Baseball

Can You Blame Joe Maddon Twice?

By Sam Fels 1846 0

On the ground, there are perfectly legitimate, nothing-you-can-do-about-it reasons for this latest Cubs swoon. A starter gets hurt before the second inning. A rookie pitcher has something of a blow-up. A rain delay forces your starter out. All of these things tend to mean you’re going to lose that game, especially when it exposed your obvious weakness, the bottom half of your pen. When they’re bunched together like they have been the past five days, it probably makes it seem worse than it is.

But we’ve been doing this for six weeks or more now, and if it were just that you could be a little more optimistic. Still, the Cubs are playing loose games. Last night Jason Heyward, generally one of the Cubs more alert and astute players, gets picked off first. We’ve lamented the errors, the base-running mistakes (which the Cubs do lead the league in), the silly decisions, the bad ABs. All of it speaks to a team just not locked in, and generally that’s on the manager.

If the Cubs don’t close the week out hard, the whispers of Joe Maddon losing his job might turn into full conversation. He’s only got half of a year left on his contract, the Cubs appear intent on finding any reason to let him ride off into the sunset, and his players seem to be playing like they’d be in favor of speeding up the process.

Except the Cubs have already done this, in a way. Check out the tweet pinned to the top of The Athletic’s Sahadev Sharma’s feed. They were talking about this in March. They were talking about this in November. More batting practice. Less shenanigans. We want this hitting coach gone. They listened to the players, this all came from them. They said they wanted this.

And this is how they’re playing.

So one has to wonder if Maddon is the problem at all. It’s impossible to imagine this group of players has the problem. Can you really see Anthony Rizzo not being tuned in and up? Or Kris Bryant? Javier Baez? Contreras? You feel like you can spot prominent players who are contributing to a broken clubhouse (they’re usually Mets), but it feels impossible that it could be any of these guys. I suppose Jon Lester contributed to one clubhouse gas cloud in Boston, but he’s considered a team leader now too. Of course, fool me once and all that…

So the Cubs have changed their pitching coach. They’ve changed their hitting coach. They’ve changed their routines. And now they’re having the season everyone thought they had last year but didn’t really. Whatever “urgency” or “edge” the Cubs were looking for isn’t there, though it’s hard to look like that when you start every game off down five.

I don’t know how deep the rot goes. I could argue that it’s all surface. The pitching hasn’t been good, the bottom half of the pen can’t keep the Cubs in games, Hamels and Hendricks either are or were hurt, and there are dark spots in the lineup. Bigger than anyone is mentioning is that Bryant isn’t hitting for power and knocking in runs in bunches, which is what happens when the Cubs are good. Bryant slugged .719 in May, and drove in 22. Those numbers are .489 and six in June. That’s not all on him, you have to have people to drive in of course, but it’s a major problem. Compounding that is Rizzo slugged .394 in June. Those two don’t just have to be good. They have to be great, and they haven’t been.

All of that explains it away, doesn’t it?

On the deepest level, perhaps the offseason malaise from ownership to the front office carried down to the clubhouse. That’s an impossible argument to prove, but you can see it, can’t you? The players didn’t feel supported, didn’t feel urgency from their bosses, and it’s spread like wildfire.

The only thing I can definitely get on Maddon for right now is going to a six-man rotation when Hendricks was already hurt. Why voluntarily wade into all of your depth when you don’t have to? You were calling up Alzolay anyway. Perhaps that game Hamels got hurt Chatwood could have taken over. There’s no guarantee there of course, but we can basically say what Montgomery is now. Maybe you get one or two of those. Things would feel better with just two more wins than losses.

But overall, Maddon was asked/forced to change his ways. He did, and the players are still providing underwhelming results. Can that really be on him? Who could do better? You going to turn things over to Mark Loretta?

Something is amiss in there. It would have seemed unfathomable just two seasons ago it could be the players. But we’re here now, and I can’t find any other answers. That’s the harder change, of course. And if you fuck it up it’s irreparably broken.

Then again, maybe it already is?

Anyway, have a good holiday. We’ll be back on Friday. 

Hockey

Flexibility Or Just Throwing Stuff At The Wall?

By Sam Fels 2517 0

We’ve gotten a lot of mileage out of the Hawks basically saying they have no plan, but a process. It got even better when after the Robin Lehner signing Bowman tried to claim they had several plans, but then didn’t follow any of them. It gives off the aura of a front office that really has no clue.

And that’s the way it’s seemed all summer. The Hawks knew enough to know their defense sucks, but haven’t gone about improving it in the way it needs really–only getting slower though probably more stable. They needed help at forward, but instead of trying something new or creative went on nostalgia tour again, a tactic that hasn’t worked…ever.

The reasons for the Andrew Shaw trade were discussed on the podcast last night, and perhaps reminding the casual fan of times they were more than a casual fan and trying to either keep them in or get them to the building again is a factor. We’ll never know, but we have our suspicions.

The Hawks have swung from trying to get faster two years ago (and not really doing so) to bigger now and everything in between. There isn’t a consistent theme, and there is no urgency in the hierarchy it seems. It’s kind of dark.

But on the other side of the coin, successful organizations aren’t so rigid with a philosophy that they don’t jump on an opportunity. The Hawks will claim the signing of Lehner is just that. Maybe it is. Maybe it was desperation to do something and spend money they had for the first time in forever.

The thing is, whatever the process, and however flawed said process is, the results are almost certainly going to be good. I’m actually going to do the math here instead of ballparking it like I did on the podcast. The Hawks had an .898 SV% as a team last year. That’s bad, though not worst in the league. It was seventh-worst. If the Hawks were to get a .910 across all strengths next year, and that might even be on the low side given the career marks of both Lehner and Crawford, they would give up 34 less goals on the season. By some models, that’s 10 points or more.

Now, that kind of drop would only see them go from 30th in goals-against to 20th or so. But it would have been around the same as what the Sharks, Leafs, and Capitals gave up last year and all were 100+point teams. You don’t have to be that stingy, you just have to put up any kind of resistance.

Which means the Hawks will probably get away with it. No matter how the breakdown of games between Crow and Lehner goes, the Hawks will give up less goals. Maybe a lot less goals. They’ll probably still score a lot. And Bowman and McD can beam in December or so when their record is much better, telling you they knew all along.

I’m not convinced they ever did. I still think the process is broken, whatever the results. And eventually, that will tell the tale. Or it would in any other sport. But hockey has so many broken processes, sometimes you can get away with it all the way to the top. Hell, the Hawks already did in 2015, in some ways (Timonen was never prepared to play, and Q misused Vermette until the conference final).

For the Hawks, it’s a good thing the NHL is a place where Sidney Deane’s unifying theory of life applies the most: “The sun even shines on a dog’s ass some days.”

Baseball

Series Preview – Tigers vs. White Sox: From The Top To The Bottom Now We’re Here

By Sam Fels 1206 0

vs.

RECORDS: Tigers 27-52   White Sox 39-42

GAMETIMES: Tuesday 7:10, Wednesday 1:10/7:10, Thursday 1:10

TV: WGN Tuesday and Wednesday afternoon, NBCSN Wednesday night and Thursday

HAVEN’T RELOCATED TO NASHVILLE YET: Bless You Boys

PITCHING MATCHUPS

Matthew Boyd vs. Reynaldo Lopez

Daniel Norris vs. Dylan Cease

TBD vs. Ross Detwiler

TBD vs. Ivan Nova

PROBABLE TIGERS LINEUP

JaCoby Jones – CF

Nicholas Castellanos – RF

Miguel Cabrera – DH

Christin Stewart – LF

Jeimer Candelario – 3B

Brandon Dixon – 1B

Nick Goodrum – SS

Gordon Beckham – 2B

Bobby Wilson – C

PROBABLE WHITE SOX LINEUP

Leury Garcia – SS

Yoan Moncada – 3B

Jose Abreu – 1B

James McCann – C

Jon Jay – RF

Eloy Jimenez – LF

Jose Rondon – DH

Yolmer Sanches – 2B

Ryan Cordell – CF

 

After dealing with teams at or near the top of their divisions or in the playoff chase for the past three weeks (yes, even the Cubs), the Sox get a three-day, four-game break against the Tigers, who along with the Royals are basically cleaning the septic tanks of the AL Central. For the Tigers now it’s about who is going to go between now and the trade deadline, which could be just about anyone. Too bad they picked a year when the Royals and Orioles are doing it better than they are.

Let’s start with the White Sox, who will unveil Dylan Cease on Wednesday afternoon. You couldn’t find a softer landing for a debut than the first game of a double-header against the Tigers, which is probably why the Sox picked it. Cease is up for good, or so the Sox say, even though his numbers in Charlotte aren’t that impressive. But at this point, the Sox are just running out of guys, so why not? The reports were that Cease was still powering his way out of trouble instead of pitching, which won’t fly against most other teams in the majors, but he can learn that just as easily at this level as he can at AAA. Cease’s Ks were down and walks up this year from his previous seasons, so the fear is that will rip and explode at the top level. We know the stuff is there, it’s about learning the approach now.

Not only are the Tigers purposely stinky, they’re beat up too. Michael Fullmer is a long-term casualty, and Josh Harrison and Daniel Norris are either out or iffy as well. Offensively, this is really about Castellanos and no one else. He’s the only one having an above-average season, as Cabrera heads for the retirement home.

On the rotation side, one of the bright spots in Spencer Turnbull has also landed on the injured list with shoulder fatigue. Other than him, there’s Matthew Boyd and then a pile of goo. Boyd has one of the best K/BB ratios in baseball, striking out over 11 hitters per nine and walking less than two.

The pen? It’s Shane Greene and his 22 saves and then an even bigger pile of goo.

Four against the Tigers and then closing out the first “half” against the Cubs who can’t get unfucked for money. Could that elusive burst past .500 be waiting finally?

Baseball

Tigers Spotlight: The Drawn Out End Of Miggy

By Sam Fels 1410 0

When teams are trying to come up with any other reason for draining the free agent market other than collusion or straight-up greed, we suppose they could use Miguel Cabrera’s contract as a cudgel. No one wants to locked into paying a hitter in his late 30s $25M or $30M while they slowly turn purple in the sun. Although it’s working out ok for Joey Votto. Not so much the case for Miggy.

Cabrera will go down as one of the best right-handed hitters of his era, and if it wasn’t for Mike Trout and whatever planet exiled him here, you wouldn’t find anyone better. Since joining the Tigers in 2008, only Trout and Votto have surpassed Miggy in WAR and offensive runs. He was the heartbeat of a string of great Tigers teams that won four AL Centrals in a row (before the Dodgers made that kind of thing de rigueur). Miggy wasn’t ever able to bring home a World Series and fulfill the dream of Mike Illitch (the one other than robbing the poor citizens of Detroit blind), but that wasn’t really on him.

What made Miggy so entertaining in dangerous is he did it all at the plate. He walked, he didn’t strike out, and he was just as likely to cut your heart out with a simple opposite-field single to score two than some bomb into the concourse. There was nowhere to go to get him out consistently, and he was more than happy to continually take whatever was on offer.

So while Miggy’s contract is ugly now, one wonders what the Tigers were supposed to do. Surely sentimentality still has a place in sports somewhere, and Cabrera is the greatest Tiger since…well, ever? Ok, not Ty Cobb. And maybe Trammel and Whitaker have claim to the previous era. Kaline and all that. Still, it won’t be long after he retires that Miggy’s number is going up on the wall at Comerica. At the time of signing, Miggy was the most feared hitter in the game or thereabouts, so maybe his decline was also off in the distance. It was 2013, remember. Could they really have just let him walk away? The cold-hearted calculations say they should have, but that doesn’t work all the time in the real world. It was also hard to see in 2013, when Cabrera signed the extension that didn’t kick in for another three seasons. It was overexuberant for sure, and perhaps a lesson every team might have taken too much to heart.

That said, the Tigers are still on the hook for $30M for four seasons each after this one, and this one is ugly. And that’s after Miggy missed all but 36 games last year, and it’s clear the effects are lingering. Miggy is struggling through knee problems this year after the groin injury last year, and now he can’t play in the field for the rest of the season. Not that Miggy ever really could, but the Tigers will have to bend their lineups around him once again. Good thing for the Tigers it doesn’t really matter.

As it does with most older players in an ever-speeding world, Cabrera can’t deal with velocity as well. Cheating for it has left him swinging at pitches out of the zone far more than he ever has in his career, and that’s led to some pretty horrific numbers on curveballs. Miggy still hits the ball hard (40% hard-contact rate), and he was above 40% well before just about everyone was. Miggy is walking less than ever, striking out more than ever, and hitting for less power than ever.

The Tigers are in just at the start of a rebuild, so he’s not costing them wins they might need. And maybe he sells a few tickets to fans who know it’s going to be a couple years at least before games in downtown Detroit matter again. But if it’s two years, what do you do then? With his physical condition, it’s highly unlikely that Cabrera can reclaim his former glory again.

Perhaps an injury settlement. Perhaps an unspoken agreement if Miggy retires that he’ll still get the money. The money’s gone, the only hope is there isn’t some standoff between player and team if he wants to keep playing but the Tigers want to move on. No one’s going to take that contract, no matter how much of it the Tigers are willing to eat. And that’s if Miggy ever hits again, which hie might not.

Perhaps if they got that World Series, it would be less unpleasant. Maybe it won’t be unpleasant at all, given what Cabrera meant to the Tigers. Before Miggy, the Tigers hadn’t won a division since 1987 (though they did go to a World Series as a wildcard, the only year in that stretch they’d won over 90 games).

No one ever gets the ending they want.

Hockey

A Tale of Two Sh*tties – An All-Too-Early Offseason Assessment

By John Pullega 2718 0

Day 1 of UFA season is in the books. Stan Bowman has made some moves. The moves ranged from “shoring up the blue line” and “adding a top-six forward” to “depth signings” and “signing Robin Lehner.” The general attitude is that the Hawks are now better than they were last year. That’s probably true, but that’s a bar that’s so low you’d likely throw your back out stepping into the divot it makes. The ambitious attitude, such as the one taken by good writer Mark Lazerus, is that “Bowman quietly has retooled the Blackhawks into a playoff-caliber team since the Quenneville firing with his most impressive run as a GM.”

I would like to whole-heartedly disagree with the latter attitude.

Here’s what the Hawks lineup looks like currently, taking some guesses as to where guys will slot.

Saad–Toews–Shaw

DeBrincat–Strome–Kane

Kubalik–Carpenter–Sikura

Caggiula–Kampf–Wedin/Perlini

 

Keith–Gus

de Haan–Seabrook

Maatta–Murphy

 

Crow

Lehner

This is not a playoff team, finishing last season on a 100-point pace be damned.

Shitty Thing 1: The Blue Line Is Still Horrible

Credit StanBo for doing something to address the blue line if you must. But if you’re sitting around thinking that the Hawks’s blue line is even remotely close to acceptable, you might be Peter Chiarelli.

This defensive corps is simply terrible, and it’s going to prevent the Hawks from making the playoffs once again. There isn’t a single first pairing defenseman among them, let alone a #1 guy. And before you try to tell me that Duncan Keith can still be that guy, let me disabuse you of that notion. Let’s start with the nerd stats.

According to Manny Perry’s WAR model on Corsica, Duncan Keith has the absolute worst WAR (wins above replacement) among all qualified D-men over the past three years. He’s been worse than guys like Rasmus Ristolainen, Kevin Bieksa, Brooks Orpik, and Cody Ceci. Now, this does come with a caveat, as a huge chunk of that number comes from the utterly abysmal 2017–18 year, in which Keith had the 10,000-day goal-scoring drought and finished -29. But over each of the past three years, Keith has performed worse than a replacement-level player. Even looking at just Blackhawks from last year, only Gustav Forsling had a worse WAR rating, and he categorically sucks.

When you look at Micah Blake McCurdy’s models, we can see some pretty bad shit when Keith is stuck in his own end, which was par for the course for all Hawks last year.

That graph on the left shows shots-against distributions when Keith is on the ice. The one on the right shows without Keith on the ice. Both have huge red blobs right in the high-danger area regardless. One positive to take from this is that when Keith is on the ice, opponents tend to attack his partner (i.e., Seabrook and Gustafsson), as Keith typically lines up on the left, but not so much as to justify Keith’s performance.

The bigger issue is what it looks like with Keith on the PK.

The one on the left is with Keith; on the right, without. You can see what an unmitigated disaster it was with Keith–Seabrook out there.

And even if nerd stats aren’t your thing, when you watch Keith, the twitch speed just isn’t there anymore, and that’s when Keith can be bothered to give a shit out there. You may remember this turnover, and though one turnover does not a year make, this is the kind of shit we’re talking about when we wonder whether Keith is fully engaged.

Keith will get his statue, his number retired, and all the accolades he deserves. But he is simply not that guy anymore. The sooner everyone admits that, the better.

If Keith isn’t even a top-pairing guy, who is? Gus scored 60 points, but he’s a complete train wreck in his own zone. Murphy isn’t that guy despite being the steadiest of all Hawks D-men, especially as a 6’5” centerfielder with a back surgery under his belt. I’m done talking about Seabrook.

Maatta and de Haan are not top guys, either. Maatta is slow and consistently hurt, having only finished an entire 82-game season once. If you want to buy into the idea that he’s a shot blocker, he’s really not. He blocked 116 shots last year, which would have had him tied at 67th overall with Zach Bogosian, Adam Pelech, and Nick Seeler.

If you’re looking at de Haan as an answer, you better hope his shoulder holds up, because he might not even be available for the first month. Plus, de Haan likely tops out as a second-pairing guy. The de Haan move isn’t bad at all, but if de Haan is your best D-man (and he might be), your blue line fucking sucks.

And this doesn’t even touch the Harju fiasco, which is its own problem altogether.

Shitty Thing 2: The Forwards Aren’t Much Better Than Last Year

I get wanting to keep the powder dry for DeBrincat. You can’t let him get away. But after hardly doing the bare minimum on the blue line, what the Hawks did with their forward corps looks like a lot of standing still. You can live with that if you’re adding a Bowen Byram or Jacob Trouba or P.K. Subban on the blue line. But when the answer to a historically bad blue line is Maatta and an injured de Haan, you’ll pardon me for not being over the moon about Andrew Shaw.

Shaw might be fine, but he’s a glorified third liner. And that’s if he can stay on the ice. Both his health and discipline have been problems since he first left Chicago. If he’s taking the kinds of dumb penalties we’re accustomed to, then you better hope de Haan and Maatta are up to the PK task, and that’s not a bet I’m willing to make. I also don’t buy that Shaw’s 47 points in 63 games is the new norm for him. And it’s going to be a real gut punch if Kahun builds on last year even a little bit, because it’ll likely make the Shaw acquisition an unnecessarily expensive lateral move.

If the idea is to outscore defensive problems, what’s new on this team that makes anyone think they can do it? You’re going to need three 100+-point scorers to outscore the defensive woes, and the Hawks have maybe two in Kane and DeBrincat in their best years. Nothing’s indicated that Dach is going to be ready, and even if he is, it’s farcical to think he can contribute at an outscore-the-defensive-woes level this year. Although we liked what we saw, we aren’t sure what we have in Strome. Toews tops out at 80 points, and that’s if he neglects the defensive side. Brandon Saad will put up a respectable 50 points and good possession numbers, but he won’t ever be the game breaker the Hawks need.

Are you relying on Kubalik to make that scoring up? Or Sikura to find it? Or are you hoping that Carpenter and Kampf churn out Selke-contending seasons? The forwards are mostly fine, but I don’t see much of anything that makes me think it’ll be better (or even as good) as last year. And though the free agent pool wasn’t deep, you wonder what someone like Joonas Donskoi might have done here.

If the Hawks came out and said, “This is a transition year, be patient,” this offseason thus far would make sense. They’ve made a bunch of fringe moves to make the team a bit more watchable. But unless Stan’s got a monumental trade up his sleeve—one that doesn’t involve GRIND and DA FIRE AND DA PASHUN as Jeremy Colliton has reportedly said he wants more of (extreme jerking off motion)—it’s hard to determine what they’re doing here.

But that would imply a plan, dear reader. And we know StanBo has absolutely no fucking plan whatsoever.

Hockey

Well If I Knew It was Going To Be That Kind Of Party…

By Sam Fels 3178 0

Headline: Hawks sign Robin Lehner to a one-year, $5M deal.

Like all these things, I hesitate to write it up because it definitely feels like there’s another shoe or two to drop. On the surface, it doesn’t make that much sense. An $11M goaltending tandem on a team that’s screaming for other things–like any d-man who can skate or actual top-six help instead of the generic answer of Andrew Shaw–is weird. Sure, Lehner is a far surer answer than Collin Delia for whatever games the Hawks thought Delia would get. Is that worth $5M?

Lehner isn’t a sure thing himself. This is not a Trotz team in front of him, and he’s only a year removed from a .908 season behind a porous Sabres team. He also had a .924 behind that Sabres team, so he’s done this thing before. He’s a pretty good goalie, let’s say that.

So let’s deal with the questions. The big one being….

What does it mean for Corey Crawford?

Anything? One, it could be that the Hawks know that Crawford’s health is permanently tainted or gone, and might not even play. There hasn’t been a whisper of that all summer, and given the way he finished the season that didn’t seem to be the case at all. Things obviously could have changed, and maybe Crawford has hinted to the team he doesn’t want to play anymore. Again, there hasn’t been a sliver of that in the wind at all, and would be a surprise.

Two, the Hawks don’t trust Crawford’s health, which makes way more sense. They think they have a chance at the playoffs (and in the West, anyone should), and don’t want it to be torched by another Crawford absence and they don’t think Delia is up to the challenge of carrying them. Delia flashed some things last year but he didn’t prove that he can carry and NHL workload yet. If you think it’s imperative the Hawks make the playoffs this year, or more to the point if they do, they don’t want to risk that on a kid with 18 games in the NHL. Fair.

Three, they’re going to try to move Crawford. He is in the last year of his deal. He’ll be 35 when the season ends. Even given perfect health, the question of re-signing him is going to be a very tricky one all season and especially next summer. And teams would still want Crawford. You an’t just trade for goalies with two Jennings and two rings every day, even with his very dicey health status. Fuck, wouldn’t the Flames leap at the chance right now? The Canes? The Sharks? That’s off the top of my head. It’s not a possibility I want to think about, but it’s there.

Or…

A tandem?

We’ve seen this here before, which was Huet and Khabibulin.  The latter was going into the last year of his deal, but that combined with having his starting role challenged inspired Khabby to a pretty good year as the Hawks returned to the playoffs. Still, it seems odd. If Crawford is healthy and staying, then there’s no way the Hawks are going to evenly split these starts. Maybe 50-32? You can see why they’d do that, because there would be little if any drop and the Hawks are determined to get .920 goaltending most if not every night.

Lastly…

Isn’t Lehner a raging dickbag?

Why yes, he is. But we lost that fight long ago, and he probably isn’t the only one. No ethical capitalism and all that.

Still, the Hawks are now down to just $1M in cap space, which makes an Anisimov trade almost mandatory now for any in-season flexibility. And they’re a cap team with no top pairing d-man and a hole on the wings. That’s…abstract. And if they can’t find a home for Arty, are they going to have to lose Connor Murphy just to open up any kind of space? Saad?

Yes, the Hawks are improved by having Lehner over Delia, whatever that role ends up being. Are they if it’s Lehner and Delia with Crawford traded? Depends on the return. Or if Crawford is on LTIR all year, depends on what they do with it.

We’ll need answers. Because these seem a lot of questions.

Baseball

Series Preview – Cubs vs. Pirates: Ok But This Time We Mean It

By Sam Fels 1164 0

vs.

RECORDS: Cubs 45-39   Pirates 39-43

GAMETIMES: Monday-Wednesday 6:05, Thursday 3:05

TV: NBCSN Monday-Wednesday, WGN Thursday

STUDIED UNDER GRADY TRIPP: Bucs Dugout

PITCHING MATCHUPS

Adbert Alzolay vs. Trevor Williams

Kyle Hendricks vs. Joe Musgrove

Yu Darvish vs. Chris Archer

Jose Quintana vs. Jordan Lyles

PROBABLE CUBS LINEUP

Kyle Schwarber – LF

Kris Bryant – 3B

Anthony Rizzo – 1B

Javier Baez – SS

Jason Heyward – RF

Albert Almora – CF

Victor Caratini – C

Addison Russell – 2B

PROBABLE PIRATES LINEUP

Kevin Newman – SS

Bryan Reynolds – RF

Starling Marte – CF

Josh Bell – 1B

Colin Moran – 3B

Corey Dickerson – LF

Elias Diaz – C

Adam Frazier – 2B

 

Ok, this time the Cubs are going to get their road record straightened out and close out strong against an inferior opponent. We really mean it this time. For sure it’s going to happen here. Yep, definitely. Totally.

Sigh.

It sounds good, but much like the Reds the Pirates might not be exactly what they seem. They were 11-15 in June, worse than the .500 record than they had in April and May, but they actually had a positive run-difference in the month which they definitely did not in April and May. That’s baseball for you.

Overall, this is a pretty middling Pirates lineup. Josh Bell has been an unholy monster of course, and he killed the Cubs when he was struggling. But other than him, the only regulars to be above average at the plate are Bryan Reynolds and Kevin Newman, both newcomers on he scene. If you can believe it, Gregory Polanco is hurt again and so is Francisco Cervelli, so those grounders just past short that always seem to drive in two runs from him won’t be a feature this holiday week. Marte has made a lot of contact as usual but it doesn’t really result in much. Cory Dickerson returned from the IL in June and has actually hit, so he’s been a boost and has made left field his.

Guess what? The rotation isn’t that impressive either! That’s Pirates baseball, baby! They’ve missed Jameson Taillon, who looks unlikely to pitch again this year as they’re being awfully careful with the Tommy John survivor. Archer isn’t missing bats as much as giving up more fly balls these days, which in 2019 baseball means you’re getting crushed. Trevor Williams and Joe Musgrove have been ok, with the former barely walking anyone. They’ve had to jumble it in the back with nine different guys making starts in June, with the occasional use of an opener.

Like most go-nowhere teams, they’ve had trouble bridging to their closer in Felipe Vasquez. Richard Rodriguez is on a heater with a scoreless June. But Francisco Liriano has been awful of late, Kyle Crick has no idea where the ball is going, and the rest of the crew is the normal gunk you find in a bullpen for a non-contending team.

For the Cubs, Kyle Hendricks will return tomorrow night from shoulder knack that the Cubs are most certainly not rushing him back from in the wake of Cole Hamels‘s injury. Nope, not at all. Ideally, this is the only outing Hendricks will have before the break, and it’ll be a good 10 days before his next one to clear up any lingering problems, if there are any. Alzolay will get another look tonight and if all goes well he could close out the Sox series. Jason Heyward’s latest flare-up at the plate has seen him move up to fifth in the order, which has always gone well in the past of course.

The Cubs caught a bad break with Hamels going down on Friday and leaving the pen to cover eight innings. But at some point, they either need to get going to we’ll just have to live with this being what they are. I’m not there yet, so enough bullshit. Let’s go.

Baseball

Pirates Spotlight: Not All Archers Are Good For A Laugh

By Sam Fels 1109 0

There are few, if any, organizations that are a prime example of how you can fuck up a great team and feel no pressure like the Pittsburgh Pirates. It’s been five seasons since they won 98 games and got Arrieta’d, and not a lot has gone right since. The past couple years have been particularly astounding, and sending Pirates fans on their way in droves. But what does it matter when Bob Nutting can still pocket revenue sharing and BAM tech money and make a huge profit?

The Pirates started last season by moving along team legend Andrew McCutchen because he was a year from free agency, and if that wasn’t bad enough (it was), they also shipped off ace Gerrit Cole because he was two years from the market. We could study how the Bucs mishandled Cole forever, trying to shoehorn him into their cutter-ground ball ways and then watching the Astros unleash a monster by letting him simply be him and chuck 97 MPH all the time.

The Pirates, in the midst of a surprise above .500 season, tried to make up for that by shipping out perennial disappointment Austin Meadows and seemingly perennially wayward Tyler Glasnow for Chris Archer. Let’s be fair to Archer, he was never as good as Cole and to expect him to be was silly. And it’s not Archer’s fault that Meadows has gone on to be a plus-plus outfielder in Tampa while Glasnow was one of the best starters in the AL before getting hurt. That’s on the Pirates. But Archer is going to be the target.

The warning signs were there on Archer before, of course. Even in his good days, 2014-2018, Archer was a two-pitch pitcher. He threw only a fastball and slider, though both being weapons were more than enough for then. But the thought was as soon as either slipped, he was going to have problems. And so it has proven.

Archer’s fastball has lost a full MPH on it this season, though you wouldn’t think averaging 94 MPH instead of 95 would be a major issue. But it has been. He’s seen a 100-point rise in slugging on his fastball, to .562 this year.

Velocity hasn’t been the problem for Archer’s slider, and he still gets over 40% whiffs on the swings on it which is very good. But it has lost some of its tilt, and has more of a sweeping action these days than it did. Which means it’s been a little easier to get in the air, and Archer has seen that increase too. And these days, if you’re giving up more fly balls, you’re asking for trouble. You’re asking for death.

Archer’s home runs per nine innings have nearly doubled this season, though it’s hardly his fault that pitchers are using Titleists out there this season. Archer’s fly ball rate is the highest of his career, which normally wouldn’t be a big problem in PNC Park, but his home run per fly ball is miles above anything that’s been seen before.

Archer has tried to make up for it by introducing a change-up this season. It’s had mixed results. He does get a lot of grounders off it, which is key. He’s getting 28% whiffs-per-swing, which is definitely something to build on. He’s still giving up too much slugging on it (.500), but as this is the first year he’s tried it it’s at least a start.

Of course, the main concern for Nutting’s Pirates is affordability, and Archer is still that. He’s got a team-option of $9M next year and $11M the following, which is nothing for even a 5th starter. And with Cole hitting the open market after this season, he’ll probably pull in three times that or more. For the Bucs, that’s what matters. Shame, that.

Everything Else

Hawks Sign Centers To Have Too Many Centers So Get Rid Of One Center You Know Which One

By Sam Fels 2413 0

I bury the lede too much, so let’s start with the Hawks signing Ryan Carpenter for three years at a million each. It’s a little weird to sign a fourth-liner for three years, but at a million apiece it makes no difference.

Still, I find it funny that the Hawks tell you they need a center to win draws in the defensive zone, they sign a center, and then everyone’s like, “Here’s a center that can win draws in the defensive zone,” without bothering to actually check if that’s true. Carpenter started nearly 60% of his shifts in the offensive zone last year. And yes, he won 53% of his draws, but that’s the only season he has at significantly above break-even. Which would matter more if faceoffs mattered as much as dumbass GMs think they do, which they don’t.

“He’ll help with the kill.” I mean, he’ll be out there, but he was the Knights’ worst PKer aside from Paul Stastny all season. Which means he’ll fit right in here, I suppose.

There’s also this narrative that the Hawks need to take defensive pressure off Toews, which Kampf can’t do alone. Except you’re no more than a year from having Strome and Dach on the roster, who are going to need to be way more sheltered than Toews, so he’s taking defensive draws then anyway. And from what we can tell, this year isn’t all that important.

Whatever. Depth signing. The Hawks also inked Kampf for two years for nothing, which is far more important. Kampf actually starts in his own zone and actually turns the play the other way, which seems to be a truly undervalued skill. That’s good.

Which means right now the Hawks have Toews-Strome-Kampf-Carpenter-Anisimov down the middle, which is too many and let’s allow for the slight possibility that the #3 overall pick makes the decision even tougher. So either they’re playing Anisimov as a bottom-six winger, or he’s going. And he needs to be going, because it opens up cap space for…well, too late for that but still, he probably should be going. 19-17-64-whatever Carpenter is down the middle isn’t poetry-worthy, but one gets the foreboding sense nothing about this team will be anyway.

Good seats still available!