A little short in Detroit and the Cubs lose 3-1.
While most of you all were watching the year to date best team in the AL host the best team in the NL, I was watching Metallica. In stunning news, I’ve discovered I’m almost 51 and things like going to concerts have gotten more challenging. I’m sore and tired. But it was a good show. Certainly, my ending was more satisfying than yours. And I get to do it again tomorrow when part two of the show occurs. They left enough of the hits unplayed that it should be amazing.
You’ll forgive me if I didn’t see every little thing like I usually would for one of these games, so if I miss something, please jump in there and provide some context for any of these numbers and information. From what I saw following, a playoff caliber game was played. The current best pitcher in baseball did his thing. When all was said and done, the Cubs put together enough hits off of him to do some damage. The generally imposing weapon that has been the Cubs baserunning failed them. In the end, the Cubs came up a little short.
Let’s look at these points one at a time. A playoff caliber game. No errors. Just one walk between both teams. Scoreless for four. 2-1 into the seventh. It was one of those games where virtually every plate appearance had some leverage to it, because a home run was going to tilt the score. Only four pitchers appeared in the game.
Tarik Skubal is on some kind of run. I saw the stat yesterday morning that Skubal had 89 strikeouts and three walks over his 10 starts leading into last night. Well, add six more strikeouts and no walks. So that was already uncharted territory and it goes further. He’s down to a 2.16 ERA. The unfortunate thing is that it did look like the Cubs eventually got to him a little but just couldn’t punch through. Of course, you all watched Jake Arrieta and Kyle Hendricks do that for years. Generating enough weak contact that it’s really hard to sustain offense without a home run.
Pete Crow-Armstrong was thrown out trying to score in the fifth inning for the first out. You’ll know better than I if Nico Hoerner’s fly ball would have scored PCA. It doesn’t matter, because sequencing would have been different. But, the decision to try to score there feels really ill advised, whoever made it. The Cubs had three singles off of Skubal in the eighth, but didn’t score after there was a caught stealing. It was the first time Matt Shaw has been caught.
There are always two sides to a coin when it comes to aggressive baserunning against a very good pitcher. Ironically, I think you use the same sentence in both directions, it’s just what your theorem is off of the statement. That is, you only get so many opportunities against a good pitcher. Is your conclusion that every runner is precious and so you can’t run aggressively? It’s excessively hard to put together a sustained rally against Skubal. Or do you push the edges? Trying to squeeze the most out of every runner?
Using one game as a barometer isn’t going to help either. From someone who wasn’t watching but just looks at results, the decision to try to score in the fifth feels horrible. An unnecessary risk with no outs. The steal attempt in the eighth cuts both ways. They did end up getting three singles. I think he probably ends up scoring. But also, he definitely scores if he steals second.
I’ve enjoyed watching Cubs baserunning this year. In being fascinated with that, I started to look around at baserunning stats. There aren’t as many as we have in other areas. But I would describe the Cubs baserunning as selective aggression. For all of the team speed they have, they don’t take a lot of extra bases on hits. They play a lot of station to station baseball. Also, they’ve lived all year among the leaders in steals while also being in the bottom third of caught stealing. They are that college basketball team that you see sometimes that only takes eight three pointers but hits five of them. It’s not crushing you, but invariably some of those end up being key plays.
Pitch Counts:
- Cubs: 102, 32 BF (8 IP)
- Tigers: 115, 34 BF
The Cubs number looks like a just missed Maddux, of course it is an inning short. Ben Brown threw 92 pitches over seven pretty effective innings against a very good team. Genesis Cabrera managed to allow a run and still throw a 10-pitch inning. I feel a little bit of regression creeping in. The Cubs had such a long run of no runs in the last third of the game and there have been a few lately. When you’re a good team and playing a lot of competitive games, every one of those runs feels backbreaking.
On the other side, Skubal gets two outs into the eighth and didn’t cross 100 pitches. That’s one bad, bad man. Strike throwing is a weapon. He threw 65 strikes out of 94 pitches (though note Brown was at 64 in 92). The Cubs did make closer Will Vest work hard. He threw 21 pitches. He only threw once in the White Sox series and threw two innings in that one, so we’ll see him again, if needed, this weekend. But one wouldn’t think there is any chance of seeing him in all three.
Given reasonable health, both teams should have their entire bullpen available to them Saturday.
Three Stars:
- Ben Brown nets my top spot for seven innings of two-run ball. I’d land him here if this had been against the Rockies. Against the Tigers, absolutely. If you gave up on Brown, you might have done it too early. Not dominant per se, but very good outing.
- Kyle Tucker had two hits including one of three doubles. He drove in the only run.
- Matt Shaw had two hits including one of three doubles. He scored the only run. If only he hadn’t been caught stealing. I can’t imagine he’s on his own in that spot, so I’m not knocking him.
Game 63, June 6: Tigers 3, Cubs 1 (39-24)
Fangraphs
Reminder: Heroes and Goats are determined by WPA scores and are in no way subjective.
THREE HEROES:
- Superhero: Kyle Tucker (.189). 2-4, 2B, RBI
- Hero: Pete Crow-Armstrong (.037). 2-4
- Sidekick: Justin Turner (.025). 1-3
THREE GOATS:
- Billy Goat: Seiya Suzuki (-.194). 0-4
- Goat: Carson Kelly (-.132). 0-4
- Kid: Nico Hoerner (-.127). 0-4
WPA Play of the Game: Spencer Torkelson homered with one out in the sixth for the Tigers second and eventually decisive run. (.186)
*Cubs Play of the Game: Kyle Tucker doubled with a runner on second and one out in the top of the sixth, driving in the lone Cubs run. (.167)
Cubs Player of the Game:
Yesterday’s Winner: Ian Happ received 157 of 246 votes.
Rizzo Award Standings: (Top 5/Bottom 5)
The award is named for Anthony Rizzo, who finished first in this category three of the first four years it was in existence and four times overall. He also recorded the highest season total ever at +65.5. The point scale is three points for a Superhero down to negative three points for a Billy Goat.
- Kyle Tucker +23
- Jameson Taillon +12
- Shōta Imanaga/Drew Pomeranz/Miguel Amaya +11
- Jon Berti -7
- Ben Brown -11
- Seiya Suzuki -11.5
- Julian Merryweather -15
- Dansby Swanson -20.33
Up Next: Game two of the three game series. Jameson Taillon (5-3, 3.76, 69⅓ IP) against another lefty. Tyler Holton (2-2, 4.13, 28⅓ IP) is an opener. A lefty opener makes a ton of sense against the Cubs.