Giants (Hicks) vs Cubs (Assad): 6/17/24, 7:05pm

[Wilson A2000]

7 minutes ago, UMFan83 said:

Apparently Craig isnt even close to removing Neris from the closers role based on his postgame comments

 

 

Fireable offense

[Irrelevant Dude]

1 minute ago, JHBulls said:

At least the Mets won 14-2

How many times will we get to hear how the Cubs are "catching the Mets at the wrong time"?

[Stratos]

Just now, Wilson A2000 said:

Fireable offense

Where's the magic fairy dusk this guy was supposedly farting out in Milwaukee?  Fart it out all over the Cubs' faces.  It was all lies.  Like the Dusty Baker Giants "getting most out of his team" nonsense.

[UMFan83]

8 minutes ago, Irrelevant Dude said:

His initial statement came across like that, but I think he realized what he was saying in real time and gave himself an out as he continued on.

Got it.  To not even be considering it would be wild

[Stratos]

This team is a sad sack of sorry losers.  They were sorry losers last Sept too.  When the going gets tough roll over and die is the motto.  You can't win when the offense is useless through the first 5-6 innings and the pen is useless through the rest of the game.  Just put everyone on the DL and call up the entire Iowa roster at this point.

[squally1313]

3 minutes ago, Stratos said:

Where's the magic fairy dusk this guy was supposedly farting out in Milwaukee?  Fart it out all over the Cubs' faces.  It was all lies.  Like the Dusty Baker Giants "getting most out of his team" nonsense.

Well one half of the fairy dust is in San Diego getting paid $90m, and the other half has been hurt all year but I’m sure will be back to shut us down at some point in the second half. 

[Stratos]

1 minute ago, squally1313 said:

Well one half of the fairy dust is in San Diego getting paid $90m, and the other half has been hurt all year but I’m sure will be back to shut us down at some point in the second half. 

At least the Brewers had a pen and their rebuild didn't take 3 years and counting.  Craig Counsell isn't magic.  The Brewers org is just better.  They have a $120m payroll FFS.

[Stratos]

Hate is strong word.  I hate this team.

[Wilson A2000]

Counsell would do anything to be back with Milwaukee I bet

[PackLandVA]

45 minutes ago, UMFan83 said:

Apparently Craig isnt even close to removing Neris from the closers role based on his postgame comments

 

 

Maybe. But I would think that what he says and what he actually does may be two different things.  I mean, is he really gonna throw Neris under a bus? Figuratively-speaking. I'd be all for it literally-speaking.

Edited June 18, 2024 by PackLandVA

[PackLandVA]

50 minutes ago, squally1313 said:

I mean, Kyle Hendricks is your 5th starter right now. Do you want him to become your 4th?

I had kinda hoped that, beyond normal leveling out of variance, the real pen upgrade would be a healthy/fully stretched out rotation. We saw the difference between April (terrible pen) to May (8th in fWAR) that just pitching a normal amount of innings makes a huge difference. And then I figured that Steele/Shota/Jameson/Wicks/Assad would let you push Brown to the pen, you'd have Horton not that far away, Almonte/Merryweather/Adbert have to come back at some point. But clearly just not going to happen for us. 

No, Hendricks wouldn't be a great option as a starter, period.  But he would only start one out of every five games.  At least the Cubs would MAYBE have a decent option with Assad tried as a closer in the other four starts, assuming this limp-dick offense could actually score runs.   And they wouldn't need to stick Hendricks in the rotation. Wesneski seems better suited as a starter than a reliever.  But there's also a bunch of dudes floating around professional baseball who couldn't be worse starting than what Hendricks has shown this season. And I'd rather keep Brown in the rotation (once he's healthy, whenever that will be)

Edited June 18, 2024 by PackLandVA

[UMFan83]

11 hours ago, PackLandVA said:

No, Hendricks wouldn't be a great option as a 5th starter.  But he would only start one out of every five games.  At least the Cubs would MAYBE have a decent option with Assad tried as a closer in the other four starts, assuming this limp-dick offense could actually score runs.   And they wouldn't need to stick Hendricks in the rotation. Wesneski seems better suited as a starter than a reliever.  But there's also a bunch of dudes floating around professional baseball who couldn't be worse starting than what Hendricks has shown this season. And I'd rather keep Brown in the rotation (once he's healthy, whenever that will be)

Assad is more valuable to us long term as a starter and he's excelling in that role.  This year isn't completely toast but its horsefeathered enough that I'm more interested in how these pieces can fit for the future rather than ripping people out of roles they are excelling in so that they can plug holes our GM neglected in the offseason.

Edited June 18, 2024 by UMFan83

[NorthsideAvenger]

I am not surprised. This team is allergic to winning baseball games. 

I now believe this team is heading for 90+ plus loss season. 

Edited June 18, 2024 by NorthsideAvenger

[Stratos]

Love seeing the success of Estrada and Megill on division rivals while this pen are trash.  Megill is throwing 100mph and Estrada has over 15 k/9

[soccer10k]

2 hours ago, Stratos said:

Wesneski and Neris are total garbage.  Can Assad or somebody teach Wesneski how to throw a fb?

This team needs major changes immediately.  Neris out as closer, call a hitter up from Iowa tonight.  Write the lineup out backwards.  Do something.  Make some adjustments.  This piece of crap offense can't hit any SP.  NOBODY.  Change the entire BP routine.  For the love of *****.

Wesneski has a 3.23 ERA this year so I’m not quite sure why he’s catching strays right now.

[Cuzi]

7 hours ago, PackLandVA said:

Cliff on the postgame just made an interesting comment.  Assad has been great as a starter.  But do you give him the ball in the 9th with a lead? He just gets people out. And you have 3 other really good starters with Brown and Wicks eventually coming back from injury.  Might be easier to get another starter (Smyly) than a closer.

No. If we are looking at current starting pitching to put in that role it would be Brown. But he's on the IL. Neris is the closer by default right now. This is Jeds doing.

Edited June 18, 2024 by Cuzi

[thawv]

6 hours ago, Stratos said:

At least the Brewers had a pen and their rebuild didn't take 3 years and counting.  Craig Counsell isn't magic.  The Brewers org is just better.  They have a $120m payroll FFS.

This has certainly not been a rebuild.  Rebuilding teams don't spend money on long term deals.  They make one year signings.  The intention may have been to rebuild when the salary dump happened.  But it was quickly aborted after one year, and signings and extensions started to happen.  

[BigbadB]

Good morning, masochists. I have to tip my hat to you all for sticking out this painful season. I had to stop watching several weeks ago. Sad to see they are still the same team I quit watching. Maybe today is when they turn things around. I still read the game threads on occasion and my phone notifies me about all of the losses the Cubs are piling up, usually of the one run variety. 

Good to see there's still some crazy talk going on here, like moving Assad to the bullpen. Yeah, that's how you reward a guy for doing his job well, Demote him. 

[Cubs420psd]

8 hours ago, Irrelevant Dude said:

That is absolutely right.  Looking back at it, it is incredible how much went right for 2015/2016 to happen 

I think about this all the time. It's amazing how lucky the Cubs got with having all their top prospects basically come up at the same time and all be hits. 

 

I mean it was 108 damn years they were due for some luck right? 

 

But no, rebuilds like that usually don't work out and they usually don't work out that well. Jed and Tom trying to  bank on it happening again is horsefeathers.

 

 

Edited June 18, 2024 by Cubs420psd

[Cubs420psd]

7 hours ago, Wilson A2000 said:

Counsell would do anything to be back with Milwaukee I bet

I would too, they are a better org, it's painfully obvious.

[Michael Busch Light]

I want this team to sell off but I don’t think that Epsteins caddy should get to make those decisions anymore.  Send him packing.  

[mul21]

7 hours ago, soccer10k said:

Wesneski has a 3.23 ERA this year so I’m not quite sure why he’s catching strays right now.

This is why:

[Eeyore]

On the bright side 🙄 the Cubs are in the have moved into the 6th spot in the draft lottery with a 5.55%% chance at the #1 pick. 😞

Edited June 18, 2024 by Eeyore
Out of date

[WhyCantWeWin]

45 minutes ago, mul21 said:

This is why:

His FIP is over a run higher too so hes due for some regression. Hes been getting lucky so far

[UMFan83]

One thing weird about Wesneski is that he was such a disaster vs. LHB last year with a .986 OPS against in 159 PA.   This year in 69 PA his OPS against vs. LHB is down to .515.

On the downside his numbers against RHB have gone up from .618 to .751.