The Cubs got a good start from Carlos Villaneuva, who struck out 6 and gave up one run in 6.2 innings. Rizzo and Valbuena homered off of Braves starter Julio Teheran, and Nate Schierholtz was inches from adding one of his own. The Cubs were prepared to pour even more on, loading the bases in the top of the eighth …
Series Preview: Cubs (2-1) at Braves (2-1)
The Cubs somehow managed to scratch together enough runs to take a series from the Pirates. Now they head to relatively warm Atlanta for another three game set. Atlanta beat up on their aging divisional rivals, the Phillies in their opening series. Team Overviews Here's how the teams looked in 2012. NL Ranks in parentheses. Cubs Braves wRC+ 80 (16th) …
Season review: Starlin Castro
Starlin Castro was one of four players to play in all 162 games in 2012. Adam Jones doing it is not all that surprising. He's relatively young. Ichiroi is a bit surprising considering his age and poor performance while in Seattle. Even more surprising is Prince Fielder. Despite playing in 4 more games this season, Castro had 24 fewer plate …
An Upton family reunion in Chicago
While Brett Jackson will return to AAA next year thanks to a poor performance at the big league level, he will get another chance at some point. I'm just not sure it will be with this team. The Cubs have a couple very attractive options this winter. The first is free agent B.J. Upton who is almost certain to not …
Season in review: Alfonso Soriano
Alfonso Soriano's projections entering the season (below) weren't anything special. It was a slightly below league average wOBA with expected poor defense and baserunning skills. Overall, he was expected to be about as close to replacement level as possible. Projection PA H HR BB SO avg obp slg wOBA CAIRO 463 106 18 34 100 .249 .308 .446 .326 Guru …
Brett Jackson and strikeouts
I had planned to put something more thorough together for today, but was too lazy to do so. Instead, I’m just going to list the guys who the highest strikeout percentage since 2006 (minimum 1000 PA) followed by their minor league strikeout rate. Sometime when I’m not lazy, I’ll add to it. For MLB numbers, I’m using Fangraphs. For MiLB …