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In the seven-year history of the current Major League Baseball playoff format, Tuesday night just might be the oddest Wild Card Game of the bunch. The Chicago Cubs will host the Colorado Rockies at Wrigley Field in the National League Wild Card Game (8 p.m. ET, ESPN, Watch ESPN), adding to what will be a long week for the winner.
As of Monday morning, the day after the regular season was supposed to end, neither the Cubs nor Rockies knew where they would open their playoffs. There was still the matter of deciding both the NL Central and NL West, with a pair of tiebreaker games on Monday. The Milwaukee Brewers and Los Angeles Dodgers won, advancing to the NL Division Series, which banished Chicago and Colorado to the single-elimination Wild Card Game just one night later.
NL Wild Card Game info, TV & streaming
- Teams: Rockies (91-72) vs. Cubs (95-68)
- Location: Wrigley Field, Chicago
- Time: 8 p.m. ET
- TV: ESPN
- Online: Watch ESPN
Needing to account for an extra day taxed both pitching staffs, such that Kyle Freeland is starting on three days rest for the first time for Colorado. Freeland had arguably the best pitching season in Rockies franchise history, posting a club-record 2.85 ERA in his 33 starts, including an unfathomable 2.40 ERA at Coors Field. He threw 96 pitches in six innings in his last start, on Friday, winning his 17th game of the season.
“I’ve done everything I could to get my arm feeling good from my last start, and it feels good right now,” Freeland told Kyle Newman of the Denver Post. “I’m ready to go, and I’m not too worried about being on short rest.”
The Cubs will turn to Jon Lester, with one of the best postseason resumes in the game. Lester has a 2.55 ERA in 21 career playoff starts and has been a part of three World Series winners. His only Wild Card Game start was in 2014 with the A’s, when he took a 5-3 lead into the eighth inning before the Royals started their magical October run with a three-run rally off Lester.
The Rockies and Cubs split six games during the regular season, with Colorado winning two of three games at Wrigley Field in April. Freeland took the only Rockies loss in that series at Wrigley Field, on Apr. 30, though he allowed just three runs in seven innings.
ESPN will televise the NL Wild Card Game, with the usual ‘Sunday Night Baseball’ crew of Matt Vasgersian, Jessica Mendoza, Alex Rodriguez and Buster Olney on the call. Online streaming is available through Watch ESPN.
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