Bertz
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Everything posted by Bertz
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You can't totally close the book on him or Casey Mize, but it's wild how little the two of them have done. Both were in the tier below Prior/Price/Strasburg as draft prospects and even setting aside injury it has not played out how it's supposed to to this point.
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I believe the last update on Steele was that he would be "facing live hitters before the end of the next homestand." That's vaguer than I'd like but I take that to be a sim game this weekend or early next week. From there you figure he needs 2-3 rehab starts? So I think the over under is basically that off day on May 9th following the stretch of 16 straight. I think outside of team context he'd probably rejoin the team for that road trip after, but given how banged up the team is already and how that stretch is probably only going to make it worse they might cut a corner and have him only do two rehab outings.
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The Cubs went 4-3 on the road without their ace during this stretch?
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Look at the opponent's starting pitchers from the last 7 games
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Huge win. Cubs have locked in at least 6-6 during this gauntlet 12 game stretch. Also as one of the people who first raised the alarm about Keegan, if he's sitting almost 95 and throwing strikes that's the whole game. I won't trust him for a bit longer yet but last night is exactly what it would look like if he was officially back. And man the pen could use it.
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In-division games start May 10th and in-division games that actually matter (i.e. not the Pirates) start two weeks later on May 24th. So the optimistic but still realistic timeline has you getting Steele back shortly before the former and Suzuki back shortly before the latter? ETA: Well horsefeathers I missed a Brewers series the first week of May on my first pass so I guess nevermind to the above
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It is indeed Seiya. And obliques are never a minimum stint so presumably put Seiya's ETA in line with Steele's?
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These obviously relate to the next series but I'm going to post them here We do draw Luzardo, but otherwise this Marlins series looks about as opportune timing wise as you could possibly draw up.
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If it is Suzuki hopefully it's just letting him DH for a ~week to get off his feet as opposed to an IL stint.
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So, Michael Busch might be pretty good at baseball
Bertz replied to Brock Beauchamp's topic in Chicago Cubs Talk
It's unreal, he has been more or less a perfect hitter. Even the little bit of blue on his page isn't bad. His in zone contact rate is ~77th percentile while his out of zone contact rate is 21st. That's exactly what you want! Unless you're a slap guy you don't want to make a lot of out of zone contact because that's generally weak contact. And the strikeouts are mainly because he's working deep counts (4.5 pitches per PA). Obviously pitchers will adjust, and he's been almost completely shielded from LHP to this point, but just an incredible story. -
The Cubs face a run of lefties coming up and Morel's looking less shaky at 3rd, so bringing someone up for Mastro makes sense. But the fact that it's not Wisdom has me a bit worried about an injury we don't yet know about.
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Alzolay, Neris, Leiter, and Almonte are all presumably down tonight. So if we want a W here the offense likely needs to bludgeon a very good SP in Kelly.
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This is reassuring. The Cubs play 23 games in the next 24 days and at best get Justin Steele back right at the very end. Having some additional depth at Iowa is a very good thing. Also makes it a little easier to make the Brown or Wesneski in the pen decision more purely on their merits as pitchers.
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Dont know that I like this.Didn't things fall apart with the Mets because he didn't want to go to AAA? I'd love him at Iowa but not the big league club.
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Minor League Discussion & Box, 4-14-24
Bertz replied to CaliforniaRaisin's topic in Cubs Minor League Talk
I really hate swinging my opinions too much on such small samples but damn if I'm not just about here too -
Bullpen was due a game like this. Their ERA coming into today was more than a half run higher than their peripherals. Today wiped out more than half of that gap but they're still a little in the red luck-wise. But yeah 2/3 this series is huge. Now even a sweep in AZ and you exit the toughest stretch of the year at .500 (please don't get swept though?).
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Minor League Discussion & Box, 4-14-24
Bertz replied to CaliforniaRaisin's topic in Cubs Minor League Talk
You probably have to push Shaw to Iowa right? Like it's less than 30 PA's but he's got an OPS north of 1.500 with even Ks and BBs as I type this. -
First off, the above was probably a little much so apologies there for coming in hot. But Tauchman has been fantastic this year so my supposition is that you are basing your evaluation entirely off of batting average and (lack of) RBIs. Tauchman is seeing more than 5 and half pitcher per plate appearance thus far, which is an insane level of grinding. Anything north of 4 is usually elite over a full season and Tauchman's miles pasy that. That grinding has gotten him to a .419 OBP. He's had 4 games getting on base multiple times and only one game this year he hasn't gotten on at all. Like yeah he's not a huge power threat but this is absolutely ideal bottom of the order production.
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Have you watched a single game this year or checked a single box score?
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I don't think they do a six man rotation, but I do expect Brown to make two, maybe three more starts before getting sent back down. Barring additional injury of course: - He's clearly going to make his next scheduled start on Tuesday, that's too early for Taillon’s return to impact anything - Brown shifts to the pen for the Marlins series - After the Marlins series, the team has an off day and then a stretch of 16 straight without another. I don't expect a full on 6 man rotation, but I do expect Brown to make 1-2 starts in there - After that next off day on 5/9 Steele's ETA is probably pretty imminent so I expect Brown to go back to Iowa and get on a schedule to manage his innings
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I think it's a couple things - I've talked about this before but I think because his sparkling ERA is very clearly built on luck, fans think he's bad actually. But you can be good and lucky at the same time, that's how Blake Snell won his Cy last year - Assad's peripherals were actually kind of bad his first few months in the big leagues. Last June his peripherals started picking up in the pen and in August/September they mostly held up in the rotation - Assad was a pure org guy until his velo spike in 2022, and even then I think the expectation was something in the Alec Mills neighborhood before he had a second velo spike last year. Not to get too far into Tom territory but sometimes prospect rankings do unfairly shape expectations
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To this point in the series the Mariners' bats have been true to their YTD form and been pretty solid against lefties while being pathetic against righties. Even though Castillo is a capital A Ace this game might not be totally out of reach?
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This definitely seems true. I'll also say I might be missing one but I don't think he's had a bad play since Colorado? I wonder if he was nervous about a short leash and after Counsell kept riding him after about as bad an opening week as possible he's relaxed.
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I imagine with Taillon they'd like to get him one more rehab start but it might kind of depend on how the pitching holds up the next few days? And Wisdom started for Iowa today so despite my wondering earlier imagine he's waiting to rejoin the team in AZ as well.
