I’m choosing to embrace this team’s ability to win different games. Over the weekend in Cincinnati, the offense carried the load for the team over and over again. In Tuesday night’s game, baserunning felt key. Every run that scored in a one run win was by a runner who had stolen a base. With two floater hits, the stolen bases mattered. Wednesday night, Cubs pitching dominated. They allowed one run, an unearned run following a throwing error (by Cubs starter Matthew Boyd). On a day when the Cubs didn’t have a deep bullpen, all four pitchers that threw performed well.
Back following game 44, I lowered my Cubs DEFCON from 5 to 4. That signified growing concern. The Cubs had dropped five of eight. I wondered if this team was fading a little. In fairness, the Cubs have played fairly weak opposition over the last 12 games. You can only beat the team in front of you. The Cubs are 10-2 over that stretch, completing two sweeps and winning every series. Dominate the bad teams. Survive the decent teams. Check and check.
The Cubs are 7-1 since the Daniel Palencia blown save in his first appearance as closer, the night key reliever Porter Hodge went on the injured list. One break that night and the Cubs might be sitting on 11 of 12. This team is finding ways to win. The schedule will pick back up soon. It’ll be interesting to see how they react to the challenge. They have aced just so many of them so far.
First, the Cubs have a pair of off days surrounding a series with the Reds at Wrigley Field. The Cubs will be able to go aggressively after a Reds team that just won two of three in Kansas City, bouncing back from a heartbreaking series for them against the Cubs. They came up short and could have swept the Royals who are over .500 with a little extra luck Wednesday. This series will be no pushover. The Reds aren’t going to just watch their season go down in flames early.
Things will get tougher. But this team just seems to rise to every challenge. I’m also interested to see if Wrigley plays a little more friendly during the daytime. It just hasn’t looked like a fun place to hit this week. Interesting that it’s been unseasonably cool in Chicago and extra hot in the Tampa area this month. It’s been an interesting thing across my lifetime watching Wrigley evolve into a more pitching-friendly place. Credit to this year’s Cubs for showing the kind of adaptability to play well. They’ve played an equal number of games home and away and just one more win at home (though they lost two “home” games in Japan).
So the numbers look a little better if you kick out the two Tokyo games. 18-8 is a fair bit better than 17-11. Interestingly, the Rangers and Diamondbacks have both tailed off and the Cubs strength of schedule doesn’t look as strong anymore as it was at the time they played it. The Cubs current schedule shows them at 12-13 against teams over .500. The Cardinals show at 16-12 in that split. That team is definitely opening some eyes.
Pitch Counts:
Rockies: 123 (8 IP), 30 BF
Cubs: 127, 31 BF
The Rockies did themselves well in this series, despite the results. Their pitchers did a really good job against a dynamic Cubs offense. The conditions didn’t help. But that is what it is.
The Cubs pitchers get a hat tip for 30 batters faced, just three over the minimum. It’s really hard to lose in that situation. They were helped by a pair of double plays in the middle of the game. The Rockies benefitted from three themselves.
With an off day Thursday, one would expect the bullpen back at full strength. No Cubs reliever threw even 15 pitches.
Three Stars:
I’ll invoke Josh on this one. Boyd was excellent but for one unearned run. But I always think of Josh’s disdain for unearned runs occasioned by pitcher errors. Four hits, no walks, eight strikeouts. That’s excellent. He threw a few too many pitches in the middle innings to go out for the seventh, but ended up giving the Cubs six strong innings without going over 100 pitches.
Pete Crow-Armstrong. Speed Tuesday, power Wednesday. 15 homers and 15 steals on the season. He remains on pace for a 40/40 season.
Daniel Palencia throws a perfect ninth for his fourth save of the year. He struck out two. The Cubs might have a closer. 19⅔ innings pitches, 21 strikeouts. Seven walks. Nine hits. The FIP reads 2.66 and suggests this isn’t a mirage.
Game 56, May 28: Cubs 2, Rockies 1 (35-21)
Fangraphs
Reminder: Heroes and Goats are determined by WPA scores and are in no way subjective.
THREE HEROES:
Superhero: Matthew Boyd (.227). 6 IP, 21 BF, 4 H, 0 BB, 0 ER (1 R), 8 K (W 5-2)
Hero: Daniel Palencia (.155). IP, 3 BF, 2 K (Sv 4)
Sidekick: Brad Keller (.116). IP, 4 BF, H, K
THREE GOATS:
Billy Goat: Carson Kelly (-.092). 0-3, DP
Goat: Kyle Tucker (-.059). 0-3, BB, R
Kid: Dansby Swanson (-.049). 0-3
WPA Play of the Game: After a leadoff single in the seventh, Ryan Brasier got Kyle Farmer to ground into a double play, preserving a one run Cubs lead. (.144)
*Rockies Play of the Game: Hunter Goodman’s single, one batter earlier was the Rockies top WPA play. (.071) The one run the Rockies scored was only .009 because it resulted in a lost out while losing by two.
Cubs Player of the Game:
Poll
Who was the Cubs Player of the Game?
0%
Daniel Palencia
(0 votes)
0%
Pete Crow-Armstrong
(0 votes)
0%
Seiya Suzuki (1-3, 2B, BB, RBI)
(0 votes)
0%
Someone else (leave your suggestion in the comments)
(0 votes)
0 votes total
Yesterday’s Winner: Matt Shaw 208 of 332 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 +21
Shōta Imanaga/Drew Pomeranz/Miguel Amaya +11
Jameson Taillon +9
Michael Busch -9.33
Seiya Suzuki -9.5
Ben Brown -14
Julian Merryweather -15
Dansby Swanson -15.33
Up Next: An off day Thursday and then a rematch with the 28-29 Reds. The Cubs haven’t announced starters as I write, though if they stay on rotation, Colin Rea should be next up.
The Reds will start Andrew Abbott (4-0, 1.77, 40⅔ IP). He beat the Cubs last Saturday, allowing a run on six hits over 5⅔ IP. The Cubs sit at 8-6 against lefty starters, including wins in their last two. Saturday, Sunday and Monday, they saw three of them.
Looking at some versus lefty numbers, the Cubs have an .834 OPS against lefthanded starters. They had a couple of plate appearances versus a lefty Wednesday night. Ahead of the game, the OPS was .828 against all lefties. Kyle Tucker has a 1.007 OPS in 76 PA against lefties. PCA is at .640 in 61. Michael Busch is at .451 in 26 PA. Two of the their three top lefties are slowed by lefties significantly. Tucker’s numbers actually increase.
Among righties, Seiya Suzuki is MUCH better against lefties (1.289 v 898 overall), Nico Hoerner is (.915 v .709), Matt Shaw is (.869 v .670), Carson Kelly (.825 v 1.028), Ian Happ (.766 v. .704), Dansby Swanson (.739 v .764), Justin Turner (.712 v .584).
As CDu has pointed out, this team is almost universally better against lefties. The question for teams trying to line things up will be the value of a lefty to stifle PCA and get Busch out of the game.