Cubs' night once again spoiled by quiet bats, shaky 'pen

ST. PETERSBURG -- Things disintegrated quickly for the Cubs on Tuesday night.

After a shutdown start from Jameson Taillon, decent bullpen work and some timely hitting, Cubs closer Héctor Neris blew the save opportunity while nursing a one-run lead. In the ninth inning, with his control wavering, Neris surrendered the tying run. Then, one strike away from forcing extra innings, he served up a walk-off three-run home run to Brandon Lowe, allowing the Rays to stun the Cubs, 5-2, at Tropicana Field.

"It was my best pitch," Neris said of the full-count splitter that Lowe deposited into the right-field seats. "I don’t have an excuse for that."

The Cubs, now 1-4 on their road trip and losers in nine of their past 11 games away from Wrigley Field, seemed on the verge of closing out another one-run game (they had played an MLB-high 26 coming into Tuesday night). But Neris surrendered a ninth-inning leadoff double against Richie Palacios after falling behind 2-0, then he struck Jose Siri out on four pitches. Neris then walked Ben Rortvedt after getting ahead 1-2, before José Caballero tied it with a soft one-out RBI single just over the leaping attempt of second baseman Nico Hoerner.

After a three-pitch strikeout of Yandy Díaz, Neris was victimized by Lowe.

"I needed to get the three outs and didn’t do it,’’ Neris said. “It was not my day. All I can do is focus on tomorrow."

For Cubs manager Craig Counsell, there were two factors that swung Tuesday night’s game.

Neris fell behind in the count too often during the ninth, while the Cubs’ offense (just two runs on 10 hits, while going 1-for-7 with runners in scoring position) couldn't deliver the timely hit.

"It was a nice at-bat by Lowe," Counsell said. "He hung on some split-fingers, then got one he could hit.

"But two runs? You’re not going to win most nights with two runs. For sure, we’ve got to do more offensively. I guess there were some good signs. We got a bunch of hits. We had some hard-hit balls for outs. But two runs ain’t going to cut it."

The ninth-inning turnabout spoiled a brilliant performance by Taillon, who tossed six scoreless innings.

He allowed just four singles, while walking one and striking out five. Taillon had a trio of 1-2-3 innings, staying ahead of the hitters and mostly forcing weak contact. He went to a three-ball count on just two batters, including a 10-pitch at-bat to Josh Lowe in the fourth, which resulted in Taillon’s only walk.

"One of my strengths is that I throw a lot of different pitches and I can command them all pretty well," Taillon said. "I’m trying not to fall into the trap of doing the same thing over and over, because these teams are pretty good at preparing.

"I didn’t feel like myself in my last start, so I really tried to put some good work in between starts. … But [the way the game ended], it’s tough. We’re in a lot of games and the close ones hurt even more because you know you were right there. But that’s baseball. You just show up tomorrow and try to get them to start turning your way. I’m confident this whole team is going to come together and start knocking out wins."

The Cubs seemed poised for that when Christopher Morel’s 409-foot solo home run to lead off the fourth inning provided a 1-0 lead. In the sixth, after Rays starter Zach Eflin departed, pinch-hitter David Bote went after the first pitch from reliever Garrett Cleavinger and laced an RBI single up the middle, making it 2-0.

The Rays made it 2-1 in the seventh when Palacios scored from third base on a wild pitch. Hayden Wesneski’s 2-2 offering to Díaz was low and couldn’t be grabbed by catcher Miguel Amaya, who inadvertently kicked it further away from his grasp, giving Palacios enough room to slide home.

Wesneski shut down the Rays in order during the eighth, but Neris didn’t have the right stuff during his 23-pitch ninth inning, which produced the Cubs’ fifth walk-off defeat this season.

"We did everything we could to win the game, but the result was down for us," Neris said. "Today was not my day. But the game is over and we have to come back fighting tomorrow."