squally1313

Expanded rosters, seeming indifference to actually carrying a full set of healthy players....just let him suit up Saturday and get a PA or an IP.

Another day off tomorrow too, so this makes sense to me (in addition to what Bertz threw out last night). I don't know. I think the difference between Horton and Taillon starting a playoff game is so vast that you want to do everything you can to make sure he's healthy in 3 weeks. But I also think playing 3 games in Wrigley is much preferrable to playing 3 games in San Diego, so I understand some effort to keep pushing for wins. And obviously we can win with Taillon or lose with Horton or push Horton and have him stay healthy or Horton can blow his arm out in the first inning next week. Ultimately just trust the 'keep Boyd/Horton healthy' process because it's worked so far.

I mean, I had someone asking what their playoff odds were in this game thread.

To calm fears, over the last 10 games the cubs increased their lead on the padres, Mets, and reds. In those ten games, the giants made up 2 games on us. For them to pass us, they would need to make up 8 games in the final 18 games (and San Diego and NYM, again, playing worse than us, would also need to pass us)

Feel like anecdotally when Kelly has bad days he has very bad days

PCA OBP machine, obviously

I’m not watching too closely and I’m very aware they have much more advanced tracking mechanisms than just ‘how many innings has he thrown this year’…but he’s also maybe the most important player for the cubs to make a run in October so I’d prefer to lean on the cautious side with him whenever possible.

They are 99.6%

That’s pretty ugly from Nico, uncharacteristically

Tucker to the IL (retroactive to 9/6), Ballesteros up, not starting tonight, fairly normal lineup with Castro in RF.

Bored on a long call. September records: 2024 Dodgers 16-10 2023 Rangers 15-13 2022 Astros 18-8 2021 Braves 18-11 So....not really. But 3-4 on 9/9 leaves a lot of finishing possibilities. Here's a slightly dated article if we're trying to talk about the second half as a whole. https://www.mlb.com/news/worst-second-half-records-for-postseason-teams

Those are numbers since June 1. The league wide gap between xwOBA and wOBA is currently 11 points (xwOBA is higher), so pretty much every one of those guys above besides Tucker is theoretically not getting the results they deserve to an extent that is, sometimes pretty significantly, beyond league average. If you don't buy into this stuff, fine, to each their own. But also, the expectation doesn't need to be 'return to the historic stretch of production'....it can just be 'marginally better than the 84ish win pace they've produced during this stretch'. There's a middle ground there. Yeah, but if the rules are that the tallest guy in the room is the World Series champion, and those are the guys that show up, then the 5'10" guy gets a parade at the end of the year. And if you're making the argument that there are no 'great teams', whatever that means...maybe the grading scale is a little thrown off? We've both been here forever, do whatever you want but like...feel free to scroll right past my horsefeathers too then? Someone else called me out for thread copping or whatever, and so I wasn't even replying to anyone in the post that set you off. If people are 'allowed to overreact a bit' but I get called out for saying the 80-60 team playing .500 ball is not pathetic, trash, going to miss the playoffs, like....what are we doing here? The amount of vitriol, some of it increasingly gross lately, towards a team that we're all supposedly fans of pisses me off, I'm going to push back on it.

Seriously why is this guy still here

Palencia to the IL, Roberts up, PCA back in the lineup at clean up but DHing (Castro in center). Still no Tucker.

Some assorted thoughts: You weren't 'discounting' the first two months. You were ignoring them entirely with all the 84 win team talk (I've got 45-40 translating to 86 win team, but splitting hairs). Ignoring them because they were so historically good makes even less sense. They showed elite levels of production for two months. That absolutely holds some weight. If you had some all powerful/all knowing deity come down and tell you that this team was a true talent 84 win team, and then you told me that since June 1, they would have by far the biggest disparity, in a negative direction, between their xwOBA and their wOBA (no other team is above 20 points, we're at 27)....I would expect them to play a lot worse than at an 84 win pace? I mean, you could also argue that the statistic as a concept is some degree of flawed/worthless, obviously a different conversation, but setting that aside the Cubs are a pretty extreme outlier. Now you could argue we've been on the other side of that luck on the pitching side but I don't think there's any way to say it's been overall equal. And I've been very negative/critical of the pitching staff and the way it was assembled/wasn't supplemented at the TDL. But I also expected Boyd or Horton to go on the shelf by now, and every day is another day closer to the playoffs with them still penciled in for 2 of the 3 first round starts. We all bemoaned the concept of having to start Matt Shaw every day and not getting Suarez, and we've all seen what's happened since. Hitting can turn quickly. I'm sorry but the other teams still matter. Cubs are 45-40 since June 1. We're very likely to play the Padres in the first round, probably in a three game series all at Wrigley. The Padres are 46-41 since June 1. The Dodgers are 43-42 in that stretch. Theoretically by that measure they also 'don't have a legitimate reason to turn around'. The Brewers, historical stretch, discount/toss that out, 11-10 since the start of the 5 game Cubs series. I guess Phillies will just cakewalk? Because they've played 2.5 games better than us over a 2ish month stretch? The 2025 Cubs don't have to beat the 2016 Cubs to have success in the playoffs. They need to beat three or four similarly flawed teams in what are glorified coin flips. I get your point on the sample size, and I'm very aware 9 games or whatever is dumb. It was mostly reactionary in that every. single. loss becomes this referendum of 'see, I told you they were bad'. Every loss is 'horsefeathers pathetic' etc etc etc. But we've yet to have a truly bad stretch, which is something you can't say about any of the other teams. 90 win teams don't win 55% of their games every week. They get hot, they play mediocre, and ultimately that's where they end up.

Look man, I made one post today about how the 81-62 that is 10 games clear of a playoff spot is not a terrible team. There are dozens of negative posts from the same people (typically people that have showed up in the last two years) every time we give up a run. The guy who has like 100% negative posts and has called out Palencia for being mentally weak and Ben brown for ‘not putting in the work’ or whatever the ****** comment was, both totally baselessly, in particular set me off. the other teams absolutely matter because for the cubs to lose like so many people here are clearly waiting for with baited breath, other teams have to beat them. 90% of the complaints rehashed here can be applied to all the other playoff teams, and ultimately someone has to win here. the team absolutely has flaws, the trade deadline and the end of the offseason were botched in very critical ways, and the lack of pitching depth is probably going to die them in when we turn the ball over to Ryan brasier or whatever in the fifth inning of game 2. Losing 2/3 to the nationals while Tucker and PCA are pretty voluntarily out in a spot in the season where the leadership has clearly prioritized rest and health (because we’re more than comfortably in a playoff spot) is absolutely not an indictment of anything meaningful, and it certainly doesn’t mean the team is garbage and awful and has no chance of doing anything in the playoffs. 3 months is more relevant than 9 games, and 5 months is more relevant than 3 months.

Good call on the home stand, not sure what I was thinking on that. calling me out for sample size issues, big or small, and then cherry picking a sample size in bad faith in the same argument is a bad look. Also all these other teams suck too.

I think he’s sweet but he’s absolutely flawed, pitching wise. Team is like 4 pitchers short

The cubs have gone 5-3 on the brewers series home stand 5-4 on the road trip 5-4 on the latest home stand take any combination of those numbers, turn them into a winning percentage, multiply that winning percentage by 162, or look what all the other teams that we’re going to play in October and what they’ve done over that stretch, and maybe, just maybe, it’s going to be ok

This guy sucks so much

Guys we can’t hit any pitchers (except the pitchers we hit, those don’t count)

Ignore me, been drinking, am an idiot, cubs are still good

Jesus christ

9.5 up for making the playoffs, 4.5 up on home field in the first round, 5 back on Milwaukee (who's bullpen is quickly becoming a giant mess)