Baseball

Series Preview – Cubs vs. Astros: Timing Is Everything

By Sam Fels 1147 0

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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 1138 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 1080 0

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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 1310 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 1325 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 1496 0

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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 1559 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.

Everything Else

You Were So In With The Out Crowd – Stanley Cup Final Preview: Barf Barf Barf

By Sam Fels 1523 0

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SCHEDULE

Game 1 in Boston Monday, 7pm

Game 2 in Boston Wednesday, 7pm

Game 3 in St. Louis Saturday, June 1st, 7pm

Game 4 in St. Louis Monday, June 3rd, 7pm

Let’s get through this together. It’s the Layoff vs. The Momentum, and it’s going to be utter torture for pretty much everyone outside the two cities involved. Still, I’m of the opinion it won’t last very long, but I haven’t been very good at this all spring so you’re going to blame me when this goes balls-up anyway.

Goalies: The big question here is if the 11 days off for Tuukka Rask is going to cost him any sharpness in what has been one of the best springs a goalie has put up in a long while. The Knights last year won the West Final in five games, had a fair amount of time off, and then Fleury was the biggest reason they got pantsed in the Final (and he’ll be the biggest reason they never get back there. Good times). Rask comes into this one with a .942, which if he were to carry out would be even better that Tim Thomas‘s Tour-de-Stupid of 2011. It’s the best mark of any goalie to get to the conference final at least since Quick’s .946 in 2012. The only marks recently that have been better for a conference final appearance or better have been Giguere’s Conn Smythe campaign in ’03, Smith’s 2012 (get fucked), and Hiller in ’09. Strangely, only Quick’s won the Cup, but here we are. If Rask remains at this level, then you don’t have to worry. He looked so in control in Carolina when the Bruins needed him, so it’s not like he’s been hanging on an edge to do this.

Jordan Binnington has been fine. Really, that’s it. He didn’t have to do much once the Sharks basically disintegrated. He was very good in Game 4, which is about the last time the Blues needed him to be. He faced only 21 shots in Game 5 and 26 in Game 6, and one would think the Bruins will require him to do more than that. Binnington has only made over 30 saves twice in 19 playoff games, but the Blues haven’t really required it. They will require a goalie win or two in this series, but it’s still not a sure thing that Binnington will provide it.

Defense: As they pile us off to the rubber room in the next week or two, they’ll do so while we’re muttering if not screaming about how neither of these blue lines is any good. So let’s narrow the focus. The Blues have to figure out who takes the Marchand-Bergeron-Pastrnak assignment, and I still don’t believe they have anyone to do it. But I didn’t think they had anyone to take the Sharks top line either. Still, this is the best line in hockey, and the Canes couldn’t do much about it and they have twice the defense. I assume the Blues will do everything they can to get Pietrangelo out there, but he doesn’t have the mobility to deal with this. I don’t know how teams haven’t been able to harvest the organs of Parayko and Edmundson, but the Bruins aren’t really all that deep either. Krejci is good, and DeBrusk has played well, but they’ve rotated left-wingers. Still, the Bruins didn’t get this far without depth scoring, and that shouldn’t stop against the murder of idiots the Blues are trotting out there.

The Bruins aren’t an impressive group either. Chara and McAvoy take the hard shifts, and metrically they’ve come up in the red. Goals-wise though, which is how they still measure the damn thing, they’re both over 65%. Krug and Carlo have been much better metrically, and they’ll have the easier time against Sundqvist’s or Bozak’s crew here. Grzelcyk has actually been sneaky good, and not getting sheltered starts to be so, but he’s the one d-man whom the Bruins can’t buy a goal when he’s on the ice. They could use a market correction here.

Forwards: The Blues have gotten incredible work from ROR, Tarasenko, and Perron, even when Tarasenko couldn’t throw a grape in the ocean at even-strength. Schenn-Schwartz-Sundqvist certainly matched or exceeded them against the Sharks, and Schenn came close to sending Pierre McGuire into a coma. Bozak, Thomas, and Maroon have chipped in with a couple big goals, and if the Blues have any advantage in this series it’s here as the Bruins don’t really go three lines deep.

We’ve already been over the best line in hockey, and given the usual IQ of the Blues they’ll get looks on the power play where they’ve been death pretty much throughout. That with Rask alone is probably enough. Coyle and Johansson have chipped in here or there, but mostly the Bruins have ridden what they get from the top unit and a little more from Krejci’s line. If the Blues find a way to stop the top line, or even keep them somewhat contained, the Bruins could be in a quandary. Good thing they won’t.

Prediction: I’m not even going to pretend to be unbiased here, so I’m going to say only what I will allow myself to say. The Blues are too stupid to not put the Bruins on the power play a good number of times. Binnington is not up to turning away repeated looks for Bergeron, Pasta, and Da Noid on the man-advantage. Rask might not be able to maintain this .942 after this break, but he probably doesn’t have to. Even .930 almost certainly gets it done.

Yeah, Binnington could go off. We don’t know enough about him to say he won’t. Tarasenko could get hot. The Blues slightly better depth at forward could matter here if the Bruins top line doesn’t keep causing gas explosions everywhere. The 11 days might matter more than we think.

But I don’t see it. Get it over with. Bruins in five.

 

Everything Else

The Doll’s Trying To Kill Me And The Toaster’s Been Laughing At Me – FFUD’s ’18-’19 Player Reviews: Jeremy Colliton

By Sam Fels 1639 0

In truth, the whole season, or at least the last 67 games of it, was referendum on Coach Cool Youth Pastor. The Hawks kind of telegraphed their intentions with their quotes and moves last summer and at the end of the season before that. You knew from the moment they brought him over from Sweden this was a guy they really liked, even if Chris Block made him cry. You knew the relationship between Joel Quenneville and Stan Bowman had gone beyond the breaking point, and everything pointed to Colliton being their hand-chose replacement. The Hawks backed themselves into a corner of having to hire him, when it was clear that Quenneville was never going to finish the season unless by some miracle. Colliton almost certainly wasn’t ready for this, but the front office isn’t going to be around for another coaching hire. At least you wouldn’t think. So it was a shotgun wedding. Did we learn anything? I’m not sure. But we had a lot of fun along the way, and in the end, isn’t that the real truth? The answer is no.

It Comes With A Free Frogurt!

The first thing that Colliton supporters will use to highlight their case, if these things actually exist, is the power play. Honestly, the power play was never a high priority for Q, as the Hawks won three Cups with a malfunctioning one either in the regular season or the playoffs or both. The PK and even-strength were given far bigger priority. So the Hawks’ power play languished, last in the league and by some distance. It was painful to watch, if not truly soul-destroying.

Look, there was clearly a lot of talent that was going to waste on it. But Colliton is the guy who got Duncan Keith off of it, trusted Erik Gustafsson to run it by himself, got it moving everywhere, and by the end of the season it finished 15th. That sounds disappointing, as it was flirting with the top-10 there for a hot minute, but when you think of where it came from, running at below 12% for awhile, to finish at 20% and to run at near 40% or above for six weeks or so is really an accomplishment. It went stale toward the end of the season when the Hawks really could have used it, but hopefully a more stable second unit and Patrick Kane not dying of exhaustion next year will curtail some of that. It was the only reason the Hawks go anywhere near a playoff spot.

To give Colliton only that would be a touch unfair. Connor Murphy played his best hockey when not being used as a blame-pawn by Q, and ascended to the toughest responsibilities. It was Murphy and Dahlstrom who closed out a fair few number of games at the end, with Keith and Seabrook on the bench. Similarly, Dylan Strome was provided an atmosphere to flourish, which you can’t guarantee would have happened under Quenneville (who was much more fair to young players than his rep suggested, however). Drake Caggiula looked useful, if not dynamic, though that could just be being freed from Edmonton. For the most part, not always, Colliton put players where they could succeed. If that meant Saad on the third line because that was his best fit, then that’s where he went. When it didn’t work, it could be argued it was because that player is just utterly talentless.

The Frogurt Is Also Cursed

You can’t go any farther without talking about the defense. It was the worst in the league, the worst in the analytic-era, and didn’t improve really at all. Was this all Colliton’s fault? No, because he was given about a defenseman and a half to work with. Jokiharju barely played for him, and when he did is when it was becoming clear he was overmatched. Still, there didn’t seem to be any sign of an upturn, and the excuse of not having a training camp ran thin after a while. He wasn’t installing Matt Nagy’s offense here. It’s hockey. If the Hawks were grooming a batch of youngsters to play the way they are going to when they matter again, you could maybe see it. But there really wasn’t. And there was no tweaking of anything to compensate for what the Hawks didn’t have, namely mobility in defense.

And Colliton’s system may be stupid anyway. It was infuriating seeing Murphy or Keith or Dahlstrom or whoever end up at the blue line in their own zone chasing one guy. Any team with any advance scouting knew that simply having a forward come high and a d-man go low would bamboozle the Hawks, and at worst leave a forward trying to defend down low with a d-man out covering the points and getting nosebleeds. It didn’t make a ton of sense. Even if the Hawks had the talent, we don’t know that this would work.

Colliton also suffered from not really acting like the boss. Brent Seabrook was never scratched, even though he was no more effective than Koekkoek, Dahlstrom, or Forsling. From what I can gather, that was merely because he and Colliton played together on a WJC team and the Hawks wanted the coach to have another veteran ally in the room. Especially as Keith couldn’t have made it any clearer he thought Colliton was a moron from day one. Kane was used for 25 minutes a night, and yes this was just about the only weapon the Hawks had, but it left him paste by the middle of March. It also showed no other plan.

The penalty kill was historically bad, and again, that was a matter of lack of talent, but there didn’t appear to be many changes to try and help it out. Teams could get passes through the box whenever they wanted. The Hawks never altered to either sink deeper or try and play with more pressure. They just kind of floated in the middle, which wasn’t working.

Also his wife doesn’t like us (though this is generally the norm among my friends and acquaintances).

Can I Go Now?

It doesn’t really matter, because Colliton will be here as long as Stan is, you would think. On any logical level, that’s what will happen. The rosy picture is to say that we’ll get a much clearer read on Colliton with an improvement in talent levels on defense. But it’s not clear that the Hawks will, or even can, do that. He’ll get his vaunted training camp to install the ideas that apparently have to be decoded by the Rosetta Stone, so that won’t be a crutch he and the team can wield any more.

Colliton is also going to have to win over the vets. Kane didn’t care or rock the boat because he was getting 25 minutes per night, and Toews is Toews and the captain and will always try and hold things together. You wonder how much longer any of these last if the Hawks don’t get off to a good start. How he gets Keith to play without both of his middle fingers extended is another mystery. Whatever the actual relationship between Colliton and Seabrook is, it probably has to be put under the test of Seabrook ending up in the pressbox some nights. You can’t improve this defense with #7 playing every night. At least it’s impossible to see how. If Crawford is finally fully healthy he’ll have a say as well. Can Colliton avoid a full out rebellion if some or all of this comes to fruition?

If Colliton’s strength is bringing along young players, we’ll have to see it more this year. Kubalik is coming over. Outside chance Kurashev is here. Sikura needs to go from threatening to actual usefulness and actual goals more to the point. Whatever d-man who is actually good, or even just ambulatory, needs to be harnessed. The penalty kill has to be something other than a war crime. And there have to be tweaks to a defensive system when called for.

It’s a lot. It was always a lot to deposit this coach with barely any experience in the middle of an organization that is thrashing wildly looking for any shore or bank. It was unfair. But there are far less excuses now. Stan has his guy, and he has to give him whatever they both decide they need for both to succeed. If Keith or Seabrook aren’t on board, then they have to go or it has to be clear that Colliton is the boss and they’d better get in line.

Good luck.

Previous Player Reviews

Corey Crawford

Cam Ward

Collin Delia

Duncan Keith

Connor Murphy

Henri Jokiharju

Gustav Forsling

Erik Gustafsson

Carl Dahlstrom

Brendan Perlini

Alex DeBrincat

Chris Kunitz

Artem Anisimov

Marcus Kruger

Dylan Strome

Jonathan Toews

Brandon Saad

Dominik Kahun

John Hayden

David Kampf

Patrick Kane

Drake Caggiula

Dylan Sikura

Baseball

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

By Sam Fels 1274 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.