Baseball

Why Is Hole Camels Getting His Whole Ass Kicked?

By Sam Fels 1891 0

When the PECOTA projections and others came out before the season and sent greater Cubdom into a Burning Man-like fit, a lot of what those systems saw was questions about the Cubs’ rotation. Well, not questions exactly, because computers don’t have questions they generate answers and this could turn into a philosophical debate that goes on forever about man and machine and that’s not really what we do here. ANYWHO, the Cubs starting rotation is definitely on the old side, definitely contains pitchers (other than Hendricks) who have had dips the past two years and who had peripherals that were a touch worrying.

These questions were basically not considered the first six weeks of the season, or the six weeks after the first one, where the Cubs rotation was probably the best in baseball and took the Cubs from 2-7 to multiple games up in the division. But now the Cubs have had a rough two weeks or so, a .500 road trip and a sub-.500 homestand before losing yesterday to the Astros (which tends to happen). There’s been an iffy couple trips through the rotation, which starts setting off alarm bells and if it doesn’t stop pretty soon will have bonfires and effigies and weird clothing in a desert somewhere (I’ve never been to Burning Man and don’t intend to, so I’m just going to have this very limited and comedic view of it).

Perhaps the most worrying part of the starting staff’s struggles of late is Cole Hamels. His past three starts have basically seen his nuts get kicked up into his throat. He’s only managed 13 innings, and in them he’s given up eight extra-base hits, 11 earned runs, nine walks against just 11 strikeouts, and 23 hits overall. That’s a 2.46 WHIP and a 7.61 ERA. So yeah, that’s not good. On the plus side, he remains extremely handsome.

So what’s been the issue? Clearly the control is something to be looked at, as Hamels had only walked 17 hitters in the previous 49 innings this season But we can go a little deeper.

On the plus side, Hamels hasn’t lost any velocity. His fastball has actually been at a higher MPH the past three starts than it was before, up over a 92.5 MPH average where it has been 91.2 in the three starts before. Hamels hasn’t seen any change in movement either, as no pitch has lost its drop or horizontal movement. His curve flattened out a little in his start against the Nats, but that was a one-off and has been where it has been all of the season for the most part.

There hasn’t been much of a change in usage, either. His last good start, against Milwaukee, he threw his fastball basically 70% of the time, but that was also an outlier and he’s been where he’s been all season, throwing it about just half the time.

But it’s the fastball/sinker where this issues seem to be. Or could be, if three starts are enough to go on. Check out his release point on his the fastball/sinker (which are basically the same thing for Hamels) over the course for the season:

Something of a dip, and his curve has seen the same though it was back to normal in Houston yesterday, it just didn’t get him saved from getting shelled.

Where does that result? Well, accuracy. Here’s where Hamels’s fastball was in his first eight starts of the season:

Pretty much in the strikezone, and when missing it was outside which is away from power for most righties. Basically zoning in on the outside corner, and when he did come inside it was low. Now the last three starts:

Whoops. All over the place, inside more than he’s been, not in the zone, and not surprisingly it’s inside and high in the zone where he’s getting mushed but good lately. It would seem the lower arm angle has cost him control and has led to pitches carrying inside and high to righties more often.

Once Hamels gets back to zeroing in on the outside corner again, or his arm-side corner, things should be fine. Let’s just hope he gets back there sooner than later.

 

Baseball

Series Preview – Cubs vs. Astros: Timing Is Everything

By Sam Fels 1189 0

vs.

RECORDS: Cubs 30-21   Astros 35-19

GAMETIMES: 1:10 Monday, 7:10 Tuesday and Wednesday

TV: WGN Monday, ABC Tuesday, NBCSN Wednesday

HOT DOG DANCE: The Crawfish Boxes

PROBABLE PITCHERS

Cole Hamels vs. Gerrit Cole

Jon Lester vs. Corbin Martin

Kyle Hendricks vs. Wade Miley

PROBABLE CUBS LINEUP

Kyle Schwarber – LF

Javier Baez – DH

Anthony Rizzo – 1B

Willson Contreras – C

Jim Adduci – RF

Albert Almora Jr. – CF

Daniel Descalso – 2B

Addison Russell – SS

David Bote – 3B

PROBABLE ASTROS LINEUP

Josh Reddick – DH

Alex Bregman – SS

Michael Brantley – LF

Yuli Gurriel – 3B

Robinson Chirinos – C

Jack Mayfield – 2B

Tyler White – 1B

Derek Fisher – RF

Jake Marisnick – CF

 

Yep, that’s Jim Adduci, called up today, batting fifth for the Cubs as they take on baseball’s best team. Jason Heyward is feeling his hip, Javy Baez is feeling his heel and is restricted to DH duty, and Kris Bryant is having a hard time feeling anything after running into Heyward yesterday. So yeah, it’s something of a skeleton staff. There’s only so much you can take as a team, no matter your depth. One wonders if Bryant or Heyward were going to be out longer if Happ wouldn’t have been the call, but here we are.

Lucky for the Cubs, they’ve caught the Astros at a sensitive point, or maybe have. George Springer is definitely out, and Jose Altuve might only return for the last game or two of the series. Collin McHugh is also down for the count.

Of course, there’s more than enough here to paddle the Cubs around, especially this bewildered sloth of a bullpen. Correa, Bregman, Brantley, Marisnick, Reddick, and Chirinos are all having well-above average years, and Bregman and Correa are at MVP-levels. Or they would be if Springer wasn’t dusting them when he’s healthy. So aren’t you excited to watch Cishek or Ryan or Maples or Edwards try and get big outs against these guys this series? Get the book on your head.

The Cubs will duck Verlander, but Cole is probably more torturous. The Cubs couldn’t do all that much with Wade Miley last year and that’s before he got the Astros pixie dust on him. Martin is one of their premier prospects, but he’s had control issues so far.

And with that depleted lineup the Cubs have, should they find themselves trailing late they’ll have to make it work against a legion of assholes breathing fire. Ryan Pressley gave up his first earned run in a year on Friday. Roberto Osuna, sadly not bathing in lava, has been a lights-out closer. Will Harris has an ERA barely over 1.00. Hector Rondon isn’t striking out nearly as many hitters as he did when he was a Cub, but he’s getting a multitude of grounders and has been very good as well. There’s no chink in the armor here.

Some would want to paint this as a possible World Series preview. We can only hope the Cubs look representative. It will be fascinating to see Kyle Hendricks try and negotiate what may be the best lineup he’s ever seen. There’s another Cole Derby today, with Hamels and Gerrit. For the Cubs to get by a team like this they need great starts. This is the hardest team to get great starts against. Let’s have some fun?

Baseball

Astros Spotlight: Gerrit Cole Doesn’t Need To Be Fancy

By Sam Fels 1166 0

You would think a lot of Pirates would benefit from escaping Pittsburgh. It’s only worked out so-so for Andrew McCutchen, the offensive centerpiece for those playoff Pirate teams. Gerrit Cole, on the other hand, has found salvation in Houston after being punted from The Confluence.

Upon arriving in Houston, Cole saw his strikeout jump up a third, to the point that he’s now striking out over 13 hitters per nine innings, after gather 12 per nine last year, or over a third the past two years. That leads the league both years and combined. Basically, nothing happens when Cole is on the mound, except the occasional home run when he finds someone’s bat. That’s been the only bugaboo this year so far.

So how was Cole able to boost his strikeouts so fantastically in Houston after flashing this stuff in Pittsburgh? Cole was the one pitcher who chafed under the Pirates cutter-heavy, and shift-heavy ways. He was pushed to give up grounders that their infield could gobble up instead of just sending hitters back to the dugout having never made contact in the first place. It wasn’t that Cole wasn’t effective in black and yellow, as his ERA was below 4.00 every year except his last.

Well, the Astros saw his 95-MPH fastball and figured he should just throw that as often as possible. They also got him to ditch his sinker/two-seamer, and haven’t worried about what ground balls he is or isn’t getting. Cole upped his fastball usage 10 percent as an Astro, and has completely cut his use of the sinker to nothing. He’s also bumped up his use of a curve and slider, which are just the same side of the coin depending on velocity, and dumped the change-up he was trying in 2017 that led to nowhere.

As you get with the Astros, there are always whispers about how exactly they improve the spin-rate of their pitchers. Cole has added a mile or two an hour to his fastball in Houston, and his curve has added three inches of drop each of the past two years. Which makes it quite the weapon, and also something you wouldn’t have seen coming. But with that smoke and then a curve that drops off the table, you can see why hitters are just waving at anything he’s serving up there.

All of it must have Cole looking at the upcoming winter and getting awfully big eyes, because it’ll be his first dip into free agency. Or he would have been if the free agent market hadn’t completely disappeared thanks to not collusion for sure. Still, top end starters have been able to get theirs. If Patrick Corbin was able to get six years at $140M, then Cole must be thinking about a $30M per year deal somewhere. deGrom just signed for a little south of that, that’s where teammate Verlander is, same for Scherzer, and those are the names Cole’s numbers have him hanging around with.

The Astros have some of the same concerns as the Cubs, locking in the players they’ve produced to make this unholy monster of a team. Jose Altuve’s salary jumps $20M next year. Bregman’s $13M. George Springer enters arbitration. So does Carlos Correa. Houston had $121M committed to next year before those two get what they have coming to them. They might have enough room for $27-30M for Cole, but it’ll be a squeeze.

Until then, they’ll just take the avalanche of strikeouts.

Baseball

Series Preview – Royals vs. White Sox: Back Down To The Floor

By Sam Fels 1117 0

vs.

RECORDS: Royals 18-34   Whites Sox 23-29

GAMETIMES: Monday 1:10, Tuesday and Wednesday at 7:10

TV: NBCSN Monday and Tuesday, WGN Wednesday

ARGUING ABOUT BBQ: Royals Review

PROBABLE PITCHERS

Homer Bailey vs. Ivan Nova

Brad Keller vs. Lucas Giolito

TBD vs. Reynaldo Lopez

PROBABLE ROYALS LINEUP

Nicky Lopez – 2B

Whit Merrifield – RF

Adalberto Mondesi – SS

Alex Gordon – LF

Hunter Dozier – 3B

Jorge Soler – DH

Ryan O’Hearn – 1B

Martin Maldonado – C

Billy Hamilton – CF

PROBABLE WHITE SOX LINEUP

Yoan Moncada – 3B

Eloy Jimenez – LF

Jose Abreu – 1B

Yonder Alonson – DH

James McCann – C

Charlie Tilson – RF

Jose Rondon – SS

Yolmer Sanchez – 2B

Ryan Cordell – CF

 

After spending the week on the road playing the cream of the crop the AL has to offer, and having the Twins get in up to the elbow, the Sox return home to go to the other side of the spectrum with a three-gamer against the Kansas City Royals, who have as many losses as the Marlins. And when you have anything that’s the same number as the Marlins, that’s a place you don’t want to be. But hey, they’re not the Orioles.

How did the Royals get here? Well, it’s not an offense as bas as you’d think one for a wooden spooner would be. They rank 9th or 10th in most offensive categories as a team, and through Dozier, Gordon, Soler, Merrifield, and Mondesi they can put up some runs on the odd night here and there. Hamilton and Maldonado are automatic outs though, when any of the Sox pitchers need a break. Soler and Mondesi are strikeout-prone, but the other three in the five mentioned are very patient and can make for a headache.

Scouring further down, the Royals rotation has actually bee slightly better than the Sox’s, in terms of ERA and FIP. Their problem is they walk more hitters than anyone other than the Rangers. The only bright spot has been Danny Duffy, whom the Sox will miss this go-around. Homer Bailey can’t get it over the plate and when he does it’s had a nasty habit of getting sent to far away places. Keller has had even bigger walk-problems, so if the Sox can be patient there’s gold in them thar hills.

Late in games, you’d want to avoid the triumvirate of Jason Diekman, Ian Kennedy, and Scott Barlow, who have very high K numbers and have generally been a pain in the ass. Everyone else has been gasoline, and with the Royals have a shrug emoji listed for Wednesday, the Sox might get to that gasoline.

For the Sox, Moncada slots up to the leadoff spot and Eloy to the 2nd spot, where you’d hope he’ll make his home for the next decade. Garcia and Anderson are nursing minor knocks but could show up at some point in the series, though not this afternoon. Either way for the Sox, it’ll be something of a relief to just no have to deal with a hell’s gauntlet of a lineup anymore.

 

Baseball

Royals Spotlight: Alex Gordon Is Undead

By Sam Fels 1358 0

Alex Gordon was dead.

That was clear. After the 2015 Royals World Series win, Gordon must’ve figured there wasn’t anything left to do, because he fell off a cliff, crashed into jagged rocks, and watched his limbs split off. Some of this was due to injury, as Gordon’s body began betraying him in that ’15 season. He only played 104 games that year, which turned him into a 2-WAR player when he had been consistently a four or five. It also affected his superb defense.

But after that? Hooo boy. The past three seasons the best average Gordon had was .245. His highest OBP was .324. His highest wOBA was .305. He didn’t have a 2-WAR season, managing 1.7 last year, and that was the highest.

Gordon was never a great power hitter, only cracking 20 homers twice in his career and never slugging higher than .455. But he used to be a doubles-machine, including putting up 51 one season. The past three seasons his totals for two-baggers was 16, 20, 24. So what happened?

It seemed like Gordon got to that magical point a lot of players do these days at age 32, when dealing with the hyped up velocity of the modern game became too much. Gordon saw a huge spike in his whiff-percentage on off-speed and breaking pitches, which kind of clues you into that he was starting to cheat a bit on fastballs. When you’re spinning like a top on curveballs, you know this could be the problem. And Gordon was doing less and less with fastballs too, which doesn’t leave you a lot of places to go.

So what’s turned around this year? Well, Gordon is dealing with the fastball again, hitting .295 against them so far after not being above .240 the past three seasons. Gordon also isn’t getting bamboozled by changes and curves, hitting .389 and .333 against them, respectively. The past three seasons those numbers were…well, unsightly.

Is there a change in approach? There seems to be only a tweak or two. Gordon is swinging at less pitches out of the zone, but he’s making contact on significantly more pitches out of the zone. High and a way seems to be the order of the day:

One wonders if Gordon’s resurgence might bring his time in Kansas City to an end. Gordon is 35, and clearly won’t be around the next time the Royals mean anything to anyone. He has a mutual option next year for $23M, but must a $4M buyout. Any contender needing another bat would probably think that’s not much of an investment. Of course, Gordon can only play left, though an AL team could slot him at DH too.

Of course, you’re also talking about one of the most popular Royals ever, someone whose name will live forever there thanks to those ’14 and ’15 teams (could you have scored in the 9th in Game 7, though?). You don’t just flog those unless you have to, especially as Gordon probably doesn’t fetch that much at 35 with still limited power. These are the decisions that rebuilding teams have to make. At least Gordon isn’t dead like he used to be.

Baseball

Weekend Series Wraps: Sox Swept By Twins, Cubs Drop Two Of Three To Reds – Get To The Meats

By Sam Fels 1359 0

You’ll have to excuse me today. It’s a holiday weekend and I’m a little under the weather, which is like the worst combination ever, so I’m just going to combine these into one so we can all go about using our bonus weekend night however we see fit. I hope there’s grilled meats and cold beer in your future. I’m gonna try the old booze and allergy med combination and see if I can’t find Lucy in the sky.

Game 1 Box Score: Twins 11, White Sox 4

Game 2 Box Score: Twins 8, White Sox 1

Game 3 Box Score: Twins 7, White Sox 0

-This is probably not how you’d design this era of Sox-Twins matchups to start, now that one has proven to be ready for primetime and the other trying to get there. 26-5 combined suggests the Sox road might be a little longer to traverse than you thought. The Twins were so ruthless this weekend, as any mistake any pitcher made in black was punished by a baseball traveling at high speeds and distances. Six homers over three games is a pretty conservative pace for them on the road, but with the weather in Minneapolis finally cooperating, they might start lining up the two.

-I can see where Max Kepler is going to be villain #1 for Sox fans pretty soon. He just looks the part, and is effective enough to take the mantle. That lithe, smarmy carriage. Besides, only assholes are named Max

-Reynaldo Lopez wasn’t that wild, but he was wild in the strike zone, which usually ends with you giving up three homers and eight runs against a team that is a fireworks factory in itself. Lopez got scared off his slider, which means it was only fastball-change, and as the change wasn’t all that effective, it’s gasoline time.

-Yonder Alonso had three hits. So y’know, that’s something.

-Willians Astudillo is as much fun as I hoped.

-Covey wasn’t even bad today. There was some BABIP Kung Fu Treachery, but is only real mistake was a change that decided to go rogue, and then it went far thanks to Eddie Rosario. The Twins just aren’t missing right now.

-It’s a little scary that Welington Castillo was allowed to stay in to take another foul tip off the dome, when he looked a little shaky after the first one. Let’s say all of baseball has a long way to go when it comes to this sort of thing.

-After another day of watching Manny Banuelos, it’s probably worth pointing out that Dylan Cease gave up one over six in his last outing with 7 Ks but four walks. It’s the latter that’s probably keeping him in Carolina.

Game 1 Box Score: Reds 6, Cubs 5

Game 2 Box Score: Cubs 8, Reds 6

Game 3 Box Score: Reds 10, Cubs 2

-We said this Reds team was miles better than its record was saying it was, and they seem intent on proving that to the Cubs alone. Votto can’t hit anyone else, but he’s still Votto against the blue pinstripes, and they will never, ever get Eugenio Suarez out. It’s just not going to happen. Ever. Forget it.

-You can’t go any farther without talking about the pen again, and I’m going to harp on this until moves are made. There’s no point in bringing in Montgomery or Chatwood for merely one inning or just an out as it was on Friday with Monty. You barely have anyone to trust out there. Right now, I’d be using both, at least three times a week combined, to take over from the starter and see how far they can go. That limits the exposure of everyone else. Sure, Cishek is supposed to be the one you can trust right now, but he’s already overworked and well on his way to 70 appearances and an additional 174 times he warms up. Considering both Monty and Chatwood were stretched out, I don’t know why they can’t give you two to three innings three days apart each. It’s certainly time for creative solutions, unless you want more Brad Brach and Kyle Ryan in your life.

-That’s a mixed message with Darvish, who kept getting pulled early in the year to keep his confidence and yet sent out there for an eighth inning he clearly wasn’t prepared for. You know when a pitcher is emptying the tank, and that was in the 7th yesterday. Yes, the pen is a mess, but again, had they just closed out Friday with Monty and maybe on more, we aren’t here.

-It’s not going to happen for Carl Edwards.

-Daniel Descalso isn’t hitting, and then gave away a run because he can’t actually catch the ball. Solid signing here. Today he came up in his first AB and clearly wanted to go the opposite way, late on even breaking balls. His next AB he seemed determined to pull everything. He’s about as in between as you can get.

-And now maybe Bryant could have the concussion problems he has last year after getting beaned. This went well. Burn this tape.

Onwards for both…

 

Baseball

Series Preview – White Sox vs. Twins: Destined To Do This…For Awhile

By Sam Fels 1544 0

vs.

RECORDS: White Sox 23-26   Twins 33-16

GAMETIMES: Friday 7:10, Saturday and Sunday 1:10

TV: WGN Friday, NBCSN Saturday and Sunday

KIRK COUSINS’S PRISONERS: Twinkie Town

PROBABLE PITCHERS

Reynaldo Lopez vs. Jose Berrios

TBD vs. Kyle Gibson

Dylan Covey vs. Jake Odorizzi

PROBABLE WHITE SOX LINEUP

Charlie Tilson – CF

Yoan Moncada – 3B

Jose Abreu – 1B

Wellington Castillo – C

Eloy Jimenez – LF

Tim Anderson – SS

Yonder Alonso – DH

Yolmer Sanchez – 2B

Ryan Cordell – RF

PROBABLE TWINS LINEUP

Max Kepler – DH

Jorge Polanco – SS

Marwin Gonzalez – RF

Eddie Rosario – LF

C.J. Cron – 1B

Miguel Sano – 3B

Jonathan Schoop – 2B

Jason Castro – C

Byron Buxton – CF

 

After four days with the class of the AL and coming out intact, if not with heads held high, the Sox traverse the length of the country (or width? Whatever, south to north) to see the team that’s knocking on the door to join that class. The Minnesota Twins are out by themselves in the AL Central, have the best winning-percentage in all of baseball, and along with the Astros have a +90 run-differential, best in the game by a distance.

How did they get here? By smashing the shit out of the baseball. The Twins lead the world in runs by 17, They’re second in the AL behind the Astros in average, on-base percentage, and lead everyone in slugging. They’ve done this while playing in one of the least hitter-friendly parks as well. In fact, it’s the worst in the American League and only trails Wrigley so far this year, with both benefitting from Winter Olympics conditions. Or suffering, take your pick.

Of all the regulars, the only soft spots are Marwin Gonzalez and  Hero Of Everymen Everywhere Willian Astudillo. Jason Castro and Mitch Garver have kept Astudillo third on the depth-chart most of the season, though Garver is hurt at the moment. But they’re getting hitting from everywhere, with Polanco vaulting himself into stardom, and squeezing power out of Nelson Cruz and C.J. Cron. The former might not play this series but is about ready to come back from injury. It’s a tough lineup to traverse, if the Sox weren’t already tired from having to run the Astros gauntlet for four days.

But it’s not like the Twins don’t get pitching as well. Berrios, Odorizzi, and Martin Perez are all carrying ERAs of 3.30 or under and FIPs to back that up as not flukes. It’s not a huge strikeout staff but they don’t walk a lot of guys. They don’t get many grounders but in that park that’s not a huge problem. Gibson has had some homer problems but that’s mostly due to luck and will probably even out over the rest of the year, even as the weather warms up.

The pen is anchored by the continually grunting and sweaty Blake Parker, and no I don’t know how that works either but it does. Parker doesn’t strike that many out, walks too many, but gets out of it with a high groundball-rate and pure guts essentially. The main bridge to him is Taylor Rogers who is the strikeout dude back there. Ryne Harper and Matt Magill have also been highly effective.

Whereas Lucas Giolito got his shot at parading through a lineup of mutants and had maybe his best night in the majors last night, it’ll be Reynaldo Lopez’s turn tonight. It looks like another bullpen day on Saturday.

With the trajectories these teams are on, and the declines elsewhere, this could be the prologue to another few years of Twins-Sox arguments at the top of the Central. Which should lead to another batch of hilarious ads from Fox Sports North and an invasion of surprisingly annoying Twins fans whenever they’re on the Southside. And away we go.

Baseball

Twins Spotlight: Buxton, Polanco, And All We Need Is Just A Little Patience

By Sam Fels 1608 0

The Twins sit eight games clear at the top of the AL Central. While they have been predicted to compete for a couple years now, surging to the front with authority was not predicted many places outside the State of Hockey. Sure, it helps that Jose Ramirez and a few pitchers in Cleveland died, but the Twins look to have arrived.

Two big reasons the Twins are up there is Jorge Polanco and Byron Buxton. Polanco has a case for AL-MVP-Who’s-Not-Trout division, and Buxton is making good on the promise that most thought had gone to waste. A difference in approach with the rearing of the two is apparent.

Hard to believe, but Buxton is appearing in his fifth major-league season. He came up first when he was 20, which some do but is a big ask for just about anyone. Before being called up, Buxton only got 13 games at AAA and 59 at even AA. So he was pretty damn green. He got an additional 49 games at AAA the following year, but he was up full-time after that. Buxton has always been a positive player purely on his defense in center, but his offense has finally joined the party this year, after some thought it never would.

Polanco would also appear briefly in the majors at 20, but that was only for four games. He spent all of 2015 in the minors, where he got 95 games at AA and another 22 in AAA before another cameo in the majors. In 2016, Polanco received another 75 games in AAA, which is far more than Buxton ever got. Polanco never quite struggled at the plate in the majors the way Buxton did at times, but both have exploded this year, especially Polanco.

Polanco’s 27% line-drive rate is top-20 in MLB, and his 41% hard-contact rate will get it done as well. Polanco’s been especially dangerous on off-speed pitches this year, crushing curves and change-ups like never before. That’s probably a product of a new alley-to-alley approach, as a jump of nearly 10% more of his contact going up the middle.

Buxton seems to be the latest member of the Launch Angle Cabal, raising his fly ball rate nearly 20% over last year and 10% over his career norm. He’s on the other side of the spectrum, pretty much selling out to turn around fastballs and susceptible to breaking or slower offerings. And as you can see from the zone profile from what he’s doing with fastballs in his career vs. this year, he’s dead-set on lifting lower ones:

Either way, the Twins appear set up the middle for a long time to come. Good thing Hawk isn’t around anymore to have the Twins continually break his heart, even if it takes place outside now instead of in a garage.

Baseball

Series Preview – Reds vs. Cubs: Tell Your Statistics To Shut Up

By Sam Fels 1327 0

vs.

RECORDS: Reds 22-27   Cubs 29-19

GAMETIMES: Friday-Sunday 1:20

TV: NBCSN Friday, ABC Saturday, WGN Sunday

WHO DEY: Blog Red Machine

PROBABLE PITCHERS

Anthony DeSclafani vs. Kyle Hendricks

Tyler Mahle vs. Yu Darvish

Tanner Roark vs. Jose Quintana

PROBABLE REDS LINEUP

Nick Senzel – CF

Joey Votto – 1B

Eugenio Suarez – 3B

Jesse Winker – LF

Yasiel Puig – RF

Derek Dietrich

Jose Iglesias – SS

Tucker Barnhart – C

PROBABLE CUBS LINEUP

Kyle Schwarber – LF

Kris Bryant – 3B

Anthony Rizzo – 1B

Javier Baez – SS

Jason Heyward – RF

Victor Caratini – C

Daniel Descalso – 2B

Albert Almora Jr. – CF

 

The NL Central is weird. Weird things can happen in baseball over two months. Hell, it can happen over six. The Reds show up today, and they’re last in the division. Yet they have a +25 run-differential, which is fourth-best in the entire NL, behind the three first-placed teams. Hell, the Cardinals have a +21 run-differential, and they’re a game behind the Pirates, who are -42. This probably evens out, and relatively soon, but for now it’s certainly odd viewing.

The way you get to that, or at least one way, is having great pitching and a woeful offense. The Reds have those. So they’re always holding opponents to few runs, but their offense rarely catches up, and when they do it’s a binge. It’s like your rare trips to Stan’s Donuts (don’t even try to play that you don’t get like three things at Stan’s. I know you. I see you).

Since we last saw the Reds, they lost two of three to the Dodgers at home and then split with the Brewers in Milwaukee, including an abstract performance art piece on Wednesday afternoon that they dropped 11-9. Not much has changed with the Reds in just eight days. One difference for the Cubs is that they’ll see Anthony Desclafani and not Luis Castillo, which is definitely a trade up if you’re the Cubs.

DeSclafani’s career has been kind of all over the map, and he’s had his injury problems. His strikeouts are up this year, but his grounders are way down and when summer finally hits in Cincy that’s generally not a recipe for success as balls tend to ride the humidity and methane from Skyline out into the right-field bleachers a ton. DeSclafani has changed this year by choking off his slider into a curveball, throwing that pitch more more than he ever has and five times as much as he did last year. He still uses the slider a quarter of the time, and it’s still his most effective pitch as far as what hitters do against it.

The Cubs also didn’t see Tyler Mahle, who’s been great and isn’t walking anyone essentially. Mahle features a fastball, change, and curve, and the change and curve get a ton of grounders for him, which will be a real boon in his home park.

Other than that, you know the drill. Eugenio Suarez will kill the Cubs at some point this weekend, Senzel is heating up, Dietrich is the only other one hitting, and the pen has multiple weapons before you even get to Raisel Iglesias at the end.

For the Cubs, they’re apparently still trying to exhume Descalso today, and Hendricks returns home where he’s given up no runs in his last two starts in white over 17 innings. Pedro Strop won’t return this weekend but is very close. Yu’s revival started against this Reds team, and they’re an offense you can get healthy against. There’s a nasty looking road trip after this, so another series win would certainly be the right prep for it.

Baseball

Reds Spotlight: Then Back To My Place Where I Will Get You Votto

By Sam Fels 1110 0

We’re going to try to add these to our baseball previews. At least as long as our sanity allows.

There are many signs of the apocalypse these days. Look around daily, and you’ll probably find one. Maybe it’s the imminent heat death of the planet. Or the fracturing of the political scene. Or increasing feudalist society across the world. Perhaps nuclear winter in the Middle East.

Joey Votto with a 74 wRC+ feels like it’s not too far down the list either.

To be fair to Votto, he did start like this once, just once, before. In April of 2016, he hit .226 with a wOBA of .276. He struck out nearly a quarter of the time, just as he did this season. That time he was hitting a ton of grounders, which he isn’t that time, and we’ll circle back to in a sec. And when all was said and done in 2016, Votto ended up slashing .326/.434/.550 with a 158 wRC+. And really, that’s what we should expect from Votto until he doesn’t do that, even if we get to September 20th and he’s still doing this. I’ll still believe he’ll end up with superior numbers. It’s one of those things where even seeing the body won’t prove to me he’s dead.

That doesn’t mean there doesn’t feel like something’s off with Votto. One, he’s swinging at way more pitches out of the zone, and the real jump is he’s not getting to any of it. The past three seasons, Votto has made contact at between 75%-78% of the pitches he swung outside of the zone. This year it’s 63.1%. He’s making less contact than he has in a long time, and his swinging strikes are as hight as they’ve been in a decade. What’s the deal here?

You heard Jim DeShaies mention when the Cubs were in Ohio that Votto’s fly balls are way up, and that’s true. 42.5% of his contact is in the air, up from 30% last year and a career rate of 33.3%. It’s come at the cost of his line-drives, which is what you think of when you think of Votto. Those are down to 20.8%, from last year’s 31.4%, and his usual rate of around 25%. His hard-contact is down a touch, but not to these kinds of margins.

Is Votto trying to go for a little more power? Well, one of the signs of age is a problem with the fastball, and Votto is certainly having that. For his career, Votto hit .324 on fastballs and slugged .593. This year those numbers are .191 and .338, which leaves your jaw shattered on the floor. And Votto can’t seem to get to it anywhere. Check out the location of his whiffs on fastballs for his career and then this year:

Votto’s struggles on off-speed pitches also suggests he’s leaning to get to the fastballs and is getting caught. He’s in-between. Votto simply doesn’t miss this much, so something seems to be up.

He is 35, which is when you’d think players would start to fade. But off a cliff like this? There is a comparison, and that’s Albert Pujols who is something of a contemporary of Votto’s. Pujols fell off the face of the Earth in his age 37 season, which may surprise you. At 36, while hardly the country-side wandering monster he was in St. Louis, Pujols had a 113 OPS+ in Anahiem. The next year it was 80, and he’s been a sinkhole ever since.

That can’t be happening to Votto, can it? The guy who looked like he could line a single to center whenever he wanted? This has happened once before, and then Votto tore a hole in the Earth. That turnaround in 2016 started in May. They’re still waiting on Votto this year.