Aaron Kennelly

Strop was filthy tonight. And it was his heater that was the most filthy. 95 with that kind of movement? It looked like an Arrieta pitch.

I haven't read through the game thread yet, but I'm sure some people will concur that was a stupid game. Three runs, all on sac flies. Some stupid crap like the pitcher getting HBP after a bunt single, or an 0-2 HBP to lead-off an inning. Just really bad luck with sequencing. I was getting pissed off. I really liked how Joe managed that game, though. The difference between him and Dusty Baker is enormous and conspicuous. There's times I've questioned Joe's bullpen management. It's nothing too bad. I don't think he's bad at it or anything. There's just been a few times I've second-guessed him. You'll have that. And I may have (nearly certainly) been wrong anyway. But, I absolutely loved everything Joe did tonight. Kudos to him.

Great win! Nice to see Almora getting in on the fun.

12 runs and 5 homers and there is one out in the second.

Contreras is 2-2 with a double already. His average is at .357. Ho hum.

If you look at the Cardinals last year and their crazy high LOB%, it was unquestionably due to luck. They had a slightly above average defense and a merely good pitching staff. Their BABIP given up was .297. They were getting sequencing luck. We have been good at getting guys out in every situation imaginable. We have a great pitching staff and a great defense -- possibly the best in the league in both regards. And if you look at practically any way to measure what kind of contact pitchers give up, again, the Cubs are great. It's just not much of a concern at all. We really are great at every facet of baseball. As such, some things might look weird. But you can't declare it all due to luck. We're just really good. Some of it probably is luck, but I wouldn't even know how to go about quantifying how much of it is. And while we should expect some of these numbers to go up, they are still, most likely, going to be the best in the league.

Your concern is unfounded. While the BABIP should be expected to go up, we've been historically great. So we really have little reason to be concerned about anything, anyway. Also, the article mentions why were are so good at turning balls in play into outs. We have an amazing defense. And we are amazing at inducing weak contact. A lot of the stuff in that article I mentioned in my "Cubs and Weak Contact" article. But there were some things he didn't mention. He mentioned that we have a very low BABIP on fly balls and attributed this partly to having great outfield defense. And this is true. But I showed in my article that when our pitchers give up pitches that are hit in the air, they are giving them up at a high trajectory. They induce lazy fly outs. They give up fly balls at the second-lowest average exit velocity in the league, and they are getting them up in the air, and hit out to Jason Heyward. And that's not even what they are supposed to be good at. They are actually a bunch of ground ball pitchers. This is where we thrive. We give up a ton of ground balls that are hit at Addison Russell and Javier Baez. We will continue to maintain a really low BABIP and a really low LOB%. It probably won't be .250 or whatever. But it's going to be low. And it will probably historically low -- somewhere in the top 1-5% of all-time. We have a bunch of really great starting pitchers that don't often walk guys, don't often give up hard contact, and have a plethora of elite defenders surrounding them. This isn't a big issue.

I wonder if they're doing that in an effort to help him find his proper mechanics again. Or if that was the hook they used to get him to sign with us. Or if they seriously think they can Arrieta him. I like this, either way. Try to Arrieta him, and if it doesn't work he can still do the 'pen thing. And even if they aren't trying to Arrieta him, it gives us a longer look at him. And it might give him more opportunity to fix his ails.

Yay!

Good to see. His plate discipline has improved each month, to the point where he has been really great in that regard lately. And now he's starting to hit some, too.

Alright. Let's get to their 'pen and rain misery upon their fan base.

We still got this. Two dongs incoming in the 7th.

Dammit

Oh I can't wait to win this thing.

Addi!!!!!

Ian Rice homer for South Bend.

lol Zimmerman

lol Shields gives up a bomb to begin his second start.

At least he made him throw 8 pitches there...

43-19 ain't so bad.

We've got this. We're going to dong him multiple times.

Vogelbach had the night off on Saturday when I was there, which was disappointing. But, man, he's a big dude. It's not like he's a fat tub of lard, though. Granted, he is pretty fat. But he's got big, broad shoulders, and he's muscular. He's just got a big, strong upper half, a lot like Schwarber. I know, he's not anywhere near the athlete that Schwarber is or anything. And it probably doesn't mean anything, if he's just gonna DH. But, there is a distinction that can be made between just being fat and being big and strong. He's not as pudgy as he was when he was drafted. The highlight of the night for me was when the drunken idiot right behind me decided that he needed to start heckling people. He was yelling very loudly while Joey Gallo was at bat... "Hey batter, batter..." And then Gallo swung through a couple balls and his intensity and volume picked up, and then, "thwap," Gallo walloped one about 450 feet off the scoreboard in right-center. He shut up pretty quickly and everyone in our section turned and looked at him and several people began mocking him.

We are going to dong Scherzer to death again. The bats are about to get on a roll. Heyward's hitting. Rizzo and Bryant are donging. The Nats haven't seen anything yet.

That makes it an 18-game hitting streak. In which time, he's hit .389 with 7 doubles, 2 triples, 6 HRs, 22 RBI, 9 BB/16 K in 72 AB. I hope he's improving his framing, working with pitchers, game-calling and controlling his emotions because the Cubs (or any team for that matter) could use his bat, especially from the catcher's position. I was at the Iowa game on Saturday. As for controlling his emotions, there were two different Contreras PAs where the ump made a bad strike call. In the first one, Contreras was visibly frustrated and stepped out of the box to compose himself. It looked like he had a few words with the ump. The same thing happened on the other PA, and then there was a little kerfuffle as the ump had some words with someone in the Cubs' dugout, presumably the manager, Pevey. I was really impressed with the way Contreras plays, though. His playing style reminds me of Javy -- full throttle all the time. There was a game last week, when Len commented that Javy is looking to make a quadruple-play on every play. And that was basically Contreras, in a nutshell. He had one guy picked off at first, but the first baseman turned the wrong way and applied a horrible tag. He would have been out, if he had just dropped his glove straight down. Then, there were a couple other times Contreras thought about showing off his arm. For instance, after blocking a ball in the dirt, he hopped up looking to throw behind the runner at first. He was trying to insert himself into the action whenever possible. He wants to show off his arm. But, he wasn't reckless. He was just looking for opportunities. Contreras really impressed me on this one play, though. The bases were loaded with one out, and the hitter, James Jones, dropped down a bunt. It was a bad bunt and only rolled 5-10 feet out in front of the plate. It had a little English on it, though, and was rolling foul. Contreras got up quickly and fielded the ball right before it went foul, took a couple steps back and stepped on home plate and fired to first for a double play. The play wasn't too terribly difficult to make. But, he showed a good understanding of the situation -- surveying the field and making several plays flawlessly and in a short time frame. From my vantage point, it was unexpected to see the bunt, and I was concentrating on the ball and whether it was going to go foul or not, and I was wondering if Contreras should even field it. I wasn't even paying attention to the runner on third and had basically conceded the run in my mind. But, Contreras acted quickly, took charge, made the play and fired a rocket to first to nab the runner. And suddenly the inning was over, and I wondered how the hell all that happened so quickly. It seemed much easier than it should have been. At the plate, I was impressed, too. He's got a beautiful swing. And his approach is impeccable. He was patient, he showed a great great eye, and he jumped all over balls in the zone. It's a really smooth, effortless swing. He hit a double that jumped off his bat and sailed over the center fielder. He went back up the middle for a base hit. It was everything you'd hope to see from him. He also showed bunt in two ABs. I was like, "What the hell is this big masher doing, trying to bunt for a hit?" I wanted to see him swing the bat. But, looking back on it, what kind of catcher is confident enough in his athleticism that he thinks he can bunt for a hit? A badass catcher, that's who. As for his receiving, he looked fine to me. He shows a nice target and presents a soft, easy landing. Nothing herky-jerky. He looked smooth back there, like an actual catcher. There were a number of close calls that he didn't get, though. Maybe it's a byproduct of Iowa's pitching sucking. Or maybe he's just not good at framing. There's a difference between receiving and framing. There's an art there. A sleight of hand is required. Maybe he just is unable to sell things. I couldn't really tell very well from my vantage point. I remain hope that he can at least be not-horrible at framing once he gets a chance to work with some better pitchers and receives some more instruction and guidance from guys like Ross and Montero. Everything else looks fine with his defense. As for the other guys, I liked Zagunis a lot. He's got a thicker frame than I imagined. He hit the ball pretty hard, too. It's a nice, quick line drive swing. He runs well. Jeimer looked good at the plate, too. Great approach, nice-looking swing. Aaron Brooks was sitting 90-92 with the fastball. His command was off-and-on. He looked really good in the first inning. And then he had a little trouble finding the zone later on. He was able to get some ground balls. But he had one pitch that did him in, when a guy barreled one up for a three-run homer. I thought Brooks looked alright, overall, though. He just wasn't consistent with his stuff. Armando Rivero came in and looked really impressive in the 8th. His fastball was 93-94, and mostly was at 94. He blew some high heat past a guy. He was able to locate well. And he showed a really nasty, heavy slider. He looked really impressive in mowing guys down in the 8th. His command wasn't as good in the 9th, though, and he wasn't able to get his fastball up to 94 as often, and he looked completely different.

Javy!