Where have I been lately? Well, things were steaming along, I didn't have much to add and little complain about, so I just let it go. But as much as I hate to complain after a win, tonight's game seems to deserve some addressing.
What in the hell is wrong with Carlos Zambrano? Is it just arm angle? Mental? Fatigue? A combination?
After coming off the DL, Zambrano appeared to have found his form. Here were his first six starts after returning, not including his solid two innings in the All-Star Game:
July 4 @ STL: 6 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 5 K
July 9 vs. CIN: 8 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 0 BB, 5 K
July 19 @ HOU: 6.1 IP, 6 H, 4 R, 6 BB, 3 K
July 24 vs. FLA: 7 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 0 BB, 6 K
July 29 @ MIL: 8 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 9 K
August 3 vs. PIT: 5 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 1 BB, 2 K
Pretty strong there, except for the game in Houston right after the break. But that's five out of six strong starts; the July 4, 9 and 29 games, in particular, are probably the three best games he threw all year.
Then came his last few starts:
August 9 vs. STL: 4.1 IP, 10 H, 9 R, 1 BB, 3 K
August 15 @ FLA: 6 IP, 4 H, 5 R, 5 BB, 6 K
August 21 vs. CIN: 7 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 4 BB, 4 K
August 26 @ PIT: 4.1 IP, 8 H, 6 R, 4 BB, 3 K
After all this, his ERA is only 3.53, but this is still a disturbing trend. That's awful control the last three starts, and he just doesn't seem to be missing many bats. Okay, it's only four starts, and actually he's only 1-1 through them, but... recently on ESPN.com, Jayson Stark did a chat that debated which team had the best potential playoff rotation (i.e. top four starters), and he picked the Cubs. But if Zambrano - the theoretical ace of the staff - can't be relied upon not to walk four guys and give up 5-6 runs or worse, that puts a pretty big hole in the rotation.
It may be that I'm overreacting. Z was up and down last year too, putting together five straight starts in August/September where he allowed 31 runs in 28.2 innings (and bookended those five starts with two starts in which he gave up a combined 12 walks in 11 innings, although he allowed just two runs combined in those two games, somehow). He also proceeded to go 4-1 in his last five starts, giving up no runs in the last two, and then had a nice start in the playoffs. So really, who the hell knows? But with that said, he's making what, 18 million a year? You need to be better than the third-best guy on a staff for that kind of cash.
Well, anyway. That's nine straight series wins, the first time the Cubs have done that since 1907, which is ridiculous. It's also their first time at 32 games over .500 since September 15, 1984 and, before that, September 2, 1969; if they win tomorrow, it'll be their first time at 33 games over .500 since they finished the 1945 season at 42 over. I refuse to assume a championship or even a pennant, but with stats like that... if this isn't the year, what the hell is it going to take?
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Thursday, July 31, 2008
Brew Ha Ha
Hey, remember how confident the Brewers were a week ago?
I mean, obviously he's not wrong. It's not even August yet; at this time last year the Cubs still trailed by a game (tying for first for the first time all season on August 1). But given how people were starting to talk about the Brewers being the hottest team in the NL (which I guess they technically have been, record-wise) and how the Cubs were so bad on the road and were in real danger of losing the division lead...
Well, who's laughing now??? Not only did the Cubs win four straight on the road, they dropped the Brewers from one back to five back at a stroke, returning to a position the Cubs hadn't occupied since July 12. The starting pitching continued to be awesome and the hitting finally came around, with the Cubs scoring 31 runs in the four games - nearly 8 per - and allowing just 11. The Cubs now have a +130 run differential, and the Brewers' is down to just +10.
It may not make or break the season, but it certainly was a statement series. First of all, it proved the Cubs can win on the road (although of course the Cubs do have a lot of historical success at Miller Park), it proved they can score runs again, it more or less proved their starting pitching is better than the Brewers' top to bottom, and more importantly it didn't just keep the Cubs in first, but it pushed their advantage well out. It's certainly a lot better than splitting the series and still being up just a game, or losing three of four and leaving Milwaukee in second place.
More importantly, this should shut up Brewers fans for a while. And more importantly, this is hopefully the start of a new trend towards more offense again. As long as the starting pitching keeps up, 5-6 runs a game should be more than enough in most games. And coming up, it's nine games at home, with the first six against cellar dwellers Pittsburgh and Houston. (Of course, watch them somehow lose one of those series now that I'm getting all excited again.)
August is really the time to extend the lead in the division. Here are the August series:
August 1-3: vs. Pirates
August 4-6: vs. Astros
August 8-10: vs. Cardinals
August 12-14: at Braves
August 15-17: at Marlins
August 19-21: vs. Reds
August 22-24: vs. Nationals
August 25-27: at Pirates
August 28-31: vs. Phillies
There's really no excuse for losing any of those series, is there? The divisional series should all be wins, there's no excuse for the Nationals series not to be a sweep, the Braves have given up and are banged up, the Marlins still aren't that good and if we had had any offense last week we'd have swept them, and while the Phillies worry me a little, in a home series we ought to at least be able to split. So that's 28 games in August. I say nothing less than 18-10 is acceptable, and ideally even better. This is the month to push that lead in the division out closer to double digits. Let's see them do it.
The Brewers have downplayed the much-hyped July series after initially calling it a dress rehearsal and a test for September and the playoffs.
"This is not a death sentence by any means," Yost said. "If this was September, it would be different. We have plenty of time to recover from this and get back on track."
I mean, obviously he's not wrong. It's not even August yet; at this time last year the Cubs still trailed by a game (tying for first for the first time all season on August 1). But given how people were starting to talk about the Brewers being the hottest team in the NL (which I guess they technically have been, record-wise) and how the Cubs were so bad on the road and were in real danger of losing the division lead...
Well, who's laughing now??? Not only did the Cubs win four straight on the road, they dropped the Brewers from one back to five back at a stroke, returning to a position the Cubs hadn't occupied since July 12. The starting pitching continued to be awesome and the hitting finally came around, with the Cubs scoring 31 runs in the four games - nearly 8 per - and allowing just 11. The Cubs now have a +130 run differential, and the Brewers' is down to just +10.
It may not make or break the season, but it certainly was a statement series. First of all, it proved the Cubs can win on the road (although of course the Cubs do have a lot of historical success at Miller Park), it proved they can score runs again, it more or less proved their starting pitching is better than the Brewers' top to bottom, and more importantly it didn't just keep the Cubs in first, but it pushed their advantage well out. It's certainly a lot better than splitting the series and still being up just a game, or losing three of four and leaving Milwaukee in second place.
More importantly, this should shut up Brewers fans for a while. And more importantly, this is hopefully the start of a new trend towards more offense again. As long as the starting pitching keeps up, 5-6 runs a game should be more than enough in most games. And coming up, it's nine games at home, with the first six against cellar dwellers Pittsburgh and Houston. (Of course, watch them somehow lose one of those series now that I'm getting all excited again.)
August is really the time to extend the lead in the division. Here are the August series:
August 1-3: vs. Pirates
August 4-6: vs. Astros
August 8-10: vs. Cardinals
August 12-14: at Braves
August 15-17: at Marlins
August 19-21: vs. Reds
August 22-24: vs. Nationals
August 25-27: at Pirates
August 28-31: vs. Phillies
There's really no excuse for losing any of those series, is there? The divisional series should all be wins, there's no excuse for the Nationals series not to be a sweep, the Braves have given up and are banged up, the Marlins still aren't that good and if we had had any offense last week we'd have swept them, and while the Phillies worry me a little, in a home series we ought to at least be able to split. So that's 28 games in August. I say nothing less than 18-10 is acceptable, and ideally even better. This is the month to push that lead in the division out closer to double digits. Let's see them do it.
Friday, July 25, 2008
Fire Bob Howry
Remember how, in 2007, Scott Eyre was struggling like crazy early in the year, and Piniella's response was to stop using him except in absolute mop-up situations? Well, what's his excuse for continuing to run Bob Howry out there in key game situations? He's got a 5.22 ERA for the year, and here's what his last eight appearances look like:
July 8 vs. Reds: Howry enters with a 7-1 lead in the ninth. He gives up a single, a deep out to left, another single, an RBI double and an RBI groundout before striking out Jay Bruce to end the game.
July 11 vs. Giants: Howry enters a scoreless tie in the eighth. He retires the 8-9-1 hitters in order and ends up getting the win when Aramis Ramirez hits a homer in the bottom of the inning.
July 12 vs. Giants: After Kevin Hart struggles to start the eighth, giving up two runs, Neal Cotts gets one out. Howry then enters the 7-2 game with a man on first. He retires Rich Aurilia on a sac bunt, then gets Randy Winn to fly out to end the inning. (Carlos Marmol subsequently pours gasoline on himself in the ninth.)
July 18 at Astros: Howry comes into the game with the score tied 1-1 and two outs in the bottom of the eighth. He retires Carlos Lee on a groundout. After the Cubs fail to score, Howry is brought back out for the ninth. He gives up a ground-rule double to Miguel Tejada, then allows another double to Hunter Pence on the very first pitch. Tejada scores and the Cubs lose 2-1.
July 21 at Diamondbacks: Howry enters in the 8th with the Cubs down 1-0. He walks light-hitting catcher Chris Snyder to start the inning, then gives up two deep fly balls to center which fortunately both go for outs. Then Stephen Drew hits a 1-1 pitch for a triple to put Arizona up 2-0, which is how it finished.
July 23 at Diamondbacks: Howry enters in the 8th with a cushy 10-3 lead. He gives up a single to Conor Jackson, then strikes out Mark Reynolds (who hasn't). Chris Young doubles. Tony Clark lines out. Howry then gives up a home run to Snyder on a 3-2 pitch to cut the lead to 10-6. Alex Romero strikes out to end the threat.
July 24 vs. Marlins: Despite throwing 33 pitches the previous night in Arizona, Howry enters in the 8th with the bases loaded, no one out, and the Cubs clinging to a 6-2 lead. He gets Cody Ross to fly out on the first pitch, then throws eight pitches to Luis Gonzalez before Gonzo hits the last one like a rocket to right center. Mark DeRosa bails Howry out with a diving catch, although the runner at third tags and scores. Howry is pulled for Carlos Marmol, who ends the inning with a strikeout of Josh Willingham.
July 25 vs. Marlins: Howry pitches for the third day in a row, entering in the top of the ninth with the game tied at 2. He immediately allows what turns out to be the game-losing solo home run to pinch-hitter Jeremy Hermida. The next four guys all hit the ball fairly hard off of him, but only Hanley Ramirez's double doesn't find a glove, so he escapes allowing just one run.
Basically, he's been awful recently. Not a single one of those outings is impressive. Either he's giving up runs, or allowing bullets that are fortunately caught. In the rare cases where he's cruised, it's only because he faced the bottom of the order or was gifted an out via the sac bunt.
But here's what kills me. Lou brought him into the game on Wednesday when the Cubs had a 10-3 lead. Seven runs! When a guy comes into a game with that kind of cushion, that makes me think that he isn't exactly trusted by the manager. Why use your top-level guys in blowout situations? It's not like Howry desperately needed to get some work in - he'd pitched two days earlier. The fact that he was being brought into the game in that spot suggests that Lou considered Howry's results in his last two outings - both of which saw him give up a run, once losing the game - and thought he should get some mop-up work just to see what was going on.
With that in mind, did the three-run homer he gave up to Snyder not make it clear that he's not cut out for high-leverage situations right now? Why was he right back out there with the bases loaded and nobody out the next night? (I know the answer here is: probably not a better option available. But that's pretty sad, isn't it?) More importantly, why was he out there today in a 2-2 game with everyone else in the bullpen available? The only possible answer is that Piniella still trusts Howry more than he trusts Cotts or Eyre or Gaudin or Marshall. And if that's the case, that's a really big problem.
The Cubs' starting pitching has probably been the best in baseball over the last 2-3 weeks. Since July 1, only three times in 20 games has the Cubs' starter gone fewer than six innings, and in no game has the starter allowed more than four runs; of the 20 games, the Cubs' starters have delivered fifteen quality starts (6 innings or more, three runs or less), and while that's kind of a bullshit stat, it at least gives you some idea of the kind of starting pitching that's been delivered. But the bullpen has been appalling. In the same 20 games, the bullpen has given up at least two runs eight times. They blew the win for the starter three times in that span (although only one of those turned into a loss for the Cubs, mercifully). Offense has probably been a bigger problem - the Cubs are averaging 4.3 runs a game in that span, with a 2-8 record in the games where they've scored three runs or fewer and an 8-2 record in the games where they've scored four or more. In other words, if they could score 4+ runs a little more consistently, the whole issue might evaporate. But while the team is going through a little bit of an offensive drag, it can't afford to have one entire sector of its pitching staff crushing the team the way it's doing right now.
But how do you fix this? Jeff Samardzija, who pitched two innings today, is one possible answer, although it's hard to believe he won't go right back to Iowa when Wood comes off the DL, if only because there's no other obvious candidate for demotion since Howry is too old for that. (Cotts, I guess maybe, but that leaves the Cubs with only one lefty out of the pen.) The trade deadline is still six days away, but reliable bullpen pitching is such a rare commodity that the guys out there for trade are either much more expensive than they should be or just not that good in the first place. (Remember, most guys are in the bullpen because they're not good enough to be starters. Sometimes that works out - Marmol - but a lot of times you're just left with a guy who's only good enough to get three outs one out of every three appearances. Right now Howry is that guy.)
Now, no one really has great bullpen pitching, it seems. Milwaukee's has been notoriously lousy for most of this year and St. Louis's hasn't been any good recently either. So it's not like that's going to make the difference, so long as the offense comes back around a bit. But until that happens consistently, having a bullpen that can't hold a one-run lead 40% of the time it's called upon risks being really devastating to this team, especially with the Brewers now just a half-game back (and potentially tying for the division lead by the end of the night). My dad's been freaking out about the offense the last ten days or so, but I think this team has too much talent there not to return to form pretty soon; it's the bullpen, which has been somewhat shaky all year and even worse than that lately, where I'm directing a nervous look.
July 8 vs. Reds: Howry enters with a 7-1 lead in the ninth. He gives up a single, a deep out to left, another single, an RBI double and an RBI groundout before striking out Jay Bruce to end the game.
July 11 vs. Giants: Howry enters a scoreless tie in the eighth. He retires the 8-9-1 hitters in order and ends up getting the win when Aramis Ramirez hits a homer in the bottom of the inning.
July 12 vs. Giants: After Kevin Hart struggles to start the eighth, giving up two runs, Neal Cotts gets one out. Howry then enters the 7-2 game with a man on first. He retires Rich Aurilia on a sac bunt, then gets Randy Winn to fly out to end the inning. (Carlos Marmol subsequently pours gasoline on himself in the ninth.)
July 18 at Astros: Howry comes into the game with the score tied 1-1 and two outs in the bottom of the eighth. He retires Carlos Lee on a groundout. After the Cubs fail to score, Howry is brought back out for the ninth. He gives up a ground-rule double to Miguel Tejada, then allows another double to Hunter Pence on the very first pitch. Tejada scores and the Cubs lose 2-1.
July 21 at Diamondbacks: Howry enters in the 8th with the Cubs down 1-0. He walks light-hitting catcher Chris Snyder to start the inning, then gives up two deep fly balls to center which fortunately both go for outs. Then Stephen Drew hits a 1-1 pitch for a triple to put Arizona up 2-0, which is how it finished.
July 23 at Diamondbacks: Howry enters in the 8th with a cushy 10-3 lead. He gives up a single to Conor Jackson, then strikes out Mark Reynolds (who hasn't). Chris Young doubles. Tony Clark lines out. Howry then gives up a home run to Snyder on a 3-2 pitch to cut the lead to 10-6. Alex Romero strikes out to end the threat.
July 24 vs. Marlins: Despite throwing 33 pitches the previous night in Arizona, Howry enters in the 8th with the bases loaded, no one out, and the Cubs clinging to a 6-2 lead. He gets Cody Ross to fly out on the first pitch, then throws eight pitches to Luis Gonzalez before Gonzo hits the last one like a rocket to right center. Mark DeRosa bails Howry out with a diving catch, although the runner at third tags and scores. Howry is pulled for Carlos Marmol, who ends the inning with a strikeout of Josh Willingham.
July 25 vs. Marlins: Howry pitches for the third day in a row, entering in the top of the ninth with the game tied at 2. He immediately allows what turns out to be the game-losing solo home run to pinch-hitter Jeremy Hermida. The next four guys all hit the ball fairly hard off of him, but only Hanley Ramirez's double doesn't find a glove, so he escapes allowing just one run.
Basically, he's been awful recently. Not a single one of those outings is impressive. Either he's giving up runs, or allowing bullets that are fortunately caught. In the rare cases where he's cruised, it's only because he faced the bottom of the order or was gifted an out via the sac bunt.
But here's what kills me. Lou brought him into the game on Wednesday when the Cubs had a 10-3 lead. Seven runs! When a guy comes into a game with that kind of cushion, that makes me think that he isn't exactly trusted by the manager. Why use your top-level guys in blowout situations? It's not like Howry desperately needed to get some work in - he'd pitched two days earlier. The fact that he was being brought into the game in that spot suggests that Lou considered Howry's results in his last two outings - both of which saw him give up a run, once losing the game - and thought he should get some mop-up work just to see what was going on.
With that in mind, did the three-run homer he gave up to Snyder not make it clear that he's not cut out for high-leverage situations right now? Why was he right back out there with the bases loaded and nobody out the next night? (I know the answer here is: probably not a better option available. But that's pretty sad, isn't it?) More importantly, why was he out there today in a 2-2 game with everyone else in the bullpen available? The only possible answer is that Piniella still trusts Howry more than he trusts Cotts or Eyre or Gaudin or Marshall. And if that's the case, that's a really big problem.
The Cubs' starting pitching has probably been the best in baseball over the last 2-3 weeks. Since July 1, only three times in 20 games has the Cubs' starter gone fewer than six innings, and in no game has the starter allowed more than four runs; of the 20 games, the Cubs' starters have delivered fifteen quality starts (6 innings or more, three runs or less), and while that's kind of a bullshit stat, it at least gives you some idea of the kind of starting pitching that's been delivered. But the bullpen has been appalling. In the same 20 games, the bullpen has given up at least two runs eight times. They blew the win for the starter three times in that span (although only one of those turned into a loss for the Cubs, mercifully). Offense has probably been a bigger problem - the Cubs are averaging 4.3 runs a game in that span, with a 2-8 record in the games where they've scored three runs or fewer and an 8-2 record in the games where they've scored four or more. In other words, if they could score 4+ runs a little more consistently, the whole issue might evaporate. But while the team is going through a little bit of an offensive drag, it can't afford to have one entire sector of its pitching staff crushing the team the way it's doing right now.
But how do you fix this? Jeff Samardzija, who pitched two innings today, is one possible answer, although it's hard to believe he won't go right back to Iowa when Wood comes off the DL, if only because there's no other obvious candidate for demotion since Howry is too old for that. (Cotts, I guess maybe, but that leaves the Cubs with only one lefty out of the pen.) The trade deadline is still six days away, but reliable bullpen pitching is such a rare commodity that the guys out there for trade are either much more expensive than they should be or just not that good in the first place. (Remember, most guys are in the bullpen because they're not good enough to be starters. Sometimes that works out - Marmol - but a lot of times you're just left with a guy who's only good enough to get three outs one out of every three appearances. Right now Howry is that guy.)
Now, no one really has great bullpen pitching, it seems. Milwaukee's has been notoriously lousy for most of this year and St. Louis's hasn't been any good recently either. So it's not like that's going to make the difference, so long as the offense comes back around a bit. But until that happens consistently, having a bullpen that can't hold a one-run lead 40% of the time it's called upon risks being really devastating to this team, especially with the Brewers now just a half-game back (and potentially tying for the division lead by the end of the night). My dad's been freaking out about the offense the last ten days or so, but I think this team has too much talent there not to return to form pretty soon; it's the bullpen, which has been somewhat shaky all year and even worse than that lately, where I'm directing a nervous look.
Monday, July 21, 2008
The kind of game that will drive you crazy
There's nothing worse than losing a game you clearly should have won out of nothing other than sheer bad luck. The Cubs started their series at Arizona with one such. Randy Johnson, 12-0 with a sub-2.00 career ERA against the Cubs entering the game, was hardly the Randy Johnson of old. He was hit hard and often, facing 24 batters and striking out just four - he allowed fifteen fly balls, tied for a career high he had only given up twice before in his career (once earlier this year against the Twins, and once in 1992 against the Yankees). But all fifteen found gloves, with at least half of them doing so within ten feet or so of the fence.
Truly it was a night for horrible luck. The Cubs' two hits were both singles - a Jim Edmonds shot up the middle, and a Reed Johnson swinging bunt to third base. The Diamondbacks also only managed two hits - and Harden struck out ten Diamondbacks, giving them fewer chances to even put the ball in play. But their two hits were a solo home run (of course by the #8 hitter, who had zero previous major league homers) and a triple in the eighth (which of course followed a walk and so allowed Arizona to tack on an insurance run, not that they needed it).
Harden is now 0-1 as a Cub when he should be 2-0. He's the first Cub ever, or at least since 1900, to strike out ten men in each of his first two games as a Cub. He's pitched great. And he's 0-1.
If there's anything that will convince you that the universe doesn't really want the Cubs to win this year, it's games like this one. Absolutely unreal. Of course, maybe you could argue that it's one last test, but honestly, haven't we suffered enough?
Truly it was a night for horrible luck. The Cubs' two hits were both singles - a Jim Edmonds shot up the middle, and a Reed Johnson swinging bunt to third base. The Diamondbacks also only managed two hits - and Harden struck out ten Diamondbacks, giving them fewer chances to even put the ball in play. But their two hits were a solo home run (of course by the #8 hitter, who had zero previous major league homers) and a triple in the eighth (which of course followed a walk and so allowed Arizona to tack on an insurance run, not that they needed it).
Harden is now 0-1 as a Cub when he should be 2-0. He's the first Cub ever, or at least since 1900, to strike out ten men in each of his first two games as a Cub. He's pitched great. And he's 0-1.
If there's anything that will convince you that the universe doesn't really want the Cubs to win this year, it's games like this one. Absolutely unreal. Of course, maybe you could argue that it's one last test, but honestly, haven't we suffered enough?
Achilles tendency
By this point, everyone knows about the Cubs' road issues. And while they obviously could hit better in road games, to some degree they've just been really, really unlucky.
Consider the following. The Cubs have now played 16 series each at home and on the road. In the 16 home series, they're 13-3. In the 16 road series, they're 4-9-3. All is not totally lost, however; the Cubs started by going 1-6-1 in road series; they're 3-3-2 since, even after the series loss to Houston. What's more, the Cubs have still outscored their opponents on the road, 210 runs to 206.
The Cubs are 15-15 in one-run games this year. 16 of those games were on the road; the Cubs are 6-10 in those games, while going 9-5 in one-run home games. Some of that is just bad luck and minor park advantage when the Cubs are on the road. More importantly, that's fully a third of the Cubs' 49 road games that were decided by a single run. That 6-10 record could even out in the second half - if the Cubs are playing a lot of close ones on the road, it's likely that they'll win some of them at some point. (What's more, in 12 more road games, the game was decided by just two runs - the Cubs are 3-9 in those games. This, too, is likely to move closer to even as long as the Cubs are really a good team.)
The Cubs also have a nasty tendency for outscoring a team yet losing the series. This has happened at home and on the road, but of course it's happened much more on the road, since the Cubs only have three home series losses. At Washington from April 25-27, the Cubs outscored the Nationals 10-7 but lost two of three. In their very next series, at home against Milwaukee, the Cubs outscored the Brewers 29-19 - thanks to a 19-5 thumping in the middle game - but lost two of three. In their next series after that, they outscored the Cardinals 15-13 in St. Louis, but lost two of three. For the season, the Cubs have six series in which they outscored the opposition but still lost two of the three games, including this past series at Houston; five of those series have come on the road. This is the sort of thing that probably can't hold up over a full season, although you never know.
So what's the problem? The obvious answer is consistency. It's not that the Cubs can't score runs on the road or that their pitchers are suddenly much worse, since the Cubs have outscored the opposition for the year - by a slim margin, to be sure, but it's a positive margin and thus not indicative of a road record that's seven games under .500. Saying that the Cubs need to be more consistent on the road is more than a bit trite, to be sure, but it really seems like the answer. The Cubs have allowed just five more runs on the road in the same number of games; they're not exactly getting pounded. Really, it seems like a few more runs ought to do it. The only question now is can the Cubs, with probably the toughest part of the schedule coming up and with some players possibly in danger of wearing down a bit over the long season, actually find more runs on the road?
I guess we'll see.
Consider the following. The Cubs have now played 16 series each at home and on the road. In the 16 home series, they're 13-3. In the 16 road series, they're 4-9-3. All is not totally lost, however; the Cubs started by going 1-6-1 in road series; they're 3-3-2 since, even after the series loss to Houston. What's more, the Cubs have still outscored their opponents on the road, 210 runs to 206.
The Cubs are 15-15 in one-run games this year. 16 of those games were on the road; the Cubs are 6-10 in those games, while going 9-5 in one-run home games. Some of that is just bad luck and minor park advantage when the Cubs are on the road. More importantly, that's fully a third of the Cubs' 49 road games that were decided by a single run. That 6-10 record could even out in the second half - if the Cubs are playing a lot of close ones on the road, it's likely that they'll win some of them at some point. (What's more, in 12 more road games, the game was decided by just two runs - the Cubs are 3-9 in those games. This, too, is likely to move closer to even as long as the Cubs are really a good team.)
The Cubs also have a nasty tendency for outscoring a team yet losing the series. This has happened at home and on the road, but of course it's happened much more on the road, since the Cubs only have three home series losses. At Washington from April 25-27, the Cubs outscored the Nationals 10-7 but lost two of three. In their very next series, at home against Milwaukee, the Cubs outscored the Brewers 29-19 - thanks to a 19-5 thumping in the middle game - but lost two of three. In their next series after that, they outscored the Cardinals 15-13 in St. Louis, but lost two of three. For the season, the Cubs have six series in which they outscored the opposition but still lost two of the three games, including this past series at Houston; five of those series have come on the road. This is the sort of thing that probably can't hold up over a full season, although you never know.
So what's the problem? The obvious answer is consistency. It's not that the Cubs can't score runs on the road or that their pitchers are suddenly much worse, since the Cubs have outscored the opposition for the year - by a slim margin, to be sure, but it's a positive margin and thus not indicative of a road record that's seven games under .500. Saying that the Cubs need to be more consistent on the road is more than a bit trite, to be sure, but it really seems like the answer. The Cubs have allowed just five more runs on the road in the same number of games; they're not exactly getting pounded. Really, it seems like a few more runs ought to do it. The only question now is can the Cubs, with probably the toughest part of the schedule coming up and with some players possibly in danger of wearing down a bit over the long season, actually find more runs on the road?
I guess we'll see.
Thursday, July 17, 2008
All-Star Lame
I don't have a terrible amount to say about the All-Star Game at this point, aside from the fact that staying up until almost one in the morning just to watch your team is at least less disappointing when the outfield of "your team" is made up of three players you hate. Anyway, a few lingering thoughts:
1. The Cubs acquitted themselves well.
With eight Cubs named to the roster in one form or another and six seeing time, two as starters, they had a lot to live up to. Fortunately, they mostly did. Soto and Fukudome didn't do much at the plate, but Soto caught a good few innings (the two steals off him were much more the pitcher's fault). Zambrano was awesome (can he please get through two innings in 20 pitches more often in real games?), Dempster was awesome (striking out the side!), and Marmol was awesome. Dempster and Marmol both pitched in the bottom of innings that could have ended the game, so I was immensely relieved that both pitched well, although I'd have taken just about anything that didn't end with a Cubs pitcher giving up the game-winning run. (The 2001 All-Star Game, when Jon Lieber gave up back-to-back home runs in the sixth to put the game pretty much away, still makes me cringe.)
2. "This time it counts" is still stupid.
As has been pointed out in various places by now, there is no good excuse for claiming that the game needs to count, especially when it's clearly not being managed that way. The lineup that the National League had on the field at the end of the game was kind of pathetic - there's no reason that any All-Star Game that "counts" should be giving three at-bats to Cristian Guzman. What would be wrong with going back to just alternating home-field, which is how it used to be done?
I mean, this is how All-Star Games are played. The best players (mostly) start the game, and then the lesser All-Stars off the bench come in to get a little playing time and finish it out. This is fine when the game doesn't count, or if it's a blowout, but in a tight game where the outcome has any kind of resonance, that kind of thing just doesn't fly. Bringing in Cristian Guzman to pinch-run for Aramis Ramirez was a calculated "let's play for one run" risk on Clint Hurdle's part, but then why did he make no effort to get Guzman into scoring position, choosing to let Corey Hart swing away? Having a man on first and no outs leads to a run more often than having a man on second with one out, but having a man on second with one out leads to a run more often than having a man on first with one out, and Corey Hart's not a bad player but his OBP is only .327 this year. At the very least, it would have been nice if Hurdle had considered that the game might go to extra innings, at which point Ramirez would be a more valuable asset at the plate than Guzman, who may have a lot of hits but only gets on base 34% of the time. Ramirez's OPS+ is 133; Guzman's is 102.
Basically, when you've got Lance Berkman and Albert Pujols on your team, it's pretty weak to finish the game with Adrian Gonzalez at first base. When you've got Chipper Jones, Aramis Ramirez and David Wright on your team, letting Cristian Guzman get three at-bats at third base is unacceptable (to be fair, Wright was DHing, but still). In VORP terms, the NL starting lineup was almost 90 runs better than the AL starting lineup, in spite of the fact that it had the least-valuable player on the field in it (Fukudome, just 11.9, sad to say). By the time the 15th rolled around, the AL now had the more valuable lineup on the field, aided in part by the fact that the most valuable guy in the AL, Ian Kinsler, was coming off their bench. In fact, Kinsler and Grady Sizemore, two of the three most valuable players in the American League, both got five at-bats for the AL. The most valuable guy by VORP left for the NL in extras was Dan Uggla; look how that turned out.
I know it would be kind of ridiculous to make, say, Pujols play a full game while other guys are being rotated out just because he's the best player in the NL. And there's something to be said for trying to strike early, I guess, or for not holding chips on your bench for an inning you might not play. But it just seems like the current format is likely to lead to games like this - close affairs that end up being decided by guys who are barely legitimate All-Stars. Just look at some of the last few out-making batters for the NL in recent games:
2008: Nate McLouth, Russell Martin, Miguel Tejada, Uggla, Gonzalez, Guzman
McLouth has been valuable this season, but he could easily turn out to be a first-half wonder. Martin is a good catcher but Brian McCann, with the highest VORP of any catcher in baseball, probably should have made it into the game first. Tejada and Guzman were both sympathy All-Stars (i.e. the only selections from their crappy teams and not deserving on merit, although Tejada played well so fair play to him). Uggla was more deserving of being there than his performance indicated. Gonzalez has had a good year, but he was also a sympathy All-Star as the only Padre. Should the All-Star Game be decided by guys whose teams aren't coming anywhere near the World Series without buying a ticket?
2007: Orlando Hudson, Freddy Sanchez, Brian McCann, Matt Holliday, Aaron Rowand
Rowand was actually the third-most valuable OF in the NL in 2007, but that says more about how generally weak center field was - Juan Pierre was in the top ten in center, for crying out loud. And of course Rowand managed to make outs in both the 8th and 9th of the 2007 game with the NL attempting to rally, the latter time, famously, with Albert Pujols languishing on the bench. Hudson and Sanchez are both okay middle infield bats but probably shouldn't be deciding a game of this magnitude. Holliday actually deserved his spot. McCann, fittingly, was in the midst of what has been the worst offensive season of his career so far.
2006: David Eckstein, Holliday, Sanchez, Ryan Howard, Carlos Lee
This one actually wasn't so bad, but the mere presence of David Eckstein - the twelfth-most valuable NL shortstop in 2006 - negates everyone else's contributions to baseball.
2005: Luis Castillo, Paul Lo Duca, Carlos Lee, Morgan Ensberg
Ensberg is basically a one-season wonder; this was that one season. Still, he was brought in at first base to replace Derrek Lee, not at his position of third base, which was occupied by token Red, the extremely mediocre Felipe Lopez (though Lopez actually got on base).
2004: Johnny Estrada, Moises Alou, Mark Loretta, Todd Helton, Jack Wilson, Jim Thome
Not as bad as it looks by the names, perhaps; Loretta was actually the top NL second baseman in VORP in 2004 and Wilson was second at SS, and someone has to play those positions. Still, not exactly Murderer's Row.
2003: Preston Wilson, Richie Sexson, Aaron Boone, Rafael Furcal, Castillo, Lo Duca
It's kind of interesting to see which guys manage to be scrubby bench All-Stars year after year, isn't it? Anyway, this is the one that really killed me - you've got a team with Barry Bonds and Albert Pujols on it, with Gary Sheffield, Todd Helton and Jim Edmonds, and Mike Lowell has doubled in his last plate appearance. And the guy you're summoning off the bench to pinch-hit for Lowell - the second-most valuable third baseman and 14th most valuable hitter in the NL in 2003 - is Aaron Boone. (This game remains epically ridiculous for the fact that Eric Gagne - who allowed 11 earned runs in all of 2003's real games and had an ERA+ of 335 [!!!!] - allowed three earned runs in the bottom of the eighth. I was ready to get all het up about the fact that Gagne was pitching the 8th and not the 9th until I looked it up and saw that John Smoltz - who allowed only eight earned runs in 2003 for an ERA+ of 383 [?!?!] - would presumably have been the go-to guy in the ninth. You're off the hook this time, Dusty.)
Some of this is just due to the NL talent deficit in recent years. But this year I really think the NL had a better team and yet they lost, in large part because that better team was fairly frontloaded and so didn't get a chance to play in the most meaningful part of the game. And again, okay, you can't really ask Pujols to play 15 innings in an exhibition game. But that's exactly the point. It's an exhibition game. You wouldn't see the Red Sox pulling Manny Ramirez in the sixth inning of a game to make sure they could get Brandon Moss into the game; they'd leave Ramirez out there because they wanted to win. And while the talent dropoff between Ramirez and Moss is obviously much larger than between Pujols and Gonzalez, for example, the point remains. You can't make the game count and still expect managers to get everyone in like it's Little League.
Am I a little bitter because the Cubs can't possibly have home field advantage in the World Series now? Maybe a little. But then they have to get there first, something of which I'm hardly completely confident, and anyway this means that when the Cubs sweep - which if the 2004 and 2005 schneid-breaking titles are anything to go by, they're destined to do - they'll win it at Wrigley. Anyway.
3. I'm looking forward to the second half.
Now that the exhibition that isn't is out of the way and we're ready for more real baseball, I'm hoping the Cubs can keep doing what they've been doing - which is to say, best record in baseball, best average, OBP and SLG in the league (and best OBP in baseball), pretty good pitching and timely hitting. With Soriano coming back soon and Harden hopefully staying healthy, this could be a really great second half, even with the schedule getting a bit tougher. Here's hoping for a few more road wins.
1. The Cubs acquitted themselves well.
With eight Cubs named to the roster in one form or another and six seeing time, two as starters, they had a lot to live up to. Fortunately, they mostly did. Soto and Fukudome didn't do much at the plate, but Soto caught a good few innings (the two steals off him were much more the pitcher's fault). Zambrano was awesome (can he please get through two innings in 20 pitches more often in real games?), Dempster was awesome (striking out the side!), and Marmol was awesome. Dempster and Marmol both pitched in the bottom of innings that could have ended the game, so I was immensely relieved that both pitched well, although I'd have taken just about anything that didn't end with a Cubs pitcher giving up the game-winning run. (The 2001 All-Star Game, when Jon Lieber gave up back-to-back home runs in the sixth to put the game pretty much away, still makes me cringe.)
2. "This time it counts" is still stupid.
As has been pointed out in various places by now, there is no good excuse for claiming that the game needs to count, especially when it's clearly not being managed that way. The lineup that the National League had on the field at the end of the game was kind of pathetic - there's no reason that any All-Star Game that "counts" should be giving three at-bats to Cristian Guzman. What would be wrong with going back to just alternating home-field, which is how it used to be done?
I mean, this is how All-Star Games are played. The best players (mostly) start the game, and then the lesser All-Stars off the bench come in to get a little playing time and finish it out. This is fine when the game doesn't count, or if it's a blowout, but in a tight game where the outcome has any kind of resonance, that kind of thing just doesn't fly. Bringing in Cristian Guzman to pinch-run for Aramis Ramirez was a calculated "let's play for one run" risk on Clint Hurdle's part, but then why did he make no effort to get Guzman into scoring position, choosing to let Corey Hart swing away? Having a man on first and no outs leads to a run more often than having a man on second with one out, but having a man on second with one out leads to a run more often than having a man on first with one out, and Corey Hart's not a bad player but his OBP is only .327 this year. At the very least, it would have been nice if Hurdle had considered that the game might go to extra innings, at which point Ramirez would be a more valuable asset at the plate than Guzman, who may have a lot of hits but only gets on base 34% of the time. Ramirez's OPS+ is 133; Guzman's is 102.
Basically, when you've got Lance Berkman and Albert Pujols on your team, it's pretty weak to finish the game with Adrian Gonzalez at first base. When you've got Chipper Jones, Aramis Ramirez and David Wright on your team, letting Cristian Guzman get three at-bats at third base is unacceptable (to be fair, Wright was DHing, but still). In VORP terms, the NL starting lineup was almost 90 runs better than the AL starting lineup, in spite of the fact that it had the least-valuable player on the field in it (Fukudome, just 11.9, sad to say). By the time the 15th rolled around, the AL now had the more valuable lineup on the field, aided in part by the fact that the most valuable guy in the AL, Ian Kinsler, was coming off their bench. In fact, Kinsler and Grady Sizemore, two of the three most valuable players in the American League, both got five at-bats for the AL. The most valuable guy by VORP left for the NL in extras was Dan Uggla; look how that turned out.
I know it would be kind of ridiculous to make, say, Pujols play a full game while other guys are being rotated out just because he's the best player in the NL. And there's something to be said for trying to strike early, I guess, or for not holding chips on your bench for an inning you might not play. But it just seems like the current format is likely to lead to games like this - close affairs that end up being decided by guys who are barely legitimate All-Stars. Just look at some of the last few out-making batters for the NL in recent games:
2008: Nate McLouth, Russell Martin, Miguel Tejada, Uggla, Gonzalez, Guzman
McLouth has been valuable this season, but he could easily turn out to be a first-half wonder. Martin is a good catcher but Brian McCann, with the highest VORP of any catcher in baseball, probably should have made it into the game first. Tejada and Guzman were both sympathy All-Stars (i.e. the only selections from their crappy teams and not deserving on merit, although Tejada played well so fair play to him). Uggla was more deserving of being there than his performance indicated. Gonzalez has had a good year, but he was also a sympathy All-Star as the only Padre. Should the All-Star Game be decided by guys whose teams aren't coming anywhere near the World Series without buying a ticket?
2007: Orlando Hudson, Freddy Sanchez, Brian McCann, Matt Holliday, Aaron Rowand
Rowand was actually the third-most valuable OF in the NL in 2007, but that says more about how generally weak center field was - Juan Pierre was in the top ten in center, for crying out loud. And of course Rowand managed to make outs in both the 8th and 9th of the 2007 game with the NL attempting to rally, the latter time, famously, with Albert Pujols languishing on the bench. Hudson and Sanchez are both okay middle infield bats but probably shouldn't be deciding a game of this magnitude. Holliday actually deserved his spot. McCann, fittingly, was in the midst of what has been the worst offensive season of his career so far.
2006: David Eckstein, Holliday, Sanchez, Ryan Howard, Carlos Lee
This one actually wasn't so bad, but the mere presence of David Eckstein - the twelfth-most valuable NL shortstop in 2006 - negates everyone else's contributions to baseball.
2005: Luis Castillo, Paul Lo Duca, Carlos Lee, Morgan Ensberg
Ensberg is basically a one-season wonder; this was that one season. Still, he was brought in at first base to replace Derrek Lee, not at his position of third base, which was occupied by token Red, the extremely mediocre Felipe Lopez (though Lopez actually got on base).
2004: Johnny Estrada, Moises Alou, Mark Loretta, Todd Helton, Jack Wilson, Jim Thome
Not as bad as it looks by the names, perhaps; Loretta was actually the top NL second baseman in VORP in 2004 and Wilson was second at SS, and someone has to play those positions. Still, not exactly Murderer's Row.
2003: Preston Wilson, Richie Sexson, Aaron Boone, Rafael Furcal, Castillo, Lo Duca
It's kind of interesting to see which guys manage to be scrubby bench All-Stars year after year, isn't it? Anyway, this is the one that really killed me - you've got a team with Barry Bonds and Albert Pujols on it, with Gary Sheffield, Todd Helton and Jim Edmonds, and Mike Lowell has doubled in his last plate appearance. And the guy you're summoning off the bench to pinch-hit for Lowell - the second-most valuable third baseman and 14th most valuable hitter in the NL in 2003 - is Aaron Boone. (This game remains epically ridiculous for the fact that Eric Gagne - who allowed 11 earned runs in all of 2003's real games and had an ERA+ of 335 [!!!!] - allowed three earned runs in the bottom of the eighth. I was ready to get all het up about the fact that Gagne was pitching the 8th and not the 9th until I looked it up and saw that John Smoltz - who allowed only eight earned runs in 2003 for an ERA+ of 383 [?!?!] - would presumably have been the go-to guy in the ninth. You're off the hook this time, Dusty.)
Some of this is just due to the NL talent deficit in recent years. But this year I really think the NL had a better team and yet they lost, in large part because that better team was fairly frontloaded and so didn't get a chance to play in the most meaningful part of the game. And again, okay, you can't really ask Pujols to play 15 innings in an exhibition game. But that's exactly the point. It's an exhibition game. You wouldn't see the Red Sox pulling Manny Ramirez in the sixth inning of a game to make sure they could get Brandon Moss into the game; they'd leave Ramirez out there because they wanted to win. And while the talent dropoff between Ramirez and Moss is obviously much larger than between Pujols and Gonzalez, for example, the point remains. You can't make the game count and still expect managers to get everyone in like it's Little League.
Am I a little bitter because the Cubs can't possibly have home field advantage in the World Series now? Maybe a little. But then they have to get there first, something of which I'm hardly completely confident, and anyway this means that when the Cubs sweep - which if the 2004 and 2005 schneid-breaking titles are anything to go by, they're destined to do - they'll win it at Wrigley. Anyway.
3. I'm looking forward to the second half.
Now that the exhibition that isn't is out of the way and we're ready for more real baseball, I'm hoping the Cubs can keep doing what they've been doing - which is to say, best record in baseball, best average, OBP and SLG in the league (and best OBP in baseball), pretty good pitching and timely hitting. With Soriano coming back soon and Harden hopefully staying healthy, this could be a really great second half, even with the schedule getting a bit tougher. Here's hoping for a few more road wins.
Wednesday, July 09, 2008
Proof or GTFO
Show me a feel-good sports story and I'll show you someone lurking three steps behind, itching to ruin it. Rick Ankiel's incredible rebirth as a 30-homer outfielder in 2007 was followed quickly by reports that he had taken HGH several years before, while still a pitcher; Dara Torres' fifth Olympic games, at age 41, is greeted with extreme skepticism in spite of the fact that she willingly signed up for the most rigorous course of drug testing the IOC has to offer. And now we have Baseball Prospectus, a site I otherwise enjoy, promulgating the rumor that the Cubs are somehow cheating their way to the best record in the National League.
A few weeks ago, John Perrotto mentioned - in an oddly casual way - that there were some grumblings around baseball that the Cubs were stealing signs at Wrigley via the manual scoreboard in center field. Presumably there were two reasons for this: (1) the Cubs were playing extremely well at home and (2) the Cubs have a manual scoreboard in center field, facilitating the alleged theft. (Goat Riders of the Apocalypse made fun of the idea a few weeks ago, around the same time when I first read Perrotto's column. It's noteworthy that when I Googled "2008 Cubs stealing signs," most of the hits were Cubs blogs or message boards laughing about it, and no one actually accusing the Cubs of doing it. There was one top ten hit saying "Cards accuse Cubs of stealing signs," but it dated to 2002.)
At 34-10, the Cubs do indeed have baseball's best home record, and they combine that with a not-exactly-gaudy 20-26 road mark. But as noted before in this space, this isn't exactly all that unusual this year. Milwaukee (29-14/21-26), Boston (33-10/21-29), Tampa Bay (36-14/19-20), the White Sox (32-13/20-24) and Minnesota (32-18/18-22) all have comparable discrepancies, and that's just among teams with 50 wins or more. Are all these teams cheating at home? Surely the Cubs' mark isn't such an outlier that they're the only ones worthy of speculation. (Why not Boston, even worse on the road than the Cubs and basically exactly as good at home?)
There is, of course, the team hitting - the Cubs go .311/.391/.502 at home and .257/.331/.395 on the road. That's 54 points of average and 60 of OBP. But their home BABIP is also 41 points higher (.347 to .306); add in the home runs that the Cubs hit at Wrigley that might just be long flies elsewhere (the Cubs as a team average a home run per 27.4 PAs at Wrigley, and just one every 46.9 PAs away from it), and that accounts for much of the difference in average and OBP - a few more homers and plain ol' good luck.
Furthermore, again, this is not a problem unique to the Cubs, even if they are on the extreme end. The White Sox lose 99 points of OPS on the road; Milwaukee's road OBP is .317 (though their home OBP is a mere .332); Boston's road OBP drops 33 points from their home. The .500 Orioles hit 30 points better at Camden Yards. The Braves, baseball's ugliest road team, give up 38 points of BA and 40 points of OBP when they leave Turner Field.
(Fact: the Cubs' road OBP of .331, supposedly so lousy and proof that they're cheating at home, is seven points higher than the season OBP of Milwaukee, a supposedly dangerous offensive team. It's .003 behind the season OBP of Philadelphia, the #2 run-scoring team in the NL.)
But apparently it's not even just hitting where the Cubs are supposedly cheating. Out of nowhere - Perrotto's article is the only other place I can recall seeing a reference to the idea prior to Googling it for this post - Christina Kahrl dropped this little nugget into her analysis of the Harden trade:
Uh, what? Even if you sign up for the idea that the Cubs hitters are getting the signs, how would Cubs pitchers be able to cheat at home in a way undetectable by umpires or opposing teams? (Even if something like overwatering the infield were being done - which I don't think I would even classify as cheating - doesn't that help the opposing team just as much?)
In addition, such an accusation isn't even borne out by the statistics. People have pointed to Ryan Dempster's record, but that owes mostly to his hitters' road woes; if you remove the aberrational 8-run disaster against the White Sox on June 27 from his road record, Dempster's road ERA is 2.55 - his home ERA is 2.58. His road WHIP is higher... by about one hit (or walk) every nine innings. His 0-3 road form owes as much to bad luck as anything - there were at least three games where he pitched well enough to win, only to see the bullpen blow the lead (most recently in his last start, July 2 in San Francisco, where he turned a 5-2 lead over to Marmol only for Carlos to serve a meatball to Ray Durham), and another game where he allowed five unearned runs thanks to errors by Fontenot and DeRosa.
Examining the rest of the rotation, Ted Lilly has actually pitched better, or at least more effectively, on the road (4.07 road ERA to a 4.92 home ERA) thanks to his home-run allowing tendencies, although he does have more strikeouts at home. Marquis' road ERA is nearly three runs lower than his home ERA. (Maybe he and Dempster should platoon.) Zambrano's ERA is a bit worse on the road but the sample size is such that the difference is negligible. Gallagher pitched worse on the road, but on the other hand he's a 22-year-old kid. Maybe the Cubs get a slightly more favorable strike zone at home, but a lot of teams with loud fans probably do, and anyway it hasn't made much difference to how many runs they give up. (Besides, that isn't the Cubs cheating, it's the umpires either cheating or just being inept and easily swayed by a raucous crowd.)
The Cubs as a staff give up .44 more runs per game on the road, but how tenuous is that figure? Well, it drops to .31 more runs per game if you take out Dempster's 2.1-inning, 8 ER debacle. Pull out the 9-0 abomination at Cincinnati on May 7 (when Lieber gave up 4 HR in one inning) and it's down to .18, which it seems to me is barely anything. How much of the "proof" for the claims of cheating at home is based on a little home BABIP luck from the hitters and two bad road starts out of 46?
In other words, I've had enough of this. Either give me some proof, or some statistics that can legitimately support the idea, or please, please, shut the hell up. Cubs fans have waited too long to have a season like this tainted by hearsay and conjecture, as the gleeful rumormongers grasp at any straws in sight. Isn't it bad enough that every single Cubs postseason appearance is going to be accompanied by video of Steve Bartman, a goat, a black cat, and every other terrible thing from the last 99 years on an infinite loop? Do you really have to try this hard to ruin the season for us before we even hit the All-Star break?
A few weeks ago, John Perrotto mentioned - in an oddly casual way - that there were some grumblings around baseball that the Cubs were stealing signs at Wrigley via the manual scoreboard in center field. Presumably there were two reasons for this: (1) the Cubs were playing extremely well at home and (2) the Cubs have a manual scoreboard in center field, facilitating the alleged theft. (Goat Riders of the Apocalypse made fun of the idea a few weeks ago, around the same time when I first read Perrotto's column. It's noteworthy that when I Googled "2008 Cubs stealing signs," most of the hits were Cubs blogs or message boards laughing about it, and no one actually accusing the Cubs of doing it. There was one top ten hit saying "Cards accuse Cubs of stealing signs," but it dated to 2002.)
At 34-10, the Cubs do indeed have baseball's best home record, and they combine that with a not-exactly-gaudy 20-26 road mark. But as noted before in this space, this isn't exactly all that unusual this year. Milwaukee (29-14/21-26), Boston (33-10/21-29), Tampa Bay (36-14/19-20), the White Sox (32-13/20-24) and Minnesota (32-18/18-22) all have comparable discrepancies, and that's just among teams with 50 wins or more. Are all these teams cheating at home? Surely the Cubs' mark isn't such an outlier that they're the only ones worthy of speculation. (Why not Boston, even worse on the road than the Cubs and basically exactly as good at home?)
There is, of course, the team hitting - the Cubs go .311/.391/.502 at home and .257/.331/.395 on the road. That's 54 points of average and 60 of OBP. But their home BABIP is also 41 points higher (.347 to .306); add in the home runs that the Cubs hit at Wrigley that might just be long flies elsewhere (the Cubs as a team average a home run per 27.4 PAs at Wrigley, and just one every 46.9 PAs away from it), and that accounts for much of the difference in average and OBP - a few more homers and plain ol' good luck.
Furthermore, again, this is not a problem unique to the Cubs, even if they are on the extreme end. The White Sox lose 99 points of OPS on the road; Milwaukee's road OBP is .317 (though their home OBP is a mere .332); Boston's road OBP drops 33 points from their home. The .500 Orioles hit 30 points better at Camden Yards. The Braves, baseball's ugliest road team, give up 38 points of BA and 40 points of OBP when they leave Turner Field.
(Fact: the Cubs' road OBP of .331, supposedly so lousy and proof that they're cheating at home, is seven points higher than the season OBP of Milwaukee, a supposedly dangerous offensive team. It's .003 behind the season OBP of Philadelphia, the #2 run-scoring team in the NL.)
But apparently it's not even just hitting where the Cubs are supposedly cheating. Out of nowhere - Perrotto's article is the only other place I can recall seeing a reference to the idea prior to Googling it for this post - Christina Kahrl dropped this little nugget into her analysis of the Harden trade:
If you really want to depress yourself, A's fans, sign up for the suggestion that the Cubs are cheating in their home park, and look at Gallager's [sic] road performance, where opposing hitters have pasted him at a .271/.341/.472 clip.
Uh, what? Even if you sign up for the idea that the Cubs hitters are getting the signs, how would Cubs pitchers be able to cheat at home in a way undetectable by umpires or opposing teams? (Even if something like overwatering the infield were being done - which I don't think I would even classify as cheating - doesn't that help the opposing team just as much?)
In addition, such an accusation isn't even borne out by the statistics. People have pointed to Ryan Dempster's record, but that owes mostly to his hitters' road woes; if you remove the aberrational 8-run disaster against the White Sox on June 27 from his road record, Dempster's road ERA is 2.55 - his home ERA is 2.58. His road WHIP is higher... by about one hit (or walk) every nine innings. His 0-3 road form owes as much to bad luck as anything - there were at least three games where he pitched well enough to win, only to see the bullpen blow the lead (most recently in his last start, July 2 in San Francisco, where he turned a 5-2 lead over to Marmol only for Carlos to serve a meatball to Ray Durham), and another game where he allowed five unearned runs thanks to errors by Fontenot and DeRosa.
Examining the rest of the rotation, Ted Lilly has actually pitched better, or at least more effectively, on the road (4.07 road ERA to a 4.92 home ERA) thanks to his home-run allowing tendencies, although he does have more strikeouts at home. Marquis' road ERA is nearly three runs lower than his home ERA. (Maybe he and Dempster should platoon.) Zambrano's ERA is a bit worse on the road but the sample size is such that the difference is negligible. Gallagher pitched worse on the road, but on the other hand he's a 22-year-old kid. Maybe the Cubs get a slightly more favorable strike zone at home, but a lot of teams with loud fans probably do, and anyway it hasn't made much difference to how many runs they give up. (Besides, that isn't the Cubs cheating, it's the umpires either cheating or just being inept and easily swayed by a raucous crowd.)
The Cubs as a staff give up .44 more runs per game on the road, but how tenuous is that figure? Well, it drops to .31 more runs per game if you take out Dempster's 2.1-inning, 8 ER debacle. Pull out the 9-0 abomination at Cincinnati on May 7 (when Lieber gave up 4 HR in one inning) and it's down to .18, which it seems to me is barely anything. How much of the "proof" for the claims of cheating at home is based on a little home BABIP luck from the hitters and two bad road starts out of 46?
In other words, I've had enough of this. Either give me some proof, or some statistics that can legitimately support the idea, or please, please, shut the hell up. Cubs fans have waited too long to have a season like this tainted by hearsay and conjecture, as the gleeful rumormongers grasp at any straws in sight. Isn't it bad enough that every single Cubs postseason appearance is going to be accompanied by video of Steve Bartman, a goat, a black cat, and every other terrible thing from the last 99 years on an infinite loop? Do you really have to try this hard to ruin the season for us before we even hit the All-Star break?
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