Chicago Cubs, Jeff Samardzija notch series-opening win against San Francisco

We can finally all stop talking about it now.

Chicago Cubs’ right-hander Jeff Samardzija saw his 17-start winless streak – that included his first ten starts of 2014 – finally come to a close on Monday afternoon as his club cruised to an 8-4 win over the San Francisco Giants at AT&T Park.

Samardzija (1-4) tossed seven innings, striking out 10 and allowing four runs – three of which were earned. It marked the right-hander’s ninth quality start on the season. He did, however, see his earned run average rise from 1.46 to 1.68 in the win – a small price to pay to break his now nationally-discussed streak.

Offensively, Chicago (19-30) scored three runs in the fifth inning, followed by a pair of runs in both the sixth and the seventh, en route to the series-opening win against the National League West-leading Giants (32-19).

After Pablo Sandoval clubbed a two-run homer in the bottom of the fourth that gave San Francisco a 3-1 lead, the Cubs offense responded quickly in an inning capped by an RBI double off the bat of none other than Samardzija himself. Emilio Bonifacio followed with his third triple of the year and before the frame was over the Cubs led

An RBI single by catcher Welington Castillo put Chicago up 5-3 in the top of the sixth before Darwin Barney kept things rolling with a two-out RBI single of his own.  The Cubs would add two more runs before everything was said and done – one coming on an Anthony Rizzo RBI double, the other on an RBI single by red-hot Luis Valbuena, who is hitting .353 over the last seven ballgames.