Cubs (Brown, B.) vs Athletics (Estes): 3/31/25, 9:05pm

[Brandon Glick]

It's another late-night affair on the west coast, this time versus the Athletics of Oakland Sacramento. The Cubs really need to win this series.

 

[Jason Ross]

Last night sucked, but in a 162 game year, sometimes that horsefeathers happens. It's infuriating, but it's baseball. Joey Estes was super not good last year. He doesn't throw hard, he doesn't limit contact. Don't let last night bleed into today and go beat up on an uninspiring arm. Don't find yourself down late and see Erceg and Miller. 

Do that and we can all move forward.

[CubinNY]

The start of this year has been so messed up for me. Another game I will have to see what happened in the morning.

[Hot Sauce]

7 minutes ago, 1908_Cubs said:

Last night sucked, but in a 162 game year, sometimes that horsefeathers happens. It's infuriating, but it's baseball. Joey Estes was super not good last year. He doesn't throw hard, he doesn't limit contact. Don't let last night bleed into today and go beat up on an uninspiring arm. Don't find yourself down late and see Erceg and Miller. 

Do that and we can all move forward.

An Estes on the mound that doesn’t throw hard or limit contact has a familiar ring to it. 

[Outshined_One]

There was a moment where my brain mentally filled in Shawn Estes as the A's starter and my response was, "He's still playing and is in the Athletics' rotation? Yeah, that tracks."

[squally1313]

17 minutes ago, 1908_Cubs said:

Last night sucked, but in a 162 game year, sometimes that horsefeathers happens. It's infuriating, but it's baseball. Joey Estes was super not good last year. He doesn't throw hard, he doesn't limit contact. Don't let last night bleed into today and go beat up on an uninspiring arm. Don't find yourself down late and see Erceg and Miller. 

Do that and we can all move forward.

Thought I was going crazy for a second, but unless they reacquire Erceg from the Royal in the next 12 hours I think we're good just trying to avoid Miller. Though Severino tomorrow is going to be a challenge all of his own and I think their lineup is pretty sneaky good. 

[squally1313]

6 minutes ago, Outshined_One said:

There was a moment where my brain mentally filled in Shawn Estes as the A's starter and my response was, "He's still playing and is in the Athletics' rotation? Yeah, that tracks."

Mentioned it above in a way, but had a long weekend (Vegas trip, people over for a BBQ yesterday) and absolutely not at full speed. Estes as their starter, Max Muncy as their second baseman, and me being sure 1908 couldn't possibly be wrong about Erceg led to me wondering if I was still dreaming somehow while scrolling through their Roster Resource page. 

[Jason Ross]

2 minutes ago, squally1313 said:

Thought I was going crazy for a second, but unless they reacquire Erceg from the Royal in the next 12 hours I think we're good just trying to avoid Miller. Though Severino tomorrow is going to be a challenge all of his own and I think their lineup is pretty sneaky good. 

Oh they traded him! Damnit! I sorted their bullpen data from 2024 the other day and compared it to their starters entirely forgetting trades happen. 

Fine, just don't pitch to Jason Giambi and we're all good.

[imb]

15 minutes ago, Outshined_One said:

There was a moment where my brain mentally filled in Shawn Estes as the A's starter and my response was, "He's still playing and is in the Athletics' rotation? Yeah, that tracks."

if he pitched as long as jamie moyer, shawn estes, the ****** lefty who inexplicably helped send us to the 2003 playoffs, would have retired in 2021. 

[cl smooth]

how's the weather looking for this one? jd and boog were talking about rain forecasted for tonight during yesterday's game. 

Edited March 31, 2025 by cl smooth

[JBears79]

im not gonna panic about the bullpen yet. Outside of the Morgan meltdown and Pressley looking mediocre, I still have faith in this group. Hodge looked dominant and Thielbar flashed some good stuff.

 

Pearson can go though, dude just has zero idea where the ball is going to end up when it leaves his hand. I'd really like to see Ethan Roberts or Palencia up for him. 

[Jason Ross]

20 minutes ago, JBears79 said:

im not gonna panic about the bullpen yet. Outside of the Morgan meltdown and Pressley looking mediocre, I still have faith in this group. Hodge looked dominant and Thielbar flashed some good stuff.

 

Pearson can go though, dude just has zero idea where the ball is going to end up when it leaves his hand. I'd really like to see Ethan Roberts or Palencia up for him. 

Per the Weather Channel looks like there will be rain, but should be clear for the game. Rain drops after 5pm local time. 

[gflore34]

30 minutes ago, JBears79 said:

im not gonna panic about the bullpen yet. Outside of the Morgan meltdown and Pressley looking mediocre, I still have faith in this group. Hodge looked dominant and Thielbar flashed some good stuff.

 

Pearson can go though, dude just has zero idea where the ball is going to end up when it leaves his hand. I'd really like to see Ethan Roberts or Palencia up for him. 

Morgan can join Pearson, just don't see an avenue to effectiveness for him.  Didn't someone mention he was extraordinary lucky last year?

Edited March 31, 2025 by gflore34

[Jason Ross]

21 minutes ago, gflore34 said:

Morgan can join Pearson, just don't see an avenue to effectiveness for him.  Didn't someone mention he was extraordinary lucky last year?

There are aspects of luck to Eli Morgan's last season, however, lucky does not always mean that he will regress to being bad either. So, while Morgan's 85% LOB% is much too high, and we should probably not expect an ERA of 1.93 from him, it isn't like he wasn't good. Morgan still posted a 3.46 FIP, and had an xERA of 2.51. 

The good about Eli Morgan is that he limits hard contact because he induces a lot of chase. He's not a stuff+ monster so the way he induces that soft contact is because hitters chase his pitches and end up hitting it poorly. Part of Morgan's issue yesterday is that he didn't get the chase he normally does. Here is his swinging strikes t the Dodgers compared to last night: 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Notice how on the left, the Dodgers chased him to death where as on the right, the Diamondbacks...didn't. He was also far too much in the zone. Morgan can't do that and survive. 

If Morgan acts like he did on the left, he should be fine. Sadly, with someone like Morgan, if he's not getting guys to chase him, he doesn't have the stuff to fall back on to generate good outcomes in the zone. It's the push and pull here.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

Morgan was very good in both of his outings prior to yesterday.  I don't expect him to be an 8th/9th inning pillar, but if we're going to pretend that him having to wear a bad day because of team circumstances is a sign he's awful, we should probably weigh that against him looking excellent against multiple teams already in the young season.

[JHBulls]

This should be a series win but as we established yesterday, baseball is a dumb sport. So anything can happen.

[We Got The Whole 9]

4 minutes ago, JBears79 said:

im not gonna panic about the bullpen yet. Outside of the Morgan meltdown and Pressley looking mediocre, I still have faith in this group. Hodge looked dominant and Thielbar flashed some good stuff.

 

Pearson can go though, dude just has zero idea where the ball is going to end up when it leaves his hand. I'd really like to see Ethan Roberts or Palencia up for him. 

You can't make that comment and say you'd like to see Palencia instead. 

[UMFan83]

So bizarre to me that 2 MLB teams will be playing at minor league stadiums for at least the next 2 years for completely different reasons.

Go Cubs! Beat the Las Vegas Athletics of Oakland via Sacramento!

[gflore34]

39 minutes ago, 1908_Cubs said:

There are aspects of luck to Eli Morgan's last season, however, lucky does not always mean that he will regress to being bad either. So, while Morgan's 85% LOB% is much too high, and we should probably not expect an ERA of 1.93 from him, it isn't like he wasn't good. Morgan still posted a 3.46 FIP, and had an xERA of 2.51. 

The good about Eli Morgan is that he limits hard contact because he induces a lot of chase. He's not a stuff+ monster so the way he induces that soft contact is because hitters chase his pitches and end up hitting it poorly. Part of Morgan's issue yesterday is that he didn't get the chase he normally does. Here is his swinging strikes t the Dodgers compared to last night: 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Notice how on the left, the Dodgers chased him to death where as on the right, the Diamondbacks...didn't. He was also far too much in the zone. Morgan can't do that and survive. 

If Morgan acts like he did on the left, he should be fine. Sadly, with someone like Morgan, if he's not getting guys to chase him, he doesn't have the stuff to fall back on to generate good outcomes in the zone. It's the push and pull here.

Thanks, me, being a math and physics guy, loves your explanation and charts of pitching science.  Well, come to think of it, baseball is physics.  As you said, the main take away is Morgan because of a lack of plus stuff has no margin for error.

[JBears79]

45 minutes ago, We Got The Whole 9 said:

You can't make that comment and say you'd like to see Palencia instead. 

I just did. Palencia is a much better relief prospect than Pearson. We already know what Pearson is and its bad. Dump him and move on to the next man up. If Palencia is bad, dump him move on to the next guy. All of these guys except Hodge should be on very short leashes. 

[Andy]

59 minutes ago, UMFan83 said:

So bizarre to me that 2 MLB teams will be playing at minor league stadiums for at least the next 2 years for completely different reasons.

Go Cubs! Beat the Las Vegas Athletics of Oakland via Sacramento!

They're the Sacramento Athletics. Nobody asked me or cares what I think, but they're the Sacramento Athletics. And the Anaheim Angels. (And, for that matter, the UL Lafayette Ragin' Cajuns, not 'Louisiana.') You can't just invent fake reasons not to call yourself by your home base.

[JHBulls]

According to official emails, they’re going with “Athletics”. You would hope that when they officially move into Las Vegas for good, they pick up Las Vegas in their team name and are called the Las Vegas Athletics. 

[NorthsideAvenger]

As frustrating as the Cubs start has been, it could be worse. We could be the Brewers right now.

 

[PeanutPunch33]

Counsell is a great manager for what he did in Milwaukee, but he's been a very average manager in his time with the Cubs

[muntjack]

What I don't love about analyzing relievers with those metrics, just like any other,  is that the small sample size makes them noisy.  If there's a week in which a reliever happens to face 10 struggling hitters,  and 8 of them are susceptible to the 4-seamers up in the zone,  it can appear to create patterns in the pitcher's  season that aren't really there.