Cubs: 3 takeaways from a massive series win over the Brewers

3 things we learned about the Cubs this week: #1: This is a team that continues to grind and battle, especially in close games

This week at Wrigley felt like postseason baseball. After losing the opener, the Cubs could have tucked tail with Corbin Burnes and Brandon Woodruff lined up in the final two games of the series. While they definitely didn't take it to either guy, the bats did just enough to come away with a pair of wins and the pitching staff matched the Brewers' studs blow-for-blow.

Steele turned in perhaps the grittiest start of his career, throwing a career-high 111 pitches over six scoreless innings and overcoming an inefficient start to his outing en route to his 15th win of the season. As I mentioned, Hendricks was as good as ever on Thursday and the bullpen, by and large, was shutdown minus the hiccup late in the finale, when Adbert Alzolay hit a man to force in the tying run.

When the Cubs' offense is firing on all cylinders, they're capable of hanging crooked numbers - but it's even more encouraging to me to see them come away with a pair of wins in which they scored a cumulative 4 runs against the first-place Brewers.