The 2 Weeks of Doom

[Little Slide Rooter]

I was discussing this with someone at work today. It was exactly 2 weeks ago when the Cubs began that fateful trip to Coors field. As I recall, at the time we were in 1st place by % points. That would not last, as the Cubs went 4-9. That would not be so horrible, except that the team we were neck and neck with went 11-2 in that same stretch. This brings me to the point, which is that our entire season has been essentially sunk by 1 bad 2 week period. I know we could have played some better ball in May and June, but this is what it really comes down to. We knew that this stretch between the Rockies, Phillies, and Dodgers would be trouble, but I never imagined how disaterous it would turn out to be.

[UMFan83]

Yeah we could have played better in May and June which would have allowed us to withstand a down stretch like this.

 

But it sure feels like these 2 weeks sunk our season.

[DivineBovine]

You're an optimist. You can also say take away the 10-3 start to May and the 9-2 start post ASB, and this team has a .438 winning percentage. Mediocre play has been the norm for this team this year, not the exception.

[Cubfanintheknow]

I was discussing this with someone at work today. It was exactly 2 weeks ago when the Cubs began that fateful trip to Coors field. As I recall, at the time we were in 1st place by % points. That would not last, as the Cubs went 4-9. That would not be so horrible, except that the team we were neck and neck with went 11-2 in that same stretch. This brings me to the point, which is that our entire season has been essentially sunk by 1 bad 2 week period. I know we could have played some better ball in May and June, but this is what it really comes down to. We knew that this stretch between the Rockies, Phillies, and Dodgers would be trouble, but I never imagined how disaterous it would turn out to be.

 

The Cardinals went 17-7 in their first 24 games. Then they played sub-.500 baseball for the better part of three months. But they've really turned it on these last two weeks, coinciding with an incredibly sucky stretch of Cubs' baseball. Ugh.

[Illini Iceman]

You're an optimist. You can also say take away the 10-3 start to May and the 9-2 start post ASB, and this team has a .438 winning percentage. Mediocre play has been the norm for this team this year, not the exception.

 

The problem has been a feast or famine offense with famine being more the rule than the exception. When they score a reasonable amount of runs their pitching wins them games. However, there seem to be too many stretches where they get 3 or less runs per game and it is asking a lot for the pitching to consistently win those. The recent Padre game where Gregg blew the save is an example. You can blame the bullpen for not closing it out but when you only score 1 run you put yourself in a position to lose. Last night Wells holds a pretty good Dodgers offense to 2 runs and the Cubs only get 1. You just can't put together good winning streaks with the offense sputtering like it has.

[champaignchris]

This team has gone on some awful streaks all year...

 

2-7 from Apr 22 to Apr 30. Scored ten runs in the 7 losses, 21 runs in the 2 wins.

 

4-11 from May 17 to June 2. Only scored 47 runs. Only 10 runs scored in the first 7 games of this stretch.

 

1-5 from June 10 to June 17. 10 runs scored.

 

2-7 from June 21 to June 30. 27 runs scored.

 

During all of June, the Cubs scored 89 runs in 25 game (15th of 16), posted a .233 BA (14th), .303 OBP (15th), .364 SLG (13th). During the same time, they had the top ERA in the NL, 3.18.

 

4-11 since getting shutout by Lehr in Cincy Aug 5th. Take away the 17 runs against Pittsburgh on Aug 14th, and the Cubs have only 44 runs in the 14 other games. Only 27 runs in the 11 losses.

[B4Icroak]

The unfortunate reality is from Aug 7th - thru Aug 22nd - the Cubs had 10 games against real baseball teams and won 1 of them. They also managed to drop 2 of 3 to a team 20 games under .500

This team sucks and sucks bad.

Hendry and Piniella have to go along with whatever the new ownership/mgmt can realistically jettison of the contracted slugs we obtained over the last 3 years. Sickening state of affairs again, yet, still, for my team. Hope is on the horizon with private ownership but this season is toast.

[rocket]

You're an optimist. You can also say take away the 10-3 start to May and the 9-2 start post ASB, and this team has a .438 winning percentage. Mediocre play has been the norm for this team this year, not the exception.

 

i'm pretty sure most teams would have a mediocre record if you took away their 2 hottest stretches.

[DivineBovine]

You're an optimist. You can also say take away the 10-3 start to May and the 9-2 start post ASB, and this team has a .438 winning percentage. Mediocre play has been the norm for this team this year, not the exception.

 

i'm pretty sure most teams would have a mediocre record if you took away their 2 hottest stretches.

 

 

And most teams might be decent if you took away their 2 coldest. Or the last 2 weeks, in the Cubs case. I'm just making a point that mediocrity has been the norm for this team. The offense has not performed all year. The Cubs simply are not good this year. Period.

[BigSlick]

moved back to school for my last year this past week and haven't really been paying much attention to baseball but I've sen that we've instantly dropped out of the race

 

unbelievable but so perfectly cubs-like. we had our little cinderella story going for a couple weeks there but so much under production and so much bad play on the road secured our fate.

[Manny Trillos Brother]

The bad thing is you know they're bust out a 8 of 10 or 12 of 15 or something like that just to get us all drawn back in just in time to go 1-6 against the Pirates and D-Backs thus losing the wildcard by 4 games.

[hotshot13422]

The bad thing is you know they're bust out a 8 of 10 or 12 of 15 or something like that just to get us all drawn back in just in time to go 1-6 against the Pirates and D-Backs thus losing the wildcard by 4 games.

 

I refuse, i'm out for this season. Of course i'm a cub fan so whatever i say when we're losing i cannot account for once we start winning.

 

 

Also, your sig fails. Go Sooners.

[champaignchris]

The bad thing is you know they're bust out a 8 of 10 or 12 of 15 or something like that just to get us all drawn back in just in time to go 1-6 against the Pirates and D-Backs thus losing the wildcard by 4 games.

 

They're starting a 23 game stretch where they play 22 games against teams with losing records, 17 of those games are at home. They could very easily pull off a 17-6 stretch. If the Cardinals cool down to a slightly less torrid 13-8 during the same period, the Cubs will pick up 3 games on them, and be only 5 games out for the last 3-game series against the Cards in St. Louis.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

The bad thing is you know they're bust out a 8 of 10 or 12 of 15 or something like that just to get us all drawn back in just in time to go 1-6 against the Pirates and D-Backs thus losing the wildcard by 4 games.

 

They're starting a 23 game stretch where they play 22 games against teams with losing records, 17 of those games are at home. They could very easily pull off a 17-6 stretch. If the Cardinals cool down to a slightly less torrid 13-8 during the same period, the Cubs will pick up 3 games on them, and be only 5 games out for the last 3-game series against the Cards in St. Louis.

 

No one ever could "very easily" play almost .750 ball for four weeks.

[champaignchris]

Turn of phrase. I didn't mean that it would be easy. I meant that it wouldn't be surprising. You've seen their upcoming schedule, right? There's no reason why they can't have a streak similar to the one from July 11 to Aug 4 when they went 17-6 against stiffer competition.

 

Will they? Probably not. I mean, it's still the Cubs, right?

[jersey cubs fan]

The bad thing is you know they're bust out a 8 of 10 or 12 of 15 or something like that just to get us all drawn back in just in time to go 1-6 against the Pirates and D-Backs thus losing the wildcard by 4 games.

 

They're starting a 23 game stretch where they play 22 games against teams with losing records, 17 of those games are at home. They could very easily pull off a 17-6 stretch. If the Cardinals cool down to a slightly less torrid 13-8 during the same period, the Cubs will pick up 3 games on them, and be only 5 games out for the last 3-game series against the Cards in St. Louis.

 

No one ever could "very easily" play almost .750 ball for four weeks.

 

A good team probably could. I would think most of your best teams will have a .750 win% over 4 week stretches relatively frequently, especially when playing the dogs. Unfortunately the Cubs aren't in that class.