A number of thoughts I have yet to count because we’re doing this live:
1. Sunday Night Baseball!
That was so fun. What a game. What a great effin’ game. Someone remind me if I’m forgetting Adam Wainwright doing something really hateworthy over the last fifteen years, but what an outing from him. Should the Cubs have hit him harder? I would say yes, but it made for good theater, so let’s let it slide today.
2. Let’s watch that Javy Báez home run again.
3. Credit to Craig Kimbrel for getting out of there alive.
That’s a tough outing—having to bat, having to fire your adrenaline back up again twice after naturally cooling periods, entering the bottom of the last inning with Nolan Arenado at the plate as the tying run. It wasn’t Kimbrel’s prettiest outing, but it was immensely important.
4. Is Zach Davies…trustworthy?
Davies’s xERA is still 7.10, so I’m going to say no, but his ERA’s down under 5.00, so let’s celebrate that. Also, his FIP’s at 5.07, and as I’ve said before, I’m yet to see the comparison between xERA’s predictivity and FIP’s predictivity (someone remind me to just do this tomorrow or Wednesday—it’s a simple set of regressions).
Regardless of the pitcher’s reliability, he did his job last night, handing a scoreless tie to the Cubs’ bullpen and buying the bats some necessary time.
5. Is Tommy Nance a top bullpen arm?
He was used in a rather high-leverage spot yesterday, and one that implies he might be fourth in the pecking order at the moment behind the Kimbrel/Andrew Chafin/Ryan Tepera triumvirate. Fun to list those options. Those are good options. (Also, no complaints about the bloop hit and the walk that brought Tepera in for Nance—that’ll happen to anyone with enough innings.)
6. Hopefully Willson Contreras’s wrist is alright.
Scary incident there with the cross-up. Contreras would be extremely hard to replace.
7. Good series. Good week.
Won the series, picked up a game on the division leaders over the weekend, finished the week 5-2. That’ll play.
***
Around the Division:
Freddy Peralta and the Brewers beat Luis Castillo and the Reds, 9-4. The Pirates lost again.
Standings, FanGraphs division championship probabilities:
1. St. Louis: 26-20, 32.7%
2. Cubs: 24-22, 21.8%
3. Milwaukee: 23-23, 37.4%
4. Cincinnati: 20-25, 8.0%
5. Pittsburgh: 18-28, 0.1%
Kwang Hyun Kim goes tonight against Lance Lynn as the Cardinals start a three-game set with the White Sox. Brandon Woodruff opposes Blake Snell as the Padres enter Milwaukee. The Reds and Pirates are off, with the former starting a series in Washington tomorrow and the latter preparing to face the Cubs.
Up Next:
Three with the Pirates in Pittsburgh starting tomorrow evening. Might be a chance to gain more ground as the Cardinals and Brewers face tougher competition.
