowler and the Indians are mercifully allowed to run off the field and hide in the dugout.
Updated
Shaw walks in a run on four pitches. Cubs up 5-0.
Cubs 5-0 Indians, top of the 5th
Shaw walks Russell on four pitches and he’s still out there. Francona is kind of giving up at this point.
Cubs 4-0 Indians, top of the 5th
Shaw walks Soler to load the bases. I suppose it’s too early to put Andrew Miller in, huh?
Cubs 4-0 Indians, top of the 5th
The wheels are coming off a bit here now for the Indians. Contreras hit a routine grounder to Kipnis at second, Kipnis bobbles, Contreras ran all out, and Contreras was safe. Runners at first and third now with two out. (Schwarber reached second on a passed ball.)
Updated
Schwarber knocks in another run and it's 4-0 Cubs.
Cubs 4-0 Indians, top of the 5th
New Cleveland pitcher Bryan Shaw opened with two strikes on Schwarber, then threw a ball, then gave up a hit to The Baseball Gronk through the infield. Zobrist scored and now it’s 4-0.
Updated
Cubs go up 3-0 on a triple to right by Ben Zobrist.
Cubs 3-0 Indians, top of the 5th
Zobrist turned on one and ripped it into the right field corner. Rizzo may have had to stay at third, but Chisenhall fell down tracking down the ball and that allowed Rizzo to score and Zobrist to advance to third on the throw home.
McAllister is now being removed by Francona.
Updated
Cubs 2-0 Indians, top of the 5th
Rizzo earns a walk on an 11-pitch at bat. Halfway through the 11 pitches he ripped one deep down the right field line, but it went just foul.
He’s reached base three times tonight already. So much for that slump he was in.
Cubs 2-0 Indians, top of the 5th
McAllister opens the fifth with a strikeout of Bryant. He’s now K’d both Cubs he’s seen tonight.
Must be weird for McAllister to pitch against the Cubs in the World Series, since I assume he grew up a Chicago fan. pic.twitter.com/wwvGiMrNBe
— DJ Gallo (@DJGalloEtc) October 27, 2016
End of the 4th: Cubs 2-0 Indians
After Ramirez worked a walk, Chisenhall popped up to shallow left field to end the inning.
Arrieta still hasn’t allowed a hit through 4 innings. (This isn’t a jinx. The old baseball thing about not talking about no-hitters didn’t include live blogs, as live blogs did not exist in older times.)
Updated
#Cavs are here. #Worldseries pic.twitter.com/ZjWaO1fPJF
— Tom Withers (@twithersAP) October 27, 2016
Cubs 2-0 Indians, bottom of 4th
Napoli hits a lazy fly to center for the second out. Okay, a soft fly. I don’t want to besmirch the fly’s work ethic.
Updated
Cubs 2-0 Indians, bottom of 4th
Arrieta strikes out Lindor to start the inning. He now has 5 Ks through 3 1/3 and is rolling after that wild first inning.
Annnnnnd ... right after I say that he almost throws one to the back stop to get to 2-0 on Napoli.
Updated
End of the top of the 4th inning: Cubs 2-0 Indians
McAllister Ks Fowler on three pitches. We’ll grade that move there by Francona to the bullpen a solid A.
Cleveland pulls starter Trevor Bauer after 3 2/3 innings
Bauer is getting the hook after giving up a hard single to center to Russell. He exits after 87 pitches. Zach McAllister is on in relief and will face the top of the lineup with two outs and Russell on first.
Cubs 2-0 Indians, top of the 4th
Soler grounds into a double play, but it was more than Cleveland created the double play. Kipnis stabbed the ball hit hard to his left, turned and threw it to Lindor at the bag, and then Lindor immediately unloaded it on a line to first to get Soler by a half-step. Beautiful play.
Cubs 2-0 Indians, top of the 4th
Contreras walks after getting to a full count. On 3-1 he took a pitch right down the middle of the plate and then skipped off to first like it was a ball. Umpires love that.
But Bauer’s ball four missed so bad that the ump couldn’t not call it a ball.
"Yeah, the @Cubs used the Bryzzo GIF again after that RBI double."
— Cleveland Indians (@Indians) October 26, 2016
"They need new GIFs, so played out."#RallyTogether pic.twitter.com/tZROnHAtln
Cubs 2-0 Indians, bottom of the 3rd
Arrieta strikes out Santana on a borderline strike. He now has three strikeouts in a row.
His streak quickly ends when Kipnis makes contact ... but it’s still an out. A liner to center ends the third inning. Contreras will lead off the top of the 4th for the Cubs.
Cubs 2-0 Indians, bottom of the 3rd
Arrieta strikes out Roberto Perez/The Greatest Hitter Ever on a full count to open the home half of the third.
Maybe he said ... uh ... “So much drama?”
Is Kyle Schwarber yelling "SUCK MY D***!" to his dugout?
— Dr Cork Gaines (@CorkGaines) October 27, 2016
MLB must love that. https://t.co/kbYrAfttGe
End of the top of the 3rd inning: Cubs 2-0 Indians
Baez strikes out to finally end a half-inning that looked like it would pass quietly after the first two batters went down quickly. But the run of Rizzo-Zobrist-Schwarber has the Cubs up two runs as we head to the bottom of the third.
Schwarber rips a single through the middle to score Rizzo.
Cubs 2-0 Indians, top of the 3rd
Schwarber probably just locked up the Arizona Fall League MVP. Zobrist is now on third, Schwarber on first with two away. Bauer up to 68 pitches.
Cubs 1-0 Indians, top of the 3rd
Zobrist single up the middle and now the Cubs have something going: first and second with two out and Kyle Schwarber at the plate.
Cubs 1-0 Indians, top of the 3rd
So much for a quick inning by Bauer. After retiring Fowler and Bryant on four pitches, he went 0-2 on Rizzo ... only to then walk him. Now Zobrist is up with one on and two out.
Cubs 1-0 Indians, top of the 3rd
Bryant gets the first pitch of the at-bat right over the meat of the plate, but over-swings and lines to shortstop. Bauer has two outs on four pitches.
Cubs 1-0 Indians, top of the 3rd
We’re back to the top of the Chicago order and Dexter Fowler quickly goes back to the bench after tapping out to second.
Updated
End of the 2nd inning: Cubs 1-0 Indians
Arrieta gets the third out by humming a 94 mph pitch by Naquin. Arrieta really settled down in the 2nd inning, which should allow about 15 million Cubs fans to settle down.
Cubs 1-0 Indians, bottom of the 2nd
After the first two pitches missed by a lot, Arrieta grooves the third pitch to Coco Crisp who rips it ... right into the glove of Baez. Two away.
Cubs 1-0 Indians, bottom of the 2nd
Chisenhall quickly grounds out to second to open Cleveland’s half of the inning. I would have thought the approach would be to let Arrieta throw some pitches to see if he’s still wild, but it was not.
End of the top of the 2nd: Cubs 1-0 Indians
Russell rips one to the warning track in right on a line, but Chisenhall nabs it high over his head to end the inning.
Bauer finishes the second inning with 51 pitches in the game. Even if the plan wasn’t to lean on the bullpen early night, Cleveland may have to anyway.
Cubs are 7-1 this postseason when scoring at least 1 run.
— Katie Sharp (@ktsharp) October 26, 2016
I wonder what their record is when they don’t score runs.
Cubs 1-0 Indians, top of the 2nd inning
Soler skies a short fly ball to center for the second out. Baez remains at first with Addison Russell now stepping into the box.
Cubs 1-0 Indians, top of the 2nd inning
Contreras lifts a fly ball to right-center that Chisenhall parks under for the first out. The crowd seems quiet tonight, as they are probably literally sitting on their hands because it’s so cold.
Cubs 1-0 Indians, top of the 2nd inning
Baez reaches first after chopping a ball down the third base line that Ramirez couldn’t get to.
End of the 1st inning: Cubs 1-0 Indians
Jose Ramirez gave it a ride to the center field warning track, the deepest part of the track and Fowler tracked it down. The Cubs are fortunate to get out of that half-inning without being scored upon.
The first inning lasted 32 minutes, meaning we’re on pace for a 4 hours, 48 minute game that will be interrupted by rain.
Cubs 1-0 Indians, bottom of the 1st
Uh-oh. Arrieta now walked Napoli, too. He’s up to 18 pitches in the inning after getting the first two batters out quickly.
He’s now getting a visit on the mound from pitching coach Chris Bosio.
Cubs 1-0 Indians, bottom of the 1st
Whoops. I wish I hadn’t just said that the good Arrieta seems to have shown up. He then walked the speedy Francisco Lindor on four pitches that were nowhere near the strike zone.
Cubs 1-0 Indians, bottom of the 1st
Jason Kipnis Ks quickly. The good Arrieta appears to have shown up so far.
Cubs 1-0 Indians, bottom of the 1st
Carlos Santana pops the third pitch from Arrieta up to short for the first out.
Jake Arrieta is not wearing long sleeves tonight, which suggests that he is tough or that he has a nice, warm coat to wear in the dugout between innings.
Cubs 1-0 Indians, end of the top of the 1st
Schwarber strikes out to end the inning, no doubt making Pete Rose feel very wise.
That half of the inning took 17 minutes. So much for starting the game early to avoid the rain.
Cubs 1-0 Indians, 1st inning
After a long battle, Zobrist lines out to left, sticking Rizzo at second. Now Kyle Schwarber is up, recent Arizona Fall League peer of Tim Tebow.
@DJGalloEtc (Note: drone music might be appropriate to play during Trevor Bauer starts.)
— Hunter Felt (@HunterFelt) October 26, 2016
At the very least, Fox should have a drone camera flying about three-feet above him on the mount the entire time. It’s how you develop storylines.
Trash-talking police force may end up regretting this.
Missing persons report filed for @Cubs offense. 👮🏽#RallyTogether #gooseegg 🐣 #GoTribe 😳⚾️⚾️⚾️⚾️ @Indians
— Cleveland Police (@CLEpolice) October 26, 2016
Cubs score on a double by Anthony Rizzo to right plates Bryant.
Cubs 1-0 Indians, 1st inning
Rizzo ripped the ball into the right field corner and then Bryant scored easily after Cleveland missed throwing the ball to the cut-off man.
Your Little League coach is very disappointed in that outfield play.
Indians 0-0 Cubs, 1st inning
Kris Bryant lines a 2-2 pitch through the middle to find his way to first. He continues to swing the bat well this postseason (and really every season he has every played baseball).
Indians 0-0 Cubs, 1st inning
Fowler grounds out weakly to Bauer on the third pitch of the game. It felt like an early Willie “Mays” Hayes at-bat. (It’s hard not to think of Major League a lot during this series. Sorry.)
There's the first pitch!
Bauer opens with a fastball high and outside for a ball to Fowler. That’s the bad news.
The good news is that his pinkie didn’t explode.
This is very good news for the Cubs:
Francona said Andrew Miller would probably be limited to "an inning, max" if the lefty appeared in Game 2 vs Cubs.
— Jordan Bastian (@MLBastian) October 26, 2016
From e-mailer Asger Kring re: Kluber ...
Kluber might be able to start 3 games, but last time he started on 3 days rest he lost. Better use of him might be the “Bumgarner” option: start game 1 and 5, be available for relief in game 7.
Please direct all weather-related inquiries to @Indians.
— Chicago Cubs (@Cubs) October 26, 2016
Maybe they have some information no one else does. pic.twitter.com/G97LHCvgVS
Important weather note about tonight: World Series games must be played to 9-inning completion. Five full innings is not enough. So if the rain comes and interrupts play for a while, they’ll pick up the game where it stands tomorrow.
Does this mean I have to liveblog all through the middle of the night until the game starts again? I ... don’t know.
The game starts in about 10 minutes and there are still some seats available on the secondary markets. StubHub has a few Standing Room Only spots left for $400/each.
It’s 43 degrees on a Wednesday night with a chance of rain. And that’s the cheapest ticket. World Series Fever is going to get someone World Series pneumonia.
Cleveland starter Trevor Bauer got a gift from Cubs fans today:
I see the @Cubs fans love me! How nice of them to send me a gift! pic.twitter.com/P3roBJn6Cg
— Trevor Bauer (@BauerOutage) October 26, 2016
At risk of sounding like those who wrote Chicago off after they fell behind 2-1 to the Dodgers in the NLCS, the Cubs will be in some serious trouble if they lose tonight.
Cleveland has already announced that Corey Kluber will start Game 4 ... and then presumably Game 7 ... meaning the Cubs will have to beat him at least once if they fall down 2-0. Chicago might be more confident tonight if Arrieta was pitching well entering this game, but he’s given up 6 runs in 11 innings this postseason. And then there’s the daunting task of trying to come back against Cleveland’s bullpen if the Cubs happen to fall behind in this one.
There’s a lot for Cubs fans to worry about and that’s without wondering if they’ll ever see a championship in their lifetimes.
Updated
Here is Chicago’s lineup this evening ...
1 - Fowler - CF
2 - Bryant - 3B
3 - Rizzo - 1B
4 - Zobrist - LF
5 - Schwarber - DH
6 - Baez - 2B
7- Contreras - C
8 - Soler - RF
9 - Russell - SS
Jake Arrieta is starting tonight for the Cubs but because the game is in an American League park, he will not bat.
Arrieta hit a 3-run home run earlier this postseason, so maybe Cleveland dodged a bullet here.
Here is Cleveland’s lineup for tonight ...
1 - Santana - DH
2 - Kipnis - 2B
3 - Lindor - SS
4 - Napoli - 1B
5 - Ramirez - 3B
6 - Chisenhall - RF
7 - Crisp - LF
8 - Naquin - CF
9 - Perez - C
Trevor Bauer is pitching. He has stayed away from doing any drone repairs and says he is 100% for tonight.
Updated
Welcome to the liveblog for Game 2 of this most remarkable Cubs vs. Indians World Series. The start time was moved up from 8:00 p.m. ET to 7:00 p.m. because the threat of rain. Cleveland will take literal dark clouds hanging over the city after decades of the figurative sort.
Please feel free to participate tonight via e-mail -- dj.gallo.casual@theguardian.com -- or on Twitter at @DJGalloEtc.
DJ will be here shortly, in the meantime here’s how the teams got on last night:
In the lead up to a World Series that is seen by many as a battle of Midwestern grit, the debate has often been about which of the teams – Cleveland or Chicago – has had a tougher history in baseball.
On the one hand, Cleveland haven’t won the World Series since 1948, though they had a couple of close losses in the 1990s. The Chicago Cubs on the other hand, haven’t won since 1908, though they have made some close runs a dozen or so times since.
After Game 1, it is the Cubs fans who are feeling the familiar sting of defeat as they witnessed their team go down to a 6-0 loss.
By scoring two runs in the first innings – on little more than a few hits and some lucky running – the Indians took the lead and never gave it up. Tribe pitcher Corey Kluber, the 2014 Cy Young Award winner, kept the Cubs batters off base, and lasted into the seventh inning. That allowed Indians manager Terry Francona to get into his strong bullpen later in the game, to keep the Chicago players from getting out in front of any of the Cleveland pitchers.
Click here for the full report:
