Series Preview: Pittsburgh Pirates (14-20) at Chicago Cubs (15-20)

The Cubs were swept by the Pirates in their last meeting, and they're facing two of the same three pitchers from that series. The Pirates still aren't a good team.

Batters (wOBA, ZiPS RoS wOBA, UZR)

1. C Ryan Doumit, BHB (.344, .345, -4.0)
2. 1B Jeff Clement, LHB (.224, .339, 0.9)
3. 2B Akinori Iwamura, LHB (.243, .324, -8.2)
4. SS Ronny Cedeno, LOL (.283, .300, 4.7)
5. 3B Andy Laroche, RHB (.337, .335, 0.6)
6. LF Lastings Milledge, RHB (.279, .318, -3.8)
7. CF Andrew McCutcheon, RHB (.380, .357, -1.0)


8. RF Garrett Jones, LHB (.339, .360, 0.9)

Pitchers (FIP, xFIP, RoS FIP)

1. Zach Duke, LHP (5.34, 4.74, 4.30)
2. Paul Maholm, LHP (5.26, 5.05, 4.10)
3. Charlie Morton, RHP (5.51, 4.00, 3.99)
4. Ross Ohlendorf, RHP (5.98, 6.81, 4.67)
5. Brian Burres, LHP (4.52, 5.73, 4.47)
6. Octavio Dotel, RHP (5.11, 4.23, 4.11)
7. Joel Hanrahan, RHP (3.98, 3.09, 3.54)
8. Javier Lopez, LHP (4.55, 4.87, 4.63)

Not exactly world-beaters. At least the Cubs don't have to face Charlie Morton this time.

For what little it's worth, I was one of the last people to admit that Ronny Cedeno sucked at baseball, defending him for a long time after it was obvious that Theriot was a much better player than he was. I guess he's just another one of those guys whose minor league numbers never translated. I wonder if his forgettable 2006 season hurt his development.

Injuries
Cedeno has a bruised wrist from a HBP on Monday, but should be okay. Ryan Church also has a bruised wrist and missed the last 5 games. Brendan Donnelly is helping the Pirates pen by not pitching, currently on the DL with an oblique strain. Chris Jakubasukas is still out following a scary liner to the back of his head off the bat of Lance Berkman. And former Cub trade pieces Kevin Hart and Jose Ascanio are both recovering from torn labrum surgeries. For the Cubs, Theriot is day to day with right hamstring stiffness. Grabow had a cortisone shot in his knee and has been available for the past 3 games, but hasn't pitched.

Players to watch Gotta go with Ohlendorf and Burres. They're the two worst pitchers on the Pirates staff, so of course they'll pitch back-to-back one hitters. For the Cubs, Starlin Castro has this spot as long as he's in the bigs. He's pretty much my main reason to tune in these days.

Pitching matchups
Friday Brian Burres, LHP (4.52, 5.73, 4.47) vs Tom Gorzelanny, LHP (2.72, 3.34, 3.98), 1:20 PM CT
I was cautiously optimistic about Gorzelanny going into the season, expecting him to put up average-ish numbers. What I was not expecting was for him to strike out over a batter per inning. His K rate will drop as the season goes on, but I'm inclined to believe the improvment is for real. Gotta tip your cap to Larry Rothschild. Here's hoping the Cubs move him at the deadline for someone good. Burres blanked the Cubs for 7 innings in his last start, despite giving up a large number of fly balls (which never left the yard) and walking three batters. Hopefully the Cubs batted ball luck turns around in this start.

Saturday Paul Maholm, LHP (5.26, 5.05, 4.10) vs Ryan Dempster, RHP (3.83, 3.61, 3.69), 12:05 PM CT
Maholm also gave up a ton of contact in his last start vs the Cubs, though his luck manifested itself differently. He allowed a ton of baserunners (11 in 6 innings) without missing bats (only 1 strikeout) but only gave up 2 runs. 2010 Cubs baseball - feel the excitement! Demp had his 37th wasted quality start of the season in his game vs the Pirates, giving up 3 runs while striking out 7 in a wasted 7 innings of work.

Sunday Ross Ohlendorf, RHP (5.98, 6.81, 4.67) vs Ted Lilly, LHP (5.21, 4.38, 4.01), 1:20 PM CT
Ted hasn't looked quite the same since coming back, though this is still basically spring training for him. His fastball is only averaging around 85, and while it seems like he hasn't had great control with his pitches, I was surprised to see that he's only walked 4 batters this year. Still he's not fooling many batters (only 4.88 K/9) and they're making decent contact off of him. Maybe it's time for the Cubs to move Jay Jackson and Cashner into the rotation so they can further shore up the bullpen with Lilly and Dempster. Ohlendorf made his first start back from an injury last week in Cincy, and pitched an uninspiring 4 innings, walking 4 and striking out 3. He's a fly-ball pitcher who has not surprisingly been bit by the home run ball often in his career. If the wind's blowing out Sunday's game might be a long one.

Series Preview: Chicago Cubs (13-16) at Cincinnati Reds (14-14)

I guess I'm out of the predictions game.

The Reds are coming off a series win against the Mets. Everyone was writing them off after the first few weeks of the season, but now they're suddenly at .500. They're certainly not doing it with their offense (.313 team wOBA). Their starting pitching is a below-average 4.49 FIP. Their bullpens is pretty good (3.90 FIP, 3.74 xFIP - 2nd best in the NL). Their defense is also below average (-2.3 UZR). So maybe this is a bit of a mirage, though many of the projectatrons did like them in the offseason.

Batters

1. C Ramon Hernandez, RHB (.327, .319, -0.7)
2. 1B Joey Votto, LHB (.404, .383, 0.0)
3. 2B Brandon Phillips, RHB (.326, .342, -3.0)
4. SS Orlando Cabrera, RHB (.297, .325, -14.4)
5. 3B Scott Rolen, RHB (.362, .352, 5.6)
6. LF Jonny Gomes, RHB (.264, .338, -9.9)
7. CF Drew Stubbs, RHB (.265, .292, 16.4)
8. Jay Bruce, LHB (.340, .336, 0.0)

Pitchers

1. Aaron Harang, RHP (5.06, 3.82, 4.13)
2. Mike Leake, RHP (3.96, 4.37, -)
3. Johnny Cueto, RHP (4.50, 4.49, 4.23)
4. Bronson Arroyo, RHP (4.38, 4.71, 4.46)
5. Homer Bailey, RHP (4.59, 4.59, 4.33)
6. Francisco Cordero, RHP (4.11, 4.36, 3.48)
7. Arthur Rhodes, LHP (2.73, 2.55, 3.31)
8. Nick Masset, RHP (4.36, 2.55, 3.83)

I said this last time the Cubs played the Reds, but I'm still kind of surprised the projection systems liked this team so much. Also, that defense looks pretty atrocious. One thing the Reds do have going for them is their pen (as mentioned above). It's probably the only quality pen in the NL central.

Injuries
Chris Dickerdoodle is on the DL with a broken bone in his hand and will be out until June. Edinson Volquez's Rookie of the Year campaign was halted by his PED 'suspension' earlier this year - he's not missing time he would have missed but he is losing out on a fair chunk of salary. Drew Stubbs has come down with a slight case of sucking. Hopefully it will meet its mate in Aramis Ramirez and they'll run away together.

Players to watch
That Joey Votto guy is pretty good at hitting. So is Soriano, who is still white-hot.

Pitching matchups
Friday: Carlos Silva, RHP (4.17, 4.12, 4.39) vs Homer Bailey, RHP (4.59, 4.59, 4.33), 6:10 PM CT
Silva was hit hard in his last start, and a big part of it was the home-run ball. His sinker must not have been working as well for him, since he gave up more fly balls than grounders for the first time this year. Bailey has been struggling with his control this year (4.13 BB/9), though control is not what he's known for. He threw 122 pitches in his last start, and has topped 100 in every start this year. Maybe we can hope he'll be a little gassed.

Saturday: Tom Gorzelanny, LHP (2.69, 3.70, 3.96) vs Aaron Harang, RHP (5.06, 3.82, 4.13), 6:10 PM CT
Harang has a terrible ERA, mainly due to a unlucky .353 BABIP and HR/FB rate pushing 20%. However, he has improved on his already admirable walk rate, walking less than 2 batters per nine. There were rumors floating around that they could pull a Zambrano on him, moving him to the pen, which is especially dumb because he IS the best starter on the team and they have a good pen. It was probably just interweb speculation.

Gorz had a great outing in his last start, racking up a career high in strikeouts and finally getting some run support. He looks like a whole new pitcher this year. Even when he had his breakout season with Pittsburgh in 2007, he only struck out 6 batters per nine (his peripherals were actually pretty bad that year - 4.88 xFIP). This year he's been striking out nearly a batter an inning. He's had a but of luck with home runs, but things are looking pretty good, even if you ignore the fact that both the players the Cubs traded to get him (Hart and Ascanio) are currently recovering from torn labrums. Great work, Larry Rothschild.

Sunday Ryan Dempster, RHP (3.75, 3.51, 3.68) vs Cy Leake, RHP (3.96, 4.37, -), 12:10 PM CT
Demp has his 157th wasted quality start of the season on tuesday. He's been pounding the strike zone, dropping his walk rate even lower than his 2.93 BB/9 from last year (which is waaay lower than I expected). This will probably be another 3-2 game where Leake allows 14 baserunners in 5 innings but only gives up 2 runs, just like the last start. He walked 7 in 6 2/3 innings in his major league debut against the Cubs but only gave up one run. He walked 5 in his next start, but in the 3 starts following those he seems to have gotten over his jitters, only walking 4 in those starts combined.

PredictionAfter the last series, I'm not going to make one. Though I guess I was right that a sweep was inevitable.

Series Preview: Chicago Cubs (13-13) at Pittsburgh Pirates (10-15)

Despite the recent offensive explosion, it's tough to believe that the Cubs offense is pretty good. They've scored the 4th-most runs in the NL, trailing the Diamondbacks (who have scored the most but have an awful pitching staff), Phillies (not surprising), and Dodgers (kind of surprising, though they've had some pitching problems too), and one run ahead of the Brewers offense. Looking at wOBA, among NL teams they trail the D-Backs and Brewers and are shockingly ahead of the run-scoring machine that is the Philadelphia Phillies. What the hell? Offensive explosion in the last series aside, it has felt like nearly every game this season has been a repeat of the Natinals/Mets/Astros series.

Luckily, the Cubs are heading to play Pittsburgh, whose season makes those godawful series look like exciting baseball. The Pirates have been outscored by 89 runs in only 25 games this season - on average they have coughed up 3-4 more runs per game than they've scored. They're "lucky" to have notched even 10 wins. The extreme shittiness of the Astros and Pirates this season should help the wild card chances of the other NL central teams, though the Brewers might have already dug themselves in too deep a hole for their shambolic pitching staff to bounce back from. Here are their primary players (note - I'm going to switch to using the updated ZiPS projections, since they're already on fangraphs)

Batting (wOBA, updated ZiPS wOBA, CHONE projected defensive runs)

1. Ryan Doumit, BHB (.385, .350, -3.4)
2. Jeff Clement, LHB (.231, .341, -0.8)
3. Akinori Iwamura, LHB (.292, .332, -1.6)
4. Ronny Cedeno, RHB (.255, .297, -0.8)
5. Andy LaRoche, RHB (.373, .338, 1.8)
6. Lastings Milledge, RHB (.264, .319, -3.2)
7. Andrew McCutcheon, RHB (.362, .357, 0)
8. Garrett Jones, LHB (.347, .364, -3.8)

Pitching (FIP, xFIP, ZiPS FIP)

1. Zach Duke, LHP (5.59, 5.00, 4.31)
2. Paul Maholm, LHP (4.70, 4.61, 3.94)
3. Charlie Morton, RHP (7.28, 3.98, 4.14)
4. Brian Burres, LHP (5.35, 6.31, 4.52)
5. Jeff Karstens, RHP (5.40, 5.28, 4.73)
6. Octavio Dotel, RHP (6.30, 4.46, 4.00)
7. Joel Hanrahan, RHP (5.68, 3.99, 3.48)
8. Brendan Donnelly, RHP (7.53, 6.16, 4.22)

They've had some crappy luck (team hitting BABIP: .275, pitching BABIP .335, on top of underperformance) but it's not like there's a ton to work with there. Andrew McCutcheon is going to be pretty good, so I guess the Pirates have that going for them. I wonder who they'll trade him for in 2 years?

Injuries
Garrett Jones missed Saturday's game after surgery to remove a chunk of roast beef from Friday's post-game spread that became lodged in his esophagus. He played on Sunday so I guess he's okay. McCutcheon is day-to-day with a sprained right ankle. Brendan Donnelly has a strained side muscle, though looking at his numbers he's probably better off not pitching. Ross Ohlendorf, one of their rotation 'mainstays' is on the DL with back spasms and should miss one more start before returning (Thursday is his usual turn in the rotation). Chris Jakubauskas is on the DL after a scary head injury from a screaming liner off the bat of Lance Berkman. He seems okay - he never lost consciousness and cat scans showed no skull fractures but the team is wisely taking it easy with him. Former Cubs Jose Ascanio and Kevin Hart, the two pieces in the Gorzelanny/Grabow deal, both have torn labrums. Ascanio had his surgery in February and Hart is having his today.

For the Cubs, Silva's wrist is still bothering him, and his next start was pushed back a day. IIRC he injured it while batting a start or two ago. Caridad is working his way back, and threw an inning in extended spring training yesterday. He should be heading to Iowa next, and could rejoin the team this weekend in Cincy.

Players to watch
McCutcheon and Doumit are both pretty good players, and they're pretty much the only guys who have been hitting on the team. As for the Cubs, you have to go with the white-hot Soriano. The fact that the Cubs are facing 2 lefties this series isn't going to hurt his chances at extending his hot-hitting streak.

Pitching matchups
Tuesday: Ryan Dempster, RHP (3.48, 3.61, 3.64) vs Paul Maholm, LHP (4.70, 4.61, 3.94), 6:05 PM CT
Demp has pitched well this year, and gave a good outing that wasn't supported by his offense (8 innings, 3 runs, 2 HR). Obviously he can't be the Ace. Hitters aren't making very good contact off of him - he's posted a 10.5% LD rate so far this season, which is a big reason why he has a .243 BABIP. The most you can say about Maholm, who is probably the Pirates erstwhile ace, is that he 'battles' and 'keeps his team in the game' with his sucky pitching. Honestly, I'd rather have a more volatile guy like Ted Lilly, who is more likely to throw a bunch of really good starts and have a blowout or three (like his last start) to even out his numbers.

Wednesday: Ted Lilly, LHP (5.90, 4.22, 3.99) vs Charlie Morton, RHP (7.28, 3.98, 4.14), 6:05 PM CT
Speaking of Ted Lilly, he's getting the next start. I'm not *too* worried about Lilly - as I mentioned above he's the kind of guy who just gets shelled a few times a year because of his flyball tendencies. He's also still coming back from that injury, and from what I've heard he didn't have great control (Lilly's calling card) in his first start either (he got some help from a hack-tastic lineup). Charlie Morton was a guy a lot of people in the Pittsburgh FO thought would break out this season, but he's been terrible - mainly due to the HR ball as he's allowed 7 in only 19 innings (check out his xFIP). He's also had an absolutely horrendous .439 BABIP on balls that don't leave the yard, though that's right in line with the 31.9% LD rate he's posted. He's a decent pitcher and this should be a good matchup.

Thursday: Randy Wells, RHP (2.35, 3.20, 4.11) vs (probably) Brian Burres, LHP (5.35, 6.31, 4.52), 6:05 PM CT
Brian Burres has been filling in for Ohlendorf and should get the start, but the Pirates might opt with the right-handed Brian Bass given the Cubs right-leaning lineup. He pitched 5 1/3 scoreless innings in his last start but wasn't really fooling anyone. He's had big control problems throughout his career. Wells has sure done a good job os silencing the doubters who figured he'd go into a sophomore slump this year (though there's still plenty of time...). His strikeout rate has jumped by over 2 batters per nine innings, and he's walking one less batter per nine as well. Obviously he's had a bit of HR luck but he's pitched pretty well - he's even been quite unlucky with balls in play (.370 BABIP) but still pitched quite effectively.

Prediction Even when teams are very far apart a sweep is never the most likely outcome, but I'm going to say the Cubs do it anyway. They're throwing their three best pitchers in the rotation this series against (possibly) two left-handers and the anemic Pirates offense. Wednesday's game should be the only one that's close.