Cubs Have Good Chance to Win Wednesday Since Counsel Doesnt Have Pitching Choice Selection

[Banks-Williams]

You’re ignoring the fact that Shota is a/the leader in HRs/innings pitched among starters. I would not have started someone with that record in the NLDS.  

He was pitching great in 2024 and early 2025, but that’s not happening now.  They should have figured out how to fix the problem before starting him in a post season game. Too much is st stake.  No need to rely on “hope” when you’ve got other very good starters. 

[Rcal10]

18 minutes ago, Banks-Williams said:

You’re ignoring the fact that Shota is a/the leader in HRs/innings pitched among starters. I would not have started someone with that record in the NLDS.  

He was pitching great in 2024 and early 2025, but that’s not happening now.  They should have figured out how to fix the problem before starting him in a post season game. Too much is st stake.  No need to rely on “hope” when you’ve got other very good starters. 

Who are these good options you speak of? 

[mul21]

1 minute ago, Rcal10 said:

Who are these good options you speak of? 

In all fairness, Brown has mowed down the Brewers in limited action.

[Banks-Williams]

On 10/7/2025 at 7:55 PM, Transmogrified Tiger said:

Thank you for asking, yes, using your two best pitchers all year, even on short rest in Boyd's case, are perfectly fine choices compared to the alternatives.  

Heading into the NLDS, Assad was pitching better than Boyd. So too were Rae and Taillon.  Assad also was fully rested.  

If you are willing to look at data going back a full year, why not go back 2 or 3 years?  Assume you own two cars, the first one has been running fine for the past year but is now giving you troubles.  You have a second car that you’ve started to drive and it is running real good, plus nobody else has driven it in recently, whereas others have been driving the first in the past 3 days.

Both you and Counsell would take the first car on the cross country trip. In fact, you’d take the first car even after knowing it would break down.  In contrast, I’d opt for the second car and I’d probably do much better than you in my trip across the country.

[Rcal10]

19 hours ago, Banks-Williams said:

I never said they’d win if Assad pitches. And I never “ranted about things that can’t be proven”.  I only spoke of two very poor decisions, both of which created two losses for the Cubs.  You really need to work on your reading comprehension my friend.

I also never said you said they would have won had they used Assad. Maybe you should practice what you preach and learn to read better. All I said was I agreed with you with who I thought should have started game one but that doesn’t mean the result would have changed. You have repeatedly suggested Counsel’s decisions cost them the first two games. That is suggesting had he chose someone else they would have won. That is what I am saying cannot be proven. You have also repeatedly suggested he has other great options. That is also not true. He had several iffy choices, no matter who he picked. None of the pitchers you have suggested are good. Again today, he has a few options. None of them good. But whoever he picks, if that guy gives up a few runs you and many others will be here to suggest how he was dumb for his choice. And again, without any proof that whoever you wanted would have done better. The FACT is he doesn’t have a good choice. But he has to make one and hope that guy pitches well. 

[Banks-Williams]

5 minutes ago, Rcal10 said:

Who are these good options you speak of? 

Assad, Rae, Taillon, Boyd, and Brown were all pitching better than Imanaga heading into the NLDS. 

And Assad, Rae, Taillon, and Brown were doing better than Boyd then too.  And Assad was fully rested and ready to go for game 1.  Why use the guy who is not fully rested and not pitching well?  That’s crazy risk taking.  

[Rcal10]

6 minutes ago, mul21 said:

In all fairness, Brown has mowed down the Brewers in limited action.

So you would start Brown? I do see reasoning there. But I wouldn’t call him a good option based on his entire years body of work. He is an option among many iffy options. 

 

[Banks-Williams]

2 minutes ago, Rcal10 said:

And again, without any proof that whoever you wanted would have done better. The FACT is he doesn’t have a good choice. But he has to make one and hope that guy pitches well. 

I already showed the data:  Assad was pitching better than Boyd heading into the NLDS.  Plus, he was fully rested (5 days).  

Nobody can predict the future, but you can estimate it.  I said game was going to be a disaster. It was,  I also wrote here that game 2 was going to be a disaster.  It was.  I further wrote that the Cubs should win game 3 since Counsell didn’t have the opportunity to pick.  They won.  

I’m batting 1000.  Counsell is batting 0.  And I haven’t spent my lifetime in baseball.  Counsell has done so, but he still gets it wrong.  That tells you, he has bad judgment because it is not for experience lacking.  You can’t teach good judgment.  It is genetic, deep in the brain.  In short, Counsell can’t be fixed. He has to go.  

[Rcal10]

4 minutes ago, Banks-Williams said:

Assad, Rae, Taillon, Boyd, and Brown were all pitching better than Imanaga heading into the NLDS. 

And Assad, Rae, Taillon, and Brown were doing better than Boyd then too.  And Assad was fully rested and ready to go for game 1.  Why use the guy who is not fully rested and not pitching well?  That’s crazy risk taking.  

First, it’s Rea, not Rae. Amazing you like him so much and don’t even know his name or how to spell it. Next, Brown wasn’t pitching better than anyone the last few weeks of the season since he wasn’t even pitching. Tailon pitched on Thursday, so he wasn’t an option for either start. So it comes down to Assad or Boyd. And as I said numerous times, I agree with you that I would have done Assad. Didn’t like Boyd on 3 days rest. But that said, Boyd actually did well against SD in his short start. Pitching him on Saturday did line him up for normal rest today. I would rather have Boyd in Wrigley then in the road. Has he been held to game 2 he would have had to pitch game 5 on the road again. This is all the things Counsel has to consider when choosing a pitcher. Obviously it didn’t work. But it was no more risky then pitching Assad, who is a pitch to contract guy against a team who loves that sort of guy, since they make a lot of contact. Good chance Assad doesn’t fair much better and then we get Boyd in game two against the Brewers in Milwaukee. Don’t really like his chances there either. If Boyd is going to pitch I want it at home. The decision to start him in game 1 makes that possible today. 

[squally1313]

4 minutes ago, Banks-Williams said:

I’m batting 1000.  Counsell is batting 0.  And I haven’t spent my lifetime in baseball.  Counsell has done so, but he still gets it wrong.  That tells you, he has bad judgment because it is not for experience lacking.  You can’t teach good judgment.  It is genetic, deep in the brain.

this is cringiest post i've read on here in a long time

[Banks-Williams]

16 minutes ago, Rcal10 said:

So you would start Brown? I do see reasoning there. But I wouldn’t call him a good option based on his entire years body of work. He is an option among many iffy options. 

 

I said I would have started Brown on game 4 or 5. I would not have started Imanaga. Either he or Soroka would have been pulled ftom the roster.  I would have started Assad game 1.

[Banks-Williams]

9 minutes ago, Banks-Williams said:

4 minutes ago, squally1313 said:

this is cringiest post i've read on here in a long time

I don’t know what “cringiest” means or if it is even a word … but what I wrote is factual.  
Not only does Counsell have terrible judgment, but he also lacks honesty. He  takes no responsibility for his poor decisions on games 1 and 2 but instead blames the players. He says they need more hits, and that they’ve got to put pressure on the Brew’s defense.  

[Sammy Sofa]

5 minutes ago, Banks-Williams said:

I don’t know what “cringiest” means or if it is even a word … 

[squally1313]

38 minutes ago, Banks-Williams said:

I don’t know what “cringiest” means or if it is even a word … but what I wrote is factual.  
Not only does Counsell have terrible judgment, but he also lacks honesty. He  takes no responsibility for his poor decisions on games 1 and 2 but instead blames the players. He says they need more hits, and that they’ve got to put pressure on the Brew’s defense.  

yeah dude, keep talking about you, genetically, have better judgment than craig counsell. very normal stuff, you're doing great. 

[Transmogrified Tiger]

2 hours ago, Banks-Williams said:

Heading into the NLDS, Assad was pitching better than Boyd. So too were Rae and Taillon.  Assad also was fully rested.  

If you are willing to look at data going back a full year, why not go back 2 or 3 years?  Assume you own two cars, the first one has been running fine for the past year but is now giving you troubles.  You have a second car that you’ve started to drive and it is running real good, plus nobody else has driven it in recently, whereas others have been driving the first in the past 3 days.

Both you and Counsell would take the first car on the cross country trip. In fact, you’d take the first car even after knowing it would break down.  In contrast, I’d opt for the second car and I’d probably do much better than you in my trip across the country.

Expanding the time horizon does not make Assad or Rea a definitively better choice than Boyd.  Baseball is a game full of noise and we constantly overrate the thing that happened most recently as the new norm.  Pitching Boyd on short rest is not ideal, pitching worse pitchers who also have concerns about their sharpness is also not great.  You can think Assad or Rea were a better option, that’s not unreasonable.  What is unreasonable is carrying on about how obviously horrific a decision it was and how it single handedly lost the game.

[Rcal10]

32 minutes ago, Transmogrified Tiger said:

Expanding the time horizon does not make Assad or Rea a definitively better choice than Boyd.  Baseball is a game full of noise and we constantly overrate the thing that happened most recently as the new norm.  Pitching Boyd on short rest is not ideal, pitching worse pitchers who also have concerns about their sharpness is also not great.  You can think Assad or Rea were a better option, that’s not unreasonable.  What is unreasonable is carrying on about how obviously horrific a decision it was and how it single handedly lost the game.

This! 100% this.