By my count, this is the first time I’ve picked a picture that included new third base coach Quintin Berry. Former third base coach Willie Harris was particularly expressive and photogenic over at third in years gone by and when a photographer captured one of those, I liked to grab those photos.
This game may be the first time this year for what I’ll call one of Tom’s tropes. Probably the theme I’ve used most often in my writing is glass half full, glass half empty. Often, I use that as a thought on the big picture of the Cubs. I hope the vast majority of you still have a cup that is more than half full. The team is very likely to be a playoff team assuming relative health. So it’s hard to get too down on this team. I do see some of that around social media, but I often read that largely as click bait.
But this game definitely had a glass half full/half empty feel to it. Ben Brown allowed a pair of solo homers in the first inning. Meanwhile, the Cubs squandered their early opportunities. In the fourth, the Cubs bounced back though, capped by a three-run homer from Miguel Amaya. I thought it was really great to see the Cubs come off of the mat on the road. Carson Kelly has cooled some, so it’s good to see Amaya being productive of late. I mean, he’s been good this year, but he’s running a little hot lately.
Brown flat lost it in the fifth. After recovering very nicely from the two early homers and getting through four, coasting a little, he got rocked (though strangely around two strikeouts). What a crazy line out of Brown who faced 21 batters, allowed seven hits and struck out eight. He was tagged with six runs.
But the Cubs immediately came off the mat again. They tallied four runs in the sixth. The first six hitters reached in the top of the sixth and four of them ultimately scored. You can never assume sequencing, but it seems likely that but for a very close play at the plate, five runs would have scored. The other side of sequencing is that but for an out at the plate, it might have been even more than five.
That inning featured, at least initially, a three-run triple by Miguel Amaya. Replay overturned the original safe call at the plate and they scored it as a two-run double for Amaya. Huge night at the plate for him with a couple of really big hits. Impressive in this one, the Cubs notched seven runs and weren’t far off of eight with the top three in the order combining to go 1-13 with two walks and a stolen base. That’s a lot of production out of the back two-thirds of the order.
While the Cubs were turning a 6-3 deficit to a 7-6 lead, Matt Shaw was notching a pair of hits, including an RBI double that produced that seventh run. Caleb Thielbar, Drew Pomeranz and Ryan Pressly faced 11 batters and recorded 10 outs. A special tip of the cap to Thielbar who pulled off the rare feat of recording four outs while facing three batters.
Then there was the last inning. Interestingly, Porter Hodge is apparently headed to the IL with an oblique injury. In an odd call, with Hodge unavailable, Pressly and Pomeranz threw the seventh and eighth innings respectively. I don’t question a lot of decisions, but this is one I just wouldn’t have made. Daniel Palencia was given the ninth inning. Calling it as it is, Palencia came extremely close to nailing down the save.
To be fair, in a hypothetical world where I’m hired as a manager and/or general manager, I’ll eventually be fired for always having a long term view of things. I have no problem with Daniel Palencia getting higher leverage opportunities. I hate to see a guy who has been very good escalated to a save situation all at once. Palencia did have holds in each of his four outings leading up to this one and did throw the eighth inning in the last of those.
For my money, it just wasn’t enough lead in. I did not look for Counsell’s comments and I’m positive he won’t have thrown Palencia under the bus. Nor should he. That’s a talented young arm with electric stuff on the rise. My best read is that he saw the situation emerging with the bottom of the Marlins in the ninth and thought that he could get through Palencia there. Pressly faced 7-8-9-1 in his one inning. Pomeranz faced 2-3-4-5. Palencia faced 6-7-8-9-1 with the last one being one batter too far.
The sequencing in this game was amazing. The Cubs struck out 12 Marlins and issued exactly one walk. That walk was the second to last batter of the game and scored the winning run. The Cubs have done fantastic of late and not walking hitters, but at least one of the stories of this game was the one walk. Look, the Cubs average allowing 3.1 BB/9 and the league average is 3.4. If you prefer the number as a rate stat, the Cubs have walked 8 percent of hitters (eighth best) and league average is 8.8 percent.
Obviously, the problem is with the bullpen. The starters have walked 65 batters in 254⅓ innings. The bullpen has walked 79 batters in 175⅔ innings. With Hodge down, this problem could be exacerbated. Hodge has actually walked 11 in 19⅓ innings, much too high. But at this point, if there was an arm ready to excel, they’d probably already be on the big league team. This move feels like it is likely to be Gavin Hollowell who has thrown pretty well when he’s gotten the chance.
Pitch Counts:
Cubs: 153 (8⅔ IP), 37 BF
Marlins: 164, 42 BF
The real story here is the work by Valente Bellozo who was making his first relief appearance of the year after making five starts, including one against the Cubs. Bellozo had posted decent numbers as a starter, though the peripherals suggested a little bit of luck and he wasn’t getting deep into games. He threw three innings in relief in this one, holding the Cubs scoreless over the final three after they’d scored seven runs in the middle three innings.
Bellozo is surely out for the series. Jesús Tinoco was dropped out of the closer spot and had a terrible sixth, failing to finish the inning and being tagged with four runs. On the Cubs side, Pomeranz and Pressly have both thrown on consecutive days and Palencia made a lot of pitches in the loss. The Cubs bullpen is a mess for game two of this series. It’s an obvious under statement, but the Cubs needed to nail this one down. There’s a real chance of losing this series. Hopefully, the offense will do more heavy lifting.
Three Stars:
No question Miguel Amaya gets the top spot. He drove in five and if Moises Ballesteros was any faster, it would have been six and a different game.
Caleb Thielbar gets the second spot. He picked off a runner to get out of the Brown mess in the fifth.
With the bottom five hitters in the order all having two hits, it’s hard to differentiate any of them. But I’m going to pick Matt Shaw. He was the only one of the five outside of Amaya to have an extra base hit. He also stole a base and drove in a run. The bottom six in the order produced relatively similar value.
Game 48, May 19: Marlins 8, Cubs 7 (28-20)
Fangraphs
Reminder: Heroes and Goats are determined by WPA scores and are in no way subjective.
THREE HEROES:
Superhero: Miguel Amaya (.416). 2-3, HR, 2B, BB, 5 RBI, 2 R
*6th largest WPA game by a Cub this season
Hero: Drew Pomeranz (.145). IP, 4 BF, H, K
Sidekick: Ryan Pressly (.110). IP, 4 BF, H, K
THREE GOATS:
Billy Goat: Daniel Palencia (-.793). ⅔ IP, 5 BF, 2 H, BB, 2 ER, K (L 0-1)
Goat: Ben Brown (-.464). 4⅔ IP, 21 BF, 7 H, 0 BB, 6 ER, 8 K
**Palencia’s is the 2nd worst WPA game score this year by a Cub, Brown’s is the 8th worst
Kid: Pete Crow-Armstrong (-.137). 0-5
***Not a Cub, but Jesus Sanchez notches a .930. The largest WPA game score by a Cub in my time tracking such things was David Bote with .901. I don’t need to tell you which game that was.
WPA Play of the Game: Fangraphs lists the play as a two-run triple to end the game. I suspect the official play-by-play of the game will eventually list it as a double. It doesn’t matter, the WPA event score is .825.
*Cubs Play of the Game: Miguel Amaya’s three-run homer in the fourth that gave the Cubs a 3-2 lead. A three-run triple in the sixth would have been more had the play at home not been overturned. (.317)
Cubs Player of the Game:
Poll
Who was the Cubs Player of the Game?
0%
Someone else (leave your suggestion in the comments)
(0 votes)
0 votes total
Yesterday’s Winner: PCA received 245 of 300 votes
Rizzo Award Standings: (Top 5/Bottom 5)
The award is named for Anthony Rizzo, who finished first in this category three of the first four years it was in existence and four times overall. He also recorded the highest season total ever at +65.5. The point scale is three points for a Superhero down to negative three points for a Billy Goat.
Kyle Tucker +16
Shōta Imanaga/Drew Pomeranz/Miguel Amaya +11
PCA +9.5
2 players -7
Michael Busch -10.5
Ben Brown -11
Julian Merryweather -13
Seiya Suzuki -13.5
Up Next: Game two of the three-game set Tuesday night in Miami. Jameson Taillon (2-3, 4.53, 49⅔ IP) was born in Florida. He’s from Lakeland and though I’m still learning Florida geography, I can tell you that Lakeland and Miami are hours apart. But, the Florida product has one of the higher contracts on the Cubs and now he gets the ball in a really big game situation. They could really use not only a good start, but a deep start.
Taillon lost to the Marlins last week at Wrigley, allowing three runs over six. In three May starts, two on the road, he is 1-2, with a 5.63 ERA in 16 innings of work. He has 16 strikeouts and only two walks allowed.
Ryan Weathers (1-0, 1.80, 5 IP) has one start this year and it was against the Cubs last week. He looked good. He’s got 48 career starts and 63 appearances overall. Thus he’s not new to facing a team back-to-back, but obviously it is his first time doing so this year.
Can’t win the series without winning this game. No such thing as a must win, but you want to stop losing in its tracks at every opportunity.