It's Maddoning

[squally1313]

We do this like once a week now. Sofa claims, repeatedly, that outside of 4 players the entire team is garbage (and sometimes even those four players are garbage too). We show why that's wrong, and then it turns into rehashing the terrible offseason that we all agree on, so...he wins? I know it's a bit at this point, but still gets annoying considering this started as a reasonable discussion about hitting with RISP.

[Sammy Sofa]

We do this like once a week now. Sofa claims, repeatedly, that outside of 4 players the entire team is garbage (and sometimes even those four players are garbage too). We show why that's wrong, and then it turns into rehashing the terrible offseason that we all agree on, so...he wins? I know it's a bit at this point, but still gets annoying considering this started as a reasonable discussion about hitting with RISP.

 

This feels like it's gotten to the point where I'm basically wishing that the Cubs had 5 good hitters on the team instead of 4, and that's some kind of crazy unreasonable idea.

 

Keep it up, Rumpelstiltskin.

 

I'm hardly the only one here talking about how many black holes the Cubs have in the line up.

[We Got The Whole 9]

I'd like to know what our guys can do to improve against curveballs. Seems like they are a big factor when our offense has a stinker.

 

Bref is such a mess to navigate on the mobile. I don't know how to find those team stats on fg but I'm pretty sure they're on br; I just can't stand their site. Its total trash, IMO.

[Sammy Sofa]

Because it's entirely unrealistic to expect any team to 'rise above the pack' at all 8 spots in the field.

 

Wow.

 

 

I'm not asking for the Cubs to be worldbeaters at every position, or every OF spot.

 

I think we all ideally want to think of the Cubs as being able to be lumped in with the likes of the Dodgers and the Yankees and Astros (and hell, the Twins). They explicitly stood pat as if they were all but a sure thing to be in that rarefied air again, but it was obvious the ENTIRE OF was a series of question marks at best. The best bet was Schwarber, and even that was, yet again, hinged largely on defensive value that was unlikely to be a consistent thing. How is it unrealistic or unfair to have wanted them to do whatever they could to try and upgrade just ONE of the OF spots to be a better shot of being more than average at best?

 

This feels like it's gotten to the point where I'm basically wishing that the Cubs had 5 good hitters on the team instead of 4, and that's some kind of crazy unreasonable idea.

It's been hashed out a ton but Schwarber was one of the best LF'ers in baseball last year regardless of defense. He was top 10 in Dongs, ISO, OBP, SLG, wOBA and tied for 11th in wRC+ and he was top 5-7 in a handful of those stats too. Do we want him to be more, yes, but he was still pretty good last year and made perfect sense to stand pat on him/LF.

 

Like I said, and you even made bold, he was their best bet. That's not an acceptable OF setup to go into the season with. Minus his unsustainable defensive value, his overall value would have taken a big hit on Fangraphs, and his overall value on BR last year is already not that hot.

 

All of that is fine if at least one of the other OF spots is a decent bet to produce, but the Cubs clearly weren't set up for that. Acting like he's some kind of anchor (the good kind) that justifies them ignoring doing ANYTHING to upgrade the OF seems nuts.

[squally1313]

We do this like once a week now. Sofa claims, repeatedly, that outside of 4 players the entire team is garbage (and sometimes even those four players are garbage too). We show why that's wrong, and then it turns into rehashing the terrible offseason that we all agree on, so...he wins? I know it's a bit at this point, but still gets annoying considering this started as a reasonable discussion about hitting with RISP.

 

This feels like it's gotten to the point where I'm basically wishing that the Cubs had 5 good hitters on the team instead of 4, and that's some kind of crazy unreasonable idea.

 

Keep it up, Rumpelstiltskin.

 

I'm hardly the only one here talking about how many black holes the Cubs have in the line up.

 

The plan was for Schwarber to be the 5th good hitter, because he was last year (115 wRC), and for Heyward to be an average hitter, like he was last year (99 wRC). Instead Heyward has been a 5th good hitter (108 wRC), and Schwarber has been the average hitter (100 wRC). Again, neither of these are 'black holes', the term you continue to use. And we haven't even mentioned David Bote (108 wRC), who was a career minor leaguer until a couple years ago, so credit should be due for that.

 

Theo put together a truly horrendous bench, and we've had to pay for that with Zobrist out in the form of giving Almora/Descalso/CarGo/Zagunis/Russell semi-regular starts (and having put up a .540 OPS in team pinch hitting so far this year). But one bad spot in the lineup, due largely to totally unforeseen circumstances, and a terrible bench, does not make the offense or the team terrible.

 

A hypothetical lineup featuring Schwarber/Heyward/KB, Bote/Baez/Zobrist/Rizzo, Contreras, given what we know of those players, is 8 hitters who are league average at worst, and has at least 3, probably 4 elite bats there. That is still a possibility come October (though who knows what you get out of Zobrist at that point).

[Sammy Sofa]

I'm sorry, we're just not going to see eye to eye on the OF. It stinks for how good this team was supposed to be, and especially in terms of taking advantage of the window of the core of players they have now, and their inaction in the offseason. And Bote is tempered by being a platoon player, a situation they find themselves repeatedly unable to figure out at multiple positions.

 

It's fine if this team is good enough for you. It's not for me. They could have and should have done better. I want the Cubs to be up there with the Yankees and the Astros and the Dodgers. They shouldn't be settling.

[ConstableRabbit]

Wait, you want the Cubs to be good now?

[Sammy Sofa]

Wait, you want the Cubs to be good now?

 

Yes, from a purely baseball standpoint I always want the Cubs to be as good as they can possibly be. From an emotional standpoint, I am very up and down in that regard this year. Talking/complaining/arguing about them from a baseball standpoint helps me try and sometimes ignore that stuff that's making it real hard to keep liking a team I've been a fan of my entire life. But hey, sweet gotcha, broheim.

[squally1313]

I'm sorry, we're just not going to see eye to eye on the OF. It stinks for how good this team was supposed to be, and especially in terms of taking advantage of the window of the core of players they have now, and their inaction in the offseason. And Bote is tempered by being a platoon player, a situation they find themselves repeatedly unable to figure out at multiple positions.

 

It's fine if this team is good enough for you. It's not for me. They could have and should have done better. I want the Cubs to be up there with the Yankees and the Astros and the Dodgers. They shouldn't be settling.

 

But the Cubs were what the Yankees/Astros/Dodgers are now. Their kids came up and dominated and they hit on veteran players to complement that perfectly (and their pitching was 3 years younger and better). We struck gold with Dexter, and Zobrist as a happily married dude in his mid-30s is a lot different than current Zobrist...but you had to commit to current Zobrist to get 2016 Zobrist (just as you had to commit to current Lester to get 2016 Lester). We've averaged 96.75 wins the last four seasons. Houston is on year 3...if they're still throwing up 100+ wins in 2021, I'll be very impressed. The Dodgers have won 90+ games for 6 years in a row, and it will be 7, but we have what they don't. The Yankees have made the playoffs the last two years, but before that they were non-competitive to the extent that they got to reload by being sellers. It's really hard to do this for an extended period of time.

 

Yes I wish our payroll was higher or that we could have picked up a Michael Brantley (doing an eerie Dexter Fowler impression) or whoever else. We didn't, and it's almost July now, so I'm tired of talking about it (not to mention the fact that we made the biggest in season acquisition thus far). We're in first place, and our offense is 8th in oWAR. The Astros went into the year with 35 year olds Yuli Gurriel (1.2 WAR in 2018) and Robinson Chirinos (0 WAR in 2018) penciled in the starting line up. I guess they should be ripped apart for settling at those positions too, right?

[ConstableRabbit]

Wait, you want the Cubs to be good now?

 

Yes, from a purely baseball standpoint I always want the Cubs to be as good as they can possibly be. From an emotional standpoint, I am very up and down in that regard this year. Talking/complaining/arguing about them from a baseball standpoint helps me try and sometimes ignore that stuff that's making it real hard to keep liking a team I've been a fan of my entire life. But hey, sweet gotcha, broheim.

It's less a gotcha and more of me trying to understand which role you're playing in this conversation.

[Sammy Sofa]

I guess they should be ripped apart for settling at those positions too, right?

 

Again, I'm not saying the Cubs, or any other team, is supposed to be stacked at every position; I am frustrated in how I feel like they settled for a mediocre OF at best, and a truly putrid bench.

 

I'm also not expecting them to be perpetually winning almost 100 or more games, but it can't help but be infuriating how they very clearly just settled for (hell, embraced) the inevitable decline of a particular core and did absolutely nothing to try and mitigate it or slow it.

 

As it stands right now, I think they're going to end up being a team that wins 85-88 games, and if they end up winning the division (or the WC) it is likely going to be in part to having to deal some of the few assets they have for short term bench and/or bullpen help. I agree, that's certainly not a bad team at all! And maybe I am just assuming the worst...but it feels like their approach is probably going to be to just let the slide happen no matter how fast it does, maybe sign a fan favorite like Baez to a longer deal, and then look to when they can construct a cheaper team based mostly out of prospects as the next window.

 

Yeah, that's a lot of projection. But there just seems like this really odd sense of urgency in how the owners and the FO have approached the team since the Darvish and Chatwood signings blew up in their faces. IMO, the settled for OF speaks less of the high quality team they've constructed, and more as a warning sign of what they're going to tolerate as the team gets older/worse.

 

I know that's really negative. I just wanted more signs that they were looking to also bolster for the future instead of only hoping for the best right now.

[squally1313]

At the risk of sounding like a PTR defender...they already bolstered the bullpen, and they did it with straight cash. Sure it took too long, but they acted better than all the other contenders out there (the definition of faint praise).

 

I think the decline, if you can call it that, was A. an inevitable (and part of any successful run), especially with the newer research saying most players come into the league essentially fully formed and just go downhill from there, and B. sped up by Heyward/Chatwood/Darvish more or less blowing up in their faces from the second the ink hit the paper. Heyward has been about 9 wins below a 4 WAR/season projection (conservative), Chatwood about 3 wins (-0.7 so far, would think about 2.3 for 1.5 seasons is fair), and Darvish about 4 (0.6 so far vs a conservative 3 WAR/season). That's money gone, and it's playing time taken up by formerly successful players who haven't performed to expectations. While I certainly expect Theo to know way more about this than I do, it's hard for me to criticize those signings because I liked them at the time. While the theoretical solution to this is taking more of the Ricketts clearly endless money to remake these holes in the roster, in reality we all know it's hard for any team to overcome three signings that backfired that badly.

 

They weren't trying to settle for a putrid bench. Descalso was by all measures an upgrade on LaStella, and Bote was supposed to be the new Zobrist, not someone who needs to be playing every day. Benches are a crap shoot anyways, so I'm not going to hold someone to the fire for that. This thinness in the offense is in large part due to the position we've been in the last few years (and a disappointing failure to produce high velocity bullpen arms that other teams seem to find with ease). Vogelbach and Torres (and McKinney, who made it, but has been garbage) in 2016. Soler, Eloy, and Candelario in 2017. We've been trading future for present for 4 years now...and now we're in the future. It's just how this works.

[Rynomites23]

Because it's entirely unrealistic to expect any team to 'rise above the pack' at all 8 spots in the field.

 

Wow.

 

 

I'm not asking for the Cubs to be worldbeaters at every position, or every OF spot.

 

I think we all ideally want to think of the Cubs as being able to be lumped in with the likes of the Dodgers and the Yankees and Astros (and hell, the Twins). They explicitly stood pat as if they were all but a sure thing to be in that rarefied air again, but it was obvious the ENTIRE OF was a series of question marks at best. The best bet was Schwarber, and even that was, yet again, hinged largely on defensive value that was unlikely to be a consistent thing. How is it unrealistic or unfair to have wanted them to do whatever they could to try and upgrade just ONE of the OF spots to be a better shot of being more than average at best?

 

This feels like it's gotten to the point where I'm basically wishing that the Cubs had 5 good hitters on the team instead of 4, and that's some kind of crazy unreasonable idea.

It's been hashed out a ton but Schwarber was one of the best LF'ers in baseball last year regardless of defense. He was top 10 in Dongs, ISO, OBP, SLG, wOBA and tied for 11th in wRC+ and he was top 5-7 in a handful of those stats too. Do we want him to be more, yes, but he was still pretty good last year and made perfect sense to stand pat on him/LF.

All you really need to know about schwarber is to review his WAR. It’s.6 and that’s 12th on the cubs (7th of the position players). He is 52nd overall in mlb so there are currently 51 players better than him in the majors his defensive war is - 3.4. You schwarber fans need a reality check

[17 Seconds]

no ragrets

 

Before the game, Joe Maddon was asked to evaluate his first half in the Cubs dugout. He's taken on more coaching duties, and from that perspective, he says it's been a good season so far: "I've really enjoyed my year. The record not withstanding. What I set out to do this year and how I've done it, I'm pleased with that, quite frankly....My interaction with the group has been spectacular and a lot of fun and meaningful. Same thing with the front office and ownership. You can't always gauge the entire picture on the won/loss record right now. We have a lot of time to go. For me personally, it's been a fun year."

[CubinNY]

no ragrets

 

Before the game, Joe Maddon was asked to evaluate his first half in the Cubs dugout. He's taken on more coaching duties, and from that perspective, he says it's been a good season so far: "I've really enjoyed my year. The record not withstanding. What I set out to do this year and how I've done it, I'm pleased with that, quite frankly....My interaction with the group has been spectacular and a lot of fun and meaningful. Same thing with the front office and ownership. You can't always gauge the entire picture on the won/loss record right now. We have a lot of time to go. For me personally, it's been a fun year."

It's because he knows this is it for him. Theo isn't going to offer him a new contract and he knows it. He finally made a boatload of cash and now can ride off and join the MAGAs at the local Tampa watering hole at season's end. he's already finished. They should fire him after a statement like that.

[Regular Show]

no ragrets

 

Before the game, Joe Maddon was asked to evaluate his first half in the Cubs dugout. He's taken on more coaching duties, and from that perspective, he says it's been a good season so far: "I've really enjoyed my year. The record not withstanding. What I set out to do this year and how I've done it, I'm pleased with that, quite frankly....My interaction with the group has been spectacular and a lot of fun and meaningful. Same thing with the front office and ownership. You can't always gauge the entire picture on the won/loss record right now. We have a lot of time to go. For me personally, it's been a fun year."

 

That quote is terrible, especially the last part.

 

It's been a long-running rumor that the Angels are interested in reuniting with Maddon. Not sure if this is just media speculation or based on insider info. Their current manager is Brad Ausmus and Ausmus sucks.

 

I say let him leave and become the highest paid manager in MLB. We really need a new voice and someone who has a greater sense of urgency. Someone younger and more progressive. Most managers suck so it will be difficult to find a great replacement, but I think everyone is ready to move on from Maddon (including Theo).

[Tryptamine]

Derek Johnson please.

[Regular Show]

I feel like the tantrum and ejection of Maddon today was premeditated lol.

 

Then again, Clint Hurdle is an horsefeathers and I've hated him since 2015. Maybe Maddon feels the same way about Hurdle, and all this losing pushed him over the edge.

[Andy]

I feel like the tantrum and ejection of Maddon today was premeditated lol.

 

Then again, Clint Hurdle is an horsefeathers and I've hated him since 2015. Maybe Maddon feels the same way about Hurdle, and all this losing pushed him over the edge.

Definitely feel like both are true.

[NotSoSober]

I feel like the tantrum and ejection of Maddon today was premeditated lol.

 

Then again, Clint Hurdle is an horsefeathers and I've hated him since 2015. Maybe Maddon feels the same way about Hurdle, and all this losing pushed him over the edge.

I'd guarantee Maddon hates red assed Hurdle. One enjoys his glass of wine, the other is busy shotgunning Milwaukees Best

[jersey cubs fan]

I feel like the tantrum and ejection of Maddon today was premeditated lol.

 

Then again, Clint Hurdle is an horsefeathers and I've hated him since 2015. Maybe Maddon feels the same way about Hurdle, and all this losing pushed him over the edge.

I'd guarantee Maddon hates red assed Hurdle. One enjoys his glass of wine, the other is busy shotgunning Milwaukees Best

This is hate speech.

I am an avid wine drinker and also an imbiber of mass quantities of cheap beer.

#LoveIsLove

[mul21]

I feel like the tantrum and ejection of Maddon today was premeditated lol.

 

Then again, Clint Hurdle is an horsefeathers and I've hated him since 2015. Maybe Maddon feels the same way about Hurdle, and all this losing pushed him over the edge.

I'd guarantee Maddon hates red assed Hurdle. One enjoys his glass of wine, the other is busy shotgunning Milwaukees Best

This is hate speech.

I am an avid wine drinker and also an imbiber of mass quantities of cheap beer.

#LoveIsLove

 

Seriously, you can do both. Why do you hate fun? But Hurdle is a red assed turd who needs to go away.

[Bull]

I'd guarantee Maddon hates red assed Hurdle. One enjoys his glass of wine, the other is busy shotgunning Milwaukees Best

This is hate speech.

I am an avid wine drinker and also an imbiber of mass quantities of cheap beer.

#LoveIsLove

 

Seriously, you can do both. Why do you hate fun? But Hurdle is a red assed turd who needs to go away.

It seems like username notsosober would understand this.

[NotSoSober]

This is hate speech.

I am an avid wine drinker and also an imbiber of mass quantities of cheap beer.

#LoveIsLove

 

Seriously, you can do both. Why do you hate fun? But Hurdle is a red assed turd who needs to go away.

It seems like username notsosober would understand this.

I have no problems with someone shotgunning Milwaukees Best, but I guarantee Maddon would look down on someone that does

[jersey cubs fan]

 

Seriously, you can do both. Why do you hate fun? But Hurdle is a red assed turd who needs to go away.

It seems like username notsosober would understand this.

I have no problems with someone shotgunning Milwaukees Best, but I guarantee Maddon would look down on someone that does

he's from hazelnut pennsytucky and proud of it, I'm sure he's fine with dudes gunning cheap beer