While it's still technically early, and while the 2007 Cubs dug themselves a much deeper early hole, the 2009 season seems to be slipping through our fingers before it could really even get going. The Cubs have followed a season-high five-game winning streak - which brought them to 21-14 and within spitting distance of first place - by losing seven in a row, including a six-game road trip on which they were swept by both St. Louis (somewhat understandable) and San Diego (somewhat unforgivable). Why? Well, it's pretty simple: this team has forgotten how to hit.
The streak has included the Cubs being outscored 28-10. Worse yet, half of those runs came in the first game of the streak, a 6-5 loss to Houston at Wrigley last Sunday. In the six games since, the Cubs have been outscored 22-5. 22 runs in 6 games really isn't that terrible. In fact, in the middle five games of the streak, the Cubs pitchers had an ERA of just 3.15 - but the Cubs only scored three runs in the entire five games in support. As a result, Ted Lilly, Ryan Dempster, and Randy Wells were all saddled with losses despite seven-inning quality starts during that stretch.
During the seven games, the Cubs have just 41 hits in 226 at-bats, a team batting average of .181. Take away their 11-hit "barrage" against Houston, and the six road losses featured just 30 hits in 187 at-bats, a team BA of .160. "But Flax," you might say, "batting average doesn't tell you the whole story!" True. The Cubs have walked 10 times in the six games, itself not a huge number - and when I tell you that six of those came in one game, suddenly things look even worse. Three of the six games featured no walks at all. Worse still, the Cubs aren't even putting the ball in play, striking out 56 times in the seven games. That's a strikeout every four at-bats, nearly one per inning.
Who's to blame? It's not any one player, but I'd say the bulk of the fault lies squarely with the table-setters, Soriano and Theriot. In the six road games, Derrek Lee is hitting .368 (7-for-19) with a .400 OBP. Do you know how many RBI he has? One. And it was a solo home run. The problem is that Soriano and Theriot, at the top of the order, have gone a combined 4-for-45 in the past six games (.089), and neither has walked once. Soriano has struck out nine times in 21 at-bats.
Still, nobody's hitting. In the same six games, here's how everyone else is doing: Fukudome .125 (though he's also taken four walks and a hit-by-pitch for a .333 OBP), Bradley .158, Soto .188, Fontenot .235, Miles .100, Scales .100 (though his OBP is .357 because of three walks and an HBP), Hoffpauir .143 (with seven strikeouts in 14 at-bats). In a six-game span, only one guy has more than four hits (Lee with seven), only two guys have reached base more than five times (Lee 8 and Fukudome 7), and only two guys (Scales and Fukudome) have taken more than one walk. Meanwhile, four guys have struck out at least five times (Soriano 9, Hoffpauir 7, Fukudome 6, Soto 5). It's ugly.
What now? The Cubs are severely limited as far as possible changes they can make to the team - I don't know that there's anyone like a Jim Edmonds last year who could possibly be brought in. People are talking about Jake Fox, who's tearing up the PCL - but it's still the PCL. Fox is apparently a guy who either homers or strikes out, and we've already got Soriano and Hoffpauir, plus Fox can't really play anywhere but first base with anything resembling acceptable defense. As far as outside help, who's there? And perhaps more to the point, who can be replaced? The outfield makes too much to be movable. The only real open space on the infield is second base, perhaps the shallowest position in the game from a hitting perspective. You're not going to fill that spot with anything better than what's already there. And the Cubs' options for trades are limited anyway given how thin the farm system is.
Of course, we should remember that a seven-game losing streak - while it sucks - is hardly cause to start talking about blowing up the team or anything. Lee's bat was cold for weeks without creating significant problems because the rest of the team was hitting better; it seems likely that a team full of professional hitters will be able to turn it around. Still, how much longer can we wait for them to do so? Even the 2007 Cubs never lost more than six in a row. We're not quite at the 2006 Cubs "7-22 in May" point... but even the 2006 Cubs topped out at eight straight losses. Should the Cubs somehow be swept at home by the Pirates - an unlikely occurrence, but at this point I'm ruling nothing out - that would be ten straight losses, the most since the 1997 Cubs lost fourteen straight to start the season (en route to a 68-94 finish). If that happens, I'm going to buy a Bears cap and devote the rest of my summer to miniature golf.
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Sunday, May 10, 2009
This may not be the year
I know it's technically still early, and the Brewers beat up on the Cubs in the first two series last year only for the Cubs to flatten them down the stretch (except in games where they had already clinched), but my God - did you ever think you'd see a Brewers/Cubs game where the Cubs' bullpen was so much worse? Let's take a look at the bullpen so far:
Angel Guzman: Perversely, he's been the best of the bunch, with the lowest ERA (4.11) and best strikeout-to-walk ratio (2.67). He's also thrown the most innings (15.1), so at least the guy who's throwing the best is getting the most work. With all due respect, though, when Angel Guzman is your best reliever that probably isn't saying much about your pen.
Carlos Marmol: His injury probably hasn't helped, although he seems to be on the way up - in his last three appearances he hasn't walked anyone, and his ERA is somewhat artificially high thanks to a four-run, 0.1 IP appearance on April 29 in a game that the Cubs were already losing 4-0. Still, his ERA is 4.50, he's already blown two saves, and his K/BB ratio is just 1.42 after being around 2.75 the last two years. At least his numbers aren't too bad aside from his leap in walk rate, which is inflated thanks to four walks in that Arizona game. He'll probably be fine.
Kevin Gregg: Gregg actually seems to have settled down after a rough start, as he's up to five saves and has still blown just the one at Milwaukee on April 10. His ERA has receded to 4.40, and his K/BB in his last six appearances is 6/1. Still, for the year he's allowing 15 W+H/9. That number will probably improve significantly if his current form keeps up, at least.
Aaron Heilman: Here's where things start to get bad. At 15 IP, Heilman has been the second most active member of the bullpen, but he seems to be going in the wrong direction. In his first eleven appearances this year, Heilman allowed just one earned run; after a scoreless inning and a third on April 26, his ERA stood at 0.82. Today it's 5.40 after just five additional outings. Most of the damage was done on April 30, when he entered a tie game with the Marlins in the top of the tenth and proceeded to get charged with six runs, five earned, without recording a single out. However, he hasn't been much better since then; after two scoreless appearances against Florida and Houston, he's been abused by Milwaukee, allowing The Incredibly Annoying Ryan Braun's game-winning eighth-inning home run on Friday (in a spot that should have been Marmol's, except I guess Lou is trying not to use him every damn day like he did in the early-going last year) and walking three after coming on in relief of the incompetent Chad Fox (about whom more anon) on Saturday. At least, I guess, if you take away the Marlins game he hasn't been that bad - his ERA is only 2.40 if you pull out those five runs.
Neal Cotts: I know Cotts is a lefty, and those are hard to come by, but I don't know what it's going to take to get him run out of town. Luis Vizcaino didn't give up a single run as a Cub and was released; Cotts seems to be allergic to outs. In 14 appearances he's recorded just 20 outs while allowing 18 baserunners (9 hits, 8 walks and a hit batsman). He's actually only given up runs in four of his fourteen appearances, but because he has a tendency to pitch 0.1 innings, his ERA is 6.75. One of the reasons why he hasn't given up that many runs, though, is because he has a lot of outings that look like this:
April 10 @ MIL: brought on to face PH Craig Counsell. Hits him with a pitch; gets yanked. Marmol finishes the inning.
April 11 @ MIL: brought on to face Prince Fielder. Walks him; gets yanked. Heilman finishes the inning.
April 18 vs. STL: brought on to start the 7th. Walks the first two batters he faces; gets yanked. Marmol finishes the inning.
April 21 vs. CIN: brought on to start the 8th. Strikes out the first batter, then allows a single and a walk; gets yanked. Marmol finishes the inning.
It goes on. In fact, only four times this year has Cotts recorded as many as three outs; on the same number of occasions he hasn't recorded any. Don't the Cubs have anyone left-handed at Iowa or even Tennessee? I don't see how they could be any less effective.
David Patton: Speaking of less effective - it's David Patton, everyone! The Rule V draftee was a fun story making the team after never pitching above A ball, but I think it's time to admit that he looked good in the spring because he was pitching in late-inning situations against total nobodies. If I'm a manager, I think I have a few spring games where I throw a few relievers to start the game; if that's what you're basing the team on, you need to know which of these guys can actually face down real big-league hitters. I guess considering Patton spent the last two seasons as a middling high-A reliever, he hasn't been as bad as one might have feared, and his ERA is certainly made worse by his 1.2-inning, five-ER outing on April 25 when he gave up the grand slam to Pujols - but if you take that away it's still over 5.00. Aside from Cotts, he has the worst WHIP of anyone who's pitched more than four innings - really, across the board his stats are second only to Cotts' in their awfulness among the regular relievers. Is it really worth not having to offer him back to Colorado, or is there just no one else in the pipeline? (What about Jose Ascanio, who's been destroying the PCL so far? Albeit he's done so as a starter, and maybe he's being saved for that role.)
Jeff Samardzija: Samardzija is already back down at Iowa, but he wasn't given much of a chance - just five appearances and 3.1 IP. He didn't have a very good start, coming into a game vs. the Reds on April 23 and giving up four hits and two runs in one inning, but since then he'd gotten two Ks in mop-up duty on April 27, another two Ks on April 29 (although between those he gave up a three-run double, all the runs getting charged to Marmol), and gotten out of a bases-loaded spot with a short flyball on May 1. Then on May 5 against the Giants he turned in this string: HBP (to load the bases), two-run double, RBI single, popout, walk. Only one of the three runs was credited to him, but apparently Lou had seen enough and Samardzija was bounced back to Iowa. While he certainly wasn't super-effective in his brief time up, it's worth remembering that Samardzija gave up runs in two of his first three appearances last year, and then went the entire month of August without allowing another one.
Chad Fox: The real reason not to send Samardzija back down is that it resulted in Chad Fox being called up. I would rather Jake Fox come up. To pitch. Here's what Fox has done since returning to the big club:
May 7 @ HOU: enters the game in the bottom of the ninth with the Cubs up 8-2. Jason Michaels walks, Ivan Rodriguez triples (scoring Michaels), Jeff Keppinger grounds out (scoring Rodriguez), Darin Erstad triples (scoring on a sac fly after Kevin Gregg replaces Fox). Final line: 0.1 IP, 3 ER.
May 9 @ MIL: enters the game in the bottom of the eighth with the Cubs down 9-6. Ryan Braun walks, then Fox throws a wild pitch in the middle of walking Prince Fielder and gets yanked mid at-bat. (Aaron Heilman comes in and finishes walking Fielder, then eventually allows both Braun and Fielder to score. Baseball's bizarre scoring system charges Fox with one run but two earned runs.)
So in two appearances, Fox has two walks and half of a third (he's credited with three in the stats), two hits, and five earned runs... and one out (and that an RBI groundout). His ERA? 135.00. His WHIP? 15.00. He makes Chien-Ming Wang look like Bob Gibson. I've gotta think we've seen about all we're going to see of Chad Fox at this point. Whatever he was doing at Iowa - where he had a 1.64 ERA and 1.00 WHIP, along with a 10/3 K/BB in 11.1 IP - he can't seem to replicate it at the major league level. If you can't even get outs in mop-up duty, you need to be out of here.
EDIT: I didn't actually get to see Saturday's game, and after writing this I found out that Fox got injured on the 2-0 wild pitch he threw and that's why he was "yanked" mid at-bat. Most likely he's thrown not just his last Cubs pitch but his last big-league pitch as well. With that in mind I feel kinda bad for the guy, but really it wasn't working out even if he'd stayed uninjured. Jose Ascanio is coming up instead, so hopefully that goes better.
So that's the bullpen so far. I guess the top end really isn't all that bad, but the bottom has just been awful. Last year the bullpen was a relative strength, but it's just looked bad way too often so far. Maybe this is just the result of a few really bad outings, but I don't know.
Add in all the injuries - especially with Ramirez set to miss at least a month and Zambrano on the 15-day DL - and the Cubs will be lucky to hold on until everyone gets healthy, if indeed everyone ever does get healthy at the same time. The worst part with all this is that 2009 was probably the best chance; this team is only getting older, and if guys can't stay healthy now, what chance do they stand in two years when Soto is basically the only guy under 30?
Angel Guzman: Perversely, he's been the best of the bunch, with the lowest ERA (4.11) and best strikeout-to-walk ratio (2.67). He's also thrown the most innings (15.1), so at least the guy who's throwing the best is getting the most work. With all due respect, though, when Angel Guzman is your best reliever that probably isn't saying much about your pen.
Carlos Marmol: His injury probably hasn't helped, although he seems to be on the way up - in his last three appearances he hasn't walked anyone, and his ERA is somewhat artificially high thanks to a four-run, 0.1 IP appearance on April 29 in a game that the Cubs were already losing 4-0. Still, his ERA is 4.50, he's already blown two saves, and his K/BB ratio is just 1.42 after being around 2.75 the last two years. At least his numbers aren't too bad aside from his leap in walk rate, which is inflated thanks to four walks in that Arizona game. He'll probably be fine.
Kevin Gregg: Gregg actually seems to have settled down after a rough start, as he's up to five saves and has still blown just the one at Milwaukee on April 10. His ERA has receded to 4.40, and his K/BB in his last six appearances is 6/1. Still, for the year he's allowing 15 W+H/9. That number will probably improve significantly if his current form keeps up, at least.
Aaron Heilman: Here's where things start to get bad. At 15 IP, Heilman has been the second most active member of the bullpen, but he seems to be going in the wrong direction. In his first eleven appearances this year, Heilman allowed just one earned run; after a scoreless inning and a third on April 26, his ERA stood at 0.82. Today it's 5.40 after just five additional outings. Most of the damage was done on April 30, when he entered a tie game with the Marlins in the top of the tenth and proceeded to get charged with six runs, five earned, without recording a single out. However, he hasn't been much better since then; after two scoreless appearances against Florida and Houston, he's been abused by Milwaukee, allowing The Incredibly Annoying Ryan Braun's game-winning eighth-inning home run on Friday (in a spot that should have been Marmol's, except I guess Lou is trying not to use him every damn day like he did in the early-going last year) and walking three after coming on in relief of the incompetent Chad Fox (about whom more anon) on Saturday. At least, I guess, if you take away the Marlins game he hasn't been that bad - his ERA is only 2.40 if you pull out those five runs.
Neal Cotts: I know Cotts is a lefty, and those are hard to come by, but I don't know what it's going to take to get him run out of town. Luis Vizcaino didn't give up a single run as a Cub and was released; Cotts seems to be allergic to outs. In 14 appearances he's recorded just 20 outs while allowing 18 baserunners (9 hits, 8 walks and a hit batsman). He's actually only given up runs in four of his fourteen appearances, but because he has a tendency to pitch 0.1 innings, his ERA is 6.75. One of the reasons why he hasn't given up that many runs, though, is because he has a lot of outings that look like this:
April 10 @ MIL: brought on to face PH Craig Counsell. Hits him with a pitch; gets yanked. Marmol finishes the inning.
April 11 @ MIL: brought on to face Prince Fielder. Walks him; gets yanked. Heilman finishes the inning.
April 18 vs. STL: brought on to start the 7th. Walks the first two batters he faces; gets yanked. Marmol finishes the inning.
April 21 vs. CIN: brought on to start the 8th. Strikes out the first batter, then allows a single and a walk; gets yanked. Marmol finishes the inning.
It goes on. In fact, only four times this year has Cotts recorded as many as three outs; on the same number of occasions he hasn't recorded any. Don't the Cubs have anyone left-handed at Iowa or even Tennessee? I don't see how they could be any less effective.
David Patton: Speaking of less effective - it's David Patton, everyone! The Rule V draftee was a fun story making the team after never pitching above A ball, but I think it's time to admit that he looked good in the spring because he was pitching in late-inning situations against total nobodies. If I'm a manager, I think I have a few spring games where I throw a few relievers to start the game; if that's what you're basing the team on, you need to know which of these guys can actually face down real big-league hitters. I guess considering Patton spent the last two seasons as a middling high-A reliever, he hasn't been as bad as one might have feared, and his ERA is certainly made worse by his 1.2-inning, five-ER outing on April 25 when he gave up the grand slam to Pujols - but if you take that away it's still over 5.00. Aside from Cotts, he has the worst WHIP of anyone who's pitched more than four innings - really, across the board his stats are second only to Cotts' in their awfulness among the regular relievers. Is it really worth not having to offer him back to Colorado, or is there just no one else in the pipeline? (What about Jose Ascanio, who's been destroying the PCL so far? Albeit he's done so as a starter, and maybe he's being saved for that role.)
Jeff Samardzija: Samardzija is already back down at Iowa, but he wasn't given much of a chance - just five appearances and 3.1 IP. He didn't have a very good start, coming into a game vs. the Reds on April 23 and giving up four hits and two runs in one inning, but since then he'd gotten two Ks in mop-up duty on April 27, another two Ks on April 29 (although between those he gave up a three-run double, all the runs getting charged to Marmol), and gotten out of a bases-loaded spot with a short flyball on May 1. Then on May 5 against the Giants he turned in this string: HBP (to load the bases), two-run double, RBI single, popout, walk. Only one of the three runs was credited to him, but apparently Lou had seen enough and Samardzija was bounced back to Iowa. While he certainly wasn't super-effective in his brief time up, it's worth remembering that Samardzija gave up runs in two of his first three appearances last year, and then went the entire month of August without allowing another one.
Chad Fox: The real reason not to send Samardzija back down is that it resulted in Chad Fox being called up. I would rather Jake Fox come up. To pitch. Here's what Fox has done since returning to the big club:
May 7 @ HOU: enters the game in the bottom of the ninth with the Cubs up 8-2. Jason Michaels walks, Ivan Rodriguez triples (scoring Michaels), Jeff Keppinger grounds out (scoring Rodriguez), Darin Erstad triples (scoring on a sac fly after Kevin Gregg replaces Fox). Final line: 0.1 IP, 3 ER.
May 9 @ MIL: enters the game in the bottom of the eighth with the Cubs down 9-6. Ryan Braun walks, then Fox throws a wild pitch in the middle of walking Prince Fielder and gets yanked mid at-bat. (Aaron Heilman comes in and finishes walking Fielder, then eventually allows both Braun and Fielder to score. Baseball's bizarre scoring system charges Fox with one run but two earned runs.)
So in two appearances, Fox has two walks and half of a third (he's credited with three in the stats), two hits, and five earned runs... and one out (and that an RBI groundout). His ERA? 135.00. His WHIP? 15.00. He makes Chien-Ming Wang look like Bob Gibson. I've gotta think we've seen about all we're going to see of Chad Fox at this point. Whatever he was doing at Iowa - where he had a 1.64 ERA and 1.00 WHIP, along with a 10/3 K/BB in 11.1 IP - he can't seem to replicate it at the major league level. If you can't even get outs in mop-up duty, you need to be out of here.
EDIT: I didn't actually get to see Saturday's game, and after writing this I found out that Fox got injured on the 2-0 wild pitch he threw and that's why he was "yanked" mid at-bat. Most likely he's thrown not just his last Cubs pitch but his last big-league pitch as well. With that in mind I feel kinda bad for the guy, but really it wasn't working out even if he'd stayed uninjured. Jose Ascanio is coming up instead, so hopefully that goes better.
So that's the bullpen so far. I guess the top end really isn't all that bad, but the bottom has just been awful. Last year the bullpen was a relative strength, but it's just looked bad way too often so far. Maybe this is just the result of a few really bad outings, but I don't know.
Add in all the injuries - especially with Ramirez set to miss at least a month and Zambrano on the 15-day DL - and the Cubs will be lucky to hold on until everyone gets healthy, if indeed everyone ever does get healthy at the same time. The worst part with all this is that 2009 was probably the best chance; this team is only getting older, and if guys can't stay healthy now, what chance do they stand in two years when Soto is basically the only guy under 30?
Tuesday, May 05, 2009
What's the problem?
For some reason, people made a big deal about the Cubs' lineup today. Here it was:
1. Gathright, CF
2. Miles, SS
3. Fukudome, RF
4. Lee, 1B
5. Hoffpauir, LF
6. Fontenot, 3B
7. Scales, 2B
8. Hill, C
On ESPN 1000 they referred to this lineup as "the Iowa Cubs." I'm really not sure why. Aside from Scales - called up (probably just for a couple days) to fill Zambrano's roster spot - the seven remaining starting position players featured three regular starters (Fukudome, Lee and Fontenot), two guys who have been getting regular playing time in the absences of Bradley and Ramirez, and the backup catcher, Hill, in a day game after a night game. Only Gathright's presence in the leadoff spot really stands out as particularly weird.
If Lincecum weren't the opposing pitcher, would anyone have noticed? It sort of looked like the Cubs were punting the game, but you do have to consider that they are in the middle of 20 games in 20 days, and it makes sense to give the regulars some rest in a day game following a night game. The fact that it was Lincecum really doesn't change that much regarding the decision. If anything it does make it a slightly easier decision; since you already want to give your regulars a rest, there's no reason not to do it in a game that is already going to be pretty difficult to win.
I'm much more concerned with the fact that Samardzija appears to be Croatian for "Farnsworth" than with anything else that happened in this game.
1. Gathright, CF
2. Miles, SS
3. Fukudome, RF
4. Lee, 1B
5. Hoffpauir, LF
6. Fontenot, 3B
7. Scales, 2B
8. Hill, C
On ESPN 1000 they referred to this lineup as "the Iowa Cubs." I'm really not sure why. Aside from Scales - called up (probably just for a couple days) to fill Zambrano's roster spot - the seven remaining starting position players featured three regular starters (Fukudome, Lee and Fontenot), two guys who have been getting regular playing time in the absences of Bradley and Ramirez, and the backup catcher, Hill, in a day game after a night game. Only Gathright's presence in the leadoff spot really stands out as particularly weird.
If Lincecum weren't the opposing pitcher, would anyone have noticed? It sort of looked like the Cubs were punting the game, but you do have to consider that they are in the middle of 20 games in 20 days, and it makes sense to give the regulars some rest in a day game following a night game. The fact that it was Lincecum really doesn't change that much regarding the decision. If anything it does make it a slightly easier decision; since you already want to give your regulars a rest, there's no reason not to do it in a game that is already going to be pretty difficult to win.
I'm much more concerned with the fact that Samardzija appears to be Croatian for "Farnsworth" than with anything else that happened in this game.
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