MILWAUKEE — The Chicago Cubs were no match for Zack Greinke’s Miller Park magic.
Greinke ran his undefeated streak at Miller Park to 15 games as he pitched seven nearly flawless innings in lifting the Milwaukee Brewers to an 8-0 victory before a crowd of 27,112 on Wednesday night.
Greinke is just the third player in modern major league history to win his first 15 home decisions. He shares that streak with Kenny Rogers of the Oakland A’s (1998-99), and needs one more to equal the record shared by Johnny Allen of the New York Yankees (1932-33) and LaMarr Hoyt of the Chicago White Sox (1980-82).
Greinke, who is due to become a free agent at the end of the season, was at his overpowering best as he allowed just two hits and struck out a season-high 12 batters.
His only trouble came in the second inning when Alfonso Soriano bounced a leadoff double down the line in left field. Greinke retired the next two batters but then issued his only two walks of the night to load the bases.
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But he struck out Chicago pitcher Paul Maholm to escape without any damage.
After that, the only Cubs baserunners were Starlin Castro on a third-inning double and Ian Stewart, who struck out but reached first on a wild pitch to open the fifth inning. Stewart was then thrown out attempting to steal. During that stretch Greinke fanned nine of the 11 batters he faced.
While Greinke was mowing down the Cubs, the Brewers offense continued to sputter through the first three innings against Maholm, who blanked the Brewers on one hit.
But Norichika Aoki, who was moved up to the leadoff spot in a last-minute lineup change, led off the fourth inning with a double. He scored the first run of the series for Milwaukee on Ryan Braun’s one-out double down the line in left field.
Corey Hart followed with an infield single and, after Rickie Weeks flied out, Cody Ransom doubled to left to drive home Braun.
Brooks Conrad, whose two previous hits with the Brewers were home runs, then capped the rally with a bloop single to left to drive in Hart and Ransom.
Aoki got things going again in the fifth when he lined a double down the right-field line and advanced to third when the ball skipped away from right fielder David DeJesus. He eventually came home on a sacrifice fly by Hart.
That would be more than enough offensive support for Greinke.
But that didn’t stop the Brewers, who tacked on three more runs in the eighth on a pinch-hit home run by Taylor Green, his first major league homer.
Jose Veras pitched a scoreless eighth and Juan Perez finished it off in the ninth.
Veras had two strikeouts and Perez added one to give the staff a combined 15 strikeouts — one more than the previous night.
