Baseball

Will The Cubs Need Another Bat?

By Sam Fels 1406 0

Granted, this is a poor post to explore a day after you’ve been smothered by Ivan Nova, statistically the worst starter in all of baseball. One is capable of the irrational at the moment. And it’s not fair to get really emotional about it when you’ve just run the Dodgers gauntlet for four games, because right now no one is scoring against them. But the thing is if you want to go anywhere, you’re going to have to bust through that Crossing The Desert, or out-slug them, or out-slug the Brewers to even win the division (Lord knows the Brewers aren’t going to out-pitch anyone), or the suddenly nuclear Braves…anyway, you get it.

The worry area for the Cubs all season has been the pen, and the signing of Craig Kimbrel doesn’t magically make all of that go away. And you still imagine that when the deadline approaches, that still will be Priority #1, and possibly #2 and even #3. Fair enough, the Cubs still only have two to three reliable guys right now, and that might even include Kimbrel. There are a lot of wildcards out there.

Still, what’s been apparent is the Cubs have obvious holes in the lineup. They’re at second, center, and right. The last is being a tad harsh, as even with Jason Heyward’s abhorrent May, he’s still having an above-average offensive year (barely). But we can aim for a little higher than barely above average, at least I hope we can. Mom always told me aim high. The Cubs can carry average or a tick below at one spot, maybe even two.

The problem is that when the main five–Bryant, Rizzo, Contreras, Baez, and now Schwarber–aren’t all firing at the same time then the offense becomes something of a wasteland after the fifth hitter. Baez is in a slump, Contreras has gotten ground-ball happy again, and this is a big reason the Cubs haven’t put together a bunch of runs of late.

Still, I don’t want to base things on a bad week or two. It’s a long goddamn season. But over the last month, the Cubs are 10th in runs in the NL, 12th in average, 11th in wOBA. A month gets harder to ignore.

And what’s clear is that the answers mostly aren’t on the team. There’s no way the Cubs could have foreseen that Ben Zobrist would leave the team and his return be totally up in the air. It’s easy to forget how good Zobrist was last year in a more limited role in service of his age, but his 123 wRC+ or .355 wOBA would be miles above anything they’re getting for the most part from anyone not in that fivesome mentioned.

With Zoby 18 being somewhere in the quantum zone, the Cubs aren’t left with many answers. Carlos Gonzalez is dead. He’s not going to be reanimated. Everyone but Joe Maddon seems to know this. What’s hilarious is that Mark Zagunis was never given near the opportunities that CarGo has been, and his numbers are significantly better. And no, that’s not a plea to recall ZagNuts and play him. It’s just an illustration of how toast CarGo is.

Addison Russell is probably not going to hit, because he never really has. Some in the organization are blinded by the 98 RBI he put up once, but that’s more a function of the great offense ahead of him in ’16 than him being a great hitter. He’s never had an above-average offensive season, and has been actively bad the last three seasons. Daniel Descalso has been a disaster, and would likely be DFA’d if Zobrist were to return.

Whatever momentum Albert Almora might have had in May has been stunted by the arrival and usage of Gonzalez. I’m not sure how exactly, but Almora had a productive May. He had terrible luck (.253 BABIP), still hit too many grounders (50%, but that was down from April), and yet hit for enough power to overcome all of that. It’s the Heyward argument; given his defense you take average or just above offense and you have yourself a very useful player. June has seen Almora hit the ball in the same fashion as May, at least contact-type wise, it’s just that none of it has gone out of the park as a quarter of his fly balls did in May. I don’t know what the truth is here, but I know there’s more potential here than trying to wheeze one more breath of oxygen into CarGo.

The only in-house answer right now is to play David Bote every day. I know that Maddon would tell me that would expose Bote, or make the Cubs too right-handed, but quite frankly that’s horseshit. In fact, Bote has been terrible against left-handed pitching this year and great against right-handed, the complete opposite of last year. Which makes you at least hope he could blend the two one day.

Bote’s run into some bad luck in June as well, as he’s had a 32% line-drive rate in the month which is insanely high. Overall, his hard-contact rate is down but I can’t see how lacing line-drives all over the place is a bad thing. He’s hardly a star, but given what else you have, it’s just about the only choice. Whether that’s playing second with Almora in center and Heyward in right, or at third with Bryant in right and Heyward in center, I really don’t care. You have to at least try. We know Maddon loves his roster flexibility, but that’s not this roster. Quite frankly. Russell, CarGo, and Descalso have played themselves off the rotation. That’s just how it is.

The problem with getting a bat via trade is they’re going to be costly, whereas you can find any reliever anywhere (and I’m kind of in the would rather have Bummer than Colome camp right now if the Cubs go shopping crosstown again). In my dreams you plug Howie Kendrick into second base and get on with your life. But even if the Nats decide to pack up the cats, Kendrick is going to cost and I don’t think the Cubs have the boat to spend, prospect-wise. It’s like Alzolay and Hoerner and that’s pretty much it. We’ll throw Amaya on there, but he’s a long way off. And Amaya is probably the only one you’re comfortable, barely, including in any deal just because he plays catcher and you seem set there for a while.

Any other bat on the market is probably the same story. It’s hard to know who that would even be. Whit Merrifield isn’t going anywhere and if he did it wouldn’t be cheap. Eric Sogard? That’s a risk but would probably be cheap? He’s kind of Zobrist-lite at this point and is only a year removed from being a black hole for the Brewers. Maybe you wait out how the Reds toggle the Derek Dietrich/Scooter Gennett conundrum, but neither are guaranteed to be moved and neither would be cheap if they were.

It’s a problem, which is why Bote should probably be given the month to see what he does with an every day role. Hell, you extended the guy anyway, right?

Baseball

Is There Anything To Be Salvaged With Carlos Gonzalez?

By Sam Fels 1643 0

No.

 

 

…all right fine. We can try and dig a little deeper into this, but there isn’t much point. What I find curious is that on the day the Cubs unveiled Craig Kimbrel, Theo Epstein was asked about Gonzalez and Albert Almora Jr., who has lost playing time to the former’s arrival. Theo’s quote was basically that Gonzalez was here to be a bat off the bench, and Almora needed to play.

Gonzalez has started four of the past six games. If you want to know why Joe Maddon has not received a contract extension, here’s a piece of evidence for you.

Let me present some numbers:

.169/.242/.186  .429 OPS  9.1 BB% 31.8 K%

.258/.287/.536  .823 OPS  3.8 BB*  15.4 K%

The former is Gonzalez’s numbers in May, and the latter’s are Albert Almora’s. Now, Almora’s aren’t exactly breathtaking, but they come out to an above-average offensive player, just, who plays plus defense. Gonzalez’s numbers make doves cry, and his defense really isn’t any good anymore either.

It’s been three seasons since Gonzalez was an above-average offensive player, and that’s accounting for the Coors factor. His power zapped away in 2017 and hasn’t really ever come back, though the .467 slugging off the bench would be fine. You’d take it. We all understand that in searching for a left-handed bat simply to replace Ben Zobrist and maybe take PH ABs from Daniel Descalso and his other interpretation of sadness at the plate, the options you can have for free are limited. It’s a free roll of the dice.

But you’re still going to get snake-eyes. And it’s fine for now because Kyle Schwarber has carried the outfield, and Gonzalez has cobbled together a couple hits that has fooled everyone into thinking he can still hit, which he can’t. Unless his .211 average since joining up really makes something stir in your bowels.

So I’m trying to see what the Cubs think they might be able to mine here, and my hope is that Joe Maddon is only trying to get CarGo in a rhythm before he’s reduced to simply pinch-hitting and spot-start duty. The only thing I can fathom is that the Cubs think they can get CarGo to go the opposite way more, which he actually does well but doesn’t do often. CarGo has been a pull everything guy for most of his career, settling for somewhere between 20-25% of his contact going the opposite way. CarGo has consistently run an average over .400 on balls the other way, though that might have something to do with being shifted against a lot and there being a lot of open territory there. But that’s belied somewhat by most of his contact the opposite way is still in the air, where a shift wouldn’t do much about it.

That’s about as near as I can figure, and his homer the other night, certainly a Wrigley product given where it landed, is hopefully a sign that CarGo is willing to change his approach to salvage another year or two in the majors. Beats working at Sears, as we know.

Still, it’s awfully harsh on Almora. I’m not Almora’s hugest fan–he hits way too many grounders and is slow, but this May was his first plus-month in the majors since the first half of last year thanks to an injection of power. There were still way too many grounders, over half his contact was, and maybe the Cubs have already concluded he would crash back to Earth with that. Still, May saw Almora hit the ball harder than he ever has, and his .253 BABIP in the month suggests he had to fight through fortune to produce a plus-month instead of ride the wave as he did last year.

It wouldn’t be a big deal, and it probably isn’t anyway yet, if Jason Heyward were hitting. But he’s not. So Joe Maddon is essentially tossing another outfield spot away on a hunch that isn’t going to play out, whereas Almora still allows us to be curious about what could come next. To boot, CarGo’s defense just isn’t that good in right.

I get the impression this won’t be a problem come July 1st when everyone sees CarGo is toast, but you never know with Maddon. And by then Almora might have lost all his momentum. He’s at least the devil we don’t know completely yet instead of the corpse we do.

Baseball

Series Wrap – Cubs Take Two Of Three From Rockies: The Answers Aren’t Here And Not Here

By Sam Fels 1177 0

Game 1 Box Score: Cubs 6, Rockies 3

Game 2 Box Score: Cubs 9, Rockies 8

Game 3 Box Score: Rockies 3, Cubs 1

It was a series somewhat overshadowed by the Cubs making a signing during Game 2, which is usually only reserved for trades. Such is the way of the game these days. Anyway, the Cubs got two of three, three of four on the homestand so far, which is a nice recovery from what had gone on the past two weeks. Win the series against Mos Eisley, and you’ll have a 5-2 homestand which is just what the doctor ordered. At least the offense is back…until it wasn’t. The rotation definitely is though.

-Tuesday night featured another Kyle Hendricks gem, and he was really accentuating the upper part of the zone. Have a look:

Hendricks’s new wrinkles this year is to go up the ladder and to throw more curves, 16 of which he chucked on Tuesday night, a season-high. When you have as free-swinging an outfit as the Rockies are, you get a pretty easy night at the office.

-You can tell Maddon is jumpy about his pen, as Hendricks was allowed to throw 111 pitches and then Quintana today went one batter into the eighth.

-You can’t blame Maddon after last night’s tour-de-stupid. Brad Brach is a nothing, and it’s time the Cubs realized that. So is Kyle Ryan. I keep stressing that Montgomery and Chatwood, who are stretched out, should be thrown multiple innings whenever possible to limit everyone else’s exposure. Perhaps the biggest disappointment with Maddon’s management, on the field that is, is his lack of imagination with his pen usage. He wants his closer, his 8th inning guy, and his 7th inning guy. He seems tempted to use Chatwood that way at times, but not consistently, and Montgomery as a one-inning guy just doesn’t make any sense.

-That’s enough of Daniel Descalso, thank you.

-The Cubs might have gotten a couple lightning strikes out of Carlos Gonzalez, but don’t fool yourself. He’s finished. He’s only had one season where he was anything but an average hitter away from Coors, and that was four seasons ago. Albert Almora seemed to have secured regular playing time, and then it vanished for this. Which just isn’t fair, unless you’re going to sit Heyward, and sitting Heyward for Gonzalez is the definition of running in place. The only benefit is the hands team the Cubs can put in the outfield late in games now.

-However, he was at the turning point of last night’s game, when German Marquez decided to pitch around CarGo and then hit Contreras, before Bote cleared the bases. I don’t know if it was from memory or a favor to an old friend, but it defied explanation. Even despite the Cubs’ pen’s best efforts, they couldn’t seal a game that had already been blown open.

-Next time, maybe just let Yu try and work himself out of his own trouble instead of protecting his psyche, because letting the pen come in and start various bonfires isn’t going to help it either.

-It does feel like the Cubs always huff paint when facing a pitcher making his major league debut, but I’m sure if I looked, or knew where to look, the numbers wouldn’t bare that out. It’s still annoying as fuck, though.

Onwards…

Baseball

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

By Sam Fels 1312 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…

Everything Else

Deferring On Addison Doesn’t Keep Maddon From Talking

By Sam Fels 1322 0

The Cubs have found themselves in a situation they’ve been in no way prepared for, I think that much we can agree on. So yesterday’s decision to option Addison Russell to Iowa when his suspension is up makes sense in that it buys everyone some more time. What they’ll do with that time, I don’t have any idea and am searching for confidence.

Most of me thinks this is simply a baseball decision, and if anything is beyond that it’s merely trying to put off the unpleasantness of Russell’s return. On a strictly baseball plane, there isn’t room for Russell right now. Javier Baez has proven to be the better player on every side of the ball. And for those dinosaurs who still can’t seem to see past Russell’s projections as a prospect, it’s important to note he’s never come all that close to even putting up an average offensive season. Whereas Javy is working on his third straight of being at least that good if not way better. Yes, Russell’s defense is steadier, but Javy is well on his way this year to matching Russell’s defensive metrics of the past couple years (Baez has been worth 2.0 defensive runs in just one month according to FanGraphs, and Russell was at nine and seven the past two years).

Beyond that, David Bote–who I’m still not convinced will hit for shit when pitchers just stop throwing him fastballs–has been too good to lose the fifth infielder spot, and in fact has forced Bryant to the outfield more often than not recently. Same goes for Daniel Descalso, as much like Bote is putting up offensive numbers Russell has never approached. Who loses ABs here? Essentially, the Cubs are trying to buy time to see if anyone gets hurt.

The only baseball concern is that Javy tires out from playing short every day, though if you ask him I’m sure that’s exactly what he’d want. And Bote could probably make a fist of it once every couple weeks if you really needed him to. It wouldn’t be pretty but he’d get you out of a game.

It’s the asking him part that I have a problem with.

I’m sure this type of thing goes on all the time in a clubhouse. And I’m sure Joe Maddon, who has quickly become the answer to a question no one asked, was just trying to be kind to Javy. But this is the problem with Maddon, is that the more he talks for the sake of hearing himself the more he ends up having to answer for.

Maddon almost assuredly never considered this, and I doubt the front office would have sanctioned it if they’d been asked, but that’s far more weight than Javy or any player should ever be asked. It’s not his job to determine where and how much Russell plays. That’s Maddon’s job. He doesn’t need to ask Javy what he thinks. Javy was given an everyday role last year essentially for the first time, certainly no more than the second, and came up with a MVP-finalist season. He’s playing just as well this year, if not better. You know Javy wants to be in the lineup every day, and he’d like to be at his natural position.

But he’s not going to say that, because no teammate ever does. He’s not going to tell Joe, even in a bunker that’s been swept for bugs and assured total secrecy, that Russell can go fuck himself and spot start at second for all he cares. It seems like Joe is just trying to cover himself and open an avenue for Russell to play short so he can then say, “Javy said this is what he wants, and he wants what’s best for the team because he’s a good teammate.” That’s the only reason you’d make this public.

Second, whether Maddon or the Cubs front office likes it or not (OR NOT), Russell just carries more with him upon promotion and insertion into the lineup. That’s what the Cubs chose to take on and carry, and we went over that yesterday. To put that on Baez is wholly unfair, because he’s not equipped to deal with that, nor is he in a position to have to do so. It would be a near travesty if Baez somehow got blamed for the presence of a player a lot of Cubs fans find detestable and don’t want around in the first place. Baez shouldn’t be sullied in such a way.

Again, the Cubs chose to take this one, and they’re going to have to show their work every step of the way. And they have a lot of the time recent. But dragging another player into it isn’t helping anyone.

Baseball

Series Wrap – Cubs Split With Angels Before It Snows In April: The Pen Is Mightier Than The Sword…For Sepuku

By Sam Fels 1106 0

It only ended up being a two-game series, as Game Of Thrones marketing has gone completely overboard and unhinged and decided to promote tonight’s season premiere with THUNDERSNOW. It was a series that saw Mike Trout stay home, Trevor Cahill not take the bump, and yet the Cubs only got one win. It doesn’t quite feel like enough, as two wins were certainly on offer. Let’s run through it.

The Two Obs

-No point in moving any farther along without addressing the bullpen, once again. The Cubs will have a streak soon, or they will need one to get back comfortably over .500. And yet it feels like to do that, they’ll have to overcome a “bullpen game,” or two, like they almost did yesterday.

I’m something of a hypocrite, which you knew by now. I’m a proponent of not really breaking the bank for relievers, because the scenery is layered with palookas and punters who throw 95 and show up for 45 pitches per week. You can find them anywhere. You’re supposed to be able to produce them relatively easily, because your system is littered with hard-throwers who can’t find a third pitch or the stamina to be starters. The Cubs so far have produced only Carl Edwards Jr. and his mind full of spiders, but that’s another talk for another time.

But it’s still galling the relievers the Cubs have tried to move forward with on the cheap. Brad Brach has been declining for three years. Randy Rosario was terrible last year, and pretty much just given a job this year even though there’s no discernible stuff. Tim Collins is the name the EA generator gives to some player that’s too far in the future in franchise mode to be real. At least he appears to have stuff, somewhat, unlike Rosario.

These aren’t guys the Cubs thought they saw something to unlock that other teams didn’t. Pitchers that if they leaned on a pitch or hadn’t before or a tweak to a motion to get more movement or velocity. They’re seat-fillers. Rosario is especially galling, because he didn’t strike anyone out or get grounders last year and yet here we are still trying to make fetch happen.

There’s not much Joe can do, because these are the guys he has to go to.

-Hendricks’s slow start continues. He couldn’t find his fastball at all, and when he has to throw only change-ups that pitch isn’t as effective as it’s not playing off anything. He also hasn’t mixed in his curve at all which he said he wanted to do, but that just might be a good thing. Nothing to see here, yet.

-On the opposite side, Cole Hamels put on his second-straight strong start, never in trouble after the Cubs gave him three runs in the firs. His velocity wasn’t where it was last year, but with a good mix of changes and curves and cutters, and dotting that fastball, it doesn’t matter.

-Fuck off forever, Pujols.

-Contreras carried them on Friday, but he had a woeful AB in the ninth yesterday. With a base open and your run not mattering at all, you have to know you’re not getting anything in the zone. Especially as the Angels had been going to sliders out of the zone on him all day with Stratton. Know time and place and all that.

-Schwarber can’t catch a break, but he also looks as lost as he has in his career. He was just fighting off fastballs yesterday, and still ahead of the breaking stuff. In the end, it only amounts to a bad week, and now a new one.

Onwards…

Baseball

Series Preview – Pirates vs. Cubs: And I’m Coming Off This Long And Winding Road

By Sam Fels 1297 0

vs.

RECORDS: Pirates 5-3   Cubs 2-7

GAMETIMES: Monday 1:20, Wednesday and Thursday at 7:05

TV: ABC Monday, WGN Wednesday, NBCSN Chicago Thursday

THE CONFLUENCE: Bucs Dugout

PROBABLE PITCHERS

Jameson Taillon vs. Jon Lester

Jordan Lyles vs. Yu Darvish

Joe Musgrove vs. Jose Quintana

Probable Pirates Lineup

Adam Frazier – 2B

Starling Marter – CF

Francisco Cervelli – C

Josh Bell – 1B

Piece Of Shit – 3B

Melky Cabrera – RF

JB Shuck – LF

Erik Gonzalez – SS

(note: the Bucs haven’t faced a lefty this year so not sure how that will change. Frazier and Shuck likely come out for Kevin Newman and Pablo Reyes). 

Cubs Lineup

Ben Zobrist – RF

Kris Bryant – 3B

Anthony Rizzo – 1B

Javier Baez – SS

Kyle Schwarber – LF

Willson Contreras – C

Daniel Descalso – 2B

Jason Heyward – CF

Well, this should be quite the atmosphere, no? Not only is it the first time Cubs fans will congregate since Tom Ricketts sat on the front office’s hands for them, as well as bitched about the money they don’t have while opening up exclusive clubs left and right in Wrigley, but the Cubs decided to put extra hot sauce on this one by biffing their opening road trip to the tune of a 2-7 record. Usually Opening Day is one big hug. This one is going to have some grinding teeth.

Then again, there’s always grinding teeth when the Pirates are involved, as they can’t seem to shake their hold-me-back ways. They kicked it off this season when Chris Archer filled his diaper yesterday after Derek Dietrich stared at a home run, one that landed somewhere near Harrisburg, so Archer threw behind him. The Pirates got put in their place of course when Yasiel Puig wanted to fight them all and no one had the tires to take him up on the offer. Then again, would you?

It seems the Bucs are always a tightly-wound bunch placing chips on their own shoulders. It’s an organization that is always Sean Rodriguez beating up a cooler, making a big show of doing nothing. And that’s what the Pirates do, nothing. Their owner can’t be bothered to augment what should be a pretty good team, and he hasn’t in five seasons now. They collect their revenue sharing, put just enough of a product out there where you squint and see a contender with one or two moves that never come. And then we do it all over again the next season.

Because this team could be good. It throws a hell of a starting staff at you, with budding star Taillon, Archer, Trevor Williams, and Musgrove (part of the Gerrit Cole deal). It’s not the best rotation, but it isn’t far off, and it comes with a lot of angry fastballs. Some of them aren’t even at hitters!

The pen hasn’t started the year sending hearts aflutter. Felipe Vasquez is always a real problem, but no one else there has been able to find the plate (it can happen to others, people). If you’re bringing out Francisco Liriano from the bullpen, you’ve pretty much admitted you’re ready for an adventure every day. They strike a lot of people out (everyone does but the Cubs), but they don’t get there easily.

The lineup is very boom-or-bust right now, though getting six games in against whatever the Reds are tossing out there certainly is a help. Adam Frazier, Josh Bell, and old friend Melky Cabrera are crushin’ fools left and right so far on the nascent season. Marte, Cervelli, and Kang are wandering lost in the woods. Let’s just be relieved there’s no Christian Yelich here.

The Cubs will be lucky to get two of these in, as Wednesday night’s forecast looks especially gross. Probably should move that one up to the off-day tomorrow, but I also can’t remember when a game was actually moved up a day. After seeing two division winners last week, the Cubs get 12 games against teams that aren’t supposed to be anything more than middling. Maybe they can get healthy that way.

Albert Almora seems to have already lost his starting job in center, as Heyward has moved over the past couple days to accommodate Descalso at second. Is that where Ian Happ will go eventually? Who knows? Maybe Joe Maddon is just riding the Heyward wave. They don’t last long so you have to.

Enough of this happy horseshit. Time to get the season back on track.

 

Baseball

You Get What You Pay For, And Life Is Real High-Priced

By Sam Fels 1421 0

Put a couple beers in a Cubs fan right now, never that hard of a task, and I bet a good portion of them would tell you there’s a level of schadenfreude with the team right now. After they spent the offseason crying poor, the front office pointing fingers every outward but certainly not inward, and everything else, the Cubs are being undone by what they ignored and arrogantly thought would fix itself, the bullpen. And it being this early in the season, and only four games, it hasn’t come anywhere close to derailing the season. You can just see how it might.

At the top, and as I’ve repeated all offseason, you can remake a bullpen on the fly. The Nationals did it just two years ago (with Brandon Kintzler as part of that). The Red Sox simply ignored their bullpen in the postseason last year. There will be a bevy of guys on teams out of it who for no reason whatsoever are throwing 97 with a slider from nowhere that you can have for B-level and C-level prospects. This is probably what the Cubs will do, and most likely they’ll be fine. It just didn’t have to be like this.

I had wondered if Theo Epstein and Jed Hoyer knew about the budget Tom Ricketts was going to hand them at the outset of the offseason. But as was pointed out to me on Twitter, the fact that they sent Drew Smyly away to extend Cole Hamels probably indicates that they did. So one has to ask if that really was the right move. Because if the thinking was that the pen as currently constructed was going to just right itself, it makes you think that pitching isn’t just a spotty mark on the record of this regime, but a clear blindspot. Remember, we’re still waiting for the first pitcher Theo has drafted to actually come up for air and do something here. Hendricks and Edwards Jr. are trades, and we’ll get to the latter soon.

Because what did the Cubs have coming out of last year? Pedro Strop, who is wonderful and insane and I love him but also has missed big chunks of time with injury two of the past three years and turns 34 this season. It seems to me that the Cubs want to treat their signing of Brandon Morrow as something other than bad, but it very well may be. Morrow only has one full season of being a dominant reliever and a whole lot of injury problems. He’s far from a sure thing, and yet the Cubs are happy to tell you his absence is the main problem in order to do themselves credit, as well as blaming Joe Maddon for having the temerity to pitch him three days in a row at the end of May. The end of May is when a pitcher should be in peak health. If he can’t do it then, he can’t do it, and hence is not a plus piece to have around.

Carl Edwards Jr. is a basketcase and has never proven to be anything else. Brandon Kintzler has one good season, and his ground-ball rate, his main weapon, has been dropping for three straight years. Randy Rosario doesn’t strike anyone out and was bad last year and can only claim to throw with his left hand. They couldn’t honestly sell Tyler Chatwood as anything other than a lottery ticket bought while drunk and using consecutive numbers.

Perhaps they thought they could count on Steve Cishek. Here’s the problem: the history of relievers who crack 80 appearances over the age of 30 is not really encouraging.

Zach Duke did it three years ago at 33, and the next season saw his K/9 rate drop in half and his FIP double. In 2017  Bryan Shaw reached 79 appearances at 29. The next year his walk-rate doubled. Only Joel Peralta survived that threshold in 2013 at that age and came back fine the next year. Or at least his peripherals did, but his ERA was still over 4.00.

The Cubs front office has been acting like the smartest guys in the room for so long now that perhaps they’ve failed to realize they’re getting passed.

Now you can also throw this at the Ricketts, who even if they took the “Look what you’ve done with our money already” tact can’t then tell the front office to go stuff it with such a clear weakness. But is that $13M net-spend on Hamels worth more than two relievers right now? If the multi-year commitment to Andrew Miller made them nervous because he’s already in decline in skill and physically, that’s cool. Don’t want to blow it all on Zach Britton? Fair, or at least understandable. I wasn’t married to Jesse Chavez. He’s a guy.

But maybe Joakim Soria? Only $7.5M per. Seems a better bet than Brad Brach.

It’s important to reserve judgement until we see what the Cubs do over the next few months. Maybe they hated the reliever market in the winter altogether and didn’t want to force it. Fine. But when they say they have the deepest crop of pitchers waiting in Iowa they’ve ever had, why should anyone take that at face value? Again, this isn’t a front office that’s produced a quality reliever or starter yet (Hector Rondon was their Rule 5 pick, but that just means he didn’t come through the system). The Cubs couldn’t wait to tell every beat writer about their technology and gizmos to measure their pitching in the system. But at this point, Cubs fans are more than excused for not wanting the labor pains, just the baby.

Actually, sounds a little like the Hawks and their blue line, doesn’t it?

Baseball

Series Preview – Cubs vs. Rangers: When A Team Runs In Circles, It’s A Maddon World

By Sam Fels 1283 0

vs.

DATES & TIMES: Thursday 3:05, Saturday 7:05, Sunday 3:05

TV: WGN Thursday, NBCSN Chicago Saturday and Sunday

NILL ESCAPEES: Lone Star Ball

PROBABLE PITCHERS

Jon Lester vs. Mike Minor

Yu Darvish vs. Edinson Volquez

Cole Hamels vs. Lance Lynn

CUBS PROBABLE LINEUP

Ben Zobrist – 2B

Kris Bryant – 3B

Anthony Rizzo – 1B

Javier Baez – SS

Kyle Schwarber – LF

Willson Contreras – C

Jason Heyward – RF

Albert Almora Jr. – CF

David Bote – DH

 

RANGERS PROBABLE LINEUP

Shin-Soo Choo – DH

Rougned Odor – 2B

Elvis Andrus – SS

Nomar Mazara – RF

Joey Gallo – LF

Asdrubal Cabrera – 3B

Ronald Guzman – 1B

Jeff Mathis – C

Delino Deshields Jr. – CF

 

At least the offseason is over.

It’s been a long few months for Cubs fans. Not only did they have to sit and stew over two consecutive losses at home to end the season with two runs scored total (must be managed by Jeremy Colliton), but then their owner went and sat on the front office’s signing hands for months. So the relief that they’ll actually run out of the dugout is immeasurable today, if only to not see Tom Ricketts’s fucking face again. Let’s line it up and play.

The narratives are well known, but the one that will get overplayed from here on out is the status of Joe Maddon. Maddon didn’t turn out to be as innovative as we thought. He never shuts up even though he has little to say. The gimmicks and quirks have run a little dry. On the other hand, he took a beat up team last year through 43-straight days or whatever it ended up being and humped them (there’s an image for you) to 95 wins. We might be bored of all the lights and whistles, but the players aren’t and that’s what matters. Just don’t turn Steve Cishek into silly puddy again.

Another one Cubs fans might become hyper aware of is Opening Day starter Jon Lester and his decline. Lester was able to dodge, duck, dip, dive, and dodge his way through the season last year, but his strikeout-rate sank, his hard-contact against rose, and he basically had his defense to thank for it all. And now he’s 35. The BABIP Dragon can be a cruel foe. You won’t find a grindy-er guy than Lester who will sit on the corners no matter what, and maybe he’s got one last surge in him to be the guy he’s been. He’s certainly a bellwether on this team, and the rotation is buffeted enough that it can probably survive if he’s just huckin’ dead fish out there by July.

The other big story of the series is Yu Darvish returning to the Cubs and returning to Texas. A lot of where the Cubs go hinges on what Darvish can provide, as he’s something of a new acquisition this season. If he stays healthy. Which is a huge if, as you’re talking about a guy who hasn’t seen 200 innings since 2013 and is coming off an injury-ruined campaign. Spring training was fun, he looks good, but everyone looks good until they get hit. It feels boom-or-bust.

Other than that, the lineup could still be doomsday gun. The bullpen will be an adventure for a bit, until Pedro Strop comes in and everything will be fine. And remember, Carl Edwards Jr. is great until August. Worry about it then.

To the Rangers, who somehow are in the last year of their stay in Arlington because it’s like 18-years-old and that’s totally outdated and fuck you that’s why. Fuckin’ Texas. Anyway, moving into a new stadium in the middle of a rebuild is always a choice, but here we are. The Rangers are gonna be bad, the Angels, A’s, and Astros especially are going to eat their innards on the highway all year, and it’s going to be fucking hot as balls.

The rotation is reclamation projects galore, with Shelby Miller, Drew Smyly, and Lance Lynn populating it. Hell, Mike Minor, the starter today, is one. The hope is probably to get these guys looking like something before the deadline and flogging them for whatever they can scrape off the pavement. You don’t make long-term plans around Lance Lynn, in the same vein as friends and salad and such.

In the lineup, only Nomar Mazara–who seriously looks like he’s about to destroy a small town every time he steps into the box–and Ronald Guzman figure to be around when the Rangers matter again. Guzman doesn’t project to be a star, and Mazara has had three goes at the American League without punching through. So clock’s ticking. This is the first year Elvis Andrus will look to his right and not see Adrian Beltre, so he might spend the whole year in black and playing Smiths records. Which we all should when it comes to the absence of Beltre. Rougned Odor and Joey Gallo are here for your strikeouts, home runs, and Cousin Vinny jokes.

Hey Hey Holy Mackerel…