The 2019 Chicago Cubs season has largely been the tale of the first nine games and the second nine games. The first nine games, 1-2 against the Rangers, 0-3 against the Braves, and 1-2 against the Brewers, was aggravating. Everyone had such high expectations and starting 2-7 was tough. The offense was putting up numbers (62 runs scored, an average of 6.8 runs per game), but the pitching was horrendous (71 runs given up, an average of 7.8 runs per game). Despite all of the aggravation and disgust, we didn't overreact. We ultimately knew the talent was there and hoped and prayed a turnaround was near.
The next nine games HAVE BEEN UNBELIEVABLE. It started with a series against the Pittsburgh Pirates (2-1), next came the Los Angeles Angel (1-1, Sundays game PPD due to weather), we then went to Miami and took 3 games from them in dominating fashion, and finally yesterday we kicked off a weekend series with the Diamondbacks with a 5-1 win.
In this nine game stretch we have seen the offense stayed scoring with 46 runs scored (5.1 per game average). But the dominance has come from the pitching staff, 15 runs given up (1.6 runs per game). Including this from the starters after yesterdays game:
That is absolute dominance, the back half of that stretch included a streak of 31 straight scoreless innings until the Diamondbacks put up one run yesterday in the 9th. Now of course like we didn't overreact to the bad start we are not going to overreact to this dominance.
After all we are talking about baseball, it obviously is not feasible to expect sub 1.00 ERAs from the starting pitching. But is there any reason this starting staff, barring health, can't lead the league in ERA like they did in the magical 2016 season? No there really is not, on paper this is one of the best staffs in the league. If we don't hit an injury bug (please don't Jonny Lester), we can allow these pitchers to get the dominant feel back and let them loose all season long.
Now looking at the offense, let's keep in mind we are averaging 5.7 runs a game without really any production from KB or Rizz. KB on the year is slashing .235/.342/.471. The OBP isn't horrible, he's a career .384 OBP guy, but the rest is and can be expected to rise. This is a guy that is an MVP player in this league, he missed time last year with an injury and this is baseball so sometimes it just takes guys a little to get going. As long as KB stays healthy, I think it's fair to expect .285, 25-30 homers, and 100 RBIs.
Rizz is slashing .169/.341/.431. Again, the OBP isn't horrendous but the batting average is obviously extremely low and again it is expected to go up barring injuries. Rizz is a guy we have come to expect to hit .280 (career .273 hitter), 30 home runs and 100 RBIs. It is just what we does and he will get back to it. Last year in the month of April, Rizz hit .158 and entered May with an overall .148 BA/1 HR/9 RBIs and he ended the season with .283/25/101. So yeah, the weather heats up and so does Rizz.
Now I would be doing a disservice if I didn't mention that making up for the lack of production from the top two guys, we have guys through out the lineup who are picking up the slack. Jason Heyward, Willson Contreras, and Daniel Descalso are all hitting above .330 on the year. It wouldn't be fair to those guys to expect that to keep up because those are just unfair expectations for any baseball player. But it's not to say they won't be productive hitters of course, they are all guys who have ability and can be bright spots in a lineup. It has just been nice to see the slack being picked up by these three and KB/Rizz have struggled a bit.
And then we have Javy, who has picked up right where he left off. Javy leads the Cubs in virtually every offensive category including strikeouts (never change Javy). Javy is hitting .304 with 6 home runs, 16 RBIs, 24 hits. Javy was the best offensive player for the Cubs last year, nearly walking away with the NL MVP, and so far we are seeing no signs of regression.
At the end of the day we have finished 19 games of 162. There have been highs and there have been lows and now it is just about balancing it out for the last 143. It is important to not get higher than the highs and lower than the lows because baseball is such a fluid game. It is constantly changing and streaks are continuously happening, positive or negative, but the version of the Cubs we have seen the last nine games is more like what we can expect than the first nine games.
PS.....
The Cubs are second in the NL in run differential with +22 so far on the year. -11 behind the Dodgers who are +33, and +10 the Phillies who are in third with a +12. Very indicative of things to come....
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