Do the Cubs have a chance?

[kente777]

The Cubs have been playing better baseball as of late. Without any major acquistions, do you think the Cubs have a shot at making the playoffs this year? And do you think Hendry is pondering a trade before the deadline, and what do you think that might be?

 

Ken

[TruffleShuffle]

baseball prospectus playoff probabilities suggest around 25% chance. That's probably right.

[Roast]

In this division, we have a chance.

 

But, then again, it's the cubs.

[rawaction]

The key part is "without any major acquisitions". If that's the case, the answer is probably, NO. Unfortunately for the Cubs, they don't have anyone to add to the ML roster from the minors so they are gonna have to get some help to catch the Brewers. The Brewers were able to add Braun and Gallardo when they were starting to struggle and both will be improvements over what they had in those spots (when Capuano comes back in Yovani's case).

 

With help brought in, I would say there's a decent chance. With the current roster, I would say they will not finish within 5 games of the Brewers.

[CubColtPacer]

I think the Cubs have a chance without any major acquisitions, but I'm not sure it's a solid one (1 in 4 like Truffle pointed out might be reasonable). They are playing much better because of a few reasons 1) Marshall and Z becoming good in the rotation, while only Marquis has been really struggling lately, 2) Howry and Marmol have both stepped up in the bullpen, 3) Pie in center, Fontenot at 2nd now (allows DeRosa to move around without having both Theriot and Izturis in the lineup)

 

The Cubs could improve those odds internally by making 1 or more of the following moves, from the most important to the least important:

 

1) Move either DeRosa or Fontenot at SS. Backup plan is bring up Cedeno to play SS.

2) After Murton has a couple more (hopefully productive) weeks at AAA, bring him back up and try the Murton/Floyd thing again (and this time Murton will hopefully hit, and if he hits he'll get more and more playing time).

3) Bring up Soto to work with Bowen at C.

 

Any of those would improve the Cubs chances, and of course a major move would help their chances even more. They aren't out of it yet though, in the division or in the WC.

Those

[C.C.]

We have this division just about wrapped up...

[BleedCubbieBlue81]

Yes, they have a change. I firmly believe the Brewers are not as good as they have been playing this year, and the Cubs aren't as bad as they've been playing. We have four huge series coming up where we can make up serious ground if we play well. 3 with Colorado, which just got swept. A key series with the Brewers at home. Then a road trip to Pittsburgh and Washington, where hopefully we can come out with a smile on our face. I think if they get close to the Brewers, they will take the division. [/eternal optimism]

[PackLandVA]

I personally won't get to excited about anything the Cubs do until the reach .500 . Doesn't matter what trades they make or how many games out they are right now. No team has ever made the playoffs without being better than .500. The Cardinals were close last year, but they were still over the even mark. And while they just swept the Sox, the Sox are getting beaten by everyone. And Cubs are just as capable of getting swept by the next team they play. After all, they just lost a series at home to the Pdres and then lost a series to the lowly Rangers.

 

So until they're at .500 or better, I won't even dream of any playoff chance!!

[shnsajax]

I fully expect the Cubs to suck me back in several more times through out this season. And probably get spit right back out as well.

[Derwood]

while the cliche says that you don't win the division in April/May, I believe that the Cubs may have lost the division when Milwaukee went 10-20 and GAINED GROUND on the Cubs.

[David]

while the cliche says that you don't win the division in April/May, I believe that the Cubs may have lost the division when Milwaukee went 10-20 and GAINED GROUND on the Cubs.

 

I thought the stat was that the Cubs won like 3 out of 11 and still gained ground on Milwaukee.

[bhogg]

Get above .500, then we can talk.

[vance_the_cubs_fan]

In summary, no.

[killthegoat06]

A fighting chance. In other words, not really.

[hawkeyecub]

Certainly.

 

7.5 games back with over 13 weeks to go. The Brewers are 27-13 at home but only 16-19 on the road. We have 7 games left with them, all at home. Win both of those series and we only have to make up a game on them every 3 weeks.

 

While an above average team, they aren't as good as the teams we've been chasing the last few years. I refuse to believe that Braun, Hart, Hardy and to a lesser extent Fielder will maintain their current production. Sheets is due to break and Vargas has been lucky.

 

Our bullpen is coming around as is our luck in close games. The Yankees are still the only team who has had a worse record than us compared to their expected W/L.

I predict we go 9-4 until the break, the Brewers go 6-7 and we'll be back over .500 and 4.5 games back.

 

Of course you can make an equally strong argument as to why we have very little shot.

[killthegoat06]

Certainly.

 

7.5 games back with over 13 weeks to go. The Brewers are 27-13 at home but only 16-19 on the road. We have 7 games left with them, all at home. Win both of those series and we only have to make up a game on them every 3 weeks.

 

While an above average team, they aren't as good as the teams we've been chasing the last few years. I refuse to believe that Braun, Hart, Hardy and to a lesser extent Fielder will maintain their current production. Sheets is due to break and Vargas has been lucky.

 

Our bullpen is coming around as is our luck in close games. The Yankees are still the only team who has had a worse record than us compared to their expected W/L.

I predict we go 9-4 until the break, the Brewers go 6-7 and we'll be back over .500 and 4.5 games back.

 

Of course you can make an equally strong argument as to why we have very little shot.

 

Nice to see an optimistic post that makes sense. Nice.

[Amazing_Grace]

Yes they have a chance. It's not a very good chance, but there's a chance.

[don_kessinger_was_good]

4 to 1 odds sounds about right to me, too. The Cubs record should be better than it is, the bullpen alone (Howry, Eyre, Ohman, one big blowup from Wuertz and two from Dempster) you could argue there is a 5 game swing minimum right there. Yes, bullpens do not always get the job done, that is part of baseball, but our guys were HOPELESS the first two months of the season, just plain awful. They're doing better in June, and the results are predictable--we're over .500 this month (barely).

 

Get five of those early season blowups back, and the team is six games over instead of four games under. Things would look a lot different, wouldn't they?

 

Having said all that, the Cubs need another run producing bat to have a legitimate shot at catching the Brewers, IMO. Too many times, the Cubs are unable to bring in men on base, symptomatic of a team with not enough consistent, run producing bats. We need an everyday bat (not a platoon player a-la Cliff Floyd) that can hit 5th and drive in 45 runs the second half of the season.

 

If the Cubs are serious about making a run at the Brewers then, a July trade for Junior or Miggy (if he gets healthy) would seem to be a necessity.

[Brian]

If they sweep the Brewers next weekend, I may have some hope for them. 2 out of 3 (gaining 1 game) won't be good enough. (and that is only if the go into the series at the very most at the current 7.5 back.)

[NewUserName]

I think the success of the Cardinals last year has created a hope for a long shot. Even if the Cubs were to win the division, they still are only the 5th or 6th best team in the National League. Then if you go and start comparing them to the Tigers and Red Sox, yikes. Realistically the Cubs at best are probably not a Top Ten team in all of baseball.

 

The reason I bring this up is I think the Cubs ought to be careful on what they give up to acquire a Griffey Jr or Bullpen help. How far up the ladder would these kind of moves make them. Yes I know the Cards won last year with a 83 win team. Teams winning the WS with less than 90 wins is so rare that I think this is a poor approach to building a team.

[CubmanPi]

The Cubs have been playing better baseball as of late. Without any major acquistions, do you think the Cubs have a shot at making the playoffs this year? And do you think Hendry is pondering a trade before the deadline, and what do you think that might be?

 

Ken

This is a pretty vague statement to begin with. If "as of late" means this weekend, then yes, we just won three in a row. Against the White Sox.

 

Stretch that definition out to the last seven days, and the record is still 4-2, but that includes a rather embarrassing series defeat at the hands of the worst record in baseball.

 

Before that, we lost 2 of 3 against SD - one game saw our classy level-headed superstar get himself suspended for an unknown stretch down the road, and the other was BP for the Padres.

 

The series win over Seattle was impressive baseball.

 

Cubs are 3-4 vs Atlanta, a .500 team, this month, though there was some pretty hard jobbing from old blue that kept it from being 4-3, and they took the series from Milwaukee.

 

So there's the month in a nutshell, 2 games over .500 after sweeping one of the few teams outside our division who actually has a worse record than we do. Yes, the Cubs have been playing better as of late - now they're playing like a middle of the pack team and not a bottom-barrel group of massive underachievers. They haven't done anything to convince me that this is going anywhere yet.

 

But yes, they're one or two good deals and one or two good DFAs away from making themselves a step better, and that one step could be all it takes to make them compete for the division.

[jersey cubs fan]

Without a major acquisition, I'd say a slight chance, maybe 1 in 5/6. If they were to get a major upgrade at SS I'd see a much better chance.

[BigbadB]

I'm in agreement that they have a chance, but I'd say it's pretty small, like 1 in 4. I don't really think the Brewers are playing over their heads. If anything, they could probably play better. They are actually playing like the Cubs should have been playing.

 

JJ Hardy was playing over his head to start the year. Now Corey Hart is playing over his. Each is a decent player in his own right, but a team needs a spark from someone occasionally that you don't really count on to make a spark.

 

DeRosa did that to start the year, but on a much smaller scale than Hardy did. Theriot sort of did the same, but on a smaller scale.

 

The Brewers are well rounded with young talent and each could single handedly win a game offensively. That's sorta what they've been doing. Couple that in with a solid pitching corps and the Cubs have quite an uphill battle to catch them. Especially if they keep running Cesar Izturis out there everyday.

[Soriano12]

Cubs have 0 chance still this year.

 

They also have 0 chance in 08 and 09.

[MPrior]

4 to 1 odds sounds about right to me, too.

 

[nerd]4 to 1 odds is not the same as 1 in 4. A 25% chance would be 3 to 1 odds.[/nerd]