Chicago Cubs at Pittsburgh Pirates: Final Score & Recap

The Pittsburgh Pirates held off the Chicago Cubs 2-1 at PNC Park on May 25, 2026, in a tight pitching duel that the DiamondIQ model entered with a 52 percent home win probability before watching it climb to a certainty by the final out. Pittsburgh scored first in the bottom of the third when Brandon Lowe delivered a double off Ben Brown, a swing that shifted win probability by 12.0 points in the Pirates' favor. Chicago answered in the top of the fifth on a Michael Busch home run off Carmen Mlodzinski, the biggest play of the half-inning and a 12.4-point swing that briefly knotted the game at one. The decisive blow came in the bottom of the seventh, when Henry Davis launched a home run off Trent Thornton for an 18.0-point win-probability swing, the single largest play of the contest and the one that effectively settled matters.

On the pitching side, Wilber Dotel led all pitchers with a WPA of plus-26.2, underscoring how critical Pittsburgh's bullpen work was in protecting the one-run lead. Ben Brown posted a WPA of plus-17.9 despite surrendering the Busch home run, reflecting a strong overall outing before the Cubs finally broke through against him. Gregory Soto closed things out with a WPA of plus-15.2, including retiring Nico Hoerner on a groundout in the ninth that carried a minus-7.1 swing against Chicago's chances. Among position players, Davis finished as the top batter by WPA at plus-13.6 with a RE24 of plus-0.6, while Lowe contributed plus-7.0 WPA and led the group with a RE24 of plus-1.0. Chicago's two errors did not help a lineup that managed six hits but could not recover from Davis's go-ahead blast.