Cubs 2, Pirates 0 and mini-preview: Anaheim Trouts of Disneyland (7-6) at Chicago Cubs (4-8)

In Postgame, Series Previews by berselius56 Comments

OSS: Cubs eke one out in the rain

Three up:

  1. Jose Quintana had one of his best starts as a Cub, striking out eleven batters in seven shutout innings. It’s especially good to see given how much of a disaster his last start was. Even better, he only issued one walk.
  2. Daniel Descalso had the big hit of the night, driving in Heyward in the seventh for the go-ahead run. We all grumbled about the signing, but he’s been pretty good so far. From what I remember he was a swing change guy which may have explained the Cubs interest in him. Certainly there wasn’t much in StL to recommend him, but he looks like a different guy now.
  3. The rain let up, so the bullpen ended up closing the door without very much drama. Another week or two of scoreless outings and they might even rate out as average!

Three down:

  1. It looks like Victor Caratini suffered a broken hand/wrist in this one. Props to him for still belting out a double after it supposedly occurred. I’m not as bullish as some on Caratini, but he’s certainly better than Taylor Davis, who seems likely to replace him.
  2. The Cubs almost blew the game in Cubes-like fashion in the sixth, when Javy was at the plate with one out and runners at second and third. Javy hit a grounder to third base which resulted in not one but two outs at home, as Javy didn’t run. He had thought the ball hit his foot, but video review was inconclusive so it turned into a cheapie double play. If you do hit your foot in a situation like that, you either have to sell it or go to first anyway. Anything in between just invites what happened.
  3. The rest of the offense was not great today, but that’s easy to chalk up to the weather conditions. At least the Cubs were able to get yesterday’s and today’s games in, rather than burning what off days are left.

Mini Preview

It’s too late to write my already lazily sourced preview, but some quick highlights

  • The Angels are coming off a sweep of the Beers. Thanks, Angels!
  • Mike Trout is day to day with a groin injury. He missed Wednesday’s game but reportedly has felt better. But if the weather is still lousy-ish I would not be surprised to see him miss a game or two in this series.
  • Friday’s matchup is between LHP Taylor Skaggs and Cole Hamels
  • Saturday’s is RHP Chris Stratton vs Kyle Hendrics
  • Sunday is former Cub RHP Trevor Cahill vs (gulp) Tyler Chatwood

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Comments

  1. WaLi

    There was a graphic last night of all time top ERA among Cubs relief pitchers (min 300 innings or something) and I was very surprised to see Strop was 1st or 2nd on that list. Didn’t realize he’s been that reliable.

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  2. Author
    berselius

    To-day’s base ball squadron

    CF Almora
    3B Bryant
    1B Rizzo
    SS Baez
    C Contreras
    2B Bote
    RF Zagunis
    LF War Bear
    P Colbert Hamels

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  3. SK

    dmick89,

    Trout/Chatwood, uselessness of tech industry, and public sperm extractors. Did I miss something else?

    (Despite what the podcast says, I haven’t read every word.)

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  4. andcounting

    Cole Hamels going 8 innings and giving up nothing but a ludicrous solo homer to Pujols (it was a fucking chase pitch) is pretty damn good.

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  5. uncle dave

    SK,

    My dog got up an hour early today, too. Don’t think I’ve posted about it yet, tho. She’s happily asleep again.

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  6. Author
    berselius

    To-day’s Bryant less base ball squadron

    2B Descalso
    RF Zobrist
    1B Rizzo
    SS Baez
    CF Heyward
    C Contreras
    LF Schwarber
    3B Bote
    P Hendricks

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  7. dmick89

    andcounting,

    Especially when you consider that Bryant has sucked and Rizzo has just been mediocre at best. Obviously the Cubs aren’t going to continue scoring this much even if those two produce at levels we’d like, but yeah, it’s kind of surprising that they’re scoring this much despite two of their best players not being much help.

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  8. andcounting

    dmick89,

    (dying laughing)
    It’s a really weird statistical distribution right now. Team batting average is .274, but only 3 qualifying batters are hitting over .250.

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  9. Smokestack Lightning

    Anyone else amazed to see a pitcher pitch AROUND Jason Heyward with a strong hitter behind him?

    I really, really, really, really hope the Jason Heyward of 93 EV with a launch angle of 25 and a sub 5% k rate sticks around for a while.

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  10. dmick89

    Perkins,

    (dying laughing) that’s a bit harsh. It was probably a 50/50 call. I didn’t think Schwarber went, but I think he was close enough to going that I wasn’t surprised when he was called out.

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  11. Rizzo the Rat

    Yeah, I hate seeing a game end on a subjective coin-flip call like that, but it wasn’t obviously wrong, either.

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  12. Perkins

    Today’s game ——-> postponed

    Good thing the Cubs have had so many off days this early in the season. I’m sure that won’t come back to hurt them down the stretch.

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  13. andcounting

    Perkins:
    Today’s game ——-> postponed

    Good thing the Cubs have had so many off days this early in the season. I’m sure that won’t come back to hurt them down the stretch.

    It’s wishful thinking at this point to hope for the stretch to be anything more than teeth-gnashing meaninglessness.

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  14. dmick89

    Perkins: Good thing the Cubs have had so many off days this early in the season. I’m sure that won’t come back to hurt them down the stretch.

    I don’t think I’ll ever stop being pissed at the ridiculous off day after opening day bullshit that happens in MLB. It happened so frequently with the Cubs this year the only way they could afford rainouts was to suck so that’s what they’re doing.

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