CHICAGO | No hard feelings from Casey McGehee. Just some hard shots.
The rookie homered while setting career-highs with four hits and five RBIs to help the Milwaukee Brewers pound Rich Harden and the Cubs 11-2 on Saturday and snap a three-game losing streak.
Mike Cameron and J.J. Hardy also went deep to back a solid effort by Braden Looper (7-4).
Claimed off waivers in October, McGehee made the team in spring training and is now batting .331 in 46 games after going 4-for-5. He singled twice and tripled before hitting a two-run homer off Valparaiso's Jeff Samardzija.
The Cubs had won three in a row after going 11-14 in June, but this was simply a brutal afternoon all around -- especially for Harden and Alfonso Soriano.
Harden (5-5) allowed seven runs and eight hits over two-plus innings in the shortest start of his career. Soriano, meanwhile, got booed for his flubs in the field and at the plate after being dropped from the leadoff spot to sixth in the order.
Hardy hit a solo shot in the second, and after McGehee led off the third with his first career triple, Cameron chased Harden with a line-drive double to left that sailed over Soriano's head after he initially broke in, drawing more boos.
Besides that mistake, Soriano went 0-for-4 after being dropped from first to sixth in the order and is now hitless in his last 16 at-bats. His groundout with the bases loaded to end the first set the tone, and the boos continued throughout the game.
"It's part of the game," Soriano said. "If you get a hit, they want to clap. If you strike out, they want to boo.
"I'm really struggling at home plate, so I don't know what I have to do."
Manager Lou Piniella wants Soriano to narrow his stance and "get a little weight on his backside so he can sit on (the pitch) a little longer."
He's also going to stick with this lineup for now, with Kosuke Fukudome leading off, and hope Soriano breaks out of his two-month slump. He held out Soriano on Wednesday and Thursday while Sam Fuld batted first and decided to drop him in the order after watching him go 0-for-5 while leading off on Friday.
"I think you've got to give it more than one day to see how things work or don't work," Piniella said. "I know you people want quick results, but that's too quick."
