Jump to content
North Side Baseball

squally1313

Old-Timey Member
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Posts

    11,046

  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    27

 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

  1. squally1313
    Yeah. I think everyone targeted this Mets series as the end of the gauntlet, and I don't think anyone would have wanted or predicted much better than 23-18 through that stretch. And we did that with pretty much nothing from Steele and not a whole lot from Shota besides some clutch pitching moments. It's really unfortunate we can't be at full strength for this next stretch because, yeah these teams suck, but historically so does Colin Rea, and Horton could be fun but you look through the top pitching prospects and how they're doing in the majors and its dire (Roki 4.72 ERA/6.17 FIP, Jobe 4.88 ERA/5.65 FIP, Dollander 7.71 ERA/6.54 FIP, Chase Petty has gotten rocked). Rea sucks, Horton/Boyd/Brown are different levels of restricted in terms of a full season worth of innings, and our only current length in the bullpen is Chris Flexen, who is probably the worst pitcher on the team. The offense very well might be enough, but they're going to have to beat up on bad pitching pretty consistently to pad their record the way that they should.
  2. squally1313
    Well there's some combination of the financial price tag and the prospect price tag, depending on the target being discussed. I think there's been some hesitancy in dipping into the AAA guys because the major league guys, over the course of the last couple seasons, simply haven't gotten it done yet, and I could understand the nervousness is trading the next wave to supplement this wave if this wave just isn't going to get there. In my head there's this long drawn out analysis centered around like, they need to decide if they want Tucker at $400m-$500m and a team set up to win this year and next or if they want Caissie and Alcantara and the financial freedom to build a different core. But ultimately I would simply like them to go 14-7 over these next 21 games against Col/Mia/Wash/CWS/Cincy, be sitting at 37-25 on June 5th with Shota being close to coming back, and force their hand into just going for it this year. They you pay the ransom for Mackenzie Gore, you do everything you can to lock in Tucker, you find a bullpen guy or two (or have Horton/Brown turn into that guy), and all the chips are on the table.
  3. squally1313
    Kinda jumping around on sides here, but the positive regression you'd expect is, in my opinion, going to be pretty offset by the fact that Steele and Shota aren't here. Horton is exciting but the track record of other top pitching prospects their first time up is not encouraging, Colin Rea is Colin Rea, we're one injury to the most injury prone dude in baseball away from Jameson Taillon being our ace for the near term future. Basically, in my mind: the offense is very good, PCA, Busch, and Nico are slightly outperforming their xwOBA but PCA and Busch even with a little regression are still elite players. Tucker, Dansby, Happ, Suzuki are all underperforming and have already been fine to great. Catchers are fine. The bullpen is bad, but all the talk around here that the Cubs are in this unique situation where we need to be nervous about close and late situations but everyone else is just nails is very over the top. The rotation is kinda shaping up to be a disaster, some part of that bad injury luck, some part of it self inflicted, a lot of which can be solved in an expensive way, and with knock on effects that would ease the bullpen problems. Go pay for a starter or two, as soon as possible.
  4. squally1313
    We don't have to admit that because it isn't true. The White Sox bullpen has been metrically worse, as has the Rockies, the Nationals bullpen has been worse by both basic and advanced stats, the Reds bullpen is 18th in fWAR compared to the Cubs being 21st. These are very bad teams in pretty much every facet of baseball. They will still win somewhere around 3 out of every 10 games, because that's how this works, but the Cubs are regressing from a very high watermark.
  5. squally1313
    BIG win
  6. squally1313
    Good for him. Let’s go win a baseball game.
  7. squally1313
    This is baptism by fire. And he’s going to shut down the white Sox next weekend.
  8. squally1313
    110 wRC
  9. squally1313
    Are you me
  10. squally1313
    Alec Mills erasure
  11. squally1313
    The Cubs averaging 5 runs a game in the Giants series, after averaging 5.3 runs a game in the Brewers series, after averaging 6.6 runs a game in the Pirates series, is technically yes trending down, but not at all portending a 'slump'. 5 runs a game gets you 810 over a season which would have been fourth in baseball last year. We were hitting at a borderline historic pace for the first month or so of the year (123 wRC, which would have been second best of any single season team in baseball since 2020). It's coming down to 'just' being a really good offense and we're having grouping/timing issues. It happens. To 1908's point: it's absolutely going to get worse than this. And that's fine, we had a really strong start and we have a really good opportunity coming out of the Mets series to pad the record (Miami, CWS, Miami, Cincy maybe without Hunter Greene, Colorado, Cincy, Washington). We need a starter, maybe two, and we need Shaw to provide some consistency at third (even if it's not a bunch of excess production). But I think the offense alone gets us to 85 wins and I think that probably is enough to win the division, so we have some cushion to identify the needs and the best solutions to optimize getting beyond just a playoff appearance.
  12. squally1313
    PHers have a wRC of 133 this year. In a DH world where you're limited to four bench bats, having a starter level bat (which Turner was, to be fair) isn't something that is a Cubs specific problem. It's the pitching. It was the pitching going into this year, and it's even more the pitching now in a post Steele world. We're second in offensive fWAR and 16th in pitching.
  13. squally1313
    Cubs Pitchers Throwing Less Than 20 Pitches In An Inning Challenge, Impossible
  14. squally1313
  15. squally1313
    Let Pomeranz start the 7th, Merryweather if there are any guys on once they get past Lee, hope that that and Hodge get you through 9. Could see Counsell waving the white flag if there are any more runs scored (kinda think he was half doing that with Flexen last night), but also not totally sure who the white flag pitcher is at this point.
  16. squally1313
    I'm team Keep Turner For Now, but I'd imagine it's a little harder to fight your way out of those slumps at one or two starts per week plus PH spots. But maybe I'm overthinking it/just playing devils advocate again.
  17. squally1313
    Stop walking the lead off guy. We're going to need at least 4 innings out of....Merryweather and someone?
  18. squally1313
    Correct. His Mom grew up in Alabama, which, I guess, but PCA spent the formative years of his life with his parents both starring on Heroes, which I can't imagine would be a very redneck-y lifestyle.
  19. squally1313
    10 innings in a row without an earned run going into last night. I mean, you might be right, you simply aren't going to be effective with this K rate. But it's 14 innings vs like 7 years of being a good to great reliever. And again, right now it's not 'is he going to be a good closer at any point this season'....it's 'is he more likely to turn into an effective contributor than Hollowell/Roberts/etc' with the added caveat that we get to keep those guys in the minors as future options whereas we don't get to keep Pressly. The money is spent, we can and should judge the signing, especially coming off Neris the year before and the general shortage of pitching we currently have. But that's a different decision than what we should do now.
  20. squally1313
    He has rich kid dbag vibes. The redneck squad is Brown, Steele, and Pressly.
  21. squally1313
    You thought the kid who grew up in southern california to two successful actors who went to a high school that cost $50k a year is a redneck?
  22. squally1313
    If we all agree to stop calling him the closer and instead call him the 7th man out of the pen, are you more ok with him sticking around a while longer?
  23. squally1313
    Going to really need a nice, long outing from Brown today. If we're trying to avoid relievers going three appearances in four days, you're already down Palencia, Thielbar, and Pomeranz, and would expect we're not going to see Pressly. Merryweather can go, Hodge and Keller pitched yesterday but could most likely go, Hollowell pitched over 30 on Monday but not last night so probably, and not sure if Flexen can go back to back like this. Brown looked great last time out, another one would be great. Otherwise it might get ugly.
  24. squally1313
    Yeah I mean, he might just suck! If he's hurt to the extent that they can only use him once a week and he hasn't effective before this, you'd think they would have gone down the IL route by now. The human element plays into it a little bit, he's had a long successful career these guys by nature have to be super confident in their abilities and would (maybe!) be hesitant to taking what he thinks is a phantom IL stint, especially after going a month without giving up an earned run. And if he's actually healthy, just bad, you probably don't want to set the precedent of abusing the phantom IL route, especially with a veteran player. Actually healthy/bad becomes where I think we've ended up, which is him being at the bottom of the totem pole but them making a calculated decision that he's at least somewhat likely to right the ship (or at least taking that chance outweighs the value of giving those minimal innings to Roberts/Hollowell in Chicago at maybe improved performance and benefit to their development).
  25. squally1313
    He was the sixth pitcher out of the bullpen last night. He had pitched twice in the last two weeks before last night, and the last time was the 9th inning of an 8-3 game. Before that was last Sunday. If you want to imply that Counsell trusts him in high leverage spots, why wasn't he pitching the ninth?
×
×
  • Create New...