squally1313
-
Posts
11,309 -
Joined
-
Last visited
-
Days Won
28
Content Type
Profiles
Joomla Posts 1
Chicago Cubs Videos
Chicago Cubs Free Agent & Trade Rumors, Notes, & Tidbits
2026 Chicago Cubs Top Prospects Ranking
News
2023 Chicago Cubs Draft Picks
Guides & Resources
2024 Chicago Cubs Draft Picks
The Chicago Cubs Players Project
2025 Chicago Cubs Draft Pick Tracker
2026 Chicago Cubs Draft Tracker: Picks & Bonuses
Blogs
Events
Forums
Store
Gallery
Everything posted by squally1313
-
Sarcasm? Not really? We might be run by Machiavelian turds willing to win regardless of any kind of ethic, but at least we aren't telling female reporters "horsefeathers you lady! This wife beater kicks ass in all the right ways." I think that is a worthy distinction. No, we're just trading for them and picking up their options. Trust me, those actions speak way louder. Edit: Also, please reconcile these comments with your comments in the General Baseball chat.
-
At the risk of bringing in too much overlap from the Politics thread...100% agree on this take.
-
Not bad. Besides when I was actually watching the game, I don't think I could have told you the sequence of events that led to Michale McDonald or whatever his name is in the last AB. I think the whole Javy bunt strikeout rage probably blocked it from my memory, but good for JHey to contribute to the actual game, not just the locker room.
-
Yeah, on a positive lighter note, it'll be interesting to see if he can find creative ways to use Ohtani. On a much more important darker note, this Skaggs situation could turn into a huge mess. I'm guessing there's a good amount of work being done behind the scenes to keep this out of the headlines during the playoffs.
-
I think it’s generally accepted they were juiced for all of 2018 and 2019, they possibly were here for all of 2017 and if they weren’t they came in some time during the year. I'm going from hazy memory and selective interpreting the data, but my thinking is that launch angle focus is responsible for a general lift in HR rate, and the juiced ball added some on top of that in 2017 and 2019 in particular. I thought about launch angle as well, and then concluded that that would just lead to more fly balls, rather than an increase in HR/FB. But FB rate is actually lower in 2019 than it was in 2010, while HR/FB rate has almost always increased, so probably something to that. Worth pointing out that 2018 actually had a lower HR/FB rate than 2017.
-
I don't know the general consensus for when these new balls came into play. The HR rate has been steadily increasing over the last 10 years (with a couple blips) due to a variety of factors, but the biggest jump was from 2018 to 2019 (12.7% to 15.3%). If it's just this year, then Quintana's HR rate jumping three years ago doesn't really give me a lot of comfort. Hendricks isn't a huge concern given his overall performance. He talked about throwing up in the zone more often this year, and based on my limited knowledge, I would think that might lead to more fly balls/home runs, with the idea being that overall you get weaker contact. His HR/FB rate going down from 14.8% to 12% to 10.4% the last three years (potentially) backs that up. I agree that Darvish's spiked, though it went down in the second half if he puts it together. Not super concerned if he can continue the huge K/BB ratio...Verlander and Cole were both top 15 in HRs allowed this year and it didn't seem to bother them much.
-
Same argument, but in reverse. It's going to help starters on every team. Looking at the lack of a 'boost' for our main guys and attributing it to 'well they just hit no doubters regardless' and then just expecting a regression for everyone else except them is not really an approach I want anyone making decisions to take.
-
Yeah, but the question is whether this is a Cubs specific thing or not. It's nice to think that all of Schwarber's home runs are no doubters, but he also blew past his career high, and I remember a lot more opposite field shots from him this year (again, anecdotally). Something like average fly ball distance would be a good start, and maybe some Statcast expert can figure that out (I couldn't). The best would be if someone took one of those spray chart gifs and figured out a way to multiply all the distances by 1.1 or whatever, and then overlayed Wrigley, kinda like how we saw when Castellanos came over. But that's a whole project. Ultimately, I'm weary on thinking this will be some Cubs specific benefit if they go back to the old ball. Ignore it, everyone uses the same thing, figure out ways to make the team better.
-
Do we actually know that this whole ball thing hurt the Cubs offense more than other teams? I know the general theory, that guys like Schwarber, Bryant, Baez hit longer home runs than the average player, but I'm wondering if that's a team wide thing, and if it's more selective memory (people remember the bombs and think every HR they hit is 440, while filtering out all the basket shots). It'd be nice if it was true, but seems...hopeful.
-
Honestly, I think the complete opposite. Free agency has been particularly unkind to guys in their mid 30's lately, so Rendon's not going to want to sign a deal like that and hit FA again at 35. He is most likely going to geta contract that could be his last, 8-10 years in the 30 per year neighborhood. There's an outside chance he does something short at a crazy AAV, like 4/150, but until we actually see one I'm growing increasingly skeptical that the Dodgers are actually offering these. I happened to read an article about Howie Kendrick in the last couple of days where Rendon was quoted as saying that he doesn't want to be playing baseball when he's Kendrick's age (36). Maybe he was just poking fun at Kendrick, but if he was serious a deal that takes him to age 35 might be exactly what he looks for. Friend of a friend works for Boras and passed along something similar. Rendon doesn't really like baseball that much, is just looking for a shorter term deal that is going to set him/family up for generations. Something like a 4/160 deal might not be out of the question.
-
Well yeah, those last two guys are dead.
-
The ideal usage of Schwarber is starting only against RHP, with a platoon partner who kills lefties. The issue with that is that Heyward needs a platoon partner even more, and somehow getting two pretty much wrecks any flexibility you have. If Bote can turn into someone who OPSs in the mid 800s against lefties, then KB can be one of those guys. But that's far from a guarantee.
-
There's a real part of me that wants to build a 6 run per game offense and just kinda figure it out as we go along with the pitching and defense 1B - Rizzo 3B - Rendon RF - Bryant LF - Schwarber SS - Javy C - Willson 2B - Happ CF - Nico BN - Vic, Bote, Heyward, Descalso, Kemp Would Happ in CF and Nico at 2b be better? I’m on board with platooning Happ/Hoerner/Heyward between CF and 2B. Vs righties Heyward starts in CF with Happ and Nico splitting the starts at 2b. Happ in CF and Nico at 2B vs lefties. Does Hoerner have splits? Happ isn't very good against lefties. Better than Heyward, but still prefer him as the first guy off the bench/the guy getting 3 starts a week spelling 4-5 positions.
-
It's really unfortunate that Almora completely lost his one ability (hitting LHP), and Happ hasn't had it the last two years. Makes someone like Castellanos that much more valuable, but I still don't think you can justify spending limited resources there when you have a left handed version in Schwarber already on the roster. Without getting into the details, picking up a starter like Grey purely through prospects and the Happs/Botes of the world, and then using Contreras to find a legit starting RH outfielder would create a lot more flexibility out there. The other way to think about this is the option cubswin11 keeps pushing, which is just keeping Almora for that spot since he'll probably bounce back, and lefty mashing outfielder is possibly the easiest thing in the baseball world to find if not. That's fair, as much as I hate Almora. Schwarber at a .750 OPS with marginal defense and Heyward at .553 regardless of defense...neither are positives. Would be nice to see a bounce back from Bote against LHP too...makes it easier to let KB play a corner spot 30-40 times a year. Schwarber/Happ/Heyward should be fine against RHP, but against LHPs it gets ugly real quick.
-
Mostly because I looked at the bench and didn't like that the only lefty with pop was a catcher. Considering all 3 starting OF are LH in this scenario and Happ and Almora are both traded, I think you might be right that RH would be probably be preferable. It's really unfortunate that Almora completely lost his one ability (hitting LHP), and Happ hasn't had it the last two years. Makes someone like Castellanos that much more valuable, but I still don't think you can justify spending limited resources there when you have a left handed version in Schwarber already on the roster. Without getting into the details, picking up a starter like Grey purely through prospects and the Happs/Botes of the world, and then using Contreras to find a legit starting RH outfielder would create a lot more flexibility out there.
-
Overall I'm in, outside of having first heard of this Shogo guy about 3 hours ago. Out of curiosity, why do you prefer the outfield bat be left handed? Wouldn't it be more beneficial to get someone who can give Heyward and Schwarber days off against tough lefties?
-
Pitchers have hope of improving when they leave Colorado, plus he only has a one year commit. I know this is cutting down small sample sizes down even more, but he was actually worse away from home this year, once you notice that his BABIP went down 187 points (.397 to .210) from home to road. Ks went way down, HRs went up. He's fine as a means of picking up salary to facilitate a trade, but I don't think he can be relied upon for anything in a solid bullpen. Grey was actually worse on the road too, for what it's worth.
-
Is McGee just for salary purposes? Because he hasn't been good in two years. If you want to pick up salary, just grab Ian Desmond and let him crush lefties in left field.
-
So having two of them would be a good thing? And also in one more start and 14 more innings, Cole put up 4.1 WAR in the second half vs Yu's 2.5 WAR, so..."basically" is doing a lot of work there. Yu was great, and the most fun I've had watching a Cubs pitcher since Jake's run, but...Cole (and Verlander and Flaherty) was/were on a different planet.
-
Cubs Manager Search (Ross to be hired - Kaplan)
squally1313 replied to Cubswin11's topic in Chicago Cubs Talk
I loved getting mad at Maddon as much as anyone else here, because he made a lot of very dumb, wrong decisions. But it's hard for me to care much at all about who they end up, because looking around the league, it's going to be someone who also makes dumb, wrong decisions pretty much regardless of who it is. Hopefully it gets wrapped up quickly, and I'm hoping it's not Ross because I honestly want it to be someone as low profile as possible. -
Yeah, Schwarber as a full time outfielder putting up 2.5-3 WAR isn't all that exciting, both for us and for another team. He put up a .900 OPS against RHP and a .756 against LHP. You obviously can't eliminate all his PAs against LHPs, but it's safe to say most of his value came from his 486 PAs against RHP, and he got none or negative value in his 124 PAs against LHPs. If you can find someone to take those ABs, then you could be looking at 4-4.5 WAR from the left field spot, which is definitely appealing. Looking at left fielder stats against lefties, there are names like Jordan Luplow, Ian Desmond, Chris Taylor that could maybe serve that role. Of course, a player like that might be better served doing this with Heyward instead of Schwarber, so this all might be a moot point.
-
As a guy who's been suggesting Pivetta since Hammel left, I would much prefer him to Teheran. He's probably similarly attainable, so yes please. I have trouble believing the Rockies are moving Gray anymore but sure yeah, if the Cubs can land him then do it. I'm all about landing a post-hype guy like Gray. OTOH if the choice is between Alzolay/Mills and throwing a couple low minor arms or Tyson Miller for a year of a much more reliable BOR arm still in his 20s then yeah, Teheran please Let’s face it - don’t we already have enough guys in the rotation who are 4/5 in Q and Lester? Q was worth 3.5 WAR this year, even with his miserable September, which was good for 26th best in baseball. But yes, definitely, he's a 4th or 5th starter. On a related note, good luck to Aaron Nola and Clayton Kershaw, both guys who put up a lower WAR this year (in more innings) in their fight to make the rotation next year.
-
The only way he comes back is if someone wants to overpay for Schwarber to fill another position of need (every day second baseman, shut down reliever, etc). Outside of that, I loved watching Nick, but Kyle hit better than him during the time he wasn’t here, is a better defender, and will cost a fraction of what Nick does.
-
Hypothetically, where do you think all the revenue should go? The market has clearly shown that millions of people are willing to pay current ticket prices, cable subscriptions, food/drink prices, etc to watch major league talent. That money has to go somewhere. What do you think should happen to it? (It's Friday, I'm bored)
-
9/26: Cubs (Q) @ Pirates (Musgrove) 6:05 NBCSCH
squally1313 replied to Cubswin11's topic in Fred Hornkohl Game Thread Forum
He’s getting paid $10m to be a top 50 pitcher in baseball while the dude we traded for him struggles to hit a .300 OBP. I was hoping for better, but we’ve done far, far worse.