1. That damn first inning.
One of the things about xBA on Statcast about which I don’t know how to feel is how much credit it gives bloopers. I understand bloopers are effective—a softly hit ball in front of the outfielders is, as xBA demonstrates, very likely to be a hit. But I don’t know how repeatable bloopers are, or how avoidable they are as a pitcher, and so in this realm I don’t know how reflective it is of true performance or how predictive it is of future performance.
Either way, just terrible luck for Kyle Hendricks in the first inning yesterday. He looked fine overall—by FIP, it was his second-best start of the season—but the first inning doomed him, and ultimately doomed the Cubs.
2. Jake Marisnick. Oh no.
Hamstrings are scary. Hopefully it’s a short absence.
3. Jason Heyward? Uh oh.
Heyward’s hand issue also sounded not-good, but it may have just been a weird way for David Ross to say it: “Heyward had a little hand thing there at the end. Something’s going on. Doctors are checking out his hand.”
4. No quit.
Personally, I love a ninth-inning rally, even if it falls short. There’s something about the mentality it shows, especially in this case at the end of a hugely successful little homestand. There are a lot of things that can make you fear a baseball team will play below its numbers. Right now, injuries are one of those with the Cubs, but things like chemistry and tenacity don’t seem to be lacking. Of course, some credit for that goes to Marisnick, but he’s not alone in his contributions.
5. If Marisnick and Heyward both go to the IL…
Ok, let’s play roster games for a minute. The 40-man roster is full. Trevor Megill is almost due to come off the 10-day IL, but it’s unclear if he’s physically ready. Jake Arrieta should be able to come off tomorrow or Wednesday. Shelby Miller is on a rehab stint in Des Moines. Nico Hoerner and Ian Happ won’t be eligible to be activated until this weekend. The Cubs are already rostering just thirteen position players with Hoerner and Happ out. If both Marisnick and Heyward have to go on the IL, the Cubs will have to either add someone to the 40-man—which would necessitate moving someone to the 60-day IL (hard to see who, above, would be movable) or designating a pitcher for assignment—or call up one of their position players who is on the 40-day roster. Those are only Miguel Amaya (highly unlikely, given he’s one of the team’s top prospects and you don’t want to start a service time clock there or use an option up early) and Christopher Morel (has never played above AA before and only has 22 plate appearances at AA).
The most likely move, if my read is correct? The Cubs go to a four-man bench for a bit, and if it is both Heyward and Marisnick going on the IL, they DFA someone (it is so hard to say who—Jason Adam?) and purchase the contract of one of their AAA outfielders—maybe Cameron Maybin or Rafael Ortega.
The reasonably-optimistic scenario is that only Marisnick needs to go on the IL, the Cubs go to a four-man bench for a bit, and even if Heyward has to miss time we see Joc Pederson and Kris Bryant in the outfield every day with Nick Martini, Matt Duffy, and maybe Ildemaro Vargas splitting innings out there as well.
That reasonably-optimistic scenario also includes Hoerner and Happ returning this weekend, at which point I suppose we may see Heyward go on the IL if it’s a nagging injury to the hand (if it’s acute, for lack of a better term—a broken bone or something of that sort—he’ll have to be on the IL immediately, but I suppose then he might be the one put on the 60-day IL).
So that’s the personnel side of where we’re at. And that’s without talking about Javy Báez, who did pinch hit through his back issue but is still a concern, especially with that hamstring issue preceding the back issue (and the hamstrings being tied to the back and etc. etc. etc.).
***
Around the Division
The Cardinals shut out the Rockies, 2-0, with Adam Wainwright outdueling Germán Márquez to complete the sweep. Wainwright is off to another solid start, and I wonder what his Hall of Fame candidacy would look like had he not gotten hurt in 2015 and 2018.
The Brewers beat the Marlins 2-1 behind a good effort from the bullpen in what was a Brett Anderson-led bullpen game. They can probably be considered “back on track” after a weird week, but they’re still battling significant injuries.
The Reds were rained out in Cleveland. Rain in Cleveland—who ever heard of such a thing?
Standings, FanGraphs division championship probabilities:
1. St. Louis: 21-14, 34.8%
2. Milwaukee: 19-16, 43.9%
3. Cubs: 17-17, 11.1%
4. Cincinnati: 15-16, 10.1%
5. Pittsburgh: 14-19, 0.2%
Maybe I’m too pessimistic about the Cardinals, but I still do think that if the Cubs finish May at 28-25, they’ll be in a fine position in the division. The Cubs get their own shot in St. Louis the weekend after this one, and the Cardinals only have six games the rest of the month against non-playoff contenders (two at home against Pittsburgh, four in Phoenix against the Diamondbacks), which is the same number as the Cubs (three in Detroit, three in Pittsburgh) but also means that if the Cubs win that series in St. Louis, holding the current 3.5-game gap shouldn’t be too much of a problem.
Up Next:
It’s a two-game set in Cleveland. Alzolay vs. Bieber tomorrow, Davies vs. Hentges in the day game Wednesday. Not fun to have to face Shane Bieber, but a split is attainable as always.
