8.14 - Cubs losing 4-2 against Reds

[Derwood]

This Dunn kid looks pretty good, and a large strike zone is helping him out.

 

Wisdom has homered, McKinstry has a double, but Thompson only lasted 1 2/3 IP

[Derwood]

Back to back homers for Gomes/Morel and Cubs lead 5-4

[UMFan83]

Looks like Keegan couldn’t get out of the 2nd. The time is near to shut him down it seems like.

 

McKinstry with 2 doubles today is promising

[CubinNY]

Now winning 5-4.

[Derwood]

JFC, how is it only the 4th inning?

[UMFan83]

I'll surely regret this during the upcoming Orioles/Brewers/Cardinals/Brewers/Blue Jays/Cardinals/Reds/Giants/Nets stretch but this team does have some 2014 vibes to it in that they are somewhat fun. The parallels end with 2014's flock of top 10 prospects ready to come up, and this team planning to let one of their best players walk this offseason.

[Tim]

Random thoughts on today's game:

 

- Ortega has had a nice run with the team and prevented much worse awfulness. But if Hill is going to be added to the 40 at the end of the year, I'd really like to DFA Ortega and get Hill some playing time.

 

- Thompson could probably stand to be shut down for 10 days or so with a DL stint for a "dead arm" or some such thing. Let him come back after that and build innings. But he's lost some velocity and command recently and could use a break.

 

- McKinstry has looked better recently. He hadn't gotten much playing time with the Dodgers, maybe he just needed to get his timing back.

 

- Morel is filling the Javy-sized hole in my heart.

[Derwood]

Rucker pouring gas on this fire

[Derwood]

The amount of center-cut fastballs that this lineup takes is just infuriating

[Bertz]

Random thoughts on today's game:

 

- Ortega has had a nice run with the team and prevented much worse awfulness. But if Hill is going to be added to the 40 at the end of the year, I'd really like to DFA Ortega and get Hill some playing time.

 

- Thompson could probably stand to be shut down for 10 days or so with a DL stint for a "dead arm" or some such thing. Let him come back after that and build innings. But he's lost some velocity and command recently and could use a break.

 

- McKinstry has looked better recently. He hadn't gotten much playing time with the Dodgers, maybe he just needed to get his timing back.

 

- Morel is filling the Javy-sized hole in my heart.

 

Agreed on all of these. Also really enjoying how well Nelly is coming on. That he's not only survived but stepped up while getting exposed to more RHP is huge.

[mias_tisg]

Thompson and Steele are both gonna be shut down at some point anyways due to innings. Better to let them play it out and shut them down in September. If Thompson sucks again next start, maybe you consider it.

[CubinNY]

Random thoughts on today's game:

 

- Ortega has had a nice run with the team and prevented much worse awfulness. But if Hill is going to be added to the 40 at the end of the year, I'd really like to DFA Ortega and get Hill some playing time.

 

- Thompson could probably stand to be shut down for 10 days or so with a DL stint for a "dead arm" or some such thing. Let him come back after that and build innings. But he's lost some velocity and command recently and could use a break.

 

- McKinstry has looked better recently. He hadn't gotten much playing time with the Dodgers, maybe he just needed to get his timing back.

 

- Morel is filling the Javy-sized hole in my heart.

 

Agreed on all of these. Also really enjoying how well Nelly is coming on. That he's not only survived but stepped up while getting exposed to more RHP is huge.

 

Ditto, especially the Morel part. It’s impossible not to love him.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

Seems like it might be an unpopular opinion, but I would not bother with calling up Hill, or even rostering him at the end of the year in all likelihood. He's not an upgrade in defense, power, or patience over Ortega, so the hope is that his hit tool sustains in MLB despite never doing anything like it at previous levels. Plus it seems fairly clear that his AAA line is driven by those first couple weeks at AAA which aren't proving sustainable:

 

5/31-7/3: 111 PA, .382/.432/.520

7/4-8/14: 113 PA, .299/.310/.420

 

I get the appeal of having someone with options, especially given the lack of LHH OF on the 40 man, but that type of player is available for basically free most years(like Ortega!) so I don't think there's a big opportunity cost. Plus I really don't think Hill is in much danger of not being around if left unrostered.

[UMFan83]

Seiya with a slash line of .219/.262/.325/.585 over his last 28 games. Should we just call this a lost season and expect him to be better next year or be concerned?

[CubinNY]

Seiya with a slash line of .219/.262/.325/.585 over his last 28 games. Should we just call this a lost season and expect him to be better next year or be concerned?

Hopefully, they bring in robot umps sooner rather than later, because his strike zone judgment has been destroyed by these terrible umpires.

[Bertz]

Seiya with a slash line of .219/.262/.325/.585 over his last 28 games. Should we just call this a lost season and expect him to be better next year or be concerned?

 

It's probably more the former than the latter, but this has gone on long enough that I'm definitely a bit concerned.

 

Nothing specifically has broken. As the season has gone on he's still chasing less than the MLB average, his exit velocity data looks solid, and he's not hitting a stupid number of groundballs (though more than he typically does). The strikeout and walk rates are bad since his hot start, but the components that feed into those are fine, so that may least is very unlikely to be permanent.

 

What has fallen apart are his numbers against non 4 seam fastballs. Since Seiya got back from his IL trip he's been horrendous against cutters and splitters, and bad against sinkers. He's also been bad against curve balls lately after crushing them early in the year. Glass half empty is that the league has found an approach that works against him.

 

Glass half full is that he's simply adjusting to the stuff in MLB still. Japan has lower velocity generally, and so the mid-high 90s sinkers and cutters that are uncommon over here are nearly non-existent over there, and he's seeing a lot of this wizardry for the first time. But the fact that he's still doing damage on 4 seamers would indicate that high velocity more broadly is not going to be a permanent barrier for him.

 

I think he's at minimum a solid 2 win player. The peripheral offensive numbers even if we take out his hot start point to a league average-ish hitter. The defense is legit and has almost never been in question, his numbers are bad but that's mostly because he was total ass early in the year as he was learning new parks. I'm not worried about him going full Fukudome on us. That said I'm less confident he's a star than I have been at any point yet He kinda needs to come out of the gate blasting next season for me to hold onto that hope.