Cubs-Brewers Game One Thread, By The Numbers

[Caesar]

38 minutes ago, Rcal10 said:

No, that is not it. You just take things over the top. One thing happens and you exaggerate it. You did it with a slump in August this year, you did it when Swanson made an error and you are doing it now. I didn’t agree with Boyd pitching. I said it before he threw his first pitch. Counsell thought otherwise. He didn’t get it right. But that doesn’t mean the other choices would have been much better. Doesn’t mean he lost the game for the team. He made a choice based on data the team had. He picked him out of all iffy choices. 

So in other words why discuss it because they way you see things there’s always a built in excuse. This is a baseball board. You want me to praise them and say phrases like , they tried, he only uses what the GM gave him. Blah, Blah. What do you wan to discuss? They are playing poorly and you need to call it that. He put Boyd in a position to not perform well and that’s it. 

[Rcal10]

25 minutes ago, Caesar said:

So in other words why discuss it because they way you see things there’s always a built in excuse. This is a baseball board. You want me to praise them and say phrases like , they tried, he only uses what the GM gave him. Blah, Blah. What do you wan to discuss? They are playing poorly and you need to call it that. He put Boyd in a position to not perform well and that’s it. 

This response doesn’t even address what I said. So no reason to even respond. 

[Banks-Williams]

Looks like Counsel is going to go with Imanaga for game 2.  Another big Counsel mistake.  Imanaga should NOT be starting before Rae, Taillion, or Assad.  He gives up too many homers and doubles.  And he doesn’t have as much rest as Assad.  Counsel messed up when he took Assad off the Roster.  

[DrCub]

8 hours ago, I owned a Suzuki said:

Using this logic, Ben Brown should have been the game 1 starter. 

He pitched well.  Milwaukee has some issues with velocity which is possibly why he’s done well against them.   I know he’s hated here, but he certainly pitched better than Boyd did. In addition, how does the history of 3 days rest playoff starts not going that well lead you to Ben Brown?  

[Brian707]

9 hours ago, Caesar said:

It’s pretty obvious by now the success of the brewers was never Counsel. Maybe he was the reason they never one a series? Has anyone ever thought that maybe he was holding the Brewers back? It’s possible correct?

[I owned a Suzuki]

3 hours ago, DrCub said:

He pitched well.  Milwaukee has some issues with velocity which is possibly why he’s done well against them.   I know he’s hated here, but he certainly pitched better than Boyd did. In addition, how does the history of 3 days rest playoff starts not going that well lead you to Ben Brown?  

Because Ben Brown was the only pitcher who was well rested and had success against the Brewers this season, which seemed to be your criteria.

I get the criticism, but all of the options came with big question marks.  They picked wrong and adjusted quickly. Unfortunately Soroka was worse. Here is the truth with this series, the Cubs are in a bad way with starting pitching. They are going to need to score 5+ runs a game to have a chance. 

A healthy Horton or close the Padres out in 2 and it would not have been so bad

[CubUgly]

8 hours ago, I owned a Suzuki said:

Because Ben Brown was the only pitcher who was well rested and had success against the Brewers this season, which seemed to be your criteria.

I get the criticism, but all of the options came with big question marks.  They picked wrong and adjusted quickly. Unfortunately Soroka was worse. Here is the truth with this series, the Cubs are in a bad way with starting pitching. They are going to need to score 5+ runs a game to have a chance. 

A healthy Horton or close the Padres out in 2 and it would not have been so bad

Looks like we might have some cooler weather in Chicago Wednesday and a it could be a good pitchers day that day.  Honestly, I'd try to save Shota for that game and do a bullpen game today since all of our high leverage guys are well rested and ready to go.   The we get another off day and Wednesday might be the best time to pitch Shota.  He really scares the hell out of me tonight with the number of homers he's surrendering and I don't care that Milwaukee is not a big homer team, that does not seem to matter right now for Shota. 

[BigbadB]

20 minutes ago, CubUgly said:

Looks like we might have some cooler weather in Chicago Wednesday and a it could be a good pitchers day that day.  Honestly, I'd try to save Shota for that game and do a bullpen game today since all of our high leverage guys are well rested and ready to go.   The we get another off day and Wednesday might be the best time to pitch Shota.  He really scares the hell out of me tonight with the number of homers he's surrendering and I don't care that Milwaukee is not a big homer team, that does not seem to matter right now for Shota. 

While I would rather see Shota pitching at home, I don't think you can just do a bullpen game when you are already down 1-0 in the series. If they would have gone with Rea or Assad in game 1, then Boyd on normal rest in game 2 and Taillon in game 3 and Shota in game 4 and Boyd in game 5 (if necessary) was the way I would have lined them up. But, luckily for all of you, I'm not the manager.

At this point, you have to hope Shota has something left or something to prove and let the dice fall where they may. 

[Jason Ross]

13 hours ago, Banks-Williams said:

Looks like Counsel is going to go with Imanaga for game 2.  Another big Counsel mistake.  Imanaga should NOT be starting before Rae, Taillion, or Assad.  He gives up too many homers and doubles.  And he doesn’t have as much rest as Assad.  Counsel messed up when he took Assad off the Roster.  

Taillon would be on short rest like Matthew Boyd. Isn't that why everyone is so convinced Boyd shouldn't have gone Saturday? 

Javier Assad has a 15% K%. This would literally be the lowest of any qualified starter if he had enough innings. While his ERA does tend to outpace his xFIP, we cannot really expect a pitcher who had a 15% K% to do that well. He also displays little velocity. Against a team who struggles more with the fastball, I'm not sure that's an ace plan. He's just not a playoff starter. The Cubs didn't even deem him one of their 12 best pitchers.

Colin Rea has been solid lately. He's also been bad against Milwaukee on the year. He's a pitcher most people didn't want signed, I don't hate the idea of Rea pitching innings but there feels like a lot of recency bias here, He has extreme R/L splits - a 4.57 xFIP against LHH. The Brewers can throw out Yelich, Collins, Frelick, Turang....

I get that Shota hasn't been as dominant as he had been last year. But he's still probably the best option the Cubs have right now. He's on regular rest, the Cubs bullpen can be used, essentially, without impunity behind him; it's well rested and Shota can be pulled the moment they want to give him some rest. 

I once again don't think there is some clear-cut better option. You can make equally poor arguments for every option. For every HR Shota gives up, Assad doesn't strike someone out, Colini Rea is just Colin Rea and Jamo is on 3 days rest. 

[CubUgly]

9 minutes ago, BigbadB said:

While I would rather see Shota pitching at home, I don't think you can just do a bullpen game when you are already down 1-0 in the series. If they would have gone with Rea or Assad in game 1, then Boyd on normal rest in game 2 and Taillon in game 3 and Shota in game 4 and Boyd in game 5 (if necessary) was the way I would have lined them up. But, luckily for all of you, I'm not the manager.

At this point, you have to hope Shota has something left or something to prove and let the dice fall where they may. 

Fair enough, I think we are going to go bullpen early regardless of whether you call it a bullpen game or not, I doubt Shota makes it past the third inning, but - my next option would be start Rea tonight.  I am really uneasy about starting Shota, just as most here were uneasy about starting Boyd Saturday.   I just think Shota's best shot off succeeding is Wednesday, and we should put our guys in the best situations to succeed.

We should be able to score some runs tonight, SHOULD being the emphasis.   So that is just as important if not more. 

[Jason Ross]

16 minutes ago, CubUgly said:

Fair enough, I think we are going to go bullpen early regardless of whether you call it a bullpen game or not, I doubt Shota makes it past the third inning, but - my next option would be start Rea tonight.  I am really uneasy about starting Shota, just as most here were uneasy about starting Boyd Saturday.   I just think Shota's best shot off succeeding is Wednesday, and we should put our guys in the best situations to succeed.

We should be able to score some runs tonight, SHOULD being the emphasis.   So that is just as important if not more. 

Colin Rea has horrible splits against LHP - over .100 points of wOBA. The Brewers have plenty of LHH. Colin Rea is probably a bad choice. The Brewers can roll out a lineup including Isaac Collins (130 wRC+), Yelich (138 wRC+), Turang (127 wRC+), Frelick (119 wRC+). These hitters have done well against Rea on the year, as he's given up six runs in nine innings, and has walked as many as he's struck out. 

You could roll out an opener, but if you're rolling out an opener for Colin Rea, who sucks against LHP, then what's the benefit of Rea over Shota? I don't believe Colin Rea is a better pitcher than Shota Imanaga. So I don't think you gain anything. 

Shota is a better pitcher. He's on full rest. Just give me the better pitcher, even if he's flawed. Pull him sometime in the fourth if you need to; it's playoff baseball, the bullpen horses haven't been used since Thursday and have tomorrow off. You'd have the same plan with Rea. Rea is just as flawed if not a bit more, and I don't think you want to look back on Game 2 and say "Man, I really wish I'd have rather just pitched the better guy".

[CubUgly]

11 minutes ago, Jason Ross said:

Colin Rea has horrible splits against LHP - over .100 points of wOBA. The Brewers have plenty of LHH. Colin Rea is probably a bad choice. The Brewers can roll out a lineup including Isaac Collins (130 wRC+), Yelich (138 wRC+), Turang (127 wRC+), Frelick (119 wRC+). These hitters have done well against Rea on the year, as he's given up six runs in nine innings, and has walked as many as he's struck out. 

You could roll out an opener, but if you're rolling out an opener for Colin Rea, who sucks against LHP, then what's the benefit of Rea over Shota? I don't believe Colin Rea is a better pitcher than Shota Imanaga. So I don't think you gain anything. 

Shota is a better pitcher. He's on full rest. Just give me the better pitcher, even if he's flawed. Pull him sometime in the fourth if you need to; it's playoff baseball, the bullpen horses haven't been used since Thursday and have tomorrow off. You'd have the same plan with Rea. Rea is just as flawed if not a bit more, and I don't think you want to look back on Game 2 and say "Man, I really wish I'd have rather just pitched the better guy".

You make good points.  I just REALLY don't like Shota here and I think it will end up being a bullpen game by default anyway.    I just think Wednesday's the much better option for him, but hey, there's a guy we're paying a lot to make the decision and he has. 

[Jason Ross]

26 minutes ago, CubUgly said:

You make good points.  I just REALLY don't like Shota here and I think it will end up being a bullpen game by default anyway.    I just think Wednesday's the much better option for him, but hey, there's a guy we're paying a lot to make the decision and he has. 

I think the Shota hate is a little ridiculous at this stage and I think a lot of it deals with his last start before the playoffs. So let's have a little fun with arbitrary endpoints:

Shota Imanaga from July 30th - September 19th: 3.69 ERA, 3.79 xFIP, 25.8 K%, 3.5% BB%

That's really good! That's over 61 innings and 10 starts. When you add in his very bad, no good day on the 25th, his numbers get much worse. His ERA jumps almost a full point to 4.49! But it was really one bad day.

Fun fact, he faced Milwaukee twice in that span. He had the following numbers:

12 IP, 13 K, 2 BB, 5 ER

That's...just fine. On the year he's running a 3.57 ERA and a .249 wOBA against the Brewers. The amount of hand wringing over Shota starting game 2 is real silly. He's on regular rest. He's the best option. No one on the Cubs is so good they need to dedicate more than four innings to them. Any day is going be in large part a bullpen day. Shota, Rea, Taillon, it doesn't matter...it won't change that math.

[PeanutPunch33]

Shota needs to find a way today.  What happened to that guy who went into Yankees stadium in the middle of July and threw 8 IP, 1 ER.  This team badly needs a performance like that 

[gflore34]

The discussions on whom should start is all academic if the Cubs bats don't get going.  Pretty much anyone who starts for the Brewers today is going to be a step down, time to start horsefeathers hitting. 

[Jason Ross]

12 minutes ago, gflore34 said:

The discussions on whom should start is all academic if the Cubs bats don't get going.  Pretty much anyone who starts for the Brewers today is going to be a step down, time to start horsefeathers hitting. 

I've got an article coming out today about Quinn Priester and how the Cubs matchup against him. He is 99% sure they're bulk innings guy.

TLDR: It's a good outlook. 

[Wilson A2000]

25 minutes ago, PeanutPunch33 said:

Shota needs to find a way today.  What happened to that guy who went into Yankees stadium in the middle of July and threw 8 IP, 1 ER.  This team badly needs a performance like that 

No chance he goes over 4-5 innings. I’d be happy with 5 innings, 2 runs.

[Rcal10]

Before the first pitch is thrown I am going on record of agreeing with the Cubs to start Imanaga. Jason has made some really good points. He deserves to start this game and is the best option. I did not like Boyd in game one. I said it before the game  as well. I did want Assad. But I realize he could have also been lit up and we would have Boyd going today. The one thing going Boyd in game 1 did was allow the Cubs to go Boyd in game 4, on normal rest. Had they held Boyd to today he would still be on the road and if he did pitch in game 5, that too would be in the road. For as much angst that Boyd has given us lately, he still has great numbers at Wrigley. If the Cubs could win this one I have a good feeling about Tailon on Wednesday. And like Boyd at home on Thursday. 

[Banks-Williams]

1 hour ago, Jason Ross said:

Taillon would be on short rest like Matthew Boyd. Isn't that why everyone is so convinced Boyd shouldn't have gone Saturday? 

Javier Assad has a 15% K%. This would literally be the lowest of any qualified starter if he had enough innings. While his ERA does tend to outpace his xFIP, we cannot really expect a pitcher who had a 15% K% to do that well. He also displays little velocity. Against a team who struggles more with the fastball, I'm not sure that's an ace plan. He's just not a playoff starter. The Cubs didn't even deem him one of their 12 best pitchers.

Colin Rea has been solid lately. He's also been bad against Milwaukee on the year. He's a pitcher most people didn't want signed, I don't hate the idea of Rea pitching innings but there feels like a lot of recency bias here, He has extreme R/L splits - a 4.57 xFIP against LHH. The Brewers can throw out Yelich, Collins, Frelick, Turang....

I get that Shota hasn't been as dominant as he had been last year. But he's still probably the best option the Cubs have right now. He's on regular rest, the Cubs bullpen can be used, essentially, without impunity behind him; it's well rested and Shota can be pulled the moment they want to give him some rest. 

I once again don't think there is some clear-cut better option. You can make equally poor arguments for every option. For every HR Shota gives up, Assad doesn't strike someone out, Colini Rea is just Colin Rea and Jamo is on 3 days rest. 

I like what you say. Just to be clear, I wasn’t saying Taillion should pitch today. I was saying all three of those should pitch before Shota.  He’s giving up too many runs now; lots of back-to-back hits. 

Assad is the best (in nearly the whole MLB in fact) at keeping runs from scoring with men on base. And if there is one thing the Brew is good at, it is “putting men on base”.  Counsel’s decision to take his most-rested starter off the roster is going to haunt him throughout this series.  He needs to spend less time dying his hair and giving interviews and more watching his players.  He played tired men too much post All Star break. 

[gflore34]

22 minutes ago, Jason Ross said:

I've got an article coming out today about Quinn Priester and how the Cubs matchup against him. He is 99% sure they're bulk innings guy.

TLDR: It's a good outlook. 

I knew that, Priester is kind of guy the Cubs have crushed almost all season, keeps the ball down, nothing overpowering, right in the Cubs' wheelhouse.

[Jason Ross]

Just now, gflore34 said:

I knew that, Priester is kind of guy the Cubs have crushed almost all season, keeps the ball down, nothing overpowering, right in the Cubs' wheelhouse.

Yep. Real bad against LHH, he doesn't use his mix well. Sinkers and sliders have issues against opposite handed hitters and he doesn't really change his mix. Cubs are lefty heavy (thus the opener) and crush sinkers and sliders. It's a good matchup for the Cubs tonight.

[Rcal10]

3 minutes ago, Jason Ross said:

Yep. Real bad against LHH, he doesn't use his mix well. Sinkers and sliders have issues against opposite handed hitters and he doesn't really change his mix. Cubs are lefty heavy (thus the opener) and crush sinkers and sliders. It's a good matchup for the Cubs tonight.

I agree with all of this, but to me that means he probably pitches only 3 innings and the Brewers use their pen. Cubs need to score at least 4 today and really wish it could be even more. They may need more. 

[Stratos]

10 minutes ago, Rcal10 said:

Before the first pitch is thrown I am going on record of agreeing with the Cubs to start Imanaga. Jason has made some really good points. He deserves to start this game and is the best option. I did not like Boyd in game one. I said it before the game  as well. I did want Assad. But I realize he could have also been lit up and we would have Boyd going today. The one thing going Boyd in game 1 did was allow the Cubs to go Boyd in game 4, on normal rest. Had they held Boyd to today he would still be on the road and if he did pitch in game 5, that too would be in the road. For as much angst that Boyd has given us lately, he still has great numbers at Wrigley. If the Cubs could win this one I have a good feeling about Tailon on Wednesday. And like Boyd at home on Thursday. 

Personally I would not pitch Boyd again this series.  Starting Imanaga Game 2 is fine.

[Jason Ross]

8 minutes ago, Rcal10 said:

I agree with all of this, but to me that means he probably pitches only 3 innings and the Brewers use their pen. Cubs need to score at least 4 today and really wish it could be even more. They may need more. 

He's probably in line for around 12-15 outs. Ashby is going to take the first four through Tucker, and then it's Priester, probably through the 4th or 5th. 

I don't necessarily think they have to score 4. Shota is a good pitcher, and the Cubs BP is good. The Brewers didn't score a single run after the 2nd against Civale (who got 1 whiff in 55 pitches) and Ben Brown. They had a great first two innings but they're not a juggernaut. For all of the worry on the Cubs lineup over the second half of the year. the Cubs had a 113 wRC+ in September to the Brewers 101. I'm not so sure the Cubs have to outhit the Brewers this much. 

Don't get me wrong, four would be great! But I do think we're over valuing the Brewers offensive capabilities. Especially if Chourio is out.

[Rcal10]

8 minutes ago, Stratos said:

Personally I would not pitch Boyd again this series.  Starting Imanaga Game 2 is fine.

I get that. Especially considering how poorly he did on Saturday. My point was really in the Cubs thought process before the game, not after seeing how poorly he did. For the sake of argument, let’s say Nico makes the play and Boyd gets out of the first with 2 runs. He then goes 2 or 3 more innings of scoreless ball. Cubs still lose, maybe 5-3. Cubs then have the luxury of Boyd at Wrigley for game 4. If the Cubs thinking, prior to the start he had, was Boyd is going to get 2 starts in the series, I would think they would want one at Wrigley. Starting game one would make that possible.