Baseball

Series Wrap – Cubs Swept By Cardinals: And Here Come The Pretzels

By Sam Fels 1459 0

Game 1 Box Score: Cardinals 2, Cubs 1

Game 2 Box Score: Cardinals 7, Cubs 4

Game 3 Box Score: Cardinals 2, Cubs 1

It’s always important to breathe at a moment like this. Sweeps at the hand of those from Mos Eisley tend to accentuate the emotions and anger and whatever your particular grievance is with the team at that time. So it is tempting to say that the offense completely sucks, even though it doesn’t. Or that the rotation isn’t good enough, even though they didn’t do anything wrong this weekend. Or that the pen is an absolute abomination…and that would be correct.

The Cubs lost three coin-flips essentially, one caused by a three-hour rain delay which I’m more and more convinced shouldn’t be a thing that exist unless they have to. Both teams looked pretty damn flat this afternoon after a very late night last night, and the Cubs just made one ore two more mistakes and lost the last one.

It’s still important to note that this team is fourth in runs in the NL, second in wOBA. It might not feel like it right now, especially when they just got bladdered by a corpse, but they were also unlucky. Three of those line drives find holes on another day, and then what are we talking about?

It’s definitely a rough patch, 2-8 in their last 10, but that happens. The encouraging thing, if you need, is that the rotation bounced back which is probably the most important thing going forward. Let’s run it through:

The Two Obs

-It seems a bit silly to complain about the bullpen and its handling on a night when the Cubs scored one run, but that’s Friday for you. Miles Mikolas still has that in the bag on occasion, even if this year has been a struggle for him. But I don’t know why anyone would be in a hurry to get to Dillon Maples when there’s already a guy on base, and I’m a Maples guy and want him to be given every chance and more to finally nail down a spot (he probably won’t ever but I’m a hopeful sort). Mike Montgomery isn’t a situational lefty, and yet because he’s the only one out there besides Ryan (who blows but more on that in a sec) he keeps being used as one. I would trust Monty to get through Wong and Bader, though to be fair to Maples he did strike out Bader and didn’t get a call. But now the bases are loaded and you have to do something dumb and Cishek doesn’t really get strikeouts that much and here we are.

-Going over the woes of the pen is probably useless at this point. Everyone knows and there’s little that can be done via trade for another couple weeks at least. Even a Kimbrel Hail Mary doesn’t do anything until July. But it’s just laughable how the Cubs boasted about the amount of arms they would have between here and Iowa and almost none of them are major league pitchers. Ryan isn’t. Brach probably isn’t anymore. Edwards might not be on his bad days. Maples hasn’t proven it. Neither is Webster, Cedeno, or Collins.

-Saturday’s game goes haywire because of the weather delay. It was about how far Chatwood could go, which wasn’t far, but he’s actually been effective this year and is probably allowed a wonky one. There’s just nothing to be done after him, and Strop’s return isn’t a cure-all.

-Rough weekend for my guy Schwarber. He can’t strike out with the bases loaded on Saturday and it looks like the things are snowballing on him again. He remains simply awful with anyone on base, which actually backs up the logic of leading him off, but you wonder how much longer the Cubs can wait on him. It’s been two and a half seasons for him, and the over-glow of a few singles in the World Series can’t count for anything. I still think he has a big boom within him, but I would also say he’s got a month or six weeks to show it, otherwise the Cubs might want to monitor how the Reds handle their Dietrich-Gennett jam at second (probably by just sitting Winker or Puig and playing both and not sending either here, honestly).

-How does a team in the majors not know how to run a rundown or pickoff? The Cubs always make at least too many throws or outright fuck it up more than any team in the league. Only cost them the game today.

-For all the gifts his arm provide, Contreras has had a bad defensive year. He’s been a subpar framer for a few years now, has been lazy blocking balls far too often, and today’s error was another the Cubs can’t have. That doesn’t mean he should be benched or anything, it’s just something we’re going to live with. Teams are rarely going to run on him or even stray off bases that much, so the arm which made up for his defensive deficiencies elsewhere doesn’t even come out of the holster that often.

Onwards…

Baseball

Series Preview – Cubs vs. Cardinals: They’re Going To Be Upset About A Fake Talk Show

By Sam Fels 1264 0

vs.

RECORDS: Cubs 31-23   Cardinals 27-28

GAMETIMES: Friday 7:15, Saturday 6:15, Sunday 1:15

TV: NBCSN Friday, Fox Saturday, WGN Sunday

DON’T EVEN BOTHER: Viva El Birdos

PROBABLE PITCHERS

Yu Darvish vs. Miles Mikolas

Jose Quintana vs. Jack Flaherty

Cole Hamels vs. Adam Wainwright

PROBABLE CUBS LINEUP

Kyle Schwarber – LF

Kris Bryant – 3B

Anthony Rizzo – 1B

Javier Baez – SS

Victor Caratini – C

Albert Almora Jr. – CF

Jason Heyward – RF

David Bote – 2B

PROBABLE CARDINALS LINEUP

Dexter Fowler – RF

Paul Goldschmidt – 1B

Paul DeJong – SS

Marcell Ozuna – LF

Matt Carpenter – 3B

Yadier Molina – C

Kolten Wong – 2B

Harrison Bader – CF

 

The Auld Rivals move down I-55 tonight and this weekend, where the Cubs and Cards will clash for the for the first time in front of the illiterate and toothless in West East St. Louis. Perhaps for the first time ever, most everyone will be paying attention to the Blues instead, at least tomorrow night. If you’re making the trip…what’s wrong with you?

The Cardinals haven’t burst out of the gates with the Cubs and Brewers, and currently are 4.5 games back and under .500. They can’t seem to get everything firing at the same time. The offense has had its moments, but currently Paul DeJong, Dexter Fowler, and Kolten Wong have been trying to shove the bat up their nose. On the flip side, Matt Carpenter is doing that thing again where he comes close to sucking you into the idea that he’s finished at the beginning of the season, and now is going nuclear (he’s slugging nearly .600 the past two weeks). Paul Goldschmidt has been good, but maybe not quite the MVP-candidate the Cards hoped they were getting this winter. Harrison Bader has also been molten the past couple of weeks, but overall has been defense-first. The offense has potential to really carry this team through the summer, but hasn’t yet.

It may have to, as we went over some of the rotation’s problems in the spotlight. The two kids have hit their speed-bumps, and at some point this goddamn team is going to have to admit the Wainwright is dunzo and it’s never going to happen for Michael Wacha. I mean, it’s fine with me if they keep sending Wacha out there to hang a curve or groove a fastball at the worst possible time, but you’d think that an organization that is still convinced it’s miles ahead of the curve would crack the code on two-fifths of their rotation turning odd colors in the sun.

The pen has gotten yeoman’s work out of John Gant and John Brebbia. You’ll hear all about the 102 MPH that Jordan Hicks throws, which always seems to ignore the fact he’s not that good. He walks too many guys, and as hard as that fastball is it’s string-straight and he doesn’t seem to have another pitch so hitters do get to it. Andrew Miller is joining Wainwright in the breeding farm these days, carrying a FIP near 6.00 as he also doesn’t seem to have any idea where the ball is going. Always a genius move to sign and aging reliever who has been worked like a mule the past four years to a multi-year deal, don’t you think? Let’s say the Cards are a touch short in the pen, but not like, Cubs-short.

For the Cubs, they’ll hopefully welcome Pedro Strop back sometime this weekend, and seeing as how everyone else in the pen is stepping on their tongue that will be greatly welcomed. Kris Bryant can look forward to being booed the whole weekend because he happened to speak a very unthreatening truth on a fake fucking talk show that was essentially a platform for aspiring bullhorn Ryan Dempster to get a show on Marquee. Not even joking, that’s what it was. But any slight is taken an a declaration of war down there, and don’t be shocked if Yadier just tackles Bryant in the batter’s box to defend the honor of his chosen hovel. This will be point #1 on his Hall resume according to St. Louis media and fans after the game, you watch.

It’s been a bit of a rough patch. The Cubs are 4-6 over their last 10, the pen is beaten down and dusted, and the rotation needs to reclaim its standing this weekend. They got a primer stopper effort from The Cerebral Assassin on Wednesday. Hopefully the rest pick up the baton. They swept these assholes last time. Let’s have that again.

Baseball

Series Wrap – Cubs Lose Two Of Three To Astros: Below Class

By Sam Fels 1246 0

Game 1 Box Score: Astros 6, Cubs 5

Game 2 Box Score: Astros 9, Cubs 6

Game 3 Box Score: Cubs 2, Astros 1

Earlier today, Sahadev Sharma on The Athletic wrote a piece about the contrast about how the Astros pitching staff, rotation and pen, is built on missing bats and striking everyone out, and the Cubs is built on soft contact and grounders. And he stated how the difference was the ‘Stros “outclassing” the Cubs. Which I objected to at first, because hey, the Cubs could have easily won both of the first games and once they revamp the pen later in the year they’ll be more set to do that.

But then you remember the Astros were running out the B-team, and it feels a lot more apt. No Springer, no Altuve, no Correa, missing Verlander, and you realize the Cubs didn’t come close to seeing the real force of this team. Which hurts. Maybe it’s a bad stretch, and doesn’t mean anything. That’s generally how baseball works. And did we learn anything new? The Cubs offense is good, but when the rotation goes odd colors in the sun the pen isn’t anywhere near in a condition to pick up the slack. You knew that going in.

But hey, there’s Kyle Hendricks.

Let’s clean it up:

The Two Obs

-Let’s get it out at the top. I am heavily tempted to blame the lack of netting from foul pole to foul pole on the richest, asshole-iest customers who would say something like, “Well I pay the most money so I don’t want a net in my view!” for the kind of abomination that Albert Almora, and really both teams as a whole, had to go through tonight. But the thing is, if that kind of thing had been stated by season ticket holders in the first few rows, or corporate entities as they mostly are today, I feel like we’d have heard more about it. I think this is something ticketing departments around the league assume would happen but really don’t that often.

I know there are plenty of industries where it takes a disaster for things that seem so simple to change actually to change. I can’t say hockey got this right, because it took a little girl dying for them to do so. But with the netting behind the nets in hockey arenas, it’s the same reaction as the extended version in parks now. You walk in, see it, and say, “Oh, that’s new.” Then you sit down and don’t notice any difference in the view you had before after two minutes. My season tickets at the UC for the Hawks has been behind the netting, and I’m in the 300 Level where I would be in next to no danger without it. I’ve never noticed it making any difference in my viewing experience, and I honestly only think about it when something like this happens.

If there’s honestly any collection of ticket holder who throws a bitch at the idea of netting in front of him (and I’m sure it’s a male if they exist), do us all a favor and put cayenne pepper on his balls and leave the rest of us alone. Players have been screaming for this for decades now, and it’s specifically so they don’t have to go through what Almora went through tonight. Think about why this happened, and how truly stupid it is at its base level, and then wonder about how anyone goes about their day.

-All right, to the baseball. We’ve been through Hamels and Lester’s problems already, which makes it all the more impressive that Hendricks stood there and turned everything away in a place where every baseball looked like a Top Flite. The Cerebral Assassin has been sprinkling in his curve more and more as the season has gone on, and tonight he dropped his coup-de-grace when he put Marisnick down in the 7th with two on and two out on an 0-2 count. He’s never thrown that pitch in a big situation before, and if this is a new thing he can count on…well, the mind reels. It’s time Cubs fans accept that if the Cubs don’t have an ace. Hendricks is as close as they’ll get right now. He’s the stopper for sure.

-Javier Baez had a rough series, and he’s going through that phase where he’s pulling off everything. It’s frustrating to watch, because when he was leading the league in opposite field hits and homers he’s been an MVP candidate. So why try to pull everything?

-I’ve had enough of Alex Bregman, thanks.

-While I wasn’t looking, Addison Russell suddenly has representative offensive numbers. It doesn’t make anything ok, but as we live in a world where Daniel Descalso died, Russell probably is gong to get the majority of starts at second now.

-Unless David Bote can, who might actually be a major leaguer which I never would have guessed.

-Brad Brach is not going to happen.

-Me, I’m pounding Dillon Maples until it works. Because he’s my guy, he’s got the best stuff, and this is his now-or-never. He either gets it now or he’ll never. Fuck, Chatwood got there, maybe, right?

Onwards…

Baseball

Let’s Try And Feel Better About Jon Lester…And Probably Fail

By Sam Fels 1246 0

Ok, so it was less than a month ago that I was writing about being hopeful about Jon Lester. I never said I would ever make sense or be consistent. Lester might have said he would be, in some ways, but I’m just following him. Also, wasn’t it just yesterday I was here trying to make myself and maybe one or two others feel better about Hamels’s last three starts? This one is a little more dispiriting, as Lester had the Astros’ B-team lineup in front of him last night and still gave up seven runs. I was particularly galled in the 6th, with the Cubs have clawed back into the game, Lester wouldn’t give in to Derek Fisher ahead of Alex Bregman, clearly the biggest weapon the Astros had last night. I know Lester’s whole thing is that he never “gives in,” that “giving in” is for weaklings, and “giving in” is what’s ruining this country and whatever else. Still, it’s your last batter of the game, and it’s Derek Fisher. I’m finding out what he can do instead of what whatever clown comes out of the pen can do against Bregman (which took one pitch to find out and the conclusion wasn’t good).

Much like Hamels, Lester’s last three starts have been bad. 14 innings combined, 16 earned runs, four homers, 25 hits. That’s a whole lot of woof. When we last looked at this, we noted that Lester’s BABIP on the season was a hilariously low .231. Well, now it’s .333, which is also way above his career-average. The last three starts, that number is .411. That’s not just a violent market correction. That’s a market correction that is zippering open your chest and feasting on your liver nightly.

But it’s not like some or most of that isn’t deserved. If Lester qualified through innings, he’d had the third-highest hard-contact rate against right now. That’s not necessarily a death-sentence, as the one right behind him is one Madison Bumgarner, and he’s having at least a respectable season. Though Bumgarner also resides at Oracle Park, which requires a bazooka to get a ball out of most nights. Shane Bieber, Cleveland’s hot new thing, is also around this mark, and he’s got a 3.11 ERA that’s real. So does Robbie Ray, but both ray and Bieber strike out more hitters than Lester does. Still, it’s much higher than it’s ever been and that’s worth worrying about.

We also noted in that last post that Lester has gone to his cutter far more this season, and is trying to use it on both sides of the plate instead of just in on the hands of righties. It hasn’t always worked, and the last three starts…well…

Lester has gone away from using the outside corner with his cutter the last three starts, and when he hasn’t gotten it low and inside, he’s getting murdered. Lester has decreased the use of his cutter the last three starts, upping the use of his change and fastball. But the fastball hasn’t been doing much better, with a .571 slugging against in those three starts. He’s also getting next to now whiffs on it.

Lester had made reference to Sahadev Sharma in The Athletic that he just feels off, and this searching for a release point the past three starts speaks to that a bit:

On the plus side, Lester’s velocity has been climbing a bit in the past few starts. On the downside, it’s still down overall this year. It might just be that Lester doesn’t throw hard enough anymore to miss his spot at all, and that righties seem to be getting to fastballs off the plate inside suggest that.

We’ll have to see what Lester does in the next few starts to change, whether that’s more cutters trying to nick the outside corner or junking it up a bit with curves and changes. The Cubs are going to need something.

Baseball

Why Is Hole Camels Getting His Whole Ass Kicked?

By Sam Fels 1859 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

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

By Sam Fels 1336 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 – Reds vs. Cubs: Tell Your Statistics To Shut Up

By Sam Fels 1294 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

Series Wrap – Cubs Split With Phillies: Could Have Been More, Could Have Been Less, So It’s This

By Sam Fels 1223 0

Game 1 Box Score: Phillies 5, Cubs 4

Game 2 Box Score: Cubs 3, Phillies 2

Game 3 Box Score: Cubs 8, Phillies 4

Game 4 Box Score: Phillies 9, Cubs 7

The Cubs should have won on Monday, but didn’t. The Phillies should have won on Tuesday, but didn’t. And each scored over eight runs in their other wins, so a split is just about right. In the words of Gennaro Gattuso, “Sometimes maybe good, sometimes maybe shit.” And considering these are two of the three first-place teams in the NL, splitting seems about right that way as well. And because everyone else in the NL East is intent on doing a damn fine Mets impression, or is the Mets, you get the feeling the Cubs and Phils might do this more than a few times more before the boxes are packed. Let’s clean it all up.

The Two Obs

-The big story of the series is the bullpen, and I suppose that’s only right. Darvish was a touch unlucky to give up three runs over six, and I thought Brad Brach was a touch unlucky to give up a run in the ninth. Segura fists one over the head of Rizzo, and that seemed to be the theme for the rest of the series. The Cubs seemed to get their fair share of BABIP Kung Fu treachery all series. Kintzler got a grounder from McCutchen in the second game, it just happened to find a hole. Happened again today too.

Still, the pen gave up runs in all four games, though the last two it was asked to go for five full innings. Chatwood took all of them yesterday, so two runs over five innings is fine for one pitcher. For some reason it’s not fine for multiple, and I thought Not John Wick was Kung Fu Treachery’d as well today for one of the runs.

We all know that the return of Pedro Strop isn’t going to fix anything, especially because he won’t be used anywhere but the 9th. Moves will have to be made. So let’s not harp on it.

-While we’re on the pen, Carl Edwards needs to drop the slide-step. He’s not Pedro Strop, who can control it. He struck out the side today, so it seems odd to nitpick. But his velocity drops when he uses it, which he was with no one on base today for some reason. He also loses most of his pitches high to arm-side because his arm can’t catch up. For someone who has such trouble repeating his delivery, just have him worry about one.

-Lester’s last two starts comprise 8.1 innings and nine runs, 17 hits. There’s going to be market corrections like this, because Lester is giving up an obscene amount of hard contact. 41% to be exact. He’s been able to raise his Ks and lower his walks, and up his grounders, but he’s going to have to find a way to limit the loud noises he’s surrendering. It was thunderous today. A quarter of the contact today was line-drives, half in the air, and with the wind blowing out that’s a problem.

-The Cubs have been through a dicey turn of the rotation, and they went 3-3. Hendricks was iffy on Sunday, with Lester iffy the day before that. Darvish and Quintana were good, but Hamels and Lester were not. You’ll take breaking even when you didn’t break even on good starts.

-The War Bear has four hits in his last two games, eight in his last seven, and has been on base 11 times in that stretch. Nothing definitive yet, but the start of something?

-Almora took the plaudits last night, as he should, but when he came up with the bases loaded today you kind of knew it had to be a soft grounder. Even in this upturn in May, he’s still nearly at 60% grounders. You can’t find success that way.

-Javy sure made it look easy, didn’t he? If he’d got backspin instead of topspin on that ball in the 8th today, the Cubs probably tie it.

Onwards…

 

Baseball

The Disconnect And The Solution

By Sam Fels 1560 0

As I watched the Cubs bullpen fritter away another lead last night, the second game in a row they’ve done so even if it came on a collection of bleeders and excuse-me’s, I have to admit I get the fans’ angst. I might not be there with them, but I can’t tell them they’re wrong. And you know how I love telling people they’re wrong, especially when I’m from the same side. The bullpen this year is perhaps the biggest spot of neglect the Theo Epstein regime has infected the team with since they slammed back into relevance in 2015.

And it of course comes back to this winter. They kept telling us they didn’t have the money for Harper or Machado, and you didn’t have to squint all that hard to see the arguments about why signings like that didn’t make sense for the Cubs. I may not agree with that assessment, but I can understand the argument. However, fixing a bullpen is far cheaper, and for the Cubs to turn their pockets out at the thought of adding the cheapest part of a baseball team was as bewildering as it was infuriating.

And yet, as the winter dragged along and the Cubs made nary a move outside Brad Brach and casting a net to find whatever various flotsam would fall into it, there wasn’t a peep out of the Cubs front office. For a team as savvy with the media (at least on baseball matters) as the Cubs are, surely there would be a leak somewhere or a nudge that Theo and Jed were as surprised with the budget closing as we were. They talked of major changes in the wreckage of a two-day slump last October, and then nothing. Surely if things had changed between then and when the markets opened up, someone somewhere would know. And yet nothing. No whispers of fidgeting anywhere.

That doesn’t mean to cast the front office as perfect. Far from it. No matter their plans, they were counting on Brandon Morrow, which was a poor choice. Perhaps they couldn’t have predicted that Carl Edwards would run farther from competence than toward it, given his age, but he wasn’t in a position to be counted on either. You can’t account for Pedro Strop getting hurt…except he has the last three seasons. While this front office has had its problems identifying and collecting pitching, this seemed an egregious error. It is not like them to stock a complete component of a team with hunches and wildcards. And yet, here we are.

Which I guess perhaps lends credence to this story from Patrick Mooney about the Cubs and Marquee. Now, no one is going to buy this hook, line, and sinker, and nor should they. There are still more than enough variables to fuck it all up, like if no one actually picks up Marquee which Crane Kenney seems so sure of. And anything Crane is sure of you best bet you should take with a whole shaker of salt.

Still, perhaps the lack of any itching or antsy-ness from the front office over the limitations this winter stems from knowing it was a one-year deal? That they would simply have to grit their teeth through this winter knowing with the money coming off the books in the form of Hamels and Zobrist, combined with greater income would turn next winter around? Perhaps they knew with the room they’ve left for midseason acquisitions they’ll be fine? We’re essentially talking about two arms here. And if Kimbrel is going to wait until after the draft to drop the compensation, a prorated salary for half a season is probably only $5 or $6M, no? Half of a Ken Giles will cost $2M. Alex Colome a little over that. I guess I shouldn’t worry.

I don’t want to be that guy who blindly trusts what he’s being told, especially by the uber rich. Still, the complete lack of agitation in the front office, apparently, makes me think something is afoot. And the Cubs being on top of the division only buys them more time. But the answers need to be relatively soon.

Baseball

Inside The Slumps

By Sam Fels 1346 0

While the Cubs have trucked along pretty much in May, some of the things that were going well in April have not gone so well in May. Specifically, there are players who helped carry the offense while Kris Bryant and maybe one or two others were still trying to get the spark plugs to fire that are no definitely making weird noises and spitting up oil and smoke. So let’s go through and see what’s going on with a couple of them.

The first that pops up is Jason Heyward. There can’t be much of a stark contrast between April and May for a player than what Heyward has gone through. Here’s April slash lines: .309/.426/.509, and you can see why everyone was so excited and felt like they’d just come upon an undiscovered warehouse of peanut butter cups. Here’s May: .169/.234/.238. And that is fucking gross. Like, going to pick up your dog’s shit and realizing there’s a hole in the bag and you’re blocks from home gross (and yes, I know those of you with kids have had this feeling every day, but I didn’t make you have kids).

I think it’s important to remember than when you combine the two, currently Heyward has a 100 wRC+, .158 ISO, and a .401 slugging, all marks that are actually the best he’s had here in Chicago (sad, I know). The reason that Heyward has only been worth 0.1 fWAR is that his defense hasn’t been the usual stellar kind, at least metrically, as it usually is. However, an exactly average offensive season and return to his usual defensive prowess for the rest of the season still makes him a valuable player. But let’s get deeper than that because we’ve got nothing else.

For one, luck is playing a huge part. In April, Heyward’s BABIP was .313, which is a touch above average. In May it’s .208, which is beyond the sewers and getting to the Earth’s core. Whatever kind of contact Heyward is making, .208 is ridiculous. That’s not going to continue.

The thing is, the contact between the two months isn’t really all that different. In April, Heyward had 17.4% line-drives, 46.4% grounders, 36.2 fly balls. May it’s been 18.5%/42.6%/38.9%. Almost exactly the same. Considering the lack of line drives and hard contact, maybe Heyward was really lucky to get what he did in April with that mere .313 BABIP.

One big difference is that the hard-contact has dropped off. Heyward had 30.5% hard contact rate in April, which isn’t even that good, but that’s dropped to 25% in May. And if you go by Statcast, Heyward is right where he should be overall. His expected batting average is .252, he’s hitting .243. His expected weighted-on base is .323. His actual is .322. This is probably what he is, and I think it’s probably fine? And if he improves from this May, not even close to what he was in April but then improves, you’ll have a decent season.

Going deeper, in the season’s opening month Heyward was crushing fastballs and curves. He’s still hitting curves well, but he can’t get anything done on fastballs. Has there been a difference where he’s getting them? A touch. Here’s where he was getting fastballs in April and then May:

It’s not a huge difference, but he’s seeing more fastballs up and in than he did, and if you remember him driving outside fastballs to left you can see why that might be a problem. And J-Hey has always had a problem with high and tight fastballs. It’s just something he’s going to have to get to.

Another is Daniel Descalso. Now, counting on Descalso for much was always folly, because it’s just not what he’s been. He has one above-average offensive season to his name, and that was the last one. Now is he .216 bad? No, he isn’t, but outside of Colorado he’s always been around a .240 hitter. What we are missing is the walks. Descalso’s BB% is down 6% from last year, which is part of the problem. And he was walking in April, around 12%. But that’s sunk to 5% in May. And the Ks are up. It ain’t pretty.

The big problem is that in April, Descalso hit a ton of shit hard, to 41.8%. In May it’s 20%, so even if that .171 BABIP feels like it’s the work of a demon, you’re not going very far when only a fifth of your contact is loud.

Descalso’s success in April was basically only what he did on fastballs. He hit .440 on them, slugged .680, and his numbers on sinkers were just about the same. So he’s not seeing them nearly as often this year. He saw 171 fastballs or sinkers in April, and only 57 of them so far in May. People catch on. And he’s getting difference in location too:

What’s weird is that Descalso hasn’t been all that good high in the zone in his career, but they’re certainly more careful about pumping shit right down the middle on him. And Descalso is helpless on anything that breaks. And until that changes, this might be what you get.