The dateline on this last stop of the Cubs’ nine-game trip was 35th and Shields, South Side.
Considering he was able to sleep in his own bed Thursday night, would this rank as half a home game for Cubs manager Craig Counsell?
“That’s a good way to say it,’’ Counsell said. “It’s nice when you look at the schedule and you see nine games of gray boxes [road games], but then you finish at home. Yeah, it is nice.’’
How much did the Cubs make themselves at home in Rate Field? They put their feet up on the furniture, left towels on the floor and empties on the coffee tables, invited thousands of their closest friends to hang out and howl and generally acted like they owned the place, much to the chagrin of their hosts.
After a week of looking out of sorts in Texas and Georgia, the Cubs settled in nicely at the Rate, once again resembling the team that had raked its way to two 10-game winning streaks in the first 40 games.
With every player in the Cubs’ starting lineup getting at least one hit, three players two and Carson Kelly three, including the baseline-hugging ground-ball single that broke a tie in the seventh inning, the Cubs whacked the White Sox 10-5 before 38,723, who carried on all night for both teams but accommodated far more carpetbaggers than Sox chairman Jerry Reinsdorf would have liked.
“We played a really good offensive game tonight, for sure,’’ Counsell said. “I know it’s been a little bit light the last four or five days, but we played a really good offensive game all around.
“I mean, we just made it hard. Every at-bat, it felt like we made it hard on them. Bunch of hits, walks, the baserunning was really good. It was a very good offensive game.’’
The Cubs’ 10 runs doubled the five they’d scored over the previous five games, including back-to-back shutouts in Texas.
Beginning with Ian Happ’s RBI single in the first inning and ending with Kelly’s two-run double in the eighth, when the Cubs scored fo
