If There's No Major Upgrade...Can We Win The Wildcard?

[Transmogrified Tiger]

The Cubs are 13-18 against .500 and > teams in the NL*. That is not so good. They can beat up the Pittsburgh and Dodgers of this year, that doesn't make them good, only medicore.

 

Note: I didn't include Bos, NY, or the W. Sox (if I had the numbers would be much worse)

 

I'd be interested to see what other NL teams did against .500 and > teams. I recall looking this up last year when the same argument was made, and found that most good teams(the Cubs included) hovered around the same level against good teams. I think I'll check it out.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

Here it is, all the teams .500 or better and how they've fared against each other.

 

 

	W	L	Pct.
CHI	13	18	0.420
Atl	32	24	0.570
Fla	23	31	0.430
NYM	27	26	0.510
Phi	26	29	0.470
SD	12	5	0.710
StL	9	12	0.430
Was	24	22	0.520

 

The Cubs have the worst percentage among the teams, but several teams are very close, and the Cubs have played fewer games than many. San Diego is by far the best, but has played only 17 games against that competition, having not faced NY, Philly, or Washington. Based on this smaller sample, most good teams in the NL are around .500, with more slightly below. I'll do last year's numbers and see if they are like I remember.

 

EDIT: ESPN doesn't have last year's grid anymore, rats.

[jjgman21]

 

The Cubs are 13-18 against .500 and > teams in the NL*. That is not so good. They can beat up the Pittsburgh and Dodgers of this year, that doesn't make them good, only medicore.

 

Note: I didn't include Bos, NY, or the W. Sox (if I had the numbers would be much worse)

 

the Cubs are 5-7 against those three AL teams.

 

what's funny about this is that in late may we all talked about how the Cubs had 32 of 36 (or something close) consecutive games against .500+ teams. now we have only played 43 total games against .500+ teams.

 

this kind of makes my point. the Dodgers were 3-4 games above .500 before the Cubs played them. so should they count? just throwing some numbers out, but let's say Houston, Milwaukee and Toronto go 4-2 over the next week while AZ goes 5-1; Florida and the Mets go 3-4; and Philly 2-5.

 

all of a sudden, in the course of one week, the number of games played against .500 teams and the Cubs record against them could change drastically. this year in particular, the teams that are above .500 and those below can change in a heartbeat.

 

looking at how a team does against .500 teams is really a useless measure of how a team performs.

 

but on the same subject, considering we were running out injured Wood, spring Maddux, and a mixture of Mitre, Koronka, Dempster, Leicester, and Rusch (seemed to lose it after his CG) to start many of those games, should we have expected any better? should we really be beating the team up for not doing better against those teams when the strength of the team, its starting pitching, wasn't even playing?

[JC]

should we really be beating the team up for not doing better against those teams when the strength of the team, its starting pitching, wasn't even playing?

 

During the recent 8 game losing streak, the following pitchers lost:

 

Maddux

Prior

Williams

Mitre

Wood

Maddux

Prior

Novoa

 

Since the high water mark of June 11 when the Cubs were 6 games over .500, they have lost 18 times, 8 of which are accounted for above. The other losses can be attributed to Maddux x 2, Mitre x 2, Rusch x 2, Zambrano, Remmy, Koronka and Ohman.

 

I don't see an inordinate number of losses coming from Wood/Prior fill ins. You are going to expect losses from bullpen guys like Ohman, Remmy, etc. Rusch and Mitre were slated to be #5/ML pen guys anyway, so I don't necessary consider them "fill ins". Blaming the Cubs poor play during that stretch on injuries to starting pitching doesn't persuade me.

[mul21]

should we really be beating the team up for not doing better against those teams when the strength of the team, its starting pitching, wasn't even playing?

 

During the recent 8 game losing streak, the following pitchers lost:

 

Maddux

Prior

Williams

Mitre

Wood

Maddux

Prior

Novoa

 

Since the high water mark of June 11 when the Cubs were 6 games over .500, they have lost 18 times, 8 of which are accounted for above. The other losses can be attributed to Maddux x 2, Mitre x 2, Rusch x 2, Zambrano, Remmy, Koronka and Ohman.

 

I don't see an inordinate number of losses coming from Wood/Prior fill ins. You are going to expect losses from bullpen guys like Ohman, Remmy, etc. Rusch and Mitre were slated to be #5/ML pen guys anyway, so I don't necessary consider them "fill ins". Blaming the Cubs poor play during that stretch on injuries to starting pitching doesn't persuade me.

 

But how many of those games were lost because the bullpen had been used up because of a poor start the day before? You have to take into account the overall toll that the big guns being out took on the staff, not just who lost what games on what days.

[jjgman21]

should we really be beating the team up for not doing better against those teams when the strength of the team, its starting pitching, wasn't even playing?

 

During the recent 8 game losing streak, the following pitchers lost:

 

Maddux

Prior

Williams

Mitre

Wood

Maddux

Prior

Novoa

 

Since the high water mark of June 11 when the Cubs were 6 games over .500, they have lost 18 times, 8 of which are accounted for above. The other losses can be attributed to Maddux x 2, Mitre x 2, Rusch x 2, Zambrano, Remmy, Koronka and Ohman.

 

I don't see an inordinate number of losses coming from Wood/Prior fill ins. You are going to expect losses from bullpen guys like Ohman, Remmy, etc. Rusch and Mitre were slated to be #5/ML pen guys anyway, so I don't necessary consider them "fill ins". Blaming the Cubs poor play during that stretch on injuries to starting pitching doesn't persuade me.

 

so who gets the W and who gets the L is indicative of who the loss can be blamed on? I mean never mind that on June 23 the Cubs kept getting and extending the lead, and Rusch kept giving it right back up. Rem took the L, so it wasn't Rusch is exonerated, right?

 

I wasn't speaking only about post June 11. I was speaking about the record against .500+ teams over the course of the entire year, but since you want to cut the sample size by two thirds:

 

specific losses against the .500 teams immediately following June 11

 

June 12 - blowup game by Rusch against Boston

June 13 - blowup game by Koronka against the Marlins

June 15 - blowup game by Maddux against the Marilins

June 17 - blowup game by Z against the Yankees

June 18 - blowup game by Rusch against the Yankees

June 19 - blowup game by Mitre against the Yankees

June 24 - blowup game by Mitre against the White Sox

 

5 out of 7 losses directly attributed to fill in starters.

 

between June 12 and June 30, the Cubs lost 10 games. they also gave up 8 or more runs in 9 of those games, 6 in the other. Wood and Prior combined for exactly 2 starts in that stretch of games, both Ws. you really don't see the fill-in starting pitching as an issue in this stretch, eh?

 

you can slice it and dice it anyway you want, but we're not the same team without our big three going.

 

as for the eight game losing streak, the starting pitching admittedly wasn't bad. then again, we had Wood, Prior, Z with the only aweful start in that stretch being one of Prior's.

 

of course the biggest problem was the offense, but our two worst OBP guys batting 1-2 is no longer an issue. the bullpen was a bit of a problem as well during that stretch, but part of that could probably be attributed to the use and abuse when our staff wasn't averaging more than 5 innings per start. between the great starts v. Fla, the all star break, and more innings eatten by starters v. Pitt, hopefully they are rested and more effective because of it.

 

I know you have a problem with people making excuses, but the bottom line is, when you don't have the services of 3-5 of your best players, I don't care what sport you are talking about or what team, you aren't going to be nearly as successful.

[JC]

should we really be beating the team up for not doing better against those teams when the strength of the team, its starting pitching, wasn't even playing?

 

During the recent 8 game losing streak, the following pitchers lost:

 

Maddux

Prior

Williams

Mitre

Wood

Maddux

Prior

Novoa

 

Since the high water mark of June 11 when the Cubs were 6 games over .500, they have lost 18 times, 8 of which are accounted for above. The other losses can be attributed to Maddux x 2, Mitre x 2, Rusch x 2, Zambrano, Remmy, Koronka and Ohman.

 

I don't see an inordinate number of losses coming from Wood/Prior fill ins. You are going to expect losses from bullpen guys like Ohman, Remmy, etc. Rusch and Mitre were slated to be #5/ML pen guys anyway, so I don't necessary consider them "fill ins". Blaming the Cubs poor play during that stretch on injuries to starting pitching doesn't persuade me.

 

But how many of those games were lost because the bullpen had been used up because of a poor start the day before? You have to take into account the overall toll that the big guns being out took on the staff, not just who lost what games on what days.

 

No, you don't. The assertion is that the Cubs have underachieved of late due to injuries in the rotation. They have suffered 18 losses, 9 of which occurred after Prior and Wood had returned from injuries. Maddux's other loss since June 11 was a 15-5 game in which he gave up 7 runs in about 4 innings. Zambrano lost 9-4 when he had nothing. Remmy and Ohman took losses when Z and Maddux had started and worked 5.1 and 5 innings, respectively. (Maddux's five inning stint shouldn't be unusual.)

 

That accounts for 13 of the 18 losses. Then, you have 5 losses by Koronka(1), Mitre(2), and Rusch(2), one of whom would have been the fifth starter anyway.

 

Thus, at most, the injuries to starters accounted for 3 losses during that stretch since June 11. Even so, the expectation that your rotation will remain intact throughout the season isn't a reasonable one.

[goonys evil twin]

Can they? Sure they can. Anybody can. The problem is their chances won't be very good if they don't improve the team. They've proven for quite some time that they are basically a .500 team, +- a series or two. Even if they don't get anybody new, they're going to have to play much better the rest of the the way in order to get a record that would compete for the wild card. At just 1 over .500 right now, they'll have to play .620 ball, 17 games over .500, to win 90 games this season. And they'll have to hope another wild card team falters a bit, because two NL East teams are on pace for more than 90 wins already, and another is closer than the Cubs.

 

You'd have to receive some tremendous good luck in order to turn a .500 team into a .620 team overnight. It'll take more than just Wood and Prior getting healthy. It'll take more than just Lee and Ramirez staying hot. They'll need Hollandsworth to play more like his June and July than his April and May. And it'll take Barrett figuring out how to maintain his recent plate approach. It'll take stronger bullpen performances than what we've seen year-to-date as well.

 

It'll require players who have been on the team all year playing better than they did in the first half. Who knows if they will. It's happened before, but what usually happens is teams play as expected, or pretty close, and nobody was predicting this team to be a .620 team when healthy in the preseason, so I don't see how they can expect it now.

 

Just like I said going into the season, it's negligent to go into a season expecting everything to go your way. You have to build your team to be able to withstand setbacks. Similarly, you can't just expect everything to go your way in the second half just because you feel you've had the worst luck in the first half. They could stand pat and still contend, but they're chances will go up if they improve the team. And if they can improve the team for 2005 and beyond, they absolutely must.

[LoneStarCubFan]

Washington's on the way to a massive second half collapse.

 

Florida is already in sell mode and may be canning McKeon.

 

Philly has the only manager in the NL dumber than Dusty.

 

The wildcard is coming out of the Central. And it won't be the Brewers.

[jjgman21]

The assertion is that the Cubs have underachieved of late due to injuries in the rotation.

 

no it wasn't. the assertion was that the Cubs underachieved the entire year due to injuries. it was you who decided that the analysis needed to be arbitrarily confined to post June 11, for what reason I have no idea.

 

however, looking at how the starting pitching performed from about June 12-24 compounding the over use do to poor starting pitching earlier in the year, it is not unreasonable to attribute some of our lack of success during the eight game losing streak to wear and tear on the bullpen caused by prior overuse.

[goonys evil twin]

The assertion is that the Cubs have underachieved of late due to injuries in the rotation.

 

no it wasn't. the assertion was that the Cubs underachieved the entire year due to injuries. it was you who decided that the analysis needed to be arbitrarily confined to post June 11, for what reason I have no idea.

 

however, looking at how the starting pitching performed from about June 12-24 compounding the over use do to poor starting pitching earlier in the year, it is not unreasonable to attribute some of our lack of success during the eight game losing streak to wear and tear on the bullpen caused by prior overuse.

 

I don't think it's fair to blame those struggles on an overworked bullpen. Really, only Wuertz was overworked. It's hard to overwork an entire pen when they've had 7 or 8 guys down there all year. The Cubs bullpen has pitched the 4th fewest innings this season, and are in the top half in bullpen ERA.

 

If the Cubs underachieved the first half due to injuries, it wasn't by much. They were over .500 when their more important injured players returned to health. Plus, it's their own fault for going into a season with so many already injured, perpetually injured, or likely to be injured players on the team.

 

I think underachieve is the wrong word for the team. I believe, given the limitations put on them by their own personel decisions, as well as the self defeating strategies employed on game day, they've performed pretty close to expectations.

[JC]

The assertion is that the Cubs have underachieved of late due to injuries in the rotation.

 

no it wasn't. the assertion was that the Cubs underachieved the entire year due to injuries. it was you who decided that the analysis needed to be arbitrarily confined to post June 11' date=' for what reason I have no idea.[/quote']

 

 

You had said earlier that "looking at how a team does against .500 teams is really a useless measure of how a team performs." You had also indicated that the team's poor record against +.500 teams was due to the injuries to the starting staff.

 

I then chose June 11 as a starting point because at that time, both Wood and Prior were injured and the Cubs had completed a run to reach their high water mark of 6 about .500. At that point, I took a look at exactly how devastating the injuries to the starting staff were to the team. I found little evidence that the bullpen was the primary reason for the 18 losses they had suffered during that time period.

 

however, looking at how the starting pitching performed from about June 12-24 compounding the over use do to poor starting pitching earlier in the year, it is not unreasonable to attribute some of our lack of success during the eight game losing streak to wear and tear on the bullpen caused by prior overuse.

 

Again, with the starting pitchers putting the team in the hole in most of the losses since June 11, I see little evidence that an overtaxed bullpen was the culprit for only being a game over .500 on July 18. Perhaps you can demonstrate some specific instances which you believe are relatable to overuse.

[jjgman21]

alright, let's track this discussion.

 

yes, I did say "looking at how a team does against .500 teams is really a useless measure of how a team performs."

 

I went on to make a tangential point that maybe we shouldn't be so quick to judge the Cubs possibility of winning the wildcard based on how they have performed to this point because their starting staff has not been together

 

this caused you to go on some rant about what happened during the 8 game losing streak and since June 11 to make a point about not seeing "an inordinate number of losses coming from Wood/Prior fill ins". last I checked games in April and May count as much as games in June and July.

 

somebody else pointed out how not having our starting staff may have taxed the bullpen and lead to some lossses. contemporaneously I posted a message that pointed out how not having our aces lead to alot of losses post June 11, and at the same time made a mention of pen possibly being effected.

 

you responded to the other poster by inaccurately characterizing what I said in a previous post. I pointed out the inaccuracy, and concurred with the assessment of the bullpen.

 

which brings us to where we are now.

 

I then chose June 11 as a starting point because at that time, both Wood and Prior were injured and the Cubs had completed a run to reach their high water mark of 6 about .500. At that point, I took a look at exactly how devastating the injuries to the starting staff were to the team.

 

why? the original point was the difficulty in beating the good teams without your best players. I still don't understand why your analysis was limited to post June 11. if the staff was intact, maybe the Cubs are 12 games above .500 at that point.

 

I found little evidence that the bullpen was the primary reason for the 18 losses they had suffered during that time period.

 

make up your mind. was your analysis about fill in starters, or was it about the bullpen?? before it was clearly about the fill ins, and you were pretty much wrong about that as I pointed out earlier.

 

Again, with the starting pitchers putting the team in the hole in most of the losses since June 11, I see little evidence that an overtaxed bullpen was the culprit for only being a game over .500 on July 18.

 

I see you ignored where I said, "it is not unreasonable to attribute some of our lack of success during the eight game losing streak to wear and tear on the bullpen caused by prior overuse."

MY primary point about the bullpen was how it performed during the eight game losing streak.

 

and again, make up your mind. are you making a point about the pen or the fill ins? just wondering because the Cubs were 4-9 between June 11 and Prior's return. here you seem to be admitting that the fill-ins were "putting the team in a hole" where before you seemed to be arguing that the Cubs were fine without their aces and not having them had little to do with the teams struggles.

 

Perhaps you can demonstrate some specific instances which you believe are relatable to overuse.

 

seeing how this point was so completely tangential and minor in the scheme of these discussions, I don't really care to get into it. looking at it a little further, perhaps they have held up better than I thought, with alot of the damage during the eight game losing streak coming against Rusch and Mitre.

 

 

but back to the main point - I don't need to analyze or research a damn thing to know that the Cubs would have done better against .500+ teams, and .500- teams for that matter, had they had their starting staff intact all year. not only would they have actually been the starters for those games, they would have pushed Maddux back so he wouldn't have started 20 games already this year.

 

reasonable minds would generally tend to agree, unless of course they were on an endless search for things to p and moan about when it comes to the Cubs or simply interested in arguing minutae.

 

and back to the main point of the thread, I iterate that we don't need to add anything cuz our starting pitching as it is right now kicks butt. if we keep getting anything close to what we have seen lately, the wild card is ours (not that I wouldn't mind an addition).

 

Thank you for letting me set things straight.

 

jg

[CubinNY]

jjgman21 your logic is fascinating.

[wastra]

 

 

Philly has the only manager in the NL dumber than Dusty.

 

 

I think Lloyd McClendon might give them both a run for their money.

[JC]

Thank you for letting me set things straight.

 

jg

 

If you want to get something straight, recognize that your post is nothing but pompous hot air.

 

Your post was more about spin than setting any record straight. The thread speaks for itself. If I misread one of your posts and responded inaccurately, it is there for everyone to fairly see.

 

My posting history evidences that I don't try to manipulate people's posts. Your assertion that I ignored some aspect of your posts is garbage. I may have missed some point of yours, but I don't intentionally ignore points that detract from my points. If that is a tactic that you utilize, along with half-assed assumptions, please don't project those onto me. Your passive aggressive attack that I am unreasonable is likewise misplaced.