9/12 best team in the division (anderson) @ cubs (_|_) 705 abc7

[Soul]

They’re jumping on a plane right now heading into a hurricane. Yeah.

[Cubswin11]

 

 

No offense to Duke, but what is really so amazing about what he’s predicting? He’s got a 50% chance of being right? They’ll either win the division or they won’t.

 

What am I missing?

That he’s being one of the only reasonable people in here instead of being a doom boner making wildly pessimistic proclamations about the team now and moving forward.

 

 

Yes it sucks they aren’t playing well and we’re all pissed, but they’re still a plenty good team who’s had to overcome horsefeathers before and knows how to figure it out and they still have a 2 game L column lead with like 16 games left. It’s not like we’re 5 games back.

 

I’m going to trust the track record of most of these guys being good to great players figuring it out, at least enough of them, than buying in to them all of the sudden being awful in arbitrary sample sizes. Get to the next off day with a lead.

 

Yeah the guy who has written four articles declaring Jason Hayward fixed has some special insight into the cubs.

 

Duke just takes whatever positive thing he can find, gloms onto it and declares that things are fine because ultimately the cubs aren’t a bad team and any idiot can look at the standings and see they’re good overall. He’s horsefeathering bill James wow

My mentality is it’s just better to look at the good things and believe in them and maintain a positive outlook because, like you said, this is ultimately a good team and the best team in the division. Instead of having a miserable, pessimistic outlook every time they hit a rough patch and make ridiculous proclamations on the teams downfall short and long term. But maybe that’s just me.

Edited September 13, 2018 by Cubswin11

[r_mack]

They’re jumping on a plane right now heading into a hurricane. Yeah.

The hurricane is hitting at least 300 miles South of DC and not until well after they leave

[Tryptamine]

I really find it strange that the Cubs were like the only team who have gained absolutely nothing from this sudden HR explosion in baseball. If anything, our guys are hitting fewer HRs now, while Albies has already hit 6 more HR this year then he did in in entire Milb career spanning 4 years.

[Cubswin11]

I really find it strange that the Cubs were like the only team who have gained absolutely nothing from this sudden HR explosion in baseball. If anything, our guys are hitting fewer HRs now, while Albies has already hit 6 more HR this year then he did in in entire Milb career spanning 4 years.

Aren’t HR numbers back down to more pre-juiced ball era (like 2015)? I still want more Dongs too and we should be hitting more but I think the HR numbers have fallen off from the juiced ball of 2017 (and part of 16?) years.

[Aaron_Kennelly]

Do you agree that more weight should be placed on recent results than what happened in April? The offense has the 19th best wRC+ since the break and it’s been a consistent decline - 13th in July, 18th in August and 23rd in September.

 

As for RD they were +0 in July (which includes pre-ASB), +13 in August and -4 in September so sure we can find little 1-2 week stretches where they’ve been good but overall the results to me show an average team for an extended period of time

 

I'd say recent results matter more, but they matter much, much less than you'd imagine. Like, without context, they barely matter more than April results at all.

 

The main context I'm looking for is the makeup of the team: who's been injured, who's been added, who's been subtracted? On that front, the main thing that's made them worse is KB being hurt. That's certainly a biggie. Throw Morrow in there, as well -- though I think his injury has hurt them a lot less. Same with Russell. Russell and KB are back, but I don't think either is 100% -- particularly KB. The Cubs have added pieces too, though. Hamels taking Chatwood's place has been huge. Chavez has been a big addition. Murphy hasn't been great, but he's helped out, especially offsetting the loss/ineffectiveness of Russell. Altogether, I don't think this team is much different talent-wise than they were in May.

 

They've played worse, sure. But I still think they are a very good team overall. Maybe the recent results are more important. Maybe Willson Contreras is irreparably broken. But I do think it's silly to care so much about him having a .500 OPS over his last 40 games or whatever, when he's been much better than that for over 1,000 other PA. He's probably closer to his career self than what we've seen the last month. His last 50 games have been incredibly painful to watch and he's been horsefeathering garbage -- no getting around that. But let's be realistic; he's not really that guy.

 

I think it gets even sillier when we start picking out a 50-game sample of RD when we have a much larger 145-game sample we can look at (not to mention the hundreds of games before that in which this same core has been very good). Picking and choosing which games matter is reminiscent of when people were saying stuff like "The Cubs are 27-29 over their last 56 games" in July of 2016 after they had a 5-15 stretch, coming on the heels of a 22-14 stretch. It was really just a bad 20-game stretch, though that stretch made any extended stretch that season look worse, especially when you removed the 25-6 start to the season.

 

Larger samples are nearly always better than smaller samples. Looking at just the last 7 games or just the last 30 games or whatever doesn't make sense when we have a perfectly fine 145-game sample.

 

There are a lot of extenuating factors that have went into this second-half W/L and RD stretch, too. There's the nightmare schedule, of course. We've also faced tougher competition. The Marlins' series were over by the break. We've only played the Reds once. We've seen a lot of the Cardinals, Nats, and Brewers. The easy stretch in the second half is the games we have remaining. Beyond that, we also had some bad matchups pitching-wise, like facing the Braves for one game and drawing Folty, facing Scherzer like 15 times, Nola, deGrom and Syndergaard, yada, yada, yada.

 

That's not to make an excuse for our performance or anything. It's just... those things stick out more in a 40-game sample than they do when you add everything up over the whole season, when most of that stuff evens out or at least doesn't matter as much over such a large sample.

 

Also, this stuff is absolutely cherry-picked, even if it happens to line up with a convenient break in the season at the All-Star Game. The second game back from the break, we lost 18-5. Two weeks before the break, we had 4 straight games with double digit runs scored. Does that 18-5 game two months ago really matter more than those 4 games two weeks before it?

 

Also some weird things have happened since the break RD-wise. We've been blown out a few times and some of them have been games Joe's punted to keep guys fresh for this miserable stretch in the schedule. There were also several games we resorted to pitching position players. We also haven't really had many blowouts that we've won. The story in the first half was that our record was correct and our RD didn't matter because of all the blowouts. But now it's been the other way around. So which is it? Should blowouts count or not? (Yes, they should, but we should look at all of them, including those ones two weeks before the break.)

 

Getting blown out frequently isn't a good sign that your team is doing well. But a few blowouts here and there will skew a 40-game sample a lot more than they will skew a 140-game sample. That and a variety of other reasons are why we shouldn't care so much about the last 40 or 50 games and throw out everything that came before it.

[Aaron_Kennelly]

Yeah the guy who has written four articles declaring Jason Hayward fixed has some special insight into the cubs.

 

Duke just takes whatever positive thing he can find, gloms onto it and declares that things are fine because ultimately the cubs aren’t a bad team and any idiot can look at the standings and see they’re good overall. He’s horsefeathering bill James wow

 

You better not apologize for this after we clinch.

[Aaron_Kennelly]

Question: Why does a lot of our seasons since we have been good almost always come down to fatigue, except for the year we won it all and nobody played the last month?

 

We lost in the 2015 NLCS because we were gassed, lost in the 2017 NLCS because we were gassed and now we might not even win the 2018 division because we are gassed.

 

Is this actually why almost all teams eventually lose?

I don’t remember the tired thing being a deal in 2015, just ran in to the one time all the Mets pitchers were firing on all cylinders and Murphy going god mode.

 

Seems more like bad luck with last year and this year with some extremes happening with the running out of gas thing. We had the rain out game and the crazy game 5 in the DS, which any team is going to get gassed and then this year with this unfortunate situation of consecutive games. Any team would get gassed, I don’t think it’s unique to us. I just think it’s some bad luck to have the situation pop up.

 

Agreed. The "running out of gas" theme is a little overplayed. I think it would be nice to just chill out for a couple weeks after clinching. But even when you clinch early, guys are still playing a lot down the wire. They can't just take two whole weeks off and then be ready to go. It's really about giving your starting pitchers a 2-inning start or maybe skipping their last start altogether, make a couple spot starts to give them all an extra day here and there, get the position players an extra day off per week the last few weeks, etc. There were honest, legit conversations on this very board about the Cubs being too rested heading into the 2016 playoffs. I remember people saying Joe was blowing the World Series for us by caring so little. Even horsefeathering Miggy called him out.

 

I don't think this team is going to get worn out by being in a race through the last weekend. Teams do that horsefeathers every year and can still play for a few more weeks after it. horsefeathers, as far as rest goes, the playoffs provide ample rest compared to the regular season.

 

The "worn out" part of last year had nothing to do with being in a tight race most of the year, either. It was nearly all because of that stupid horsefeathering NLDS. The rainout and Game 5, like you mention. We were already using pitchers on short rest just to get out of that series and then we just exacerbated the problem when we didn't in-effect punt Game 1 by starting Lackey. Arrieta and Lester had both suffered injuries within the final month-and-a-half. Quintana was pitching on short rest for the first time ever, if I remember correctly. We just weren't prepared to enter that series. We weren't at full strength and it had nothing to do with the Brewers hanging around like a gnat all year. Plenty of guys pitch 200+ innings or play 150+ games every year without running out of gas.

 

It happens, sure, but we aren't really in danger of overusing many players this year anyway. We have a lot of depth and Drinky Joe is constantly giving guys rest and punting games. The starting pitchers haven't really been overworked, mostly because their own ineffectiveness has prevented them from working deep into games. The only reliever that is really approaching overworked status is Cishek.

 

Right now, it's mainly been this awful stretch in the schedule wearing us thin. Going a whole month without a day off is crazy. But if we make it through the regular season unscathed, I think we'll have plenty of gas left in the tank.

[17 Seconds]

what a sad series

[17 Seconds]

This team just has way too many problems. Starters injured or ineffective, bullpen gassed, closer hurt, 2nd best reliever randomly completely lost it, Bryant is like the 6th best hitter on the team, Rizzo appears to be going through one of his infamous extended slumps, the Javy bubble finally burst, Russell Happ Almora all are completely worthless at the plate. The offense is so bad I’ve seen many people anxiously awaiting Heyward bat returning to the lineup, the team is completely gassed and still has to play 7 more days in a row, etc etc etc

 

we just dont have nearly as many good players as we did a couple years ago. almora/happ/russell all completely collapsed, schwarber and Willson have been mediocre for a long time, kb is broken, the choices we've made in the roatation have been disastrous, and lester/Hendricks have regressed.

 

there is going to be a lot of pressure on theo this offseason to stop the bleeding.

[jersey cubs fan]

. almora/happ/russell all completely collapsed,

 

Almora didn't collapse. He Almorad.

[Cubswin11]

This team just has way too many problems. Starters injured or ineffective, bullpen gassed, closer hurt, 2nd best reliever randomly completely lost it, Bryant is like the 6th best hitter on the team, Rizzo appears to be going through one of his infamous extended slumps, the Javy bubble finally burst, Russell Happ Almora all are completely worthless at the plate. The offense is so bad I’ve seen many people anxiously awaiting Heyward bat returning to the lineup, the team is completely gassed and still has to play 7 more days in a row, etc etc etc

 

we just dont have nearly as many good players as we did a couple years ago. almora/happ/russell all completely collapsed, schwarber and Willson have been mediocre for a long time, kb is broken, the choices we've made in the roatation have been disastrous, and lester/Hendricks have regressed.

 

there is going to be a lot of pressure on theo this offseason to stop the bleeding.

Do you think all those guys are irreparably broken and suck and need to be replaced? Or could it just be growing pains, some luck, injuries, down year, etc? Like do you think they need to overturn most of the guys you mentioned above in offseason? I'm curious. Add Bryce in the offseason and all of Almora/Happ/Russell mostly become role players anyways and not everyday guys, if they aren't traded because there's a roster surplus. Hendricks has been pretty much same old Kyle in his last ~100 innings.

[Sammy Sofa]

Yeah, it's more of a collection of a LOT of things going wrong in the short run than, IMO, things looking bleak for the long run. Sure, guys like Happ and (especially) Almora might just suck as everyday player options, but a lot of things had to horsefeathers up for it to get to the point of needing them to play this much. Sign Harper next year and relegate one or both of them to platoon and/or backup roles and things are likely fine (barring a bunch of injuries again). This all looks more like an unfortunate cascading effect of a bunch of things going wrong at the same time as opposed to, "oh horsefeathers; the team actually sucks."

[minnesotacubsfan]

I’ll say it again: everything has fallen apart and we’re still in first, juuuuust barely. It can be fixed.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

Given Baez's breakout and Schwarber's bounce back, the only real point of concern is Contreras, and I'm 95% sure he's just hitting a wall from overuse and the accumulated playoff games. That's pretty easily fixable with a stronger backup or more commitment to Caratini from Joe.

 

Outside of that, Almora, Happ, and Russell could all disappear tomorrow, and you're one signing away from a defensive alignment of Schwarber/Heyward/Harper in the OF and Bryant/Baez/Zobrist/Rizzo in the IF with Bote still around. There's too many numbers to worry about there actually being persistent black holes in the coming years.

[UMFan83]

Given Baez's breakout and Schwarber's bounce back, the only real point of concern is Contreras, and I'm 95% sure he's just hitting a wall from overuse and the accumulated playoff games. That's pretty easily fixable with a stronger backup or more commitment to Caratini from Joe.

 

Outside of that, Almora, Happ, and Russell could all disappear tomorrow, and you're one signing away from a defensive alignment of Schwarber/Heyward/Harper in the OF and Bryant/Baez/Zobrist/Rizzo in the IF with Bote still around. There's too many numbers to worry about there actually being persistent black holes in the coming years.

 

Have we really seen much of a bounce back from Schwarber?

 

His OPS is 42 points higher, all due to higher BA and OBP, but his BABIP is exactly 42 points higher this year. His offensive value is pretty similar to last year and his change in WAR (from 0 to 1.6) seems to be heavily influenced by improvements in defensive value. To me there might be improvement but its slight compared to the 2nd half of last year.

 

*waits for TT to bring out the fancy stats to make me look like a fool*

[Transmogrified Tiger]

Given Baez's breakout and Schwarber's bounce back, the only real point of concern is Contreras, and I'm 95% sure he's just hitting a wall from overuse and the accumulated playoff games. That's pretty easily fixable with a stronger backup or more commitment to Caratini from Joe.

 

Outside of that, Almora, Happ, and Russell could all disappear tomorrow, and you're one signing away from a defensive alignment of Schwarber/Heyward/Harper in the OF and Bryant/Baez/Zobrist/Rizzo in the IF with Bote still around. There's too many numbers to worry about there actually being persistent black holes in the coming years.

 

Have we really seen much of a bounce back from Schwarber?

 

His OPS is 42 points higher, all due to higher BA and OBP, but his BABIP is exactly 42 points higher this year. His offensive value is pretty similar to last year and his change in WAR (from 0 to 1.6) seems to be heavily influenced by improvements in defensive value. To me there might be improvement but its slight compared to the 2nd half of last year.

 

*waits for TT to bring out the fancy stats to make me look like a fool*

 

His OBP is 40 points higher, his wRC+ went from 102 to 114, and he's been worth 3.0 fWAR. The defensive value is part of that and likely not 100% sustainable, but we're much more confident of what he is and will be than at this point last year. He's not taken a Baez-esque leap to be worth as much with the bat as, say, Rizzo, and he does get shielded from LHP a bit(some of that is being defensively replaced), but RH corner OF platoon help is never an actual problem if that's the worst case scenario.

[Cubswin11]

Given Baez's breakout and Schwarber's bounce back, the only real point of concern is Contreras, and I'm 95% sure he's just hitting a wall from overuse and the accumulated playoff games. That's pretty easily fixable with a stronger backup or more commitment to Caratini from Joe.

 

Outside of that, Almora, Happ, and Russell could all disappear tomorrow, and you're one signing away from a defensive alignment of Schwarber/Heyward/Harper in the OF and Bryant/Baez/Zobrist/Rizzo in the IF with Bote still around. There's too many numbers to worry about there actually being persistent black holes in the coming years.

Right, exactly. And you still probably want to keep some of those surplus parts (Russell, Almora, Happ) instead of just selling off because there’s still upside and pedigree in there and you still need backups. I’d rather have Russell next year than like Hechavarria, Alcides Escobar, etc in a backup role and Happ over like Austin Jackson or Cameron Maybin.

 

I agree a huge thing with Willy is the innings catching up. Not having a real backup catcher was as bad a move as signing Duensing this offseason. That needs to be fixed this offseason. If we have a real backup catcher at the beginning of the year I bet we have an extra win or two right now because that guy actually did something good and/or Willy is more fresh the last month.

[imb]

It's crazy to me that we won a world series with almost an entire roster of pre-prime or just-entering-their-prime guys, and almost to a man they have all gotten worse

[Hairyducked Idiot]

It's crazy to me that we won a world series with almost an entire roster of pre-prime or just-entering-their-prime guys, and almost to a man they have all gotten worse

 

https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/hitters-no-longer-peak-only-decline/

[imb]

It's crazy to me that we won a world series with almost an entire roster of pre-prime or just-entering-their-prime guys, and almost to a man they have all gotten worse

 

https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/hitters-no-longer-peak-only-decline/

 

this is obviously true, but even under these stricter standards, guys like Russell, Contreras, (even Schwarber if you consider that most of his WAR improvement is just that he has been given the opportunity to throw a lot of runners out from LF) have stalled at best. Russell has been unplayable for two years in a row.

[Sammy Sofa]

I am genuinely baffled as to how Contreras' WAR is so high with both BR and FG.

[Sammy Sofa]

Like, FG is going to have him end up being almost the same value fWAR-wise as last year, even though they have his defensive value ending up almost exactly the same, while his offensive value has completely cratered compared to last season. How the horsefeathers does that work?

[Cubswin11]

Like, FG is going to have him end up being almost the same value fWAR-wise as last year, even though they have his defensive value ending up almost exactly the same, while his offensive value has completely cratered compared to last season. How the horsefeathers does that work?

Isn’t it adjusted for position? There’s only like 4 qualified catchers and he has the highest OBP of any of them and like 2nd highest BA.

[17 Seconds]

I am genuinely baffled as to how Contreras' WAR is so high with both BR and FG.

 

catchers stink