The Cubs arrived at PNC Park on Monday for their first 2026 trip to Pittsburgh carrying an eight-game losing streak and the weight of a rivalry that has usually tilted their way on the road. They opened a four-game series against the Pirates with Ben Brown scheduled to face Carmen Mlodzinski, in a matchup that gave Chicago a chance to reset and Pittsburgh a chance to lean again on a familiar opponent.
The numbers behind the series tell the story. Chicago was 2-1 against Pittsburgh before the opener, after the Pirates won on April 10 at Wrigley Field on Bryan Reynolds’ two-run home run and then took the second game 4-3 in 11 innings, their third extra-inning victory of the season. The Cubs answered in the third game with a walk-off single by Carson Kelly, setting up a rematch that has carried more than the usual early-season weight because Chicago had dropped eight straight and Pittsburgh had lost six of its last nine.
The series also sits inside a much longer pattern. The Pirates did not score more than four runs in any of their 13 games against the Cubs in 2025, and they won only one game against Chicago at home that season. Even so, Pittsburgh entered this set with a recent edge in the rivalry and a reminder that the Cubs’ success in the ballpark has not always been matched by easy closures. A sweep this week would push Chicago’s regular-season win total at Pittsburgh to 600 since the rivalry began in 1887, a milestone built on decades of trips that have often ended with the Cubs on top and the Pirates looking for answers.
That broader history is why this four-game set matters beyond the standings. The Cubs had 596 wins at Pittsburgh before the series, compared with 579 at Philadelphia and 566 at St. Louis, while the Pirates had 712 losses at home to Chicago, more than their totals against Cincinnati and the Giants in New York and San Francisco. Chicago’s last four-game sweep at Pittsburgh came Aug. 1-4, 2011, and this is its 13th four-game set there since that sweep. The Cubs won three games in each of their two most recent four-game series at Pittsburgh, in 2022 and 2023, and they have gone 27-9 in all games there since 2021, a run that has helped turn PNC Park into one of their more reliable road stops.
The pitching matchups may decide whether that pattern holds. After Brown and Mlodzinski on Monday, the Cubs were scheduled to send an unnamed pitcher against Braxton Ashcraft on Tuesday, then Jameson on Wednesday. Mlodzinski entered at 4-3 with a 3.96 ERA, a 1.400 WHIP and a 2.98 FIP, while Ashcraft was 3-2 with a 2.89 ERA, a 1.027 WHIP and a 3.16 FIP and had last thrown seven innings with nine strikeouts and one earned run allowed. Brown, by contrast, was 1-2 with a 2.09 ERA, a 0.983 WHIP and a 2.36 FIP, giving Chicago a starter who has kept runners off base even as the club has searched for something to stop the slide.
The tension in the series is simple. Pittsburgh has been able to keep games tight against Chicago, but the Cubs have usually found a way to win enough at this park to make history their own. If they can sweep this week, the number 600 will belong to them at PNC Park, and the losing streak that followed them into the city will look like a brief interruption rather than the start of something deeper.
