Baseball Everything Else

Series Recap: NEW KID ON THE CUBS HAD A BUNCH OF HITS

By Forklift 1733 0

Game 1 Box Score: Cubs 10 Dads 2

Game 2 Box Score: Dads 9 Cubs 8 (10 innings)

Game 3 Box Score: Dads 4 Cubs 0

Game 4 Box Score: Cubs 4 Dads 1

Not the hero we need, the hero we deserve.

Not the hero we need, the hero we deserve.

 

For guys of a certain age (old), the thought of the Cubs going to San Diego in a must-win situation can still conjure up visions of 1984, with Steve Garvey walking the Cubs off in a game that looked as good as won, Jim Frey leaving Rick Sutcliffe in during Game 5 while he had Steve Trout rested and ready to go, then the ball getting past Leon Durham/s Gatorade-soaked mitt. So, good times.

Let’s…

Baseball

Series Preview – Cubs vs. Padres: Anytime Now, Assh—s

By Sam Fels 1171 0

vs.

RECORDS: Cubs 76-66   Padres 66-76

GAMETIMES: Monday-Wednesday 9:10, Thursday 2:40

TV: WGN Monday, NBCSN Tuesday/Thursday, ABC 7 Wednesday

LOOKING FOR THE SUIT STORE: Gaslamp Ball

SERIES PREVIEW POSTS

Depth Charts & Pitching Staffs

Padres Spotlight: Manny Machado

I may have waved the white flag at this team, or something a lot more impolite, but there are those out there that haven’t. And maybe the players haven’t either. They can’t say they have. We’ll find out real soon. If they do plan on making a fist of this season, and not just waiting around for the Diamondbacks or Brewers or Phillies to come and slip the quiet knife between the ribs, it should probably start….cue Denis Lemieux…RIGHT FUCKING NOW.

The Cubs head out to the West Coast for the fourth time this season (because that makes sense) for four games with the Padres before returning home for a 10-game homestand that definitely has the feel of 2004 where everything will go wrong. But before we get there, it’s this series against the Padres, one of the NL’s most exciting teams…next year.

The Fathers sit 10 games under, and suffered through a brutal July where they went 8-16. They recovered for a 13-15 August, and just won a series off the moribund Rockies (whom the Cardinals get to play soon. Oh joy!). They also took three of four off the Giants to end August, though getting swept by the D-Backs is also in there.

One reason for the ho-hum record is that this isn’t a very good offense. Producing a good one in that park will be the challenge for GM AJ Preller going forward, as Petco seems to gobble up offense even in the face of demonic baseballs. Of late, only new kid Josh Naylor is hitting, taking Hunter Renfroe‘s job in right field. Naylor is playing to lock down a spot next year, which is a common theme amongst this team at the moment.

They weren’t helped by Fernando Tatis Jr. going on the shelf for the season either. Wil Myers has been the only other regular to hit the past month, but he doesn’t always get playing time either in left, center, or first, though you might see him at the latter as Eric Hosmer has been emitting a weird smell all season. Recent promotion Nick Martini, and all the Groucho Marx jokes that come with him, has hit since arriving as well and gets most of the time in left.

The Cubs missed Chris Paddack when the Padres invaded Wrigley right after the break, but they won’t do so this time. However, the second half has been much rougher on the rookie, with an ERA a rest stop or two away from 5.00. He’s still carrying near a 5-to-1 K/BB ratio, but the Fiendish BABIP Kung Fu Treachery has gotten him in the second half, and he’s giving up more fly balls. These days, that’s not going to work out well. They’ll miss Joey Lucchesi, who has been great over the past month, and they will see Cal Quantrill who is carrying an ERA over 9.00 in that span. Ronald Bolanos will only be making his second start in the majors, so look for him to throw six shutout innings in true Cubs tradition.

The Cubs would be well advised to get to the starters, because you don’t want to have to stare down Kirby Yates and Craig Stammen late in the game, or a few others. The Padres always seem to fashion a plus-pen out of whatever’s lying around in true MacGeyver fashion, and this year is no different. Luis Perdomo has returned from injury this year into the pen and has been lights-out of late. This is just not the unit you want to try and come back against, not that this Cubs outfit as currently molded has much interest in doing that against anyone these days.

The Padres are not a doormat, but they’re not offensively charged and their starters can be had. Then again, that description could be thrown at the Cubs, and they don’t have the bullpen the Padres do. At some point, if only out of embarrassment, you’d think the Cubs would turn the levels up just a tad, and it would have to start here. But hey, if they fuck this up, with the Cardinals getting the funeral dirge that is the Rockies for three games, then at least you know the division will be over.

If you need a reason to watch and hurt yourself some more, Nico Hoerner will be up to take over at short with Baez and Russell out. Isn’t this fun?

Clean it up, assholes.

Baseball

Cubs Show Strange Sense Of Urgency, Call Up Nico Hoerner

By Sam Fels 1507 0

What Cubs fans will tell you is most infuriating or disappointing, or confusing, or infurapusing, about this season is that before it, Cubs ownership/front-office didn’t show much urgency about it. Now, we’ve been having the debate about how much urgency a team coming off a 95-win season with half of a Kris Bryant really needs to show, but it’s some. You’re in your window, you’re supposed to be competing for a World Series every year, every chance is precious, so there’s built-in urgency.

During the season, there’s been some. It’s easy to point to the Craig Kimbrel signing and say the Cubs truly do care. Except they were almost shamed into that with the bullpen they did engineer for this season. There was almost no choice. And they only did that because Ben Zobrist‘s salary came off the books. Nicholas Castellanos‘s acquisition is another, though it cost pretty much nothing and wasn’t as big of a splash as they could have made. It certainly worked out that way, though.

Still, the overriding feeling of this season was basically running it back and seeing what happens. And the team itself has certainly played that way, only enhancing the feeling that the whole organization is in some sort of malaise or fog. Every time they’ve had a chance to surge forward they’ve turned it down, no one seems to be taking a step forward other than Darvish and Castellanos in a contract drive.

So the Cubs calling up Nico Hoerner today smacks of a desperation they just haven’t shown at all this year. Yes, they’re out of shortstops, as Javier Baez has a broken thumb and Russell a broken face, and Russell has been an offensive black hole as it is. Hoerner at least can provide similar defense as Russell, and just might make more contact.

But it feels like it would have fit perfectly for this Cubs team, from top down, to just throw David Bote at short until Russell was healthy again and try to make do. Joe Maddon hadn’t wanted to do that all season, which led to Baez being turned into a fine paste by playing every single day, but both the front office and now the players don’t seem to give a flying fornication what Maddon wants to do these days.

Calling up Hoerner also feels like exactly what happened to Almora or Happ or Russell even, though what happens next year will be more telling of that. All three of those players were promoted to the majors without an extended period of offensive dominance, or even success in Almora’s and Russell’s case really, and all three have failed to consistently hit at the top level. Hoerner has 70 games at AA. So one has to believe this is just an emergency and he’ll start next year back at AA or AAA if he really balls out in spring training or something.

The Cubs may just be out of options, and feel like taking a flier. Just like they took on Robel Garcia, or Happ again, or Carlos Martinez for eight minutes, or Zobrist now (which is somewhat working). Hoerner doesn’t strike out, though we’ll see if that continues with the jump to MLB pitching, makes contact, and is fast, three things the Cubs have had next to zero of all season. He can play the position too, though his long-term future is obviously at second or in center thanks to Baez. Fuck, at this point Cubs fans will be happy if he just doesn’t throw the ball into the next county like Russell had an affinity for.

What an intro it will be for a young kid to walk into a clubhouse in mid-September for a team competing for a playoff spot full of players that just seem like they want to go home. Hopefully he isn’t paralyzed by confusion.