Nico Hoerner slides into a base

The Off Day After Opening Day React Post

In Commentary And Analysis by Rice Cube112 Comments

Because the Cubs play at Wrigley Field, which historically does not have a roof despite being in the Midwest where it can get a) cold and b) wet, this necessitates a scheduled off day right after the official Opening Day, in case they have to make up the home opener later. I guess if Friday had gotten weathered out, they would have thrown in a doubleheader on Saturday, but I believe the most recent CBA marked the return of full nine-inning doubleheader games, so that would be rough that early in a season. Thankfully the weather was good enough that the Cubs got to play and won, and you can check out the box score here at MLB dot com. Barring the invention of force fields or an insta-roof, I guess we will have to deal with this random off day for the foreseeable future. It’s kind of like the commercial break after a score that precedes a kickoff and then you get another commercial, except over the course of a few days rather than a few extra minutes of no football. So now we have to twiddle our thumbs until Saturday (or at least try to be somewhat productive at work) and think about this first win that keeps 162-0 alive.

You’re On the Clock

Overall, it looked like Cubs starter Marcus Stroman was well under control, pitching around traffic and keeping the Brewers off balance for the most part. Stroman worked pretty quickly, mostly out of what I perceive to be a “stretch” position with a quick step back on his plant foot before lifting and throwing, and I blanked on whether this was also the case once there was a guy on first base as I figured there should be a quicker step in those situations. Stroman is now a trivia answer:

I was also wondering how this was officially recorded, but I guess all it took was scrolling down in the box score:

I don’t know if this is surprising or not, but it was the only pitch clock violation in the game (the other image in my tweet above includes a snooze-K of Rafael Devers, who won’t be signing with the Cubs because he got some money Boston found). It’s surprising that it was Stroman because he seemed to have such a good grasp of gaming the clock, but it’s not surprising there’s only one because they’ve been working through it all spring. I think there were a couple pickoffs attempted by the Brewers staff (the disengagement thing) and most of the batter timeouts appeared to be by the Brewers as well. There was one challenge by the Brewers (lost, like they did the game) and one by the Cubs (won, because the umpire blinked I guess) and those were rapidly taken care of. The game ended in two hours and 21 minutes by the official time listed in that box score, which means I can write this and still go and do a bunch of other things before dinner, because I earned dinner unlike some other bloggers.

If you’re interested, this is what the Cubs/Marquee scorebug does to do the pitch clock, which blips in when it reaches 10 seconds and is actually quite nondescript, or at least I didn’t find it distracting (the on field clock is no longer visible from center field cam, although I saw a clock staring down the first base line when they did a replay of Dansby Swanson on base):

Some other broadcasts did a thing with the clock ticking down inside the baseball diamond icon and I thought that was pretty clever too.

Game Thoughts Not Directly Related to the Clock

The Brewers apparently had a couple speedsters in their lineup today, one of whom forced Nico Hoerner to rush a throw and that baby sailed, it was quite a shock. He probably would have been safe anyway but the throw was uncharacteristic for what we’ve experienced of Nico so far in his career. Despite that speed and the bigger bases and the limited disengagements and what not, no steals were actually attempted in the game, although the Cubs went first-to-third multiple times and also took advantage of some Brewers boo-boos that were likely caused by their aggressiveness on the basepaths.

Marcus Stroman and Yan Gomes took advantage of the home plate umpire’s, uh, generous zone:

I liked the game plan, if he’s gonna keep giving it to you and the catcher can frame it, just keep throwing it, and I’m sure it pissed the Brewers off to no end but I think they gave that edge to Corbin Burnes and company too. Speaking of Burnes, the former Cy Young winner, I kind of thought the Cubs would rack up double digit strikeouts facing him, but he actually gave up three walks and three strikeouts while giving up all four runs (three earned, with one bonus when the Brewers played bomb disposal with the baseball). All told, the Cubs were pesky all day, only striking out five times while keeping that ball in play even if they didn’t all become hits.

On the pitching/defense side, Stroman got a quality start with his six shutout innings, and aside from Eric Hosmer trying to kill him twice, the Cubs kept the Brewers completely off the board. There were a couple of nifty plays all around the horn, and one sliding attempt by Ian Happ that seemed to be mistimed but Cody Bellinger backed him up immediately to prevent the extra base. The only weirdness besides Nico’s bad throw was Yan Gomes being charged with several passed balls and not blocking pitches that seemed like they should have been routine (even if nothing in baseball is ever truly routine but you know what I mean). It almost seemed like his glove wasn’t broke in right because the ball just wouldn’t stick in, unless he was trying to frame and just pulled his glove away a fraction too quickly.

Anyway, as we pondered in the Dreamcast, this game was a shining example of whatever plan was concocted by Jed Hoyer and friends. Essentially, keep the other team from scoring with pitching and defense, and string enough hits through a relatively better contact-oriented lineup than before and suddenly you have a victory. That this was a four-run victory rather than a one-run victory was a bonus.

Just for shits and giggles, I’m embedding our latest podcast episode here again, although you can always access it via this site’s sidebar or your podcast application of choice. It’s an off day before play resumes, so you might as well listen, but I can’t tell you what to do.

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Comments

  1. BVS

    Cubs fans of a certain vintage will love the fact that Taillon was in the top 10 SPs in terms of BB/9 across all of baseball last year.

    E.g.: Me

    BVS loves players who control the plate, both on the mound and in the batter’s box.

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  2. BVS

    Since I was in the woods yesterday, and couldn’t follow the game, I appreciate both the wrap ups and the comment stream. I don’t subscribe to any Chicago papers, so these are often my reviews aside from mlb.com.

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  4. BVS

    I was thinking about the leadership discussion we were having on Ian Happ in the Dreamcast. Seems like with Taillon, Hoerner, and Swanson, the Cubs have pre -filled that role.

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  6. Author
    Rice Cube

    BVS,

    Yeah they probably have enough “good clubhouse chemistry” and “leadership” guys to weather the storm, so they are probably telegraphing that they don’t care if Ian leaves in free agency, which will probably temporarily suck like with the previous core guys, but we’ll live

    For the gallery, how was this latest Dreamcast episode sounding? I figure if only three people listen I should at least make it sound good (dying laughing)

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  9. Author
    Rice Cube

    berselius,

    Last I saw of this he just had a bad bruise and they were supposed to know more soon after the imaging, that could have happened to anyone though, controlling 103+ is no easy task!

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  11. BVS

    Rice Cube,

    Video showed it hitting the guard over the knee, so hopefully that kept the kneecap etc intact.

    Twitter trolls whining about how he’d have been fine in a traditional stance, which, sure, instead of it bouncing off his knee he’d have missed it completely.

    My Granddad took a baseball off his kneecap playing 2b in college ball in the late 20s or early 30s. It broke into multiple pieces. The doc/trainer simply realigned them manually under the skin like putting a puzzle together and put him in a cast. When he was in his 70s he finally got the knee replaced. You could feel ridges of calcification under his skin where the pieces had knitted themselves back together. Helped keep him mobile until 98, so totally worth it.

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  15. BVS

    Rice Cube,

    That happened to our HS catcher a few years ago. Not 103mph, but still…

    Back in lineup next night. I played Iron Man theme song as his walk up the rest of the year.

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  23. BVS

    Rice Cube,
    Apparently 14/32 drafted or signed as IFA’s by the Cubs. Seems anemic for development, no? Mostly because of 4/15 pitchers? (Suppose we can give credit for Wick too, since we traded for him, so 5/15.)

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  24. Author
    Rice Cube

    BVS,

    Depends on the other levels, I would suggest a higher proportion of truly homegrown guys at SB and MB and Tennessee but I honestly haven’t looked at the rosters yet

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  25. Author
    Rice Cube

    Watching CLE @ SEA since it’s the free game of the day, lots of guys running wild and the defenses have been super sloppy, the Cubs have kind of spoiled us after this spring…this game is entertaining but comparatively dragging, we’re like almost two hours in and it’s still in the bottom of the fourth at this time

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  26. Author
    Rice Cube

    I was gonna try an April Fool’s post but couldn’t really think of a foil that wouldn’t immediately be seen as complete BS (dying laughing)

    Maybe next year I’ll try harder

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  27. Author
    Rice Cube

    Rice Cube,

    I guess it would have been easy too with the paying for the legacy blue check mark thing and the ensuing chaos of not knowing who is real and who’s not, unless Musk was actually prescient enough to make THAT his April Fool’s joke

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  42. andcounting

    Swanson vying for best start to a Cubs free-agent career. Fukudome had a good one, but this is right up there.

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  46. andcounting

    Steele is DEALING.

    Also, for those of us who listen and follow along on Gameday, the increased pace of play now means instead of the audio being 2-3 pitches behind the graphics, it’s now more like an 8-pitch delay.

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  57. andcounting

    Assad’s velocity range is impossible. And he came out of the bullpen throwing everywhere from 80–95 with command of his changeup, cutter, sinker, slider, and 4-seam. In the span of three batters. (dying laughing)

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  73. Author
    Rice Cube

    Hopefully Taillon also tosses a six inning shutout and the bullpen doesn’t die this time tomorrow, Reds coming up and that should theoretically be a series to win

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  77. Author
    Rice Cube

    Quick thoughts in case berselius is setting up a follow up thread, otherwise I’ll do one tomorrow as a home series postmortem…

    Small sample size caveats apply

    1. Dansby Swanson seems to be having one of the best debuts of any Cub in recent memory, and I hope he doesn’t crash like Fukudome did (although Kosuke was pretty solid, just he was never going to be a superstar)

    2. The starting pitching is doing what I thought they would and the defense too, but I think this game told us that there are going to be hiccups and certain role changes depending on situation, was kind of disappointing but you’re not going to win many games scoring just the one run anyway

    3. Hoping that Belli and Mancini start remembering they’re supposed to hit, too

    4. Madrigal needs to convert that so-called contact ability into hits or at least make it more difficult for the defense to throw him out

    5. Certain performances today make me hope that guys like Suzuki and Mervis come up sooner rather than later, maybe even Morel with all his whiff issues

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  80. berselius

    andcounting:
    Rice Cube,

    New game threads are for winners.

    This (dying laughing). I’m too busy/lazy to write new posts effectively every day – my rough schedule when I actually pay attention to the team has been to 1) write Series previews and 2) write recaps after wins if I happened to watch the game / am still awake / someone else hadn’t already written one. It’s no big deal if two people write posts that step on each other. It’s more like an OV tradition (dying laughing). It’s hard to top the time a few offseasons ago where there was no new shit for months, then andcounting and I posted new shit within 10 minutes of each other.

    tl;dr – make new posts when you want, the only things I ‘reliably’ do are series previews.

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  82. Author
    Rice Cube

    Having slept on it some, splitting the first two against Burnes and Woodruff is a pretty nifty thing and I hope the Cubs beat up on whoever this guy is today

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  84. berselius

    Looking forward to watching Taillon today, yay new pitching,

    Also looking forward to eating this foccacia that is currently filling my place with good smells.

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  86. andcounting

    It’s kinda wild to look at the pitchers Swanson’s hits have come off of so far. He’s raking against some pretty solid dudes.

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  90. berselius

    No comment on the number of years that I thought today’s starting pitcher’s name rhymed with ‘galleon’

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  105. andcounting

    Rice Cube,

    I’m no therapist, but I think any strategy consisting solely of things over which you exert neither control nor influence is a recipe for abject frustration.

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  111. Perkins

    Last year I remember knowing when the Cubs went under .500 in late April that they wouldn’t see it again. I’m somewhat more optimistic for this season, but not by much.

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