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It might be hard to believe, but Patrick Wisdom is one of the longest-tenured Chicago Cubs. The only current players who had appeared in a game for the Cubs before Wisdom’s two-plate-appearance cup of coffee in the shortened 2020 season were Ian Happ, Nico Hoerner, Adbert Alzolay, and, of course, Kyle Hendricks. If we want to get technical, David Bote, Brad Wieck, and (somehow) Carl Edwards Jr. are still around (or have come back around), but none of them have been big-league mainstays like Wisdom has, and I wouldn’t bank on any of them breaking camp with the big-league roster this year.
My thoughts on this are twofold: it’s crazy how quickly big-league rosters turn over, and that Wisdom is becoming something of a forgotten man on the 2024 iteration of the Chicago Cubs. This is a guy who posted 2.3 FanGraphs WAR in 106 games in what was his first full big-league season just three years ago.
In so many ways, it’s easy to see why he’s forgotten. Since that 2021 season, Wisdom has struck out 36.9 percent of the time. That is second-worst in all of baseball in that timeframe, with only Joey Gallo posting a higher strikeout rate. Wisdom is absolutely a flawed player.
On the other hand, his strengths are just as clear: When he does hit the ball, he hits the absolute snot out of it. In that same timeframe, his 16.1 percent Barrel rate is eighth in baseball, and his hard-hit rate of 40.1 percent is 11th. His isolated power is eighth-best in MLB. Wisdom has a special ability to hit the ball hard and out of the ballpark.
All of this brings us to the 2024 season, which is the furthest down the depth chart Wisdom has found himself since he’s been a Cub. Michael Busch is here to cover first base. The noise around Christopher Morel playing third base every day seems to be real. Nick Madrigal is still here, and I am sure Cody Bellinger will be seeing some playing time at first, as well. It’s possible that Wisdom is now the team’s third-best option at first and third base, his two primary positions. With so many other options, is there a way that the Cubs can deploy him to best suit his skills?
The obvious solution for a right-handed hitter would be to only put him into the lineup against left-handed pitchers. The issue with that would be that, last year, he actually hit righties better than lefties: he posted a 104 wRC+ against southpaws, and a 114 wRC+ against right-handed pitching. For his career, he has hit lefties better (a 119 wRC+ vs. a 102), but that still isn’t a massive gap, and he has actually struck out more against lefties than righties for his career. That doesn’t really give me confidence that he can be a guy who would crush left-handed pitching this season.
Interestingly, Wisdom saw more fastballs in the 2023 season than in any other season with the Cubs. According to Baseball Savant, 39 percent of the pitches he saw were four-seam fastballs, which was up from 32.2 percent in 2022. He slugged just .269 on the pitch, and was worth -13 runs when facing four-seamers--by far his worst figure against any individual offering. Looking at his wOBA on fastballs by zone from 2021-2023, it’s clear to see the hole in his swing:
If a pitcher can spot his fastball on the upper part of the zone, Wisdom basically becomes Jon Lester. Based on the number of four-seamers he saw last year, it would seem pitchers have caught on to this. Could Wisdom be deployed exclusively against pitchers who either don’t live up in the zone with their fastballs, or don’t throw their fastballs often?
Looking at a list of pitchers against whom Wisdom has hit well in the past, I’d say the answer is yes! Let’s look at three pitchers whom he’s hit well in his career, and whom the Cubs are likely to see this season.
Wade Miley throws his four-seamer just 21 percent of the time against righties. Wisdom has hit .250/.357/.583 off of him in 14 plate appearances. Miles Mikolas throws his four-seamer 24.6 percent of the time against righties. Wisdom has hit .273/.357/.545 in 14 plate appearances off of the veteran. Graham Ashcraft doesn’t even throw anything that classifies as a four-seam fastball on Baseball Savant. Of course, Wisdom also hit him well, to the tune of a .273/.333/.818 line in 12 plate appearances.
Are these cherry-picked numbers? Maybe! Wisdom has faced Corbin Burnes 15 times, who famously throws a lot of cutters and not a lot of four-seam fastballs, and only has one hit to show for it. To that, I would say, nobody hits Corbin Burnes well, and hey, that one hit was a home run! Also, this is not a perfect science. We are still dealing with very small sample sizes if we’re looking at his numbers vs. individual pitchers. Regardless, the hole in his swing against four-seamers up in the zone is clear to see.
There was some talk of the Cubs doing this with Wisdom last season, but I don’t think they executed it very well, and with Nick Madrigal in and out of the lineup with hamstring issues, Wisdom was probably pressed into more playing time than the team had initially anticipated. This season, though, with Busch in the fold, Morel playing third, Madrigal returning, and even Matt Shaw looking ready, I think the Cubs might finally have the depth to pull this off. If they can deploy Patrick Wisdom against pitchers who either aren’t comfortable working up in the zone with their fastball or don’t throw a four-seamer very often, I think he can become a very valuable part-time player.
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