Toyota Road Report: May 13-18

For the second consecutive season, the South Bend Cubs will pay a visit to the Lansing Lugnuts in May. Entering the week at 9-24 overall and 1-14 on the road, the Cubs will make the 155-mile drive to Michigan’s capital aiming to follow last year’s series win at Jackson Field with another. It won’t be easy, though, as the Lugnuts come in at 18-15 overall and 10-8 at home, marking three straight weeks of facing a team with a winning record for the Cubs.

Road Work: The week presents another opportunity for the Cubs to improve what’s been an unideal start to the season away from home. Their only win in 15 tries on the road occurred two Fridays ago in Cedar Rapids. Then again, the Cubs haven’t been far off from playing .500 baseball outside of South Bend, as nine of their 14 road losses have been decided by two runs or less. Nevertheless, wins are wins and losses are losses, and the Cubs have ended up with quite a few more of the latter.

The Cubs also seek their second series win of the season and their first since the April 8-13 opening homestand against Peoria. Last time on the road, the Cubs lost five out of six at Cedar Rapids. After that, they came home to face the Fort Wayne TinCaps this past week, dropping four of the six contests. Most recently, the Cubs lost 10-3 to Fort Wayne on Sunday.

South Bend’s two victories occurred on Thursday and Saturday, the first being a 3-1 win that needed only 1 hour and 49 minutes to complete. That means it was the fastest South Bend Cubs game to last nine innings since May 5, 2015. No. 10 Cubs prospect Jaxon Wiggins cruised through his outing, becoming the first South Bend starting pitcher to cover seven innings since 2021. Outfielder Rafael Morel also tagged his first home run of the season to provide some insurance for Wiggins and company.

On Saturday, less than 24 hours after the Cubs brought in their largest crowd of the season, South Bend picked up its first shutout of 2025. The 5-0 win saw starting pitcher Ryan Gallagher turn in six hitless innings and strike out eight TinCaps. The Cubs also got off to a fast start, scoring four runs in the first frame with the help of a two-run single from catcher Miguel Pabon.

Best in the Midwest: The South Bend Cubs just became the second Midwest League team this year to sweep the league’s weekly awards. Gallagher was named the Midwest League Pitcher of the Week, while infielder Jefferson Rojas became the Cubs’ third Midwest League Player of the Week this season. Keep reading for the full breakdown of their standout performances against Fort Wayne.

What is a Lugnut? A lugnut, or in the technically correct sense, a lug nut, is a fastener that secures the wheel of a vehicle. After relocating from Springfield, Illinois, in 1996, Lansing’s franchise adopted the name to honor the city’s strong ties to the automotive industry.

When it comes to the Lansing Lugnuts, there’s even more history to unpack than that. Their franchise has existed at the Class-A Midwest League level since 1955, holding affiliations with seven different teams: the Boston Red Sox (1956-68), Cleveland Indians (1955, 1977-88), San Diego Padres (1990-94), Kansas City Royals (1969-76, 1995-98), Chicago Cubs (1999-2004), Toronto Blue Jays (2005-20), and presently the Athletics. It started not far from South Bend in Lafayette, Indiana, before moving to Waterloo, Iowa, then Springfield, and now Lansing. The Lugnuts have nine Midwest League titles but are mired in a 22-year championship drought.

After going 59-72 last season, this year’s Lugnuts will have a good shot at finishing above .500 for the first time since 2018. They come off a 4-2 series loss at West Michigan, the team they’re currently chasing in the Midwest League East division. The Lugnuts are currently missing the top prospect on their roster, third baseman Tommy White (7-day injured list), but they have plenty of talent in other places.

Offensively, Lansing specializes in getting on base, ranking second only to Cedar Rapids in Midwest League batting average and on-base percentage. The Lugnuts have four different individual players in the league’s top 12 for batting average, while White ranks ninth in OPS (.888). Rodney Green Jr., their low-average and high-strikeout center fielder, resides in a seven-way tie for the league lead in home runs with six.

Outside of No. 13 A’s prospect Gage Jump, the Lansing pitching staff doesn’t strike out many. However, the Lugnuts rotation features three starting pitchers with an earned run average of 3.15 or lower: Jump, Kyle Robinson, and Yunior Tur.

South Bend’s players to watch…

Ryan Gallagher, RHP: Make no mistake – the Ryan Gallagher who took the mound on Saturday afternoon was 2024 All-American and Big West Pitcher of the Year Ryan Gallagher. The 22-year-old right-hander, drafted by the Cubs in round six of last summer’s MLB Draft out of UC Santa Barbara, had it all working in his sixth start of the season. In Gallagher’s six hitless innings, he struck out top Padres prospect and No. 3 Major League prospect Leo De Vries three times, fanning him with two runners on to end his outing. South Bend’s Saturday starter heads to Lansing with a 3.38 ERA after securing his first professional win, but he’s yet to complete three innings on the road.

Cristian Hernandez, SS/2B: Cristian Hernandez is heating up again. The No. 11 Cubs prospect brings with him to Lansing a team-long hit streak of eight games after hitting .400 (10-for-25) with six doubles in the Fort Wayne series. He has started all 10 Cubs games in the month of May and now stands alone atop the Midwest League hits leaderboard with 37. What’s more, he’s the only player at the High-A level with 15 extra-base hits and at least 10 stolen bases.

Jefferson Rojas, 2B/SS: With Sunday evening’s MLB Pipeline update, Jefferson Rojas jumped Iowa Cubs second baseman James Triantos to become the Chicago Cubs No. 6 prospect. He also rose from No. 93 to No. 78 in the overall Top 100. Settling into a groove after missing the season’s first nine games with a hamstring injury, Rojas has a 13-game on-base streak and is suddenly hitting .300 with a .900 OPS across 80 at-bats for the year. He homered twice in Sunday’s series finale against the TinCaps, making him the only South Bend Cub with back-to-back multi-home run series in 2025. He clocks in at fifth in the Midwest League for both slugging percentage and OPS heading into the Lansing trip.

Top prospects in the series…

South Bend: Jefferson Rojas (Cubs No. 6, MLB No. 78), Jaxon Wiggins (Cubs No. 10), Cristian Hernandez (Cubs No. 11)

Lansing: Tommy White (Athletics No. 7), Joshua Kuroda-Grauer (Athletics No. 10), Steven Echavarria (Athletics No. 12), Gage Jump (Athletics No. 13), Rodney Green Jr. (Athletics No. 18), Nate Nankil (Athletics No. 28)

Schedule and probables…

Tuesday, May 13 - 6:05 PM ET: RHP Tyler Schlaffer vs. RHP Corey Avant

Wednesday, May 14 - 11:05 AM ET: LHP Evan Aschenbeck vs. RHP Steven Echavarria

Thursday, May 15 - 7:05 PM ET: TBA vs. RHP Grant Judkins

Friday, May 16 - 7:05 PM ET: RHP Nick Dean vs. Yunior Tur

Saturday, May 17 - 7:05 PM ET: RHP Ryan Gallagher vs. RHP Kyle Robinson

Sunday, May 18 - 1:05 PM ET: RHP Kenten Egbert vs. RHP Corey Avant