It was the kind of pitch you think a seasoned hitter would spit on — a breaking ball that began high and never came down, spinning awkwardly before sailing well above the strike zone. Yet in the tightest moment of the game, the bat stayed frozen, the umpire’s hand went up, and the Cubs’ rally hopes were cut short. Fans groaned; however, the frustration grew louder when the familiar voice of the team called it exactly what it was: a costly mistake.
“(Seiya) Suzuki ran up on a pitch that was not in the strike zone,” Boog Sciambi said on Awful Announcing. Ryan Dempster, the Cubs legend watching on, did not stop either: “It was never in the strike zone… Just gotta be better than that in a situation, tight game like this.” His follow-up stung more — Ryan Dempster described the pitch in detail, highlighting how it spun, backed up, and stayed almost six inches above the letters. For the legend, it was not related to bad luck and a missed call. It was related to execution, plain and simple.
Which is what makes this moment so bitter. Seiya Suzuki has been a consistent bat of the Cubs this season, racking up 27 home runs, 85 RBIs, and an .821 OPS across 450 at-bats. Over Suzuki’s career, he has maintained a .271 average with power and speed, which has kept the star a reliable presence in the lineup. However, baseball has a cruel way of magnifying mistakes at the worst possible times. A star with that résumé is expected to deliver, not get frozen on a hanger. And when Dempster puts the stamp of “grave mistake” on it, the frustration hits even harder.
However, if there is room for optimism, it comes from the team’s starting pitching. The Cubs‘ starting rotation carries a 2.92 ERA since July 1st, which leads the MLB. Now, the offense just needs to kick itself back into elite motion for the Cubs to turn their struggles around.
“(Seiya) Suzuki rung up on a pitch that was not in the strike zone.” – Boog Sciambi
“It was never in the strike zone… Just gotta be better than that in a situation, tight game like this.” – Ryan Dempster #MLB pic.twitter.com/0NxLcE6hTR
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) August 15, 2025
Moments like Suzuki’s strikeout are not happening in isolation — they are symptoms of a larger issue. The Cubs’ struggles down the stretch have raised uncomfortable questions not just related to execution on the field, however, related to whether the management did enough to support this roster when it mattered most.
Should the Cubs have done more at the trade deadline?
The Cubs entered July looking like a legitimate contender; however, the second half of the season has been anything but kind. While the Brewers have become a juggernaut, the Cubs have sputtered, losing ground in the NL Central and watching their World Series buzz fade into doubt. And that has fans pointing back to the trade deadline — a point in the calendar where management takes big swings; however, the Cubs stayed unusually quiet.
Tim Kelly of Bleacher Report said bluntly, noting that the Cubs “certainly haven’t gotten the post-trade deadline jolt some teams have.” With other contenders like the Mariners and Padres making aggressive upgrades, the Cubs’ lack of urgency now becomes a glaring issue. Instead of reinforcements, the team has been left to rely on its existing core, which has shown cracks at the worst possible time.
Such cracks are specifically visible with Pete Crow-Armstrong and Kyle Tucker. The 2 stars were All-Star starters, yet neither has looked the part since the break. The power has disappeared, the consistency has wavered, and the star’s slumps have dragged the rest of the lineup down with them. Had the Cubs added another bat and star at the deadline, those issues could have been masked and at least softened.
Now, with just over a month left, the Cubs’ margin for error is gone. The Brewers are sprinting away, the lineup looks thin, and the lack of trade-deadline effectiveness looms large. Instead of keeping pace with the NL’s best, the team is stuck in neutral — and that decision by the management could be remembered as the turning point of 2025.
Credits: Japan Forward/ Chicago Cubs designated hitter Seiya Suzuki hits a broken-bat single in the seventh inning against the Hanshin Tigers on March 15, 2025, at Tokyo Dome. (©KYODO)
The Cubs’ unraveling is not related to one strikeout and one missed call — it is related to a season slipping through their fingers because execution and preparation have not lined up when it mattered most. Suzuki’s mistake was magnified because the Cubs have not had the depth to cover for it, and the trade deadline silence only deepened that gap. With history repeating in all the wrong ways, it is up to the team to prove they still belong in the race.
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