It’s the Cubs who get rattled

PHOENIX -- Mark Reynolds started the season riding buses in and out of Mobile, Ala.

But for a moment Wednesday night, he found himself at the center of the baseball universe, rounding the bases to extend his team’s unfathomable journey.

Youth prevailed and the wise were questioned Wednesday night, as the Arizona Diamondbacks claimed a 3-1 victory over the Chicago Cubs at Chase Field in the opening game of the National League division series.

Game 2 is tonight.

The Diamondbacks’ three runs were driven in by so-called “Baby Backs,” with Reynolds’ solo home run to left in the seventh marking the go-ahead run and 25-year-old Conor Jackson scoring Chris Snyder later in the inning on a sacrifice fly. Stephen Drew, a shortstop in his first full season, homered in the fourth.

“All of us young guys were kind of thrown in the middle of this and don’t know what’s going on,” Reynolds said. “I don’t personally realize the magnitude of the situation that we’re in.”

Nor does Jackson, who proclaimed, “Ignorance is bliss.”

Cubs Manager Lou Piniella is decades removed from the time he could make such a claim, which is why he found himself under fire for taking out starting pitcher Carlos Zambrano after six effective innings.

Zambrano, who is due to pitch in Game 4 on three days’ rest, had evenly dueled Brandon Webb, giving up one run and having thrown only 85 pitches at the time of his exit.

Zambrano’s replacement, the young but usually unhittable Carlos Marmol, gave up the two runs in the seventh.

Piniella was miffed when asked if he could be accused of looking ahead.

“I’m not accused of anything, sir,” Piniella said. “I’ve got a good bullpen here, OK, and I trust my bullpen. I’m bringing back a pitcher on three days’ rest on Sunday and I took a shot with my bullpen. It didn’t work today. They’ve done it all year. I’ve got confidence in them, period, end of story.”

Piniella blamed the result on the Cubs’ offense, which was held to one run and four hits over seven innings by Webb. Facing relievers Brandon Lyon and Jose Valverde over the last two innings, the Cubs couldn’t get a hit.

Webb struck out nine, including three in a row in the third inning after Zambrano led off with a double.

“It was going to be a low-scoring game so I had to bear down,” Webb said.

Webb faced a similar no-out, man-on-second pinch in the fifth, when Ryan Theriot reached scoring position because of an errant throw by Reynolds on what should have been a routine 5-3 groundout. Webb retired the next three hitters.

“You’re not going to win on the road, or anywhere, scoring one run on four hits,” Piniella said. “I give their pitching credit.”

For Drew, his two-for-four night was an extension of the 12-for-29 tear with which he ended the regular season.

Drew, 24, had established himself as the Diamondbacks’ every-day shortstop in his second major league season, but he wasn’t nearly as proficient with his bat as he was with his glove, finishing with a .238 average.

“I’ve been comfortable for a while,” Drew said a couple of hours before his first postseason game. “The balls are starting to fall. I hit a lot of at-’em balls this year. You can’t do anything if you’re hitting balls right at people.”

Whereas Drew thrived when the lights were brightest, fellow 24-year-old Marmol froze.

Marmol, who had a 1.43 earned-run average in the regular season, started the bottom of the seventh by giving up the home run to Reynolds. He struck out Jeff Salazar, but walked Snyder, who advanced to third on a double by Augie Ojeda.

Jackson, a pinch-hitter, drove in Snyder with a fly ball to center.

dylan.hernandez@latimes.com