Everyone is on lockdown, as they should be, but that doesn’t mean we can’t bring you…well, whatever this is. John, Sam, and I discuss what’s to be done with the season going forward, and whatever else to try to keep ourselves sane. Audio after the jump.
Though he is technically listed here the Sox #4 starter in their 2020 rotation, the reality is the front office (and us as blog writers and fans) see Dylan Cease as at least the #3 starter of this team going forward. If that’s going to happen, however, there are a few things that need to happen both with his delivery and the results associated with them. While there were a few bright spots and moments of dominance for Dylan Cease in 2019, there were also times when his command disappeared for long stretches, leaving his fastball very hittable.
If Cease is to take over the 3 spot in the rotation, the year to state his case (hopefully) is this one. He’s been working in the off-season with Lucas Giolito to hone the control of his fastball (which worked wonders for Giolito this past year), and now has a new weapon behind the plate in Yasmani Grandal which should snag him a few more strikes each start. Honestly the more I write about the pitching staff, my level of happiness with the Grandal signing goes up. Will it be enough to break Dylan Cease out this year? Let’s take a peek.
2019 Stats
14 starts 73 innings
4-7 Record
5.79 ERA 5.19 FIP
9.99 K/9 4.32 BB/9 1.55 WHIP
45.7% GB-rate 68.1 LOB% 21.4% HR/FB
128 ERA- 0.7 fWAR
Last Week On Nitro: Man, those are some unsightly numbers, aren’t they? Looking at those, you’d think that 2019 was a total bust for Dylan Cease and that all hope was lost, right? WELL FUCK THAT SHIT. Granted, 2019 was definitely not the season that Cease was hoping for when he was called up to start on the 3rd of July. Sox fans hoping for some early fireworks were sort of let down. He went 5 innings, giving up 3 earned runs while striking out 6 and got the win so all good! Except he also walked 4 guys and hit two of them. The start was also against the Tigers, which is basically the baseball version of the Red Wings.
His next 4 starts were all losses, with him never giving up less than 4 runs and him only making it out of the 6th inning once. He got back in the win column again almost a month later (against the Tigers) but was still having issues with his control. Then came the start against the Rangers on August 23rd, and we all got a taste of why Dylan Cease was so highly regarded as he was. The first inning was more of the same, 32 pitches and a 3 run bomb by Willie Calhoun off a fastball that just spun at the top of the zone instead of slicing out of it.
Sox fans had seen this show plenty up till this point, but Cease flipped the script. Those 3 runs were all he was giving, and suddenly the fastballs were unhittable and the curveballs were dropping out of the bottom of the zone. The Rangers had no answers for him, and the Sox bats came alive and reminded Lance Lynn that he was, in fact, Lance fucking Lynn by dropping 7 on his head. Cease struck out 9 and only walked 1 in 5 dazzling innings after the first clunker.
One inning per start seems to be the one that prevented Cease from achieving a solid rookie year in the bigs. One inning where his command abandoned him, and his fastball failed him and his curveball hung there, waiting to be pummeled. The rest of the year was consistently inconsistent. Cease followed up his gem against the Rangers by getting tuned up by the Twins for 8 runs. Then he went 7 against the Tribe while striking out 11. The last 3 starts of the year were positive steps, as he only gave up 1 in each of them, leading us to wonder which Dylan Cease will show up this year?
Too Sweet! (WHOOP WHOOP): Best case scenario for Dylan Cease is he becomes Lucas Giolito Redux and breaks out this year in a ginormous way. If he’s able to control his fastball at the top of the zone, there aren’t too many hitters outside of Aaron Judge and Mike Trout who have the bat speed and eyes to catch up to it. Combine that with his spike curveball which, according to Statcast, has the 5th nastiest movement in all of MLB. Seriously, just look at this big bowl of filth.
Throw all those things together and you get a recipe for a big ole Breakout Pie. In what will (in theory) be a shortened season there is hope that Cease can K around 100 hitters and keep his ERA a respectable 3.70. He also won’t have any innings limits, so Renteria can feel free to let him off the chain. More importantly, he learns to avoid the Big Inning and is able to go deeper into games, averaging around 6+ innings per start. That’s a hell of a number 2-3 starter for a team with contention aspirations.
You Fucked Up! You Fucked Up!: Worse case scenario here is he actually stays the same as 2019. The Big Inning continues to plague him, he can’t get out of the 5th inning and each start proves that instead of a number 2 starter, his ceiling is actually that of a number 5. Without that bullet in the chamber, the Sox are forced to rely on Carlos Rodon coming back healthy to round out the rotation.
Instead of having a glut of starters and potential trade pieces down the road the Sox are left with merely 5 starters, two of which are coming back off of major elbow surgery. I don’t believe this is going to happen, as the Cease we saw against the Rangers and the Indians is far closer to the one we will get than the guy who got the tar pounded outta him by the Twins. You can’t discount the possibility, though.
Bah Gawd, That’s Dylan’s Music!: I think once Dylan Cease is able to take the mound this season we will all see an improvement over his inconsistencies of last year. The Big Inning will not totally disappear but the 2nd half of his season will be a little closer to what we see. There will still be burps and hiccups where he’s not able to get out of the 4th inning, but he’ll be going deeper and deeper into games the more he pitches. A 4.15 ERA with (more importantly) a 1.21 WHIP is not out of the question, with an increase in his K/9 to 10.55 and a decrease in his BB/9 (which at 4.5 last year wouldn’t take much to be considered an improvement) down to 3.30.
He’s going to be helped quite a bit by Yasmani Grandal, but hindered as well by the defense behind him. The other thing to remember is this is a kid who has all of half a season under his belt, so inconsistencies aren’t surprising in the slightest. All told, this second step in his career as a starter will be considered a success, with his status as number 3 starter of the future cemented. A 40+ home run left fielder and a number 3 starter with upside, all for Jose Quintana. Rick Hahn gets a gold star for this one, as the future continues to be bright for the Sox. Now if we could just have some baseball to look forward to…
Now we come to (at least statistically speaking) the #3 spot in the Sox rotation and the 4th most exciting off-season signing: Gio Gonzalez. Part of me wonders whether he will ever actually take the mound for the Sox, considering this is technically his 3rd go around with the team and he’s yet to throw a single pitch for them.
The Sox drafted Gonzalez 38th overall in the 2004 draft with a supplemental pick from the Yankees. He lasted in the system a whole year before the Sox sent him to the Phillies for Jim Thome, then got him back from the Phillies with Gavin Floyd in 2006 when they sent the corpse of Freddy Garcia out East. He made it to the AAA level before Kenny Williams in his infinite wisdom sent Gonzalez out to Oakland for the human knock knock joke known as Nick Swisher (vomit emoji). Once he finally made the bigs he carved out a nice career for himself as the 3rd starter for both Oakland and the Nats, averaging around 165 innings a year and about 180ish strikeouts. He ended up with the Brewers in 2018 and spent the better part of 2 seasons there as their 4th-ish starter.
Gonzalez has always been a very solid strike thrower in his career, but recently he’s had some trouble staying on the mound. Last season Craig Counsell and the Brew Crew were able to manage his innings pretty well (mostly because their bullpen was fucking nails), but will the Sox have the same luck? Let’s dive in.
2019 Stats
Games Started: 17
Record: 3-2
3.50 ERA 1.29 WHIP
78 K 37 BB 9 HR
8.04 K/9 4.04 FIP
Last Week On Nitro: The first thing that jumps out at you looking at Gonzalez’ stat line from last season is…there’s not much of it. 17 starts? 3 Wins? Only 78 Ks? What did the Sox pay for? Well (at least this time) the stats don’t tell the whole story. Gio didn’t start a game for the Brewers until the last week of April (which if that happened this year it would be a blessing, but I digress), and then missed pretty much all of June and July with a dead arm. He came back off the DL on the 20th of July, and surprisingly rounded back into formpretty
When he was on the mound last year he very rarely pitched more than 5 innings, with his longest outing coming on July 26th against the Cubs (a whopping 6.1 innings). Most of this is due to what was mentioned above, namely the fact that he wasn’t needed after the 5th inning thanks to the Brewers bullpen being such an unholy terror. Combine that with Craig Counsell’s (correct) thinking that the best way to get the most out of Gonzalez was to manage his innings, especially coming off something called “dead arm” and you can see why his numbers are so far off his career averages.
When he was on the mound, Gio was pretty effective. His 4 seamer could still occasionally touch 92, combined with the movement on his 2 seam fastball and curveball still got the swinging strikes. Oh, and his changeup against righties wasn’t too shabby either.
I don’t care what anyone says, those Brewers unis are hot fire.
The knock on Gonzalez has always been his occasional bouts of wildness, which last year’s 3.81 BB/9 stat showed pretty clearly. He also saw a jump in his HR/9 which was the 2nd highest in his career in 2019. All told, however, he was a pretty valuable piece to the puzzle for the Brewers last year and by then end of the 2020 season he should hopefully be slotted where he belongs in the Sox rotation at #5.
Too Sweet! (WHOOP WHOOP): Best case for Gio Gonzalez in a Sox uniform is he dials the clock back a few years to when he was averaging around 170 strikouts per year with an ERA in the mid 3’s and a FIP to match. If this version of Gonzalez shows up, the $5 million the Sox committed to him this year will look like a steal. Doubly so if Michael Kopech comes back hurling holy fire upon his enemies and Rick Renteria can manage his (Gio’s) innings appropriately.
If the season doesn’t start until mid June (which right now is looking hopeful at best), Gonzalez can come out firing his best bullets since his workload will have been managed indirectly by the Pandemic. A 3.50 ERA and 99 Ks in half a season from the Sox 5.5th starter will be nothing short of a win for Rick Hahn and have the Sox in the position they need to be rotation-wise to contend for the AL Central.
You Fucked Up! You Fucked Up!: Worst case scenario here is one of two things: Gonzalez can’t stay healthy, forcing the Sox back into a “5th starter by committee” role resulting in a loss every 5th day, or his tendency for wildness and change in parks does him in with the long ball.
Playing in Miller Park isn’t exactly like Pac Bell (or whatever the hell it’s called now) in San Fran, but as far as suppressing home runs it’s a darn sight better than The Down Arrow can be on a hot, windy summer day. If Gonzalez can’t find the strike zone and becomes predictable (and the ball is still made with a yellow cake uranium core) you better hold tight to your helmet nachos on the Fan Deck.
In this scenario you’re looking at a 5+ ERA, and most likely getting waived by the short season equivalent of the all star break. Or even worse, the Sox just say fuck it and roll with that sadness in the rotation, figuring Outbreak 2020 isn’t their year.
Bah Gawd That’s Gio’s Music!: What do I think will really happen with his stats this year? I think his FIP for last season (4.04) is a nice clue. Gio pitching with the Brew Crew’s defense behind him and backed up by that bullpen helped him suppress some of his worse tendencies. The Sox D isn’t going to be so kind, and the Sox bullpen probably won’t be that level of awesome (though I am excited to see what they can do, as I’m calling a big bounce back year for Kelvin Herrera).
I think a 4.15 ERA with 97 strikeouts, 33 walks and a 8-8 record would be completely acceptable for the White Sox, and would be right in line with what they’re looking for out of the 5th starter’s role. If they can get 5 innings out of him each start like the Brewers were able to, I think Rick Renteria and Don Cooper will be pretty satisfied.
All’s I know is I won’t believe he’s actually on the team until I see him throw out that first pitch, otherwise I’ll just be waiting for the notification on my phone that they traded him to Philly again.
We come now to the savvy veteran of the Cubs rotation, as we visit with the surprisingly-gracefully-aging Jon Lester. While Lester is certainly far from the pitcher he was during his first two years with the Cubs, he has done a good job avoiding completely falling off a cliff over the past few years, and in many ways improved over his 2018 campaign. Let’s dig in.
Jon Lester 2019
31 starts, 171.2 innings
4.46 ERA 1.50 WHIP 4.26 FIP
8.65 K/9 2.73 BB/9
43.3 GB% 14.6 HR/FB
102 ERA- 2.8 fWAR
So, Lester saw his ERA climb by more than a full point from ’18 to ’19, but in reality that was actually the result of incredible luck in 2018 keeping the ERA down. In 2018, his ERA of 3.32 was a full point below his FIP of 4.39, which is a major red flag. In 2019, though, he actually brought the FIP down to 4.26, and his ERA being above that is indicative of the actual results matching the expected results. He also saw a bit of bad luck, as evidenced by the ERA being just over the FIP, but also the fact that opposing batters had a .347 BABIP against him, which was far and away the highest mark against him in his career. Overall, 2019 should serve as an encouragement for Cubs fans for what Lester still might have in the tank.
YES! YES! YES!: Given that Lester is now 36 and has been worth less than 3.0 WAR three years in a row, it’s hard to dream too much on a best case scenario for 2020. In reality, the best case scenario is really just avoiding any wide variety of worst-case scenarios, which we will touch on more in a moment. If Lester can be worth more than 2.0 WAR this season, which he should be capable of, then it should be considered a good season from him given his age and lack of overpowering stuff.
The one big thing that the Cubs and their fans may hope to avoid is any chance of Lester somehow vesting his 2021 option. It’s unclear how exactly that would work out at this point, given the option vests if he throws 200 innings this year, and without a 162-game schedule there is zero chance of him getting there, but if that option did happen to vest, it would be bad news for the Cubs. They’d have to pay a 37-year old Lester $25-million in 2021, and while certainly none of us are going to cry tears for the Ricketts having to pay anyone, having that much payroll space taken up by an old pitcher who is just barely performing over league average would not be nice.
YOU’RE A B+ PLAYER: As I briefly mentioned, there are a number of potential worst case scenarios for Lester in 2020, and probably too many to try and get specific with them all. Suffice it to say they can all be summed up with this – it’d be really bad if his age really caught up with him really fast. Again, this could manifest itself in a multitude of ways. Maybe he walks a shit ton of guys. Maybe he is tossing home run derby velocity up there and Wrigley field looks more like a driving range than a baseball field when he pitched. Maybe neither of those things happen, but he still just can’t get anyone out and people just tee off on him. Again, there are many outcomes, but you just hope not to see any of them.
And while the aforementioned option vesting would probably only vest because Lester stays in games for a long time because he’s pitching well, it’s still best to avoid that.
DRAGON OR FICKLE?: I am not one to bet against aging curves, but I am also not one to ignore years of great performance. And while Lester is definitely not an elite pitcher anymore, he still has the pitch control, repertoire, and mindset to pitch well in the bigs. I think we see a virtual repeat of 2019 from Big Jon, though maybe with some ever so slight decline in overall value and production. Mark me down for an official prediction of 2.5 WAR, and I won’t go too far into the rest of the numbers, but if pitches well enough to produce that WAR, the rest of his stats should be satisfactory as well.
With the news about to drop from Governor JB that Illinois is about to go on further lockdown to combat the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, and because we just love our little cretins so much, we’ve decided to try to do something to fight off Space Madness once again, even if it looks like an inevitability at this point.
Tomorrow night, Saturday, NBC Sports will be replaying arguably the greatest game of the modern Hawks era, Game 5 against Nashville in the first round of the 2010 playoffs, and we will be broadcasting it on HotMic once again. Sam, John and I will be there at the very least, and we are currently efforting some old friends to join in the fun, so a certain emeritus editor with a penchant for obscure craft beers may just show up. The broadcast starts at 7:00PM, so there’s a very real chance that we’ll all be dick in the dirt drunk by the time the game ends, even if we know how it’s going to end. In any event, please do join us,irritate the family that you’re locked in amongst, and hop in the chat room.
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Reynaldo Lopez doesn’t really know what he wants to be. His first full season with the White Sox in 2018 was very up and down, with flashes of greatness. His follow up in 2019 was very up and down, with flashes of greatness. I’m sure that Lopez would like to be more great than not, but man he has a helluva time trying to get there.
Consistency seems to be difficult for Reynaldo to come by, as he can toss a 14K/3 H gem like he did to close April and then five days later open May giving up 6 ER/2 HR. The real problem lies in the fact that the gems are much fewer and farther between than the stinkers, but some underlying indicators as the season wore on give hope that a corner is about to be turned…
2019 Stats
Games Started: 19
33 Games Started 10 Wins and 15 Losses
5.38 ERA 1.46 WHIP 184 IP
169 Ks 65 BB 35 HR
8.3 K/9 Innings 5.04 FIP
2.3 WAR
Last Week on Nitro: As mentioned, the constant for Lopez in 2019 was inconsistency. He managed to erase gains made in 2018 across the board, adding almost a point and a half to his ERA (3.91/5.38), a half a HR/9 (1.19/1.71) and lost 25 points on his park-adjusted ERA- (94/119…higher than 100 is BAD). He suffered from erratic control, spraying per game K, BB and IP totals all across the board all season. In what was expected to be a year with a step or two forward, Lopez stayed mostly running in place (which could probably be perceived as a step back if we’re all being honest).
All hope is not lost, though, as Reynaldo was the lead in a tale of two halves. Lopez was especially rough in the first half of 2019, walking nearly a batter an inning his first month and giving up 23 HR prior to the ASB while turning in a 2018 Giolito-esque 6.34 ERA/1.58 WHIP. Something clicked in late July, though, as Rey was able to right the ship to the tune of a 4.29 ERA/1.31 WHIP while lowering his BB/9 to 2.83 from 3.5 in 86 IP. The HR/9 dropped from 2.11 to 1.26 as he saw a nearly 2 MPH increase on his fastball (94.8/96.2), usually a very strong indicator of an improvement to come. Lopez will look to use the 2nd half springboard to create a constant for himself in 2020…if it ever begins.
Too Sweet! (WHOOP WHOOP): All of those positives from the 2019 2nd half hang around, and combined with a new offseason program Lopez takes a Giolito sized step forward in 2020. So a 5 WAR step is probably asking too much, but what the hell? He’s got the stuff, and the fastball velocity improvement added to the more consistent location of the slider and change add up to a 4 WAR SP on a surprise AL Central force on the South Side. A further look at the numbers suggest that Reynaldo worked with an unlucky BABIP of .325 through the ASB and the .304 mark thereafter is a much more realistic number to expect from opposing hitters.
Really, continuing what worked for Lopez in the 2nd half and working to make his mental approach more consistent would be enough for a lot of Sox faithful. Frustration is the word that comes to mind to best describe Lopez thus far in both his starts and how he appears; if he can change it for himself he can probably change it for fans and the organization as well.
You Fucked Up! You Fucked Up!: Lopez has now turned in two seasons with 1st/2nd half splits that make the upcoming year look encouraging. A third in a row will mean a trend that maaaaaybe he just isn’t going to realize his frontline starter potential, and that’d be quite a disappointment. A FIP and ERA- going in the wrong direction again puts Lopez in a sort of grey area – is he a backend SP, capable of the occasional gem, but not really counted on for much more than eating innings OR is he better suited as a high leverage RP, honing his offerings for 15-25 pitches at a time and looking to add a tick or two more to that FB?
There are some that already believe Lopez should be moved to the bullpen, and with Dallas Keuchel set to be a rotation fixture for at least four year, Lucas Giolito the staff ace, Michael Kopech breathing down his neck and a stable of young arms (or a 2020 FA addition?) possibly a season away time is running out for Rey to control his own destiny. The other scenario is another org thinks they can sort him out and keep him in the rotation, or he thinks that enough of himself and requests a ticket out if the Sox don’t agree. Either way, if Lopez can’t keep the good vibes trending up we’re all gonna wonder a lot about exactly how/if he can help the 2020 club.
Bah Gawd, That’s Reynaldo’s Music!: The Sox finally look like they’ll roll out a more than competent MLB rotation, and they’re planning for Lopez to be a part of that. A full season line mimicking his 2019 2nd half would be more than enough for the Sox, especially a consistent start with the K/BB and HR/9 ratios. The beauty of this season is, if the problems persist the team isn’t exactly SOL. Sure, they may struggle to fill the spot in the rotation in season and it’d definitely be a bummer, but with Kopech, et al, ready to contribute the margin for error is larger than it’s been in half a decade or more.
Would Lopez be willing to move to the ‘pen should things go South? Would he be better there than Carlos Rodon in July if both are healthy? I don’t know! But that possibility could also be the motivation that Lopez needs to get his mind right and fix the mental part of his game. And if it isn’t, well, after three-plus years of the same song and dance likely means Reynaldo just ain’t it…and for the first time in years that might be okay.
Though it looks less likely that we’ll get more hockey this year with each passing day, that doesn’t mean the Hawks aren’t not doing anything. Here’s a weekend update about the goings on with the Men of Four Feathers.
– In an interview with Scott Powers, Rocky Wirtz said that there will be no front office changes in the near future. That means all your favorite stars like John McDonough, Stan Bowman, and Jeremy “Please Stop Saying I’m the Worst Coach in the League” Colliton are sitting pretty on the velvet couch of the Blackhawks Brain Trust, where you can suck for three years and still make bank.
With this decision, Rocky Wirtz has finally given us a morsel of what the plan is. And that plan is to continue being an abysmal defensive team coached by a stubborn putz whose system clearly doesn’t work with the guys he’s got, and generally managed (though we use this term in its loosest form) by a man whose solution to his bad defense was to make it slower and ouchie-er.
If we needed proof that Rocky doesn’t watch the games at all, this:
“Well, if I wasn’t confident, they wouldn’t be employed,” Wirtz said. “Yeah, I’m very confident. Like I said, we had a good run, but that doesn’t mean when you’re drafting 27th, 28th, 29th, 30th … You know it’s a young person’s game. You have to put work in there. Stan, right or wrong, after ’10, ’13 and ’15, you essentially had to trade half your team away. Yeah could we have been a dynasty if it was back in the Edmonton days? Of course. The 2010 team could have been around for a long time. But with the salary cap, you couldn’t do that. It is what it is. You got to work within the system.”
There you have it. In what’s becoming a theme around these parts, the Blackhawks brass is reaching back to the greatest hits to justify things they’re doing five years after the fact. If the whole point is “You got to work within the system,” what’s inspired confidence that Bowman’s been doing that effectively? Was it the Brandon Manning signing two years ago? Was it trading Jokiharju for Nylander the Lesser last summer? Was it signing Olli Maatta and Calvin de Haan who suck and have no shoulders, respectively, last summer? We know Bowman had to rip those championship teams apart. We were there. What does that have to do with what he’s done lately?
Rocky’s got some thoughts on that too, buddy.
“I’m very optimistic on some of the young players,” Wirtz said. “It’s the system we have in place to draft and then develop players I think is good. I think that’s what you’ll see. If the system’s right, then we’re going to be OK. I think that’s the key thing. So, I’m optimistic. I don’t do doom and gloom and stuff.”
The system they have in place is good and maybe right, he says. The same system that hasn’t produced a worthwhile defenseman since Nick Leddy. The same system that can’t find a spot for Dylan Sikura but has all the time in the world for Matt Highmore and Brandon Hagel. Kirby Dach has been a hit so far, yes. As has Top Cat. But who do they have down there who’s going to change anything who isn’t already here?
It’s one thing to be optimistic. It’s entirely another to be totally removed from what’s going on. But really, why should Rocky worry? People were still showing up in droves, after all. And what’s more important than packing the house and filling the coffers? Certainly not changing a system that clearly doesn’t work. Why do that when you can just not?
Rocky goes on to talk about players from Europe, such as Artemi Panarin and Dominik Kubalik, and he’s not wrong. The Hawks’s European scouting is outstanding. But to assume that guys like that will still just want to come play for the Blackhawks is dangerous and presumptive. It’s been three years since their last playoff appearance. Riding “We’re the Blackhawks” won’t have the same pull soon enough, especially with the most recent track record.
The last two years have brought us historically bad defense from the Blackhawks. It took them half a year to get Dominik Kubalik—now their second-leading goal scorer—out of the bottom six. Before Boqvist’s injuries and the season suspension, they were leashing the one kid who could drive play from the back end for . . . what? To improve his defense? You don’t get to say you care about defensive development when you’re icing Nick Seeler, Slater Koekkoek, and Dennis Gilbert at any time for any reason with a straight face.
But hey, at least now we know what the plan is. Just kind of hope shit works out. Rocky likes his guys. You wonder what Kane, Toews, Keith, and Crow think about that.
– But it’s not all bad news with the organ-I-zation. Credit to Rocky (and Jerry Reinsdorf) for agreeing to pay all United Center game-day employees through what would have been the end of the regular season.
It would have been more of a surprise if the organ-I-zation hadn’t done so. If you’re cynical, maybe you look at this simply as good PR. If you’re optimistic, you see this as them simply doing the right thing. We’ll choose to be optimistic on this one.
On top of that, the Hawks committed to matching donations of up to $100,000 to the Chicago Community COVID-19 Response Fund. Both very good things to do, and both things that take the sting out of Rocky’s “We like our guys” oafery.
That’s it for now. Stay safe, stay isolated, and keep watching the skis.
Look, everything is a goddamn mess right now. We don’t know what’s going on and neither do you. But Sam, John, and I have a podcast for you. That’s the best we can do. Enjoy.
With the season suspended, we thought we’d take a second to share some thoughts on Fels’s new adventure. Enjoy.
They say you should never meet your heroes. Sam Fels disabused me of that notion.
I can remember a game back around ‘08-‘09 with my uncle. We got there right as the gates opened, as is tradition whenever we go to any sporting event. As we approached the gate from our spot on Washington and Paulina, my uncle told me, “I need to get my Program.”
We walked around the gates until my uncle saw a man with a stack of papers in one hand, a wad of cash in the other, and a PigPen-esque cloud of cigarette smoke in his wake.
“Two Programs,” my uncle boomed in his deep clergyman’s bellow. As we walked into the United Center, I asked him, “What is this?”
It didn’t look like any program I had ever seen. It was homemade and had no gloss. It was cartoony. It said “fuck.” A lot.
“The Indian,” my uncle said.
I didn’t know it, but this was my introduction to Sam Fels, punk rock, and hockey as I now know it.
I remember sitting in the 300s, nary a soul around us, and laughing uncontrollably with my uncle. We each pointed out our favorite jokes and one liners. I pored over that Program the entire game. I don’t remember who they played or who won. But I remember the Program.
Since then, we’ve had three Cups and nine playoff appearances with the Blackhawks. Over the past 11-12 years, Fels has given us weirdos a voice, a guide, and more recently, a place to commiserate. He made the math fun and introduced many of us to why the stats mattered. More importantly, he clarified why this team mattered, on the ice and in our lives.
What always mattered most to me was the laughter and the irreverence at the bullshit. I remember killing time at jobs I hated, reading everything Fels wrote on SB Nation and finishing the day with a rare smile. From 2010-2013, Fels’s writing was a refuge from a reality I tried desperately to drink myself out of. And during the summer of 2015, Fels’s writing helped me confront and cope with a lot of problems I’d buried. It was always a bright light, even when the subject matter was dark.
Fels’s writing—in its punk rock, fearless, fuck-you way—changed us for the better. It gives me and people like you, dear reader, a sense of community and oftentimes respite. Fels’s writing combines art, arithmetic, and angst to create an easily adoptable identity and legacy. It’s a legacy we’ll do our best to keep alive here.
Fels’s writing is important. To me. To you. And now, to the wider audience fortunate enough to introduce themselves to it.
Congratulations, good luck, and smell ya later, Sam. You’ll do well. Because everyone’s got to get their Program.
Now to the consensus #2 starter in the rotation and the Sox second biggest free agent signing of the winter, Dallas Keuchel. 2019 was not the highpoint of Keuchel’s career, nor was it the lowest. He spent the first 3rd of the season on the sidelines, waiting for a suitor for his services after not getting any good offers during the winter (mostly due to the compensatory pick associated with his free agent status.)
Once the Braves finally came calling in June after the cost of the pick expired he signed a one year deal with them worth approximately 21 million. He finally took the mound for them on the 21st of June, and went 8-8 the rest of the way with a bunch of unspectacular but solid numbers. While he’s not the same guy who won the Cy Young with the Trashstros back in 2015 he’s still a valuable pitcher who can keep the ball on the ground and out of the bullpen. Can the Sox take advantage of his specialty? Let’s take a look.
2019 Stats
Games Started: 19
8 Wins and 8 Losses
3.75 ERA 1.367 WHIP
91 Ks 40 BB 16 HR
7.3 K/9 Innings 4.72 FIP
0.8 WAR
Last Week On Nitro: 2019 was a weird year for Dallas Keuchel. For the entire off-season he sat on the sidelines watching pitchers with far worse pedigrees than him get signed to deals that most would consider beneath his level. A majority of industry folks assumed that this was due to the compensatory draft pick that a team would be required to cough up were they to sign Keuchel to a deal. So he was forced to wait until the pick associated with him dropped off at the beginning of June, and on the other side of that line the Braves were patiently waiting.
It was kind of an odd fit at first look, as the Braves boast what might be the deepest glut of young pitching possibly in the entirety of MLB. Much of that pitching is untested, and the Braves felt that having an excellent veteran like Keuchel in the locker room could help shorten the incubation time on some of those arms considerably. So Keuchel signed with the Braves for $21 mildo (pro-rated for the half season he actually pitched, the total came to just over 13 million actually paid out) and spent a few weeks in AAA before joining the big club at the end of June.
Over the season he went a solid 8-8 with a respectable 3.75 ERA, but the 4.72 FIP behind those numbers shows a lot of batted ball luck, and quite a bit of excellent defense behind him suppressing that ERA. As Fangraphs takes FIP instead of ERA when calculating WAR, his FIP is the biggest reason why he was only worth 0.8 in their eyes. He pitched in 2 postseason games and ended with a no decision in both starts, giving up 4 runs in 9 innings combined.
Too Sweet! (WHOOP WHOOP): Best case scenario for Dallas Keuchel would be for him to find the groove with his sinker again and the Sox infield behind him continue to improve on their minimal gains from last season. For someone like Keuchel who is neither a fireballer (his 4-seamer tops out at about 92 MPH) nor a strikeout pitcher, his pitch to contact style generates a TON of ground balls. Out of the last 5 seasons, he’s second in all starters for ground ball percentage with 59.2%. Only Marcus Stroman has a higher GB% and it was a whopping .3% higher than Keuchel’s.
So for Keuchel to have the kind of success he enjoyed with the Astros, the defense behind him has to be ready to field. Having Nick Madrigal come up at some point (though with the plague we’re all currently dealing with, who knows if/when that will happen) would definitely help as he and Moncada would both be plus defenders behind him. Tim Anderson‘s continued improvement would go MILES to helping Keuchel’s ERA stay below 4. Anderson has been quoted as saying he’s been working hard on his defense this winter. Hopefully that’s true, as with Keuchel on the mound he’s going to see a lot of action.
I would consider the following stat line for Keuchel to be a complete success:
12 wins 9 losses/3.45 ERA/1.18 WHIP/155 K/44BB/3.99 FIP
You Fucked Up! You Fucked Up!: Conversely, the worst case scenario for Keuchel is twofold: the Sox defense behind him gets worse, resulting in a ton of unearned runs, and his sinker stops sinking and he becomes an infinitely more expensive version of Dylan Covey. Because when you have a sinkerballer who throws that pitch more than 70% of the time and it doesn’t sink that’s exactly what you get. A whole shitload of balls leave the yard at a very high rate of speed and frequency.
At that point the Sox have to hope that Gio Gonzalez is able to pick up more of the slack, adding a bunch of unnecessary innings to his plate. This causes his pitching arm to go dead in July, forcing Kopech into the rotation much sooner than everyone hoped. This causes more damage to his elbow and he turns into the Sox version of Brent Honeywell: all promise and zero ligaments. Or we all get COVID-19 and the season is canceled, which would fucking suck too.
Bah Gawd That’s Keuchel’s Music!: In reality I think we can probably expect a slightly better version of Dallas Keuchel than the Braves got last season. A 3.65 ERA with a 1.20 WHIP and 10-7 record with a 4.10 FIP seems about right. He’s going to have a little trouble with the long ball, especially since it looks like the league won’t fire up until late May at least. That removes the cold weather factor, which usually suppresses home runs during the first month of the season. Plus pitching at the down arrow naturally inflates HR totals due to it’s tiny confines and the heat from the Dan Ryan, which causes air (and baseballs) to rise to the heavens.
All in all the Sox have themselves a solid #3 or 4 starter locked in for the forseeable future, which with the glut of young arms (Cease, Kopech, Dunning, Lopez etc) and one returning high draft pick in Rodon, is exactly what this team needs. Someone to keep the ball on the ground, eat innings, and give the bullpen a rest for the days when the young guys lose command of their fastball and they have to leap to the rescue. All for the low, low price of 18 million per year. Good work if you can find it.
Stay healthy out there everybody.
