'Must-watch' Bellinger powers Cubs with 2-HR game

CHICAGO -- Fighter jets soared around Chicago’s lakefront on Saturday afternoon for the air and water show, eliciting cheers from the Wrigley Field crowd each time the noise reached the old ballpark. Cubs star Cody Bellinger decided to get in on the act.

Bellinger sent a pair of home runs up into the North Side skies, powering the Cubs to a 6-4 victory over the Royals. As Chicago has pulled itself back into contention over the past two months, Bellinger has been a driving force within one of the National League’s best offenses.

“As good as it's been for him, it's been better for us,” Cubs president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer said this week. “I mean, he's been amazing. He's sort of been the centerpiece of this run we've had for the last six, eight weeks.”

Sitting at a podium with his Cubs hat turned around backwards after Saturday’s win, Bellinger made sure to note how the lineup as a whole has consistently put him in a position to do damage. In fact, Chicago’s offense has churned out 203 runs in the second half, marking the second most in baseball behind only the Braves.

“It’s definitely not just me,” Bellinger said. “It is the product around me. The guys put together incredible at-bats day in, day out. As a unit, we have solid game plans and a bunch of really good baseball players. I’m just excited to be a part of it.”

His teammates are plenty excited he has been a part of this, too.

“He’s just must-watch television at this point,” Cubs lefty Justin Steele said. “Any time he comes up, whatever the situation is, he’s must-watch. He’s always putting together great at-bats. And he’s just a great, great presence to have in the clubhouse. Yeah, he’s the heartbeat right now.”

Cubs manager David Ross echoed that sentiment.

“Putting the lineup on his back is kind of what he does,” Ross said.

Bellinger sent a 2-2 pitch from Royals righty Brady Singer out to left field for a two-run blast in the first inning and then homered on a 1-1 offering from Singer to lead off the third. The two homers gave Bellinger 20 on the season, marking his most since hitting 47 in his NL MVP campaign with the Dodgers in 2019.

Since coming off the injured list due to a knee injury in mid-June, Bellinger has hit .365/.403/.615 with 13 homers and 43 RBIs for the Cubs, who have posted a 33-22 record since his return. On the season, the center fielder and part-time first baseman has slashed .326/.375/.564 with 20 doubles, 63 RBIs and 17 steals in 91 games.

“Probably, if you take away the fact that he missed a month, he's in the MVP race,” Hoyer said. “Somewhere in that top four or five guys. If you said that we'd be winning and he would do that, you'd sign up for that all day.”

Bellinger added a sacrifice fly in a four-RBI performance that backed another quality start for Steele. The All-Star limited Kansas City to two runs over six innings, ending with seven strikeouts and no walks. Steele walked off the mound with a 2.80 ERA, which ranks second in the NL.

One of the more remarkable aspects of Bellinger’s season has been his production in two-strike counts.

In Saturday’s victory, both his first home run and the sacrifice fly came with two strikes on balls he hit the opposite way. That gave Bellinger a .296/.333/.441 slash line in two-strike counts. MLB as a whole was hitting .171/.249/.272 with two strikes, entering Saturday. Only Luis Arraez (.319) had a better average than Bellinger among batters with at least 75 plate appearances ending with two strikes.

“If you watch video, there's just a little less movement,” Ross said of Bellinger’s two-strike approach. “[You’re] just watching him try to play pepper. The ball travels a little bit deeper. It seems consistent. The ball goes to the other side of the field, on the ground sometimes. Or [he’s] staying inside it and finding that kind of bleeder that [goes] down the left-field line.

“He just has a real knack for that. And if they make a mistake, he punishes them.”

He did that again in Saturday’s Air and Belli show at Wrigley.

“Our offense kind of goes as he goes,” Ross said. “He's just really, really important.”