Latest / North Side Territory: A Chicago Cubs Podcast / Is it time for the Cubs to start panicking about their offense?

Transcript

Is it time for the Cubs to start panicking about their offense? · North Side Territory: A Chicago Cubs Podcast

0:00
Speaker 1: Score some runs. Breaking news like this, can't get no
0:04
Speaker 1: hit like you know once a week, you know, quite
0:07
Speaker 1: a homestand it's got a change.
0:12
Speaker 2: Welcome into north Side Territory. I'm Sahadi Charman with my
0:16
Speaker 2: partner Patrick Mooney. We're both Cubs beat writers for The
0:20
Speaker 2: Athletic and this is our new Cubs podcast that we
0:23
Speaker 2: do with Foul Territory. We're happy to have you listening.
0:28
Speaker 2: Make sure to subscribe, rate and review all that good stuff.
0:32
Speaker 2: Thank you to all the people behind the scenes doing work.
0:34
Speaker 2: We're doing this at night and and who knows how
0:38
Speaker 2: how late they have to stay up to get to
0:40
Speaker 2: get to this, but I appreciate it. And well, I
0:45
Speaker 2: mean Patrick, there's not much to talk about outside of
0:50
Speaker 2: what's going on with this offense. The Cub's lost again
0:54
Speaker 2: to Atlanta. They lose two of three, they got shut out.
1:00
Speaker 2: This is like what we're seeing with the offense has
1:03
Speaker 2: been going on now long enough that you know, it's
1:07
Speaker 2: it's fair to be concerned. It's fair to wonder what's up.
1:12
Speaker 2: Their season has not been decided, they've not it's not
1:15
Speaker 2: dictated that they are a bad offense. But this stretch
1:21
Speaker 2: that they're on after after the first Like basically it's
1:25
Speaker 2: like two seasons right now, right, the first twenty six
1:27
Speaker 2: games and the last twenty five games, And they're hitting
1:31
Speaker 2: one ninety nine in their last twenty five games, right,
1:34
Speaker 2: and like it has nothing to do with situational hitting
1:39
Speaker 2: or they don't have this. They don't have that. They're
1:41
Speaker 2: just not hitting. There's nothing going on, no consistent attack.
1:46
Speaker 2: If it weren't for they're like nine and a half
1:49
Speaker 2: percent walk rate during that stretch, it would be abysmal,
1:53
Speaker 2: Like this would be like on it almost is unwatchable
1:56
Speaker 2: at times because some of what the talk that you know,
2:01
Speaker 2: I hear from fans in the press boxes like this
2:04
Speaker 2: is boring. They're not like yeah, it's not like we're seeing,
2:11
Speaker 2: you know, them put up a fight much on offense.
2:14
Speaker 2: Like a lot of this stretch has been like Okay,
2:18
Speaker 2: they have the occasional home run, but it's really like
2:21
Speaker 2: sacrifice fly ground out, RBI ground out, Like where's where
2:26
Speaker 2: where's the excitement? Like even that seven run inning in Pittsburgh,
2:30
Speaker 2: six of it was via walks, like come on.
2:34
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean not staying there's a north side territory jinx,
2:38
Speaker 1: but I mean I run their obfositive number since this
2:41
Speaker 1: podcast launch. It is abysmal. And yeah, I mean it
2:46
Speaker 1: was a seven game homestand in which they had one
2:50
Speaker 1: nothing walk off win and another game that they won
2:53
Speaker 1: in the tenth inning, I believe, so that kind of
2:57
Speaker 1: tells you where they are right now. I've read your
3:00
Speaker 1: latest piece up in the Athletic. Was it five shutouts
3:04
Speaker 1: in the last twenty five games? Does that sound.
3:06
Speaker 2: Right after zero in the first twenty six?
3:09
Speaker 1: Okay, uh yeah, I mean if they're not panicking yet,
3:16
Speaker 1: I certainly think this is more than just some of
3:21
Speaker 1: the valid reasons for this offensive downturn. I think both
3:27
Speaker 1: sides can be both things can be true of facing
3:32
Speaker 1: good hitting, sorry, facing good pitching. Hitting is cyclical, there
3:37
Speaker 1: were injuries, the schedule what I want, fine, but this
3:45
Speaker 1: is a significant amount of the season. And it also
3:49
Speaker 1: gets to like, you know, the pessimist view of what
3:54
Speaker 1: this season could be, what like the low end of
3:56
Speaker 1: some of the projections would be, like the kind of
3:59
Speaker 1: devil's advocate. If you're looking at this team and spraying
4:03
Speaker 1: of stuff you've been righting about for a long time,
4:07
Speaker 1: where's the star power? Like who's the guy that can
4:10
Speaker 1: carry them? When things don't go well, like where's the
4:14
Speaker 1: It's one thing to have depth, but that doesn't mean
4:19
Speaker 1: you have like a deep, complete lineup that puts pressure
4:23
Speaker 1: on the other team. And you know, our understanding at
4:28
Speaker 1: this moment is they're not like frantically calling Triple A
4:32
Speaker 1: Iowa looking for a solution. Maybe that does happen at
4:36
Speaker 1: some point, and not ruling out people losing patience overnight
4:40
Speaker 1: on the way to Saint Louis, but like there isn't
4:43
Speaker 1: a savior down there. Memorial Day weekend is not the
4:49
Speaker 1: time to bench someone like Ian Hat But I don't
4:52
Speaker 1: know if they're fifty one maybe games in now, like
4:57
Speaker 1: another couple of weeks, I think, you know, the intensity
5:02
Speaker 1: or frequency of those conversations are going to pick up
5:05
Speaker 1: because this is not sustainable and we haven't even gotten
5:10
Speaker 1: into like what it does for the pitching or what
5:13
Speaker 1: it says about where this kind of program is going.
5:16
Speaker 1: There's a lot it's this last week or so has
5:19
Speaker 1: really it's not quite the wheels falling off, but it's
5:23
Speaker 1: kind of like the you know, if things goes wrong,
5:27
Speaker 1: this is what the season could look like. And there's
5:29
Speaker 1: plenty of time to turn around, but that still has
5:32
Speaker 1: to happen before we can kind of move on from this.
5:35
Speaker 2: We have to acknowledge some things, right, Like they were
5:38
Speaker 2: injured for a good chunk of this twenty five game downturn, right,
5:43
Speaker 2: and these guys need to find some rhythm that have
5:46
Speaker 2: gotten healthy. But they're healthy now, right. Dancy Swatson looks
5:49
Speaker 2: like Okay, Dansby looks better since he's come off the aile.
5:54
Speaker 2: Not seeing you know, bad strikeouts, You're seeing quality at
5:59
Speaker 2: bats and him hitting the ball hard. There's some decent
6:02
Speaker 2: signs right like Ian happ Okay, I see something there.
6:06
Speaker 2: In the past few games, you can feel like he's
6:09
Speaker 2: digging himself out of this hole. Christopher Morrell, this is
6:13
Speaker 2: a really weird stretch of baseball that I've watched with him.
6:16
Speaker 2: He looks really good at the plate, and I know
6:20
Speaker 2: fans are gonna say, like it a certain you know,
6:22
Speaker 2: after a certain amount of time, you can't keep talking
6:24
Speaker 2: about bad luck with individuals, and it's fifty ish games.
6:29
Speaker 2: You can't, Yes, bad luck happens for fifty games, and
6:33
Speaker 2: he's been above average despite having some bad luck. Like,
6:36
Speaker 2: I'm not worried about him. It's just maddening to watch
6:40
Speaker 2: and be like he's doing everything right and not getting
6:43
Speaker 2: rewarded for it often enough. But there's some things that
6:47
Speaker 2: like Cody Bellinger is in a little bit of a
6:49
Speaker 2: slump now, and you wonder, like is he pressing? Is
6:52
Speaker 2: he trying to do more because the offense is struggling,
6:55
Speaker 2: Like just seeing him get a little bit out of
6:58
Speaker 2: his zone, which he has hasn't done much in his
7:01
Speaker 2: time with the Cubs. You know, Michael Bush is a rookie.
7:05
Speaker 2: He is going through an adjustment period. You have to
7:08
Speaker 2: ride this out like he is a part of the
7:11
Speaker 2: future and the present right he needs to be solid
7:14
Speaker 2: above average offensive player for this to all work correctly,
7:20
Speaker 2: says Azuki, has looked a little off. I'd like to
7:22
Speaker 2: think that Thursday's game was a step in the right
7:26
Speaker 2: direction because I was starting to wonder what was going
7:30
Speaker 2: on with his at bats, because it was looking way
7:32
Speaker 2: too much like July, with those ugly, awkward swings. They
7:35
Speaker 2: were becoming too frequent, and you start to worry. They're
7:41
Speaker 2: like I came into the season expecting big offense. I'm
7:46
Speaker 2: not jumping off that prediction just because of this downstretch.
7:50
Speaker 2: I still think they can be that it can be
7:53
Speaker 2: the strength of the team. It's just it's getting to
7:56
Speaker 2: a point where it's like, WHOA, what's going on? Here's
7:59
Speaker 2: I just want to point out a couple of stats
8:01
Speaker 2: that I have in my piece. First twenty six games
8:04
Speaker 2: one hundred and forty runs. Last twenty five games, seventy
8:08
Speaker 2: eight runs. They had five or fewer hits just three
8:12
Speaker 2: times in those first twenty six games. Today Wednesday or
8:15
Speaker 2: Thursday was their twelfth time in the past twenty five games,
8:19
Speaker 2: so nearly half of those games have had five or
8:21
Speaker 2: fewer hits. They're just not doing enough. It's just like,
8:25
Speaker 2: I can look at all the advanced stats I want
8:27
Speaker 2: to about this if they're not hitting. Like we were talking,
8:31
Speaker 2: we were talking in postgame like, I was like, they
8:34
Speaker 2: have a one ninety nine batting average, and the person
8:38
Speaker 2: it was, Bruce Evine, who I've known forever right said said, oh,
8:41
Speaker 2: now you're into batting average. I was like, what I
8:44
Speaker 2: mean when you're hitting one ninety nine, yes, unless it's
8:46
Speaker 2: somehow you're you're slugging and and.
8:50
Speaker 1: They don't get hits and they don't score runs, but
8:52
Speaker 1: everything else looks pretty good under it.
8:54
Speaker 2: Yeah, right, So I mean there's just there's not a
8:57
Speaker 2: lot to grasp onto it the moment outside, And this
9:01
Speaker 2: was kind of the theme in post game in my opinion.
9:05
Speaker 2: As far as the positive spin from Council, I heard
9:08
Speaker 2: it from Horner, I heard it from Bush. What like,
9:12
Speaker 2: what has happened in the recent past isn't the best
9:15
Speaker 2: predictor of what's going to happen these A lot of
9:18
Speaker 2: these A lot of these players have established themselves and
9:21
Speaker 2: know what their baseline is. The past twenty five games,
9:24
Speaker 2: isn't their baseline right now? If you want to say
9:26
Speaker 2: Michael Bush hasn't established himself, fine, that's fine. I'm gonna
9:30
Speaker 2: I'm not going to argue on that point. But outside
9:33
Speaker 2: of a very select few, which I think in the
9:35
Speaker 2: past twenty five games, there's three guys with over one
9:37
Speaker 2: hundred way to runs great A plus it's Talkman, It's Bellinger,
9:41
Speaker 2: and it's morell Morel's been just good, right good, not great.
9:45
Speaker 2: He needs to be great. I think he has the
9:47
Speaker 2: potential to still still be great. Bellinger is in a
9:49
Speaker 2: little mini slampier over fourteen and Talkman actually with his
9:53
Speaker 2: over today. May that that number may have dipped below
9:56
Speaker 2: one hundred over the last twenty five, but guess what,
10:00
Speaker 2: it's been great Like he's I'm not going to complain
10:02
Speaker 2: about Mike Talkman's production.
10:04
Speaker 1: Their best hitter this year, right, right, right? But he
10:06
Speaker 1: shouldn't be right, with all due respect, like a guy
10:11
Speaker 1: you love to have on your team, tremendous presence, but
10:20
Speaker 1: if you look at his contract and his salary and
10:23
Speaker 1: his track record compared to a lot of the other guys,
10:25
Speaker 1: there shouldn't be their best hit.
10:26
Speaker 2: Right. Yeah, when it's it gets a little jarring after
10:33
Speaker 2: a while watching this over and over again. Uh, I'll
10:37
Speaker 2: be honest, I'm getting tired of hearing facing good pitching. Thankfully,
10:41
Speaker 2: that wasn't what was said today. I get it Max
10:43
Speaker 2: Freed on Wednesday he was dominant, right, But it's what
10:48
Speaker 2: you're going to face in the playoffs, good pitching. You
10:52
Speaker 2: know you want to be a good team. You want
10:54
Speaker 2: me to buy into this being a top tier offense
10:57
Speaker 2: got to hit good pitching, and they have the had
11:00
Speaker 2: these moments where they like. The reason I used this
11:03
Speaker 2: twenty six game cut off is because that that twenty
11:05
Speaker 2: six game was a seven to one win over the
11:07
Speaker 2: Red Sox against Cutter Crawford, who was having a really
11:10
Speaker 2: good season up to that point. I think he's still
11:12
Speaker 2: having a really good season. If I if I looked
11:15
Speaker 2: up his I think I looked up his numbers earlier today,
11:17
Speaker 2: still having a great season. The Cubs like took it
11:20
Speaker 2: to him because they had good at bats, they had
11:24
Speaker 2: multiple innings where they had multiple hits, and we're constantly
11:28
Speaker 2: putting pressure on them. That game against Bobby Miller, I
11:31
Speaker 2: think I brought that up last podcast, that the start first,
11:37
Speaker 2: the first Jared Jones game, the first Jared Jones game,
11:40
Speaker 2: the one that Cody Bellinger hit a home run on
11:42
Speaker 2: one hundred and one mile power fastball. Those are the
11:45
Speaker 2: types of games, Those are the types of bats you
11:47
Speaker 2: need to see more regularly. And it's like kind of
11:51
Speaker 2: vanished for a moment here, even like there's just there's
11:55
Speaker 2: not enough of it. There's not enough of the big innings,
11:58
Speaker 2: there's not enough of these really tough at bats that
12:02
Speaker 2: kind of grind down the starter. Ian Happ said it
12:05
Speaker 2: after Wednesday's loss, just talking about facing tough pitching. We
12:09
Speaker 2: need to have better at bets. We need to grind
12:11
Speaker 2: down the pitcher, we need to get into the bullpen.
12:12
Speaker 2: That's essentially what he was saying, and it's right, like, yeah,
12:17
Speaker 2: bullpens are much tougher nowadays, but still like you're facing
12:22
Speaker 2: tough pitching, you got to put up good at bets.
12:24
Speaker 2: Maybe you're not going to score six runs against them,
12:26
Speaker 2: but get them out of the game by fourth and
12:28
Speaker 2: fifth inning, like that's it's just not happening enough, and
12:31
Speaker 2: it's and it's I don't I said this last podcast.
12:37
Speaker 2: This isn't missed opportunity. It's just bad. They're just not
12:41
Speaker 2: playing good baseball. They're they're they're lucky to be three
12:44
Speaker 2: games above five hundred.
12:47
Speaker 1: Well the a opportunity. They missed the playoffs by again.
12:50
Speaker 1: But I love how I loved your tweet last night.
12:53
Speaker 1: It summed up how like numbingly bad the offense has
12:58
Speaker 1: been during the stretch. Your tweet, Max Reid is perfect
13:02
Speaker 1: through five here Wrigley third time parentheses that I can
13:05
Speaker 1: remember off the top of my head that the Cubs
13:07
Speaker 1: have been no hit for at least five innings this season,
13:11
Speaker 1: Louis of Renowball, Skimes and now free like it's just
13:14
Speaker 1: like commonplace, yeah, like matter of fact over the last
13:19
Speaker 1: couple of weeks. So yeah, like obviously skiings enormous ceiling
13:24
Speaker 1: you know sev Reno's at his moments. Freed certainly has
13:28
Speaker 1: a very good track arger but just this like kind
13:30
Speaker 1: of like way in which teams just have their way
13:36
Speaker 1: against the Cubs, to me, I think we'll lead to
13:40
Speaker 1: a serious re evaluation here at some point, like council,
13:45
Speaker 1: as you know, when he walks into the interview room,
13:49
Speaker 1: it's really hard to tell whether they won or lost.
13:54
Speaker 1: We're told he's the exact same way in his office
13:58
Speaker 1: interacting with the front office players. So he's probably not
14:02
Speaker 1: going to like flip out publicly, but we'll see in
14:07
Speaker 1: his actions. You know. I still think it's a little
14:10
Speaker 1: early to start varying players or benching players or kind
14:15
Speaker 1: of like crossing your fingers and hoping, you know, Owen
14:20
Speaker 1: Casey or someone like that can like, you know, figure
14:24
Speaker 1: out major league pitching. But we're getting there, I mean,
14:28
Speaker 1: it's and I also think it will factor into the
14:31
Speaker 1: evaluation of the trade deadline. Like at this time of
14:34
Speaker 1: month ago, pictures were getting injured left and right, and
14:38
Speaker 1: obviously the bullpen still needs work. You can never have
14:42
Speaker 1: enough pitching, so that that clearly is going to be
14:45
Speaker 1: a focus towards the end of July. But I I
14:49
Speaker 1: don't think you can feel great about this this lineup,
14:55
Speaker 1: like where is the guy? And maybe it is Bellinger
14:58
Speaker 1: has a stretch like he did last summer that was
15:01
Speaker 1: three months of like basically being an MVP. Well you
15:05
Speaker 1: know baseball right now, you know, someone's explained to me,
15:07
Speaker 1: like every team has like five dudes whose only job
15:10
Speaker 1: is to figure out how to get you out. And
15:12
Speaker 1: so like he puts up good numbers, you want him
15:19
Speaker 1: on your team. But I think a little bit of
15:21
Speaker 1: this is like why didn't he get that eight eight year,
15:26
Speaker 1: one hundred and fifty million, two hundred million dollar contract,
15:29
Speaker 1: And so he's he's a solid, like a very good
15:32
Speaker 1: two way, versatile player who loves baseball and has a
15:37
Speaker 1: great cup clubhouse influence, but like right now, he's not
15:41
Speaker 1: that guy. Saya Suzuki is not one hundred million dollar
15:44
Speaker 1: player right now. And you you were kind of on
15:46
Speaker 1: this of like the half swings the hesitancy is back
15:50
Speaker 1: a little bit, and Craig Counsel said, uh, yeah, I
15:52
Speaker 1: think you're right. Dancy was what batting eighth today? Your
15:57
Speaker 1: your franchise shortstop, the catcher position. It kind of like
16:05
Speaker 1: you know, flies under the raider because everything else, you know,
16:07
Speaker 1: when everyone's getting no hit, like you know, you know,
16:10
Speaker 1: we're not like yeah o thing. But the catching position
16:13
Speaker 1: is becoming offensively sort of like what first base was
16:18
Speaker 1: and DH was last year, like during the Cosmo Mansini
16:23
Speaker 1: kind of revolving door until they brought in in Jamber
16:27
Speaker 1: and things stabilized a little bit when they got closer
16:30
Speaker 1: back towards the middle of the pack. But like that
16:34
Speaker 1: right now is just an offensive black hole that like
16:37
Speaker 1: needs to creep up a bit. Otherwise there's just a
16:41
Speaker 1: lot of empty at bats here and spots where other
16:46
Speaker 1: teams can just really be pretty pretty comfortable. There's not
16:52
Speaker 1: a lot of pressure being put on them at all,
16:56
Speaker 1: and that to me is something that even if you
17:00
Speaker 1: have a good weekend, even have a good week, I
17:02
Speaker 1: think it's hard to just ignore this as you move
17:06
Speaker 1: forward and think about what they can do to get
17:08
Speaker 1: to October crats.
17:10
Speaker 3: Here from FT, I wasn't feeling as focused as I
17:12
Speaker 3: wanted to be and heard some buzz about ag one.
17:15
Speaker 3: Since drinking ag one daily, I've felt energized, locked in,
17:19
Speaker 3: and ready to hit.
17:20
Speaker 2: The day bron here.
17:21
Speaker 4: That's because ag one is a foundational nutrition supplement that
17:25
Speaker 4: supports your body's universal needs like gut optimization, stress management,
17:29
Speaker 4: and immune support. Since twenty ten, AG one has led
17:32
Speaker 4: the future of foundational nutrition, continuously refining their formula to
17:36
Speaker 4: create a better, smarter way to elevate your baseline health. Crats,
17:40
Speaker 4: not only did I replace my multi vitamin with AG one,
17:42
Speaker 4: but I love that every scoop also includes prebiotics, probiotics
17:46
Speaker 4: and digestive enzymes for gut support. That's a big deal
17:49
Speaker 4: for me.
17:49
Speaker 3: I recommend AG one to fam and friends because it's
17:52
Speaker 3: tested for nine hundred and fifty contaminants and NSF certified.
17:57
Speaker 4: For sport Crats, we're both traveling a lot too, and
18:00
Speaker 4: those travel packs are clutch. I drink AG one daily
18:03
Speaker 4: to support gut health so that we can dominate the day.
18:05
Speaker 4: So if there's one product to recommend to elevate your health,
18:08
Speaker 4: it's AG one and that's why we're excited to welcome
18:10
Speaker 4: them as a new partner to the FT network. If
18:13
Speaker 4: you want to take ownership of your health, it starts
18:15
Speaker 4: with AG one. Try AG one and get a free
18:17
Speaker 4: one year supply of Vitamin D three, K two and
18:20
Speaker 4: five free AG one travel packs with your first purchase
18:23
Speaker 4: at drinkag one dot com slash foul. That's drinkag one
18:27
Speaker 4: dot com slash foul.
18:29
Speaker 1: Go check it out.
18:30
Speaker 2: Catcher position is we're a fifty six way to runs
18:33
Speaker 2: great a plus for Miguel Amaya. That is, you know,
18:38
Speaker 2: he's Yeah, you could make the argument he's a little
18:40
Speaker 2: unlucky there, but that's I mean, with good luck. What
18:44
Speaker 2: is it? Maybe eighty Jon Gomso is a major concern
18:48
Speaker 2: in my opinion. Offensively, it's thirty six. This is not unusual.
18:54
Speaker 2: People are like, well, but he was average last year. Sure,
18:57
Speaker 2: he's thirty six and he's a catcher. These are the
19:00
Speaker 2: profiles of guys that you know. He's not a superstar
19:03
Speaker 2: in offense. He was, I mean, he was a really
19:05
Speaker 2: good offensive player early in his career, and he showed
19:08
Speaker 2: signs of that last year that oh, oh yeah, this
19:10
Speaker 2: guy knows how to hit. When you hit thirty six,
19:13
Speaker 2: you hit mid thirties as a catcher that's been catching
19:16
Speaker 2: like for a long time. This can happen. You lose
19:19
Speaker 2: your lower half and you just struggle offensively. You know,
19:23
Speaker 2: he doesn't look Yeah, it's catching positions definitely an issue.
19:29
Speaker 2: Thirty two way to recreate post so sorry, twenty six
19:32
Speaker 2: after today after jeez, wow, that's I mean, and he's
19:36
Speaker 2: striking out at nearly a forty rate. Yeah, I mean,
19:40
Speaker 2: there's a reason he's your backup catcher. I get it.
19:42
Speaker 2: But they're getting nothing there. It's it's it's rough. I mean, okay,
19:47
Speaker 2: let's there are a couple positives, right, Primarily, I mean
19:53
Speaker 2: Ben Brown looked really good again, and I brought up
19:57
Speaker 2: the Jesse Rogers stat the eggs velocity. I I double
20:01
Speaker 2: checked that, and he's he gives up a lot of
20:03
Speaker 2: hard contact. I don't something maybe maybe just don't care
20:07
Speaker 2: about that. And and the fact that hey, this guy's
20:11
Speaker 2: pretty good. He misses bats and whatever role he's going
20:14
Speaker 2: to hold for this team, I think he can help them.
20:16
Speaker 2: It's very clear. Uh, he is a positive impact on
20:20
Speaker 2: this team. He's not going anywhere, and like that's there's
20:25
Speaker 2: there's a little bit of you know, okay, here's some stability.
20:29
Speaker 2: But you know, what happens when this team gets healthy.
20:32
Speaker 2: What happens when this team finds a rhythm offensively. Okay,
20:36
Speaker 2: they have some pieces that make you feel good about things.
20:39
Speaker 2: The pitchings there, the starting pitching is better than we expected, right, Brown,
20:43
Speaker 2: if Ben Brown is in the bullpen. Uh and Hayden Wisnsky,
20:47
Speaker 2: who looks pretty good in the in the bullpen. I
20:49
Speaker 2: know he gave up a home run to Jared Clinic,
20:52
Speaker 2: but you know that's it's not the end of the world. Perfect, yeah,
20:56
Speaker 2: you got you gotta score runs right like we we
20:59
Speaker 2: I noticed that. And Kyle Hendricks whoor bullpen outing because
21:04
Speaker 2: the Cubs offense is awful but right now but in general,
21:07
Speaker 2: like you need, I'm seeing some positive signs with the
21:12
Speaker 2: pitching and feeling better. It's like, do they have something
21:14
Speaker 2: with the bullpen? Jose quass is outing and Wednesday makes
21:17
Speaker 2: you concerned the back get like he's like some of
21:20
Speaker 2: these things. It's like council people are like, why is
21:23
Speaker 2: he going to pitcher X? In these situations, it's like
21:29
Speaker 2: do you know who's available? Like not very many people
21:31
Speaker 2: were available today, like like pitch a thousand.
21:36
Speaker 1: You know, it's just and and I do think this
21:41
Speaker 1: is where the offense there is a kind of cascading
21:45
Speaker 1: effect to these things of like you know, Dustin Steele,
21:50
Speaker 1: you know, I'm personally not concerned about him. I think
21:56
Speaker 1: he certainly has a smaller runway to be like that
21:58
Speaker 1: impactful like you know five six war type cy young
22:05
Speaker 1: contender that they got last year. But like, you know,
22:09
Speaker 1: if things were a little more in order, like do
22:11
Speaker 1: you push steal out to the seventh the other night
22:16
Speaker 1: if you had kind of your you know, even our
22:19
Speaker 1: head relievers, you're a bullpen lined up. Your starters are
22:25
Speaker 1: working under enormous amount of pressure. You have relievers you're
22:30
Speaker 1: either trying to kind of get up to speed in
22:32
Speaker 1: the majors or worked their way back from whatever issues
22:38
Speaker 1: Jose Quils and Kyle Hendricks are going through. You know,
22:45
Speaker 1: someone like Mark Leder Junior is not going to be
22:47
Speaker 1: perfect and gets zerous every time, and so it's going
22:49
Speaker 1: to be the one time he gives up a run,
22:52
Speaker 1: Like is that going to be like a blown save,
22:54
Speaker 1: like a crushing loss in Saint Louis And so you know,
22:58
Speaker 1: just hit a three run homer once in a while,
23:01
Speaker 1: like have a beginning that sets you up for the
23:05
Speaker 1: rest of the series too, right of just like if
23:07
Speaker 1: you're playing one run game after another, you know, gonna
23:13
Speaker 1: wear out your yeah, your top believers too.
23:16
Speaker 2: We saw, we saw, we saw yeah.
23:18
Speaker 1: Yeah, So like score some runs, you know, it help
23:22
Speaker 1: helps breaking news like there's just can't get no hit,
23:28
Speaker 1: like you know, once a week, you know, quite a
23:31
Speaker 1: home stand, like it's got a change.
23:35
Speaker 2: Yeah, So three in Saint Louis, right, three in Saint
23:40
Speaker 2: Louis coming up. The Cardinals looked like a pretty bad
23:44
Speaker 2: team about two weeks ago, a week ago, but they
23:47
Speaker 2: are on a little bit of a run. They have one, one, two, three, five,
23:51
Speaker 2: eight of ten, eight of ten against you know, Milwaukee,
23:57
Speaker 2: the Angels, the Red Sox in Baltimore. So one bad
24:00
Speaker 2: team they're in the in the Angels, and then they
24:03
Speaker 2: just swept Baltimore, swept Baltimore for the first time, and
24:05
Speaker 2: like I can't remember the number, but they haven't been
24:08
Speaker 2: swept in a in a long time, Baltimore. That's right, yeah, yeah,
24:12
Speaker 2: And uh, this is a bad time for the Cubs
24:15
Speaker 2: to catch the Cardinals. I listen, I get it. I don't.
24:19
Speaker 2: I don't think the Cardinals are going to uh make
24:23
Speaker 2: the playoffs this year. I don't think they're going to be,
24:26
Speaker 2: you know, a top ten or even top half team
24:29
Speaker 2: in baseball when all is said and done. But the
24:33
Speaker 2: Cubs are not feeling good about themselves, right, They're gonna
24:36
Speaker 2: They're gonna tell us everything that how like how they're
24:39
Speaker 2: keeping their heads up, But it's hard to keep your
24:40
Speaker 2: head up when you're when you're playing this type of offense,
24:42
Speaker 2: especially and they're going into a team that's kind of
24:47
Speaker 2: feeling themselves and feeling good about things. There are rival
24:50
Speaker 2: that probably feels like, oh, these guys think they're better
24:53
Speaker 2: than us, and and they're like they're going to Saint
24:56
Speaker 2: Louis for the first time. I think. I think this
24:59
Speaker 2: is going to be a tough series, and the Cubs
25:01
Speaker 2: are about to hit like they are hitting a moment
25:04
Speaker 2: that's like, Okay, this could be like a like how
25:08
Speaker 2: bad is this going to get? How are you going
25:11
Speaker 2: to allow this to kind of wheels fall off? You know,
25:15
Speaker 2: really long stretch of poor play right right now, they've
25:20
Speaker 2: weathered this storm in a sense where they're not playing
25:23
Speaker 2: good baseball. They're ten and fifteen, I believe is what
25:26
Speaker 2: I wrote in these twenty five games where the offense
25:29
Speaker 2: stinks and like at a certain point it gets where
25:34
Speaker 2: it's out of hand, right where you're like, Okay, they're
25:39
Speaker 2: lucky to have built that eight games over five hundred
25:41
Speaker 2: little cushion and allowed them to not feel like they're
25:46
Speaker 2: out of it because of this ten and fifteen stretch,
25:48
Speaker 2: you know, but it feels like a danger point, Like
25:54
Speaker 2: it's like going to play your rivals that are playing well,
25:58
Speaker 2: that aren'trobably aren't a good team, but they're playing better
26:03
Speaker 2: than you right now, flat out. That's just the bottom line.
26:05
Speaker 2: And sometimes that's how baseball is. I don't care like
26:08
Speaker 2: how good each team is or which team is more talented,
26:10
Speaker 2: how are they playing at the time. Baseball is so
26:12
Speaker 2: much like that. Things can turn on a dime too, right,
26:15
Speaker 2: they can, but it's just the way they're going. I'm
26:20
Speaker 2: not sure what the pitching matchups are off the top
26:22
Speaker 2: of my head, but yeah.
26:24
Speaker 1: Last I tell you it was Miles Michael Inside and
26:32
Speaker 1: Michaelis and showed Uh. And then I saw a bunch
26:35
Speaker 1: of tvds for the Cardinals. I don't fade updated it.
26:38
Speaker 1: I think they just have double this week. So, like
26:41
Speaker 1: you're saying, it's sometimes it's not who you play, it's
26:43
Speaker 1: when you play them. And uh. The Cubs still haven't
26:48
Speaker 1: had a three game losing streak this season, but their
26:51
Speaker 1: longest winning streak is five and three of those were
26:54
Speaker 1: like in April sweep of early April sweep of the Rockies,
26:59
Speaker 1: So we haven't had that moment yet of what you're
27:04
Speaker 1: hinting at. Historically, Saint Louis and Bush Stadium is the
27:09
Speaker 1: type of place where weird stuff and frustrating moments happen.
27:14
Speaker 1: It's lessened over the years as the Cubs have gotten
27:17
Speaker 1: better and the Cardinals have receded. But I don't know
27:22
Speaker 1: you've you've spent enough time there to know that, like
27:28
Speaker 1: the later innings there, like stuff happens, like the crowd
27:31
Speaker 1: gets into it. You think your story's written, you can
27:36
Speaker 1: out to the airport and something happens and Holy forces
27:39
Speaker 1: you to rewrite, and then you're scrambling. So that I
27:44
Speaker 1: do think how they respond to this, how Craig Council
27:48
Speaker 1: maintains his kind of public persona, you know who, who
27:56
Speaker 1: really like pops off like postgame first. I think that'll
27:59
Speaker 1: be interesting to see whenever that happens. Maybe it's not
28:04
Speaker 1: this weekend, but you have kind of all these forces
28:08
Speaker 1: lining up to go into an environment like Bush Stadium.
28:12
Speaker 1: And then Councils returned to Milwaukee, where those Cup to
28:17
Speaker 1: Brewis games are always wild, and then we're getting past
28:21
Speaker 1: that Memorial Day marker where teams can you really begin
28:27
Speaker 1: to obsess of like what they have, what they need,
28:30
Speaker 1: where they're going, and so uh, there's not a lot
28:34
Speaker 1: of like reassuring signs at the moment. But you know,
28:41
Speaker 1: Mike Talkman makes another crazy catch at the wall and
28:45
Speaker 1: someone hits You're at Homer first inning showed as awesome,
28:50
Speaker 1: Like we have a much different story.
28:54
Speaker 2: Michael is five seventy seven ERA his last start with
28:58
Speaker 2: solid five innings one against the Red Sox. But that's
29:01
Speaker 2: that's pretty much one of his best starts of the season.
29:06
Speaker 2: You know, at a certain point, you got to stop
29:08
Speaker 2: talking about good pitching because that that's not a good
29:11
Speaker 2: pitcher anymore. Like that's you know, league average below average
29:14
Speaker 2: so far this season, but let's call him a league
29:16
Speaker 2: average pitcher. They got to hit him, like it's time
29:18
Speaker 2: to get out of a rut, you know, Sonny Gray
29:20
Speaker 2: on Sunday. So so that's going to be a tough
29:23
Speaker 2: one if the offense doesn't find its confidence and find
29:25
Speaker 2: its rhythm. Yeah, look, Patrick, this is I don't like.
29:33
Speaker 2: Bad offense and bad bullpen are two of the harder
29:36
Speaker 2: things to watch. I think, like when you just don't
29:39
Speaker 2: have the talent with the starting pitching, like you get
29:42
Speaker 2: it right, like that was twenty one, twenty one right
29:47
Speaker 2: when yeah.
29:49
Speaker 1: The game whatever eleven game was.
29:52
Speaker 2: Yeah, And you just kind of because you see it
29:56
Speaker 2: from the start, right it's like you know, Jake Arietta
29:58
Speaker 2: and Milwaukee, Like right away from like pitch one, you're like, oh,
30:02
Speaker 2: this isn't going to go well, right, Yeah, you just
30:05
Speaker 2: kind of go into games knowing they don't have much
30:07
Speaker 2: of a chance. But when you blow games with the
30:10
Speaker 2: bullpen and when your offense can't do anything, those are
30:13
Speaker 2: two things that are just difficult. The blowing of the
30:16
Speaker 2: bullpen is hard to watch. It's most probably demoralizing for
30:19
Speaker 2: the team. The bad offense is the toughest to watch.
30:24
Speaker 2: There's just nothing going on. Like I said before, it
30:27
Speaker 2: has to change. It has to like it just purely
30:30
Speaker 2: for entertainment value. It has to change. Like fans like
30:35
Speaker 2: are likely losing their minds just based on mentions and
30:39
Speaker 2: what I see on Twitter. They certainly are reading some
30:42
Speaker 2: of the comments there. They want action, right that they
30:46
Speaker 2: want this guy bench and this guy moved, and like
30:48
Speaker 2: you said that that's probably not happening just yet, but
30:52
Speaker 2: it's it's getting to a point where you know that
30:56
Speaker 2: they've got to make they got to make things happen
30:58
Speaker 2: on the field. Uh. Three in Saint Louis, they got
31:02
Speaker 2: to wake up and you'd like to think that this
31:05
Speaker 2: could be a point. And then four in Milwaukee. That's
31:09
Speaker 2: will will likely wrap this up. We'll we'll likely have
31:14
Speaker 2: one probably for them on Monday, a podcast for the
31:18
Speaker 2: uh for the people on Monday to preview that series.
31:21
Speaker 2: Wrap up Saint Louis, and.
31:22
Speaker 1: Well, definitely, I think next week got to get going
31:24
Speaker 1: on some kind of fan interactive stuff. Will start posting
31:30
Speaker 1: uh for you know, whatever questions you guys have, and
31:36
Speaker 1: we can try to provide some managers answers. But we
31:39
Speaker 1: think that'd be a really fun way to connect. And
31:43
Speaker 1: it always helps us to like know what you're thinking
31:48
Speaker 1: about and what you're curious about because that helps our
31:50
Speaker 1: writing and reporting.
31:52
Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely, Uh, thanks for listening. This is you know,
31:57
Speaker 2: episode three, and I feel like we apologize for not
32:02
Speaker 2: delivering Cubs Wins to you right away, so let's uh,
32:06
Speaker 2: let's ope it. Then there's some more to see.
32:09
Speaker 1: The first point, like right when this launch is perfect timing,
32:13
Speaker 1: on our.
32:13
Speaker 5: Perfect timing, we definitely want fan interaction and we'll try
32:17
Speaker 5: and ease your pain or at least allow you to
32:20
Speaker 5: release some frustrating a grievances. Yeah, yeah, absolutely, this is
32:26
Speaker 5: Northside Territory.
32:27
Speaker 2: I'm Saadi Sharma. That's Patrick Mooney. Make sure you read
32:30
Speaker 2: our work at The Athletic. Make sure you rate, review, subscribe,
32:34
Speaker 2: do all those good things for this podcast. Thanks for listening.
32:39
Speaker 2: We'll be back at you early next week. Thanks to
32:42
Speaker 2: take care