Series Preview: Pittsburgh Pirates (5-3) at Chicago Cubs (2-7)

In Series Previews by berselius25 Comments

Well, that road trip is over with. Hopefully the Cubs can get a fresh start now that they are finally at their homes for the first time in two months. At least the Brewers final felt like a regular loss instead of yet another back-breaking loss.

Team Leaders

I’ll use the teams’ 2018 numbers here (excluding injured/departed players), since looking at a bunch of zeros is boring.

Pirates

  • OBP: Francisco Cervelli (.378)
  • ISO: Gregory Polanco (.245)
  • HR: Polanco (23)
  • R+RBI: Polanco (156)
  • wRC+: Cervelli (125)
  • BSR: Josh Harrison (2.4)
  • DRS: Corey Dickerson (16)
  • SP K/9: Chris Archer (10.32)
  • SP BB/9: Joe Musgrove (1.79)
  • SP FIP: Jameson Taillon (3.46)
  • RP K/9: Felipe Vazquez (11.44)
  • RP BB/9: Richard Rodriguez (2.47)
  • RP FIP: Vazquez (2.43)
  • WAR: Taillon (3.8)

Cubs

  • OBP: Ben Zobrist (.378)
  • ISO: El Mago (.264)
  • HR: Baez (34)
  • R+RBI: Baez (212)
  • wRC+: Baez (131)
  • BSR: Jason Heyward (4.3)
  • DRS: Albert Almora (9)
  • SP K/9: Yu Darvish (11.03)
  • SP BB/9: Kyle Hendricks (1.99)
  • SP FIP: Cole Hamels (3.42)
  • RP FIP: Carl Edwards Jr (11.60)
  • RP BB/9: Pedro Strop (3.17)
  • RP FIP: Edwards (2.93)
  • WAR: Baez (5.3)

Injuries, transactions, vengenace pacts, etc.

The Cubs sent Edwards to Iowa and Monty to the DL to call up Kyle Ryan and Allen Webster. They promptly gave up three runs between them in their Cubs debut. They looked better in yesterday’s game, where the bullpen shockingly gave up zero runs.

The Pirates are waiting to hear on suspensions following a pretty big fight by baseball standards. Chris Archer is almost certainly going to face one after throwing behind some Reds player not named Joey Votto, but he wasn’t slated to pitch in this series anyway.

We thought the Cubs offseason was bad, but the Pirates weren’t far off. They signed OF Lonnie Chisenhall and P Jordan Lyles and that’s about it, unless you count bringing back off-field problem child Jung Ho Kang as a new signing.

Pitching Probables

Projected K/9, BB/9, ERA listed for each pitcher.

Monday: Jameson Taillon, RHP (7.99, 1.91, 3.65) vs Jon Lester, LHP (7.78, 2.95, 4.16), 1:20 PM CT

Taillon was much better than I remembered last year, and it looks like the fantasy baseball types are all over him to have a breakout year after adding a slider in 2018.

Lester has been the most steady presence in the Cubs rotation so far, which isn’t saying much. Hopefully he’ll have another okay start in this one.

Wednesday: Jordan Lyles, RHP (7.16, 3.11, 4.81) vs Yu Darvish, RHP (10.38, 3.71, 4.02) 7:05 PM CT

Lyles has mostly been a reliever/swingman for the past few years, but it looks like the Pirates signed him to be a starter. He started his career as a innings sponge for those terrible pre-WS Astros teams, and then got lit up in Colorado after leaving Houston. He has a career 5.25 ERA, but the Pirates are only paying him $2m for the season. I guess it’s a better deal than Chatwood’s!

Darvish’s second start was better than his first, but it still stunk. Luckily for Darvish it was overshadowed by a bullpen meltdown after he was yanked from the game.

Thursday: Joe Musgrove, RHP (7.82, 1.69, 4.02) Jose Quintana, LHP (8.58, 3.03, 3.88) 7:05 PM CT

Musgrove throws a ton of strikes, so hopefully the Cubs hitters won’t be confused to see a guy that doesn’t go to a full count on every PA. He threw seven innings of shutout ball against the Reds in his only start so far this year.

Q got lit up by the Brewers, coughing up three homers in as many innings. Hopefully it can’t get much worse, which is pretty much the motto of the 2019 Cubs so far.

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Comments

  1. dmick89

    It would be remarkable to look at all the contracts for starting pitchers and see that pretty much every single one of them is better than the one the Cubs were super eager to give Chatwood.

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  2. BVS

    dmick89,

    Look at that offense you are predicting!

    Re: Taillon + Fantasy. My fantasy team is pretty happy with him. Rizzo and Contreras appreciate his command. Matt Chapman has expressed wonder that he is actually a starter and not a converted reliever.

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  3. Author
    berselius

    To-day’s base ball squadron

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

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  4. Smokestack Lightning

    Okay. I see Cubs with 10 runs. Pirates with… zero? Are they declining to hit until the 7th inning to make things more fair?

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  5. andcounting

    If I wanted to be optimistic, I would say it’s a good thing that the bullpen has had to pitch so much these last two days. They could definitely use the confidence boost, and they have the opportunity to go 11 scoreless innings.

    Again, if I wanted to be super optimistic, I would say that. I’m not saying that, I’m just putting it out there for any optimistic people who are looking for something to say.

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  6. WaLi

    13 innings in a row for Cubs pitchers (11 of which by relievers) without allowing a run.

    The offense has scored 10 or more runs in 5 games so far.

    I’m getting back on the hype train boys, Cubs are back and they aren’t going to let me down again!

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  7. dmick89

    WaLi: I’m getting back on the hype train boys, Cubs are back and they aren’t going to let me down again!

    I think they’re going to win at least 30 more so if this was college basketball they’d be awesome.

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  8. EnricoPallazzo

    based on today’s game, two things are blatantly obvious:
    1. the bullpen issues were a total fluke and will not come back, ever
    2. the offensive production will continue at unsustainably high levels for the duration of the season

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  9. Smokestack Lightning

    EnricoPallazzo:
    based on today’s game, two things are blatantly obvious:
    1. the bullpen issues were a total fluke and will not come back, ever
    2. the offensive production will continue at unsustainably high levels for the duration of the season

    Also, every opposing defense will commit as many errors as needed for the Cubs to score 10 runs all the time.

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