5/27: World Champeen Cubs (DONKEY TEETH) @ Dodgers (Brandon "OK Dude" McCarthy) 6:15PM CST on Fox

[cubsclapp]

Am I off-base in saying John Mallee completely sucks at his job and should be held largely accountable for the downfall of our young bats? Lump Hinske in there as well. I wonder how long Theo is going to abide this horsefeathers 3/5 of his pillars are putting forth.

 

It's certainly possible Mallee and company have something to do with it, but it's more likely just a couple months of struggles that happen.

[CaliforniaRaisin]

Am I off-base in saying John Mallee completely sucks at his job and should be held largely accountable for the downfall of our young bats? Lump Hinske in there as well. I wonder how long Theo is going to abide this horsefeathers 3/5 of his pillars are putting forth.

 

If we're blaming the coaches for the young hitters slumping, do they not get credit for fixing Rizzo back in the day and Heyward this year?

[Transmogrified Tiger]

Am I off-base in saying John Mallee completely sucks at his job and should be held largely accountable for the downfall of our young bats? Lump Hinske in there as well. I wonder how long Theo is going to abide this horsefeathers 3/5 of his pillars are putting forth.

 

Here's a good article from Fangraphs earlier this week: http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/the-meaning-of-a-teams-50-game-record/

 

The thrust is that preseason projections are better predictors of rest of season record after 50 games than that 50 game record is. I don't know how the correlations break down for an individual(I imagine the 50 game is stronger than it is for the team), but I think you can take away a similar concept. Kyle Schwarber probably didn't forget how to hit and will improve markedly when he makes the necessary tweak/adjustment. Ian Happ probably didn't become a laser beam hitting machine and will revert to something more pedestrian. Someone will figure out how to give Contreras some xanax and his plate discipline will hopefully improve. Russell's shoulder should get better in time, etc. These are not guarantees, but the fact that they remain the most likely outcome is indicative that it's not really a demonstrable sample that we're working with to evaluate something like the effectiveness of a hitting coach(you can easily say such an evaluation is basically impossible, but that's a topic for another day).

[We Got The Whole 9]

Am I off-base in saying John Mallee completely sucks at his job and should be held largely accountable for the downfall of our young bats? Lump Hinske in there as well. I wonder how long Theo is going to abide this horsefeathers 3/5 of his pillars are putting forth.

 

If we're blaming the coaches for the young hitters slumping, do they not get credit for fixing Rizzo back in the day and Heyward this year?

Legit argument for Heyward, but I'm not sure about Rizzo. Mallee was hired after 2014, Rizzo's breakout year.

 

I understand he has his work cut out for him and then some. Not many coaches are given 5 young players almost at once. And most of the guys were rushed at warp speed through the system. But there has to be some visible evidence of growth at the MLB level to earn some slack. It's simply not there.

[cubsclapp]

Am I off-base in saying John Mallee completely sucks at his job and should be held largely accountable for the downfall of our young bats? Lump Hinske in there as well. I wonder how long Theo is going to abide this horsefeathers 3/5 of his pillars are putting forth.

 

If we're blaming the coaches for the young hitters slumping, do they not get credit for fixing Rizzo back in the day and Heyward this year?

Legit argument for Heyward, but I'm not sure about Rizzo. Mallee was hired after 2014, Rizzo's breakout year.

 

I understand he has his work cut out for him and then some. Not many coaches are given 5 young players almost at once. And most of the guys were rushed at warp speed through the system. But there has to be some visible evidence of growth at the MLB level to earn some slack. It's simply not there.

 

There's also Baez completely changing the kind of hitter he his. Obviously not in the plate discipline department, but the hitters usually are what they are that department once they reach the majors. But the Cubs got Javy to shorten up and ditch the leg kick on occasion, for example. He's gone from a guy that K'd 41.5% of the time in 2014 to a guy that has K'd 24.0% and 23.4% these last two years.

 

It's of course hard to tell how much of an impact a hitting coach's guidance truly factored into that. And it's even harder to know an impact they're having on hitters struggling.

 

The guys that are slumping... I'm just not sure what a hitting coach could've really done to prevent that. TT explained it well. Schwarber is Schwarber (like I'm sure they could get him to shorten up at times or something but this is his game), Contreras has just gotten too out of control at times, Russell's shoulder is probably an issue, etc.

 

I'm just not sure there is really anything to it aside from natural slumping or hitters getting into habits that you can't control. I'm sure they preach patience, selective aggressiveness, etc etc, but you can't control what the hitter does with that information once they're at the plate. It's not like last year where Heyward's mechanics were clearly a disaster (and *that* was partly their fault, actually, but they seem to have fixed it).

 

So, I'd probably give it some more time.

Edited May 28, 2017 by cubsclapp

[gobigred]

went to the game today I cannot remember the last Cubs game I went to at Doyer Stadium where they won but I am pretty sure Wood was the closer. Hell I cant remember going to a game there where they even scored

[CaliforniaRaisin]

went to the game today I cannot remember the last Cubs game I went to at Doyer Stadium where they won but I am pretty sure Wood was the closer. Hell I cant remember going to a game there where they even scored

 

They seem to always go 1-2 at Dodger Stadium.

 

Thank goodness they didn't last October.

[Agony and Ivy]

horsefeathers the Fire Mallee truthers are here too? What in the actual horsefeathers happened to this place the last week? I challenge one moron that thinks it's Mallee's fault to explain EXACTLY what a hitting coach does on a day to day basis, because I don't think you actually have a clue.

[Sammy Sofa]

I'm pretty sure it's just one dude griping about Mallee.

[UMFan83]

The only thing I'll say about Mallee and I have no idea if it's even remotely something you can blame him for but it does seem like our hitters tend to be very streaky, like if something goes wrong it takes awhile to fix it. That's probably more a symptom of young hitters though and you can't argue with the overall numbers though as well as the hit rate on top prospect hitters.

[Aaron_Kennelly]

I believe David is up on the next Game Thread. I haven't seen him on here much this weekend. UMFan83 would be after him.

[Cubswin11]

Wouldn't be surprised to see Joe try to force some action tonight with a bunting extravaganza