Iowa Cubs Come Back and Walk It Off, Thanks In Part to Matt Shaw's 418-Foot Homer – Bleacher Nation

The big league Cubs were off yesterday, but the Iowa Cubs – or the Iowa Oaks, as the throwbacks indicated – played themselves a thriller to fill in the space.

With Iowa down a run in the 6th inning, Matt Shaw tied things up with a long bomb to straight center:

He just hits the ball SO HARD. That’s 106.6 mph off the bat and 418 feet for a guy who is listed at 5’9″, 185 pounds. Built like fullback, hits like a beast.

Shaw, 22, had the briefest of adjustment periods upon being called up to Iowa this summer, and now he’s cruising like always. I’m as confident as ever that, in time, he’s going to hit in the big leagues. The question is where he’ll play defensively, and how well he can develop at that position.

Anyway, so the I-Cubs later fell back behind by the bottom of the 9th, trailing by a run. But a Moises Ballesteros single that moved James Triantos to third, followed by a Darius Hill sac fly tied the game and sent it to extra innings.

There, in the 11th, pinch-hitter Chase Strumpf called game:

I love all walk-off wins, not only for the excitement of the play, but just to watch the players enjoy the moment as much as they do. Unreserved joy.

(Bonus note on that front: Kevin Alcántara was out there celebrating without an obvious limp, so hopefully whatever happened to him earlier this week was not too serious?)