Let's talk about our awesome pitching

[Aaron_Kennelly]

There's been a lot of haranguing from both local and national media and fans, alike, about "You can't build with just hitting! Where's the pitching going to come from?" And basically everyone here perpetually has dongs on their mind. But, let's give a little respect to the awesome pitching we've seen.

 

2016 MLB ranks:

xFIP: 1st

FIP: 2nd

ERA: 1st

BB/9: 1st

K-BB%: 3rd

BAA: 1st

WHIP: 1st

 

 

It's been both the rotation and the bullpen, too.

 

Starters MLB ranks:

xFIP: 3rd

FIP: 3rd

ERA: 1st

 

Relievers MLB ranks:

xFIP: 2nd

FIP: 2nd

ERA: 5th

[Tracer Bullet]

did they say last night that the starter has pitched at least 6 every game? yummy

[Aaron_Kennelly]

did they say last night that the starter has pitched at least 6 every game? yummy

 

Yeah, it's the longest streak with 6+ IP from the starter to start a season for a Cubs team since 1910. It's also the longest streak to open a season for any major league team since the 1988 Astros. We passed the 1999 Braves last night.

[jersey cubs fan]

Only 1 dong and 2 doubles. I will talk about how awesome they are when they start being awesome.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

All 5 Cubs starting pitchers are in the Top 30 of MLB in fWAR.

 

3 of those are in the Top 12 in RA9-WAR, including Arrieta the far and away the leader

 

Also:

 

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[raw]

Lester looks on point so far with his early season fastball command. Of all the pitchers on staff, I'm just a little more excited about his 2016 than the others.

 

Showed a stat last night during the broadcast, but Lester's been pretty good for a while now. If he didn't follow Baseball Jesus in the rotation, we'd have a huge thread dedicated to a guy with a 2.50 ERA, 0.88 WHIP and 9.3 K/9 over his last 23 starts.

[Ding Dong Johnson]

All 5 Cubs starting pitchers are in the Top 30 of MLB in fWAR.

 

3 of those are in the Top 12 in RA9-WAR, including Arrieta the far and away the leader

 

Also:

 

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That, my friends, is sexy as all get out

[Cubswin11]

This is good stuff, I haven't looked at the numbers but if I had to guess even going back to last year to this point we are near the top of the league in all these stats as well. Our pitching, outside of Arrieta, gets overlooked.

 

As a side note, I'd be interested to see where we'd rank if you took Arrieta out on those stats going back to last year. It's probably still top 1/3 of the league.