NLDS Preview: Braves vs Giants

(Originally posted at Another Cubs Blog. Again I apologize for the crappy formatting from the blogger editor's overzealous linebreak translator).

The last of the four Divisonal Series is the Wild Card winning Braves against the NL West champion Giants. Both teams made it into the postseason on the last day of the regular season on the heels of a Braves win over the Phillies and a Giants win over the Padres. Atlanta will have to try to win this series without face of the franchise Chipper Jones, who tore his ACL in August and may be done for good, depending on how his rehab goes. The offense is now led by catcher Brian McCann, former Cub Derrek Lee, who has been hitting the ball well, breakout second baseman Martin Prado, and ROY contender Jason Heyward. His neck-and-neck competitor, catcher Buster Posey joins Pat Burrell and Aubrey Huff as the leader of the Giants suddenly lively offense. What happens in this series will not affect the Rookie of the Year vote, as if I remember correctly those ballots are submitted at the end of the regular season. But it should be a good matchup nonetheless.

Team to team comparison

	Braves	Giants
wOBA	.327	.318
SP xFIP	3.98	4.15
RP xFIP	3.40	4.02
Defense	3	53

I had no idea the Giants were so good defensively. If you look at the average between UZR and DRS (used in the numbers above), the Giants were the best defensive team in baseball. A big part of the assignation of those numbers was Giants OF Andres Torres, who managed to collect a whopping 22.6 UZR across 3 OF positions. Strangely enough even Pat Burrell posted a big year in both UZR and DRS. Speaking of strange defensive numbers, the Braves ended the season with a -34.4 UZR....and +43 by DRS. What the hell? Most notably DRS liked the now-departed Yunel Escobar, the now-injured Chipper Jones, and Jason Heyward a lot more than UZR.

Atlanta Braves

	wOBA	CHONE
C Brian McCann	.361	.364
1b Derrek Lee	.340	.356
2b Martin Prado	.352	.361
SS Alex Gonzalez	.292	.315
3B Omar "All-Star" Infante	.340	.339
LF Matt Diaz	.319	.334
CF Melky Cabrera	.294	.324
RF Jason Heyward	.376	.363
OF Eric Hinske	.341	.335
OF Nate McLouth	.283	.335
2b/3b Brooks Conrad	.356	.314

I listed a few of the backups because we'll probably see most of these guys as the Braves mix and match their crappy players into 3b, LF, and CF and hope someone gets hot. If MLB had a Reverse Comeback Player of the Year Award (Hindenberg award?) McLouth would easily be the guy who wins it. Both his bat and his (overrated) glove took massive leaps backward this year, which led to lots of Melky Cabrera.

	FIP	CHONE
Derek Lowe	3.89	4.02
Tommy Hanson	3.31	3.84
Tim Hudson	4.09	3.94
Billy Wagner	2.10	2.84
Kyle Farnsworth	2.93	3.60

The Braves also have some kid named Brandon Beachy, he of 15 career MLB innings, penciled in as the game 4 starter. I'm pretty sure they'll just go back to Lowe. Former ROY candidate Jair Jurrjens is not on the NLDS roster, and the other option is fellow rookie Mike Minor.

San Francisco Giants

	wOBA	CHONE
C Buster Posey	.368	.356
1b Aubrey Huff	.388	.356
2b Freddy Sanchez	.327	.314
SS Edgar Renteria	.314	.312
3b Kung Fu Panda	.314	.367
LF Pat Burrell	.371	.342
CF Andres Torres	.363	.346
RF Nate Shierholtz	.288	.329
ST Mark Derosa	infinity	infinity

Just about everyone on the Giants is hitting out of their minds. It must be a side effect of Mark DeRosa's stubble. Oddly enough Sandoval, who was the only position player worth a damn in the Giants offense since Bonds left, has had an awful year.

	FIP	CHONE
Tim Lincecum	3.15	3.04
Matt Cain	3.65	3.92
Jonathan Sanchez	4.00	4.14
Madison Bumgarner	3.66	4.67
Brian Wilson	2.19	2.98
Jeremy Affeldt	3.98	3.83

Prediction: Giants in 5. We should several low scoring affairs, but despite the fact that Lowe is a pretty underrated pitcher (by the forecasting systems), SF's superior pitching will win out. Atlanta's positional problems at 3b, LF, and CF would hurt them more if SF weren't essentially punting at RF, 2b, and SS and Sandoval continues to slump. I don't think the winning team scores more than 15 total runs in this series, and I look forward to the epic pitching matchup between the Giants top 3 and the Phillies top 3.

NLDS: Reds at Phillies

(Originally posted at ACB. Too lazy to fix the stupid auto-returns in the editor, sorry)

This series will start at roughly 4pm CT today in Philly. First, the head-to-head comparisons:

	Reds	Phillies
wOBA	.339	.328
SP xFIP	4.35	3.82
RP xFIP	4.18	4.12
Defense	42	3

Both these teams play in hitter friendly parks, which makes the Phillies SP numbers that much more impessive.

Cincinnati Reds

I laughed when the cellar-dwelling Reds made a seemingly meaningless trade for Scott Rolen last year. I laughed again when many of the projection systems picked them to do well this year, maybe even win the central. As it turned out those were pretty shrewd moves. The biggest difference between my perception of the team and their performance was in defense. I had been too imprinted with years of watching Adam Dunn stumbling around out there to believe that they improved. I still don't know that I buy Jay Bruce as a quality RF though. Again, it's probably some sort of subconscious Dunn comparison. They also picked up Jim Edmonds as a backup OF, but he was left off the NLDS roster.

	wOBA	CHONE
C Ramon Hernandez	.350	.326
1b Joey Votto	.439	.402
2b Brandon Phillips	.332	.338
SS Paul Janish	.315	.298
3b Scott Rolen	.367	.352
LF Johnny Gomes	.330	.341
CF Drew Stubbs	.345	.311
RF Jay Bruce	.363	.362

As you can see above the Reds are quite good defensively. Rolen, Phillips, and Bruce are regarded as above-average glove men, and Janish was the leader among shortstops in Tango's fan scouting reports so it's not surprising to see the Reds at +4 wins due to defense.

	FIP	CHONE
Edinson Volquez	4.00	4.27
Bronson Arroyo	4.61	4.89
Johnny Cueto	3.97	4.60
Francisco Cordero	3.92	4.10
Nick Masset	3.38	3.55
Aroldis Chapman	1.35	3.87

That pitching staff isn't all that inspiring. It looks like they're planning on starting those three in this series. The fourth pitcher on their depth chart, Travis Wood, is a rookie and while he has been effective every Phillie not named Ryan Howard absolutely destroys left-handed pitching. I'm not sure what happened with former ace Aaron Harang, who now seems to be an afterthought. They do have a great bullpen - probably the only one worth a damn in the NL Central.

Philadelphia Phillies

Heading into the season I thought that Philadelphia was easily the best team in the National League, but then they disappointed for the first half of the season. A big part of that was injuries. Here are the players that hit the DL this year for the Phightins:

• Joe Blanton 4/1-5/3


• J.C. Romero 3/26-4/29


• Brad Lidge 3/26-4/30, 5/10-5/31


• Jimmy Rollins 4/12-5/17, 5/22-6/22


• J.A. Happ 4/16-7/06


• Ryan Madson 4/29-7/08


• Brian Schneider 5/9-5/24


• Antonio Bastardo 6/17-7/15


• Carlos Ruiz 6/19-7/10


• Chase Utley 6/29-8/17


• Placido Polanco 6/26-7/17


• Ryan Howard 8/2-8/21


• Shane Victorino 7/21-8/12

That almost reminds me of the 2009 Cubs, except the Phillies were lucky enough that Blanton was the only hurt starter, and even then he's not all that crucial to their success. All their primary position players except Werth and Ibanez were hurt, and even then Ibanez's bat pretty much disappeared all year.

	wOBA	CHONE
C Carlos Ruiz	.366	.330
1b Ryan Howard	.367	.366
2b Chase Fucking Utley	.373	.384
SS Jimmy Rollins	.317	.331
3b Placido Polanco	.323	.335
LF Raul Ibanez	.341	.351
CF Shane Victorino	.339	.340
RF Jayson Werth	.397	.375

Lots of disappointing years here. Ruiz is the only guy who's really playing out of his mind.

	FIP	CHONE
Roy Halladay	3.01	3.03
Roy Oswalt	3.13	3.77
Cole Hamels	3.67	3.83
Brad Lidge	3.87	4.09
Ryan Madson	2.61	3.11

The Phillies have a BIG edge in pitching, which is one of the reasons why they're so favored in this series.

Prediction: Phillies in 4. The Reds pitching staff is good enough to rack up wins against the likes of the NL central, but a (finally healthy) offense like the Phillies should be able to break through.

Series Preview: Los Angeles Dodgers of Los Angeles (25-19) at Starlin Castro (21-24)

I don't know why, but for some reason I've always disliked the Dodgers. They've just always seemed kind of overrated to me in general. And boring. Anyway, depending on how you feel the Cubs will either keep their recent mini-tear going against the Dodgers, confirming their excellent BsR record, or they will collapse like the shitty team they are and it will trigger a fire sale. I'd be kind of happy with both. *shrug*. This part of the season just came earlier this year. At least we'll get to see Kershaw and the rejuvenated Billingsley in this series, and miss Cub kryptonite Hiroki Kuroda. This godforsaken heat wave should make this an exciting series.

LAD position players (wOBA, ZiPS RoS wOBA, CHONE defense projection)

• C Russel Martin, RHB (.330, .341, 0.0)


• 1b James Loney, LHB (.338, .352, 0.0)


• 2b Blake DeWitt, LHB (.271, .320, 0.9)


• ss Rafael Furcal, BHB (.369, .332, 2.7)
  


• 3b Casey Blake, RHB (.354, .330, 5.2)


• lf Manny Ramirez, RHB (.396, .411, -6.1)


• cf Matt Kemp, RHB (.356, .374, 1.0)


• rf Xavier Paul, LHB (.386, .308, -4.4)

Pitchers (FIP, xFIP, ZiPS RoS FIP)

• Clayton Kershaw, LHP (3.56, 4.21, 3.38)


• Chad Billingsley, RHP (3.51, 4.34, 3.41)


• Hiroki Kuroda, RHP (3.49, 3.55, 3.60)


• John Ely, RHP (1.83, 3.25, -)


• Ramon Ortiz, Holy shit, he's still pitching? (5.49, 4.92, 4.46)


• Jonathon Broxton, Holy shit (0.34, 1.43, 1.98)


• LAD Bullpen (4.03, 4.45)

2 things: The Cubs might be hitting the Dodgers at the right time, given their injury woes (Furcal, Ethier, Padilla). Too bad they won't get the chance to take some batting practice off Ramon Ortiz. The other thing that surprised me was how mediocre their total bullpen numbers were despite Broxton's absolutely obscene numbers this year.

Injuries

Furcal is set to be activated from the DL tomorrow, but I would be surprised if he played in all three games. He was supposed to be activated ~2 weeks ago but his date had to be pushed back, which is never a great sign. Ethier broke one of his fingers a week or so ago and will miss this series. Vincente Padilla is on the DL with nerve irritation in his elbow (never a good sign) and is expected to return sometime in June. Reliever Cory Wade (i.e. Scott Proctor 2.0) is on the 60-day DL following shoulder surgery in spring training. And the mighty Brad Ausmus is also on the 60-day following surgery to remove 15,682 catching innings from his back.

As for the Cubs, Caridad is on the DL with an elbow injury. Ramirez is expected to sit a few games to allow his bruised thumb to heal and work on his timing with Jaramillo. Gorz's x-rays were negative on the hand that was struck by a line drive last week, but the off-day today means it's not a big deal - they'll probably just move everyone up a day before they decide where to slot in Z.

Players to watch

Starlin Castro owns this spot until any of Andrew Cashner, Jay Jackson, Brett Jackson, or Josh Vitters get a call-up. For the Dodgers, it's Broxton. He's putting up cartoon numbers, and the projections agree that they're no joke. Wasn't he rumored to be part of one of the many Rich Hill deals floating around a few years ago?

Pitching Matchups

Tuesday Clayton Kershaw, LHP (3.56, 4.21, 3.38) vs Ryan Dempster, RHP (4.08, 3.88, 3.78), 7:05 PM CT

Kershaw and Billingsley are both good pitchers, but as you can see they have had a bit of luck this year on HRs. Kershaw has only had one horrendous outing all season - he was touched up for 7 runs in only 1.1 innings by the Brewers at the beginning of May. He's posting an ungodly 10+ K/9, but his control (never his strong suit) has been especially terrible this season, as he has walked 5.26 batters per 9 innings, though it's been a bit more under control in his last few starts. All those walks and the inevitable HR regression (he's a slight FB pitcher) is not a good combination. Speaking of regression, Demp has pitched well this year but has posted a .252 BABIP. His numbers are due for a rise as well.

Wednesday Chad Billingsley, RHP (3.51, 4.34, 3.41) vs Tom Gorzelanny, LHP (2.78, 3.57, 3.89), 7:05 PM CT

I guess you should ignore what I said above about moving everyone up, since Gorz is penciled in as the Wed starter on Cubs.com. That injury was on his pitching hand so hopefully it doesn't mess with his stuff. *insert yet more praise for the theft of Gorz from PIT for two guys who had torn labrums this year*. Billingsley's numbers look a lot better than Kershaw's - he still strikes out a ton of guys but has much 'better' (relatively speaking) control. He's also more of a groundball guy so he's not quite as burned by the HR ball either, though he has had some luck there as well.

Thursday John Ely, RHP (1.83, 3.25, -) vs Ted Lilly, LHP (4.53, 4.83, 4.04), 1:20 PM CT

At least Lilly is pitching on the coolest day of the series. Still though, it could be hot, humid, and raining baseballs on Waveland Ave. At least his control seems to have improved. Ely came out of nowhere (he doesn't even have a projection) and has pitched like Lou Pineilla's wet dream in his MLB debut - it took him 90 batters to issue his first career walk. He was a 2007 draftee by the White Sox out of college, and was one of their top prospects when he came to the Dodgers in the Juan Pierre trade. That was some great work by Colletti.

Series Preview: Starlin Castro (19-23) at Elvis Andrus (23-18)

The Cubs head to Texas to face the Rangers, who were generally considered to be the best team in the AL west, and have lived up to their preseason projections so far. Here's their lineup and pitching staff

Hitters (wOBA, ZiPS RoS wOBA, CHONE UZR projection)

• C Matt Treanor, RHB (.251, .279, -1.3)
  


• 1B Justin Smoak, BHB (.291, -, -)
  


• 2B Ian Kinsler, RHB (.385, .377, 3.7)
  


• SS Elvis Andrus, RHB (.366, .338, 0)
  


• 3B Michael Young, RHB (.351, .354, 0)
  


• LF Josh Hamilton, LHB (.373, .368, 0.8)
  


• CF Julio Borbon, LHB (.240, .310, 13.3)
  


• RF Nelson Cruz, RHB (.445, .383, 4.5)
  

Pitchers (FIP, xFIP, ZiPS RoS FIP)

• Scott Feldman, RHP (4.49, 5.09, 4.77)


• Rich Harden, RHP (5.75, 5.76, 4.04)


• C.J. Wilson, LHP (3.53, 4.25, 3.69)


• Colby Lewis, RHP (3.66, 3.99, 4.10)


• Derek Holland, LHP (4.42, 3.93, 4.90)


• Neftali Feliz, holy shit (2.86, 3.50, 3.99)


• Darren Oliver, LHP (2.90, 2.44, 3.53)


• Frank Francisco, RHP (3.94, 4.25, 3.77)

It seems strange that Traenor is their catcher, given the shitton of talent I seemed to remember at the catcher position there. Maybe the mlb.com depth chart is off its rocker. Aside from their erstwhile ace (Feldman), the Rangers have a damned good pitching staff. Just look at all that young talent. This is what the 2013 Cubs should look like before Hendry and Ricketts fuck it up by trading their young talent for the Joe Blantons of the world.

Injuries

Caridad was moved back to the DL (sucking), and Gorz is not expected to make a trip after taking a liner off his hand. He might miss a start, but the Cubs should be able to skip his turn in the rotation with the off-day on Monday. The Rangers have a bunch of guys on the DL whose names I don't recognize, so I figure they're not very important (dying laughing) ST can correct me tomorrow if I'm wrong.

Players to watch

The easy choice is Castro and Andrus, two young and talented SS who broke into the big leagues at a very young age. They've both got great careers ahead of them.

Pitching Probables

Friday Ted Lilly, LHP (4.77, 4.70, 4.03) vs Colby Lewis, RHP (3.66, 3.99, 4.10), 7:05 PM CT

Several of the projection systems had a tough time with Lewis, as he had a shitty early career from 2002-2007, never posting a FIP below 5. He went over to Japan for the next two seasons and pitched out of his mind before returning to the team he started with. So far, his 2010 has looked a lot closer to his Japan years than his earlier MLB ones. The biggest difference is his strikeout rate, which hovered near the mid 6's before Japan but have been over 9 K/9 so far this season. He still walks a fair amount of batters though (3.68 BB/9 this year). Lilly has unsuprisingly been burned by the It could be an ugly game with Lilly pitching at the Launching Pad in Arlington, but hopefully it won't be too warm tomorrow night. Hopefully he strings together a few good starts and the Cubs move him for some more prospects.

Saturday Randy Wells, RHP (2.97, 3.47, 4.08) vs Derek Holland, LHP (4.42, 3.93, 4.90), 7:05 PM CT

Looking at those numbers for Wells really makes me shake my head at the bullpen talk. However, I'd probably keep him on my list of guys the Cubs should hang on to in the event of a fire sale. This is only his second season in the bigs (I don't think his 5.1 innings in 2008 count) so he should still be around in 2012 and 2013. If you look at Holland's strikeouts and walks, his numbers look great, but not surprisingly, given his home ballpark, he's had big problems with HRs. Here's hoping the right-leaning lineup pounds him.

Sunday Fail Whale, RHP (4.21, 4.12, 4.37) vs C.J. Wilson, LHP (3.53, 4.25, 3.69)

I'm not exactly sure what to make of C.J. Wilson's projections, as he was a reliever for pretty much all of his mlb career until this season, and that 3.69 FIP is still largely projecting him as one. He had an insane season last year, posting a 10.26 K/9 in 73.2 innings. He's pretty wild too, though not quite Marmol-esque. So far he's managed to keep things relatively under control as a starter. Silva had yet another decent start in his last outing, scattering 6 hits and giving up 2 runs, and most importantly inducing 11 grounders to only 7 liners/flyballs. It could get ugly to see the Rangers teeing off in him in that park though.

Mini Series Preview: Colorado Rockies (19-18) at Starlin Castro (16-22)

This is only a 2-game series so I'll make this preview brief. Here are the Cubs and Rockies team numbers, with their NL rank in parentheses

Stat	Rockies	Cubs
wOBA	.337 (6th)	.341 (4th)
UZR	-3.3 (11th)	-0.6 (8th)
Starter FIP	4.05 (8th)	3.73 (4th)
Starter xFIP	4.17 (8th)	3.81 (4th)
Relief FIP	3.50 (3rd)	4.23 (12th)
Relief xFIP	4.42 (14th)	4.34 (11th)

Wow - I don't think I've ever seen as big of a FIP-xFIP split as the Rockies bullpen. They've been incredibly lucky with the HR ball, even more so considering where they play half their games. They've had decent luck on balls in play too, with a .283 BABIP in that cavern of a ballpark (contrast with the Cubs' pen's .335 BABIP)

Pitching matchups

Monday: Aaron Cook, RHP (4.58, 4.87, 4.37) vs Randy Wells, RHP (3.02, 3.66, 4.18), 7:05 PM CT
Cook is a groundball machine, guys who FIP tends to undervalue. He's pitched incredibly poorly this season, and from the looks of it a big part of it is his non-sinker fastball. It's tough to tell from Fangraphs' pitch value chart, since they combine all fastballs into one category, but he's seen a 10 to 15 run per 100 pitches drop in effectiveness. His secondary pitches have never been special either. He's still getting plenty of GB so it's probably his 4-seamer. Wells has done a great job at keeping up his stellar K rate, posting a full 2 K/9 higher than his breakout year last season, while walking even less batters and allowing fewer HRs. His bloated 4.57 ERA is pretty much entirely a factor of his .348 BABIP. I'm a broken record on this, but great work by Wells and Rothschild for avoiding the sophomore slump so far.

Tuesday: Jhoulys Chacin, RHP (3.54, 3.60, 4.65) vs Fail Whale, RHP (4.18, 4.26, 4.35), 7:05 pm CT
Who is this Chacin guy? I was never high on the Rockies rotation except for, of course, Ubaldo Jimenez. I saw the guy pitch in person last year and even from the upper deck I could tell how electric his stuff is. It's too bad the Cubs aren't facing him in this series, because I'd love to see it. I was surprised to see that he threw a no-hitter though. His stuff is as electric as Z's once was (with even MORE velocity) but he has an even bigger tendency to throw too many pitches early in the game. But I digress - I'm supposed to be writing about Chacin (dying laughing). He filled in for Jorge De La Rosa after he went down with a hand injury a few weeks ago and has pitched quite well despite the lousy projection. He gets a decent number of strikeouts and groundballs (a good fit for Coors) and has good projectability - he should be a #3 starter at worst going forward. Maybe not this year though. Silva, meanwhile, is on a roll, and is 4-0 despite throwing three straight starts that are much mroe typical of what we should expect from him - a total line of 16.1 IP, 25 hits, 11 runs, 11 strikeouts, 6 walks (more than I expected), 28:20 GB/FB ratio.

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 (and a Castro-inspired trip down memory lane) Marlins (14-17) at Cubs (14-18)

Since I've pretty much given up on this season already, I (mostly) enjoyed this series. We were talking about it in the comments a few days ago, but Friday's game was the most exciting Cubs game any of us could remember going back to 2008. Honestly I can't pull out a specific game memory out of any of the 2009 games, but I can list off four great ones from 2008 that were just as memorable:

Sep 20, 2008: Cubs 5 - 4 Cardinals . The greatest Cubs team any of us will see in our lifetimes capped off a fantastic season at home over their biggest rivals. Of course, they were also nice enough to do it in the one game I attended all year (dying laughing)

Sep 18, 2008: Cubs 7 - 6 Brewers, 12 innings. The Cubs were down by 4 runs and facing Brewers closer Salomon Torres. With 2 outs the Cubs rallied to score 4 runs, including a game-tying 3-run HR by Geovany Soto. The Cubs went on to win it in extras on a Derrek Lee walkoff single

July 28, 2008: Cubs 11 - 4 Brewers. The Cubs went into a big 4-game series at Miller park tied with the surging Brewers. The Brewers sent Sabathia to the mound in the first game, who had been mowing down the National league since being traded to the Crew. The Cubs eked out a win in this game, and went on to utterly embarrass the Brewers in their own park, outscoring them 31-11 in the 4 games.

And, of course Sep 14, 2008: Cubs 5 - 0 Astros.

After all that I'm too lazy to write much of a preview (dying laughing)

The Marlins have a pretty crummy offense (.318 wOBA), but then again so do many teams at this point in the season. It's strange that their two best hitters (Ramirez and Uggla) are their middle infielders. Go figure.

They're below average on the field as well, as their defense has cost them roughly half a win thus far. As per usual though, their pitching staff has put up a respectable 3.92 FIP, and it's not all smoke and mirrors as their xFIP is 4.14. I guess it's not that surprising given the pitchers' park they play half their games in.

Matchups

Monday Nate Robertson, LHP (5.55, 5.59, 4.56) vs Ted Lilly, LHP (5.44, 4.06, 4.06), 7:05 PM CT

Robertson is a guy that I wished the Cubs had gone after when they were shopping Milton Bradley. The Tigers pretty much dumped him on the Marlins, paying all of his salary minus the league minimum. For some reason I thought he was right-handed. I thought that the transition to the National League would have helped him (he moved from one pitchers' park to another one), but so far not so much. Lilly just had one of those games in his last outing. It's still spring training for him, and he's a flyball guy. He had a few blowout losses in April last year too. I'm not too worried. One nice thing about Lilly is that he tends to (or at least seems to, I'm being lazy today) give up runs in bunches, so overall he's more helpful to a team than a guy like Silva who you can pretty much count on for 6 innings and 3-4 runs every time. Lilly either gets hammered or shuts them down.

Tuesday Ricky Nolasco, LHP (4.37, 3.90, 3.63) vs Randy Wells, RHP (2.60, 3.44, 4.09) , 7:05 PM CT

Speaking of Cubs pitchers getting hammered, Wells was hit hard in his last start. Though seeing how it didn't make a dent in his FIP numbers some of it was bad luck - his BABIP skyrocketed to .383....but that's right in line with the ridiculous 25.5% LD rate he's posted so far. Nolasco turned in a great 2009 despite his 5+ ERA. He struck out more than a batter an inning, walked 2.14 per nine and had a reasonable HR rate of 1.12 HR/9. He had some bad babip luck (.336), and presumably some bad defense behind him too. Maybe the Cubs could trade Lee for him and move him to the bullpen?

Wednesday Chris Volstad, RHP (4.25, 4.42, 4.47) vs Tom Gorzelanny, LHP (2.71, 3.34, 3.93), 1:20 PM CT

I seem to remember Volstad shutting down the Cubs in their first look at him last year. But my memory is usually pretty faulty. He doesn't strike out very many, but gets a fair number of ground balls. Expect a WAG-fest. Gorzelanny is the 2009 Randy Wells of this season - he just can't get any run support. Huge props to the Cubs for landing him for two guys who are on the DL with torn labrums. Even bigger props to the Cubs and Rothschild in particular for jacking up that K rate - he's struck out more than a batter an inning ever since he joined the team. That was a real steal by Hendry.

I'm out of the prediction game, but I do like the fact that the Cubs face two lefties. Go Castro Go!

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.

Series Preview: Arizona Diamondbacks (10-11) vs Chicago Cubs (10-12)

The Diamondbacks head to Wrigley for 4 straight day games this week. I honestly didn't know much about this team before looking at the numbers. I knew a few of their players that had been around for awhile, such as Upton (who deserves the title of Most Exciting Young Player far more than Alcides Escobar), Drew, Young, Reynolds, and Haren, but had no idea how they were doing. Upton especially is a guy who's seemingly been ticketed for superstardom for awhile but was merely really, really good in 2009 (4.7 WAR season) after struggling in his first year as a regular in 2008.

Looking at their numbers so far, the team has been clubbing the ball, with many of their regulars (Johnson especially) outperforming their projections by a wide margin in the small sample of the season so far. They've posted a .349 wOBA, 4th in the majors. Their pitching, however, has more than made up for it. Their staff has posted a 4.81 FIP, only ahead of the Royals, Pirates, and Natinals. The bullpen has been especially fail-tastic. However, overall they've been incredible unlucky with HRs, as their xFIP stands at 4.29.

Hitters (wOBA, CHONE wOBA, CHONE projected defense)

1. C Chris Snyder, RHB (.352, .329, 1.4)
2. 1b Adam LaRoche, LHB (.383, .359, -2.9)
3. 2b Kelly Johnson, LHB (.470, .349, 3.0)
4. SS Stephen Drew, LHB (.369, .332, 0.0)
5. 3b Mark Reynolds, RHB (.393, .365, -3.8)
6. lf Gerardo Parra, LHB (.257, .325, 2.9)
7. cf Chris Young, RHB (.354, .313, -2.5)
8. rf Justin Upton, RHB (.300, .383, 4.5)

Pitchers (FIP, xFIP, CHONE FIP)

1. Dan Haren, RHP (3.84, 2.87, 3.24)
2. Edwin Jackson, RHP (4.42, 4.25, 4.41)
3. Ian Kennedy, RHP (5.76, 4.04, 4.70)
4. Rodrigo Lopez, RHP (4.20, 3.94, 4.68)
5. Kris Benson, RHP (4.41, 5.72, 5.37)
6. Chad Qualls, RHP (5.08, 3.25, 3.41)
7. Juan Gutierrez, RHP (5.52, 5.21, 4.04)
8. Bob Howry, RHP (8.56, 4.80, 4.41)

Injuries
Still not much to report on the Cubs front. Caridad has been throwing in Arizona and could rejoin the team as soon as Saturday. For the Diamondbacks, their regular LF Conor Jackson is on the DL with a strained right hamstring. Former PECOTA favorite Miguel Montero is out 4 to 6 weeks with a meniscus tear in his knee suffered in mid-April. Worm-killer Brandon Webb is still on the 60-day DL following shoulder surgery from last season. There's no timetable on his return.

Players to watch
The bullpens. Each team has had horrendous performances from their pens. I don't see Arizona moving Dan Haren to the 8th inning.

Pitching matchups

Thursday: Ian Kennedy, RHP (5.76, 4.04, 4.70) vs Ted Lilly, LHP (2.74, 4.34, 4.10), 1:20 PM CT
Kennedy has been racking up the strikeouts this year (21 in 22.1 innings), but has been stung by the HR ball (6 HRs in his first 4 starts). He missed most of last year after surgery to deal with an anuerysm. Lilly was a little wild in his last start (by his usual standards at least), but the hack-happy Brewers were happy to help him out by swinging at a lot of his pitches. Hopefully Chris Young doesn't make him slam down his glove again.

Friday:Rodrigo Lopez, RHP (4.20, 3.94, 4.68) vs Randy Wells, RHP (2.29, 3.53, 4.27), 1:20 PM CT
Lopez keeps bouncing from team to team, built on 2 BABIP-fueled good seasons with Baltimore in 2002 and 2004. He has decent control, but gives up too many HRs and doesn't strike out enough to make up for it. He was hammered by the Phillies in his last start. Wells has pitched quite well this year, improving his strikeout rate while dropping his already great walk rate even lower, and put up his numbers despite a .356 BABIP. However, he has yet to give up a HR this season. He's not as good as his numbers so far, but it certainly looks like his chances of avoiding the sophomore slump are pretty good.

Saturday:Dan Haren, RHP (3.84, 2.87, 3.24) vs Carlos Silva, RHP (3.00, 4.08, 4.67), 12:05 PM CT
Haren is great at throwing baseballs. Like the rest of the staff, he's had some problems with HRs this year (six so far), but the rest of his peripherals are even better than his career numbers. Dave Cameron wrote an interesting piece on Silva's new approach yesterday - basically Silva is now throwing a lot more changeups to LHH rather than a heavy dose of fastballs as he had previously done. Silva's had a big platoon split over his career, but this change in his pitch mix should help out his overall numbers since changeups don't really have a big split. His numbers against RHH are right in line with his career values, so it looks like this success vs LHP is a big portion of his success this season.

Sunday:Edwin Jackson, RHP (4.42, 4.25, 4.41) vs Tom Gorzelanny, LHP (2.49,4.04,4.43), 1:20 PM CT
Speaking of pitchers and changeups, Edwin Jackson's changeup isn't very good, and more importantly it's taking away from his success last season that came from a greater reliance on his slider. Maybe he doesn't have a good handle on it yet this year. He was crushed by Colorado in his last start, surrendering 10 runs in 2.1 innings. Gorzelanny had another wasted start on monday, giving up 2 runs in 7 innings though his strikeout rate (as expected) dropped a bit. I'd love to see the Cubs move him in a hypothetical deal for a Eighth Inning Guy™ which would also solve the problem of moving Z back to the rotation. He's probably the most fungible guy in the rotation - Wells has too much value due to cost-control, Lilly still has the injury question, though he does have the expiring deal, and Silva has too much $$.

Prediction
I like most of these matchups (except Saturday of course), but this is the Cubs we're talking about. They'll get a split and feel lucky to do so. Get used to seeing the Cubs hover around .500

Series Preview: Washinton Natinals (10-9) at Chicago Cubs (9-10)

The Cubs prepared for their upcoming series with the over-.500 Natinals by taking three days off to do nothing but take batting practice. Even Aramis Ramirez looks like he's starting to break out of his slump, getting some good contact in the last BP session.

The Cubs somehow managed to pull a winning record out of that road trip, and the big reason is still starting pitching. I mentioned this in my last preview, but wanted to extend the numbers. Here are the ERs (and IP) given up by Cubs starters since the beginning of the Astros facepalm-inducing series

0, (7.0), 2 (3.0), 1 (7.2), 1 (6.0) 2 (6.0), 1 (6.0), 2 (5.2) 1 (7.2), 0 (6.0), 2 (7.0)

That's an ERA of 1.74, folks. The Cubs starting pitching is pretty good.

As far as the Natinals go, it's pretty similar to last year. Their offense is surprisingly good (5th in the NL), the starters are appallingly bad (second worst FIP and xFIP in all of MLB), and they play decent defense, led by the underrated Nyjer Morgan. Their second best player, Ryan Zimmerman, is banged up and likely won't be able to play in all three games (he missed the last series except for a pinch-hit appearance). Their best player is of course pitching for Harrisburg.

Position players (wOBA, CHONE wOBA, CHONE UZR)

1. C Pudge Rodriguez, RHB (.449, .290, 2.3)
2. 1b Adam Dunn, LHB (.363, .378, -4.0)
3. 2b Cristian Guzman, BHB (.306, .316, 0.0)
4. SS Ian Desmond, RHB (.331, .324, -18.6)
5. 3b Ryan Zimmerman (.445, .379, 0.0)
6. LF Josh Willingham, RHB (.468, .361, -0.9)
7. CF Nyjer Morgan, LHB (.363, .321, 10.3)
8. RF Willie Harris, LHB (.329, .328, 2.6)

Pitchers (FIP, xFIP, CHONE FIP)

1. John Lannan, LHP (5.50, 5.28, 4.74)
2. Craig Stammen, RHP (4.28, 3.66, 4.96)
3. Zombie Livan Hernandez, RHP (4.22, 4.96, 4.83)
4. Scott Olsen, LHP (6.40, 4.08, 5.12)
5. Luis Atilano, RHP (3.68, 5.27, -)
6. Matt Capps, RHP (3.69, 4.68, 3.82)
7. Brian Bruney, RHP (6.37, 6.61,4.35)
8. Tyler Clippard, RHP (1.69, 3.29, 4.20)

A lot of these guys are really tearing the cover off the ball, especially Pudge and Willingham. Laughably Riggleman has been batting Cristian Guzman, arguably the worst batter on the team, in the 3-spot while Zimmerman was out.

Injuries
The Natinals have quite a laundry list of injured players. Ryan Zimmerman has been having hamstring issues. Pudge has a sore back. RF Willie Harris had an MRI on his sore knee yesterday which came back okay, but he's expected to miss Monday's game at least. Catcher Jesus Flores had offseason shoulder and elbow surgery and still has not begun throwing. Cubs Legend Jason Marquis (the greatest fifth starter ever) is on the DL with floating bodies in his throwing elbow. Starter Garret Mock is on the DL with a spine injury with no timetable for return. The Natinals also have Chien-Ming Wang and future star Jordan Zimmerman on the 60-day DL recovering from arm surgeries.

The only injury out there for the Cubs is Caridad, who has been throwing in Arizona. According to this Bruce Miles report, Caridad could be reactivated after this homestand.

Players to watch
As mentioned above, Rodrigo Ramirez seems to have started squaring up the ball again. Hopefully the upcoming Natinals pitchers will keep the Cubs bats hot and build even more confidence. For the Natinals, I hope Adam Dunn strikes out 12 times and commits 4-5 errors at 1b, to ram a stake into the 'Cubs should have signed Dunn' partisans that will inevitably turn up the volume of their whinging in this series.

Pitching Probables
Monday: John Lannan, LHP (5.50, 5.28, 4.74) vs Carlos Silva, RHP (3.06, 4.03, 4.67), 7:05 PM CT
Lannan, the Natinals erstwile ace, 'kept his team in the game' in his last start, and admitted that his off-speed pitchers were not working for him. He has been pretty unlucky though, with a .350 BABIP. The Fail Whale, meanwhile, has posted a ridiculous .178 BABIP so far, so that's going to go up. He's also seen a jump in his K-rate and big drop in his BB-rate. Obviously none of these are sustainable. It will be interesting to see where his numbers level off.

Tuesday: Zombie Livan Hernandez, RHP (4.22, 4.96, 4.83) vs Tom Gorzelanny, LHP (2.14, 3.42, 4.43), 7:10 PM CT
I was about to complain about how Hernandez has pitched so late into his career and was surprised to find that he's only 35. It seems like he's been around forever. Something must have happened to him in 2006 (injury?), because after cranking out 7 years with FIPs more or less in the high 3's, his FIP jumped by about a run. His main problem is that his strikeout rate has gone waaaay down from earlier in his career, and he's posted an eyeball-averaged 4 strikeouts per nine innings over the last three seasons. Most of what he has left is his durability - in his last few years as an effective starter, he pitched 233, 255, and 246 innings on some awful Expos/Natinals teams. He's been lucky so far this year, posting a .158 BABIP and leading some to wonder how he turned it around this year, but he's still the same shitty pitcher from the last few years. Which of course means he'll throw a 3-hit shutout tonight.

As far as Gorzelanny goes, I still think despite all evidence to the contrary that he's the most likely guy to be demoted to the pen if they ever move Z back (*jams improvised paper-clip shiv in ear*). Just a feeling. He has been striking out a ton of batters in his first few starts, which is a nice sign.

Wednesday: Luis Atilano, RHP (3.68, 5.27, -) vs Ryan Dempster, RHP (2.92, 3.54, 3.89), 1:20 PM CT
Atilano made his major league debut last week agains the Dodgers and was fairly effective, allowing only one run over 6 innings. He wasn't blowing anyone away though - he only struck out one. None of the systems (on fangraphs at least) seem to have projected him, but based on last year's minor league numbers he's basically a replacement level starter. He has decent control, but that's about it. Maybe HP will chime in more on what he throws before his start.

Dempster continues to roll along, piling up strikeouts and getting a decent number of ground balls, exactly what you want to see. He's been a bit lucky with HRs, but there's no question that he's the best pitcher on the team right now.

Prediction Cubs win 2 out of 3, and climb back to .500. Given the shitty pitchers the Cubs are facing this series, a sweep is not out of the question, but the Natinals have a decent offense and are facing the back end of the Cubs rotation here too.

Series Preview: Chicago Cubs (4-10) at Milwaukee Brewers (8-7)

The Cubs just lost consecutive series to the worst team in the NL (Astros), and the worst managed/GM-ed team in the NL (Mets). Now the Cubs and their ice-cold offense head into Milwaukee, who are fresh off a sweep of the Pirates in Pittsburgh, outscoring them 36-1. As you can see below, the Brewers are all offense, no pitching. Unlike the Cubs, who have had great starting pitching, but shitty, shitty offense. In the last 7 games Cubs starters have given up 2,1,2,1,1,2, and 0 earned runs over a total of 41 1/3 innings, for an ERA of 1.95. And the team has only 2 wins in those games.

I feel pretty good about the starters matching up with the Brewers potent offense (power meets power), but the failpen is another story. If Z (I still can't believe I'm saying this), Marshall, and Marmol get all the extra work, then the Cubs will only lose these games 3-1 instead of 7-1.

Brewers lineup (current wOBA, CHONE wOBA, chone UZR)

1. 2B Rickie Weeks, RHB (.348, .374, -5.2)
2. CF Carlos Gomez, RHB (.325, .323, 11.4)
3. LF Lloyd Braun, RHB (.486, .404, -4.9)
4. 1B Prince Fielder, LHB (.309, .412, -3.0)
5. 3B Casey McGehee, RHB (.479, .324, -3.4)
6. RF Jim Edmonds, LHB (.371, .334, -6.2)
7. C Gregg Zaun, BHB (.149, .315, -1.2)
8. SS The Most Exciting Player Ever, RHB (.368, .322, 0.9)

Pitchers (FIP, xFIP, CHONE FIP)

1. Yovani Gallardo, RHP (3.98, 3.30, 3.62)
2. Randy Wolf, LHP (4.50, 4.01, 4.22)
3. Doug Davis, LHP (5.61, 3.73, 4.57)
4. David Bush, RHP (4.47, 4.32, 4.79)
5. Jeff Suppan, LOL (7.20, 7.23, 5.23)
6. Trevor Hoffman, RHP (10.23, 6.52, 3.84)
7. LaTroy Hawkins, RHP (2.40, 3.47, 3.97)
8. Todd Coffey, RHP (4.60, 5.77, 4.10)

Injuries
Not much new on the Cubs front. Lilly comes back in Saturday's game. Caridad was supposed to start throwing this week but I haven't heard any news on him. For the Brewers, the only injury of note is to "3b" prospect Mat Gamel, who has a shoulder tear and should be out a few more weeks.

Players to watch
Don't look now (or I guess, look now), but Soriano has started looking pretty good at the plate. He's been locked in the past few games, and was taking a ton of pitches in Thursday's game. Look for him to break out against this weak pitching, especially Suppan and Davis. For the Brewers, how can you not go with The Most Exciting Player Ever? Fireworks go off whenever he handles a routine grounder to SS.

Matchups
Friday Ryan Dempster, RHP (2.83, 3.34, 3.89) vs Jeff Suppan, LOL (7.20, 7.23, 5.23), 7:10 PM CT
Demp's having a great season. He didn't bring great control against the Brewers in his last start, but the Cubs' bats actually woke up, so he was pitching to contact for most of the game, including a towering HR by Lloyd Braun. Jeff Suppan, is, well, Jeff Suppan (dying laughing). Just look at those FIP and xFIP numbers.

Saturday Ted Lilly, LHP (-,-,4.10) vs Doug Davis, LHP (5.61, 3.73, 4.57), 6:10 PM CT
Ted had a nice outing in his last rehab start on monday and should be ready to go. He struck out 9 over 7 innings and threw strikes, which is what he's best at. He's a fun guy to watch pitch. Davis has been hammered pretty hard in all three of his starts this year, and hasn't made it out of the 5th inning in any of them. The Cubs hit a pair of homers against him last week, and with the righty-heavy lineup they can throw out there, hopefully they can do the same again.

Sunday Randy Wells, RHP (2.43, 3.69, 4.27) vs David Bush, RHP (4.47, 4.32, 4.79), 1:10 PM CT
Bush painted the corners in his last start against Pittsburgh, inducing a ton (14) ground balls over 7 innings. He's had a lot of BABIP luck (.220) and is doing a shitty job of striking out batters (4.82 K/9), so hopefully the Cubs get to see a little regression here. Wells, on the other hand, has posted great numbers despite being very unlucky (.362 BABIP). So far the main source of his success is a higher K rate and a lack of HRs. That streak will probably end in this series.

Prediction
Though this should be a boring series, since both teams strengths match up well. But the Failpen should be worth at least two losses. Cubs lose 2 out of 3. It's too bad Cubs Ace Carlos Silva won't pitch in this series.

Series Preview: Chicago Cubs (5-7) at New York Presbyterian Hospital (4-7)

Well, that was a disappointment. But luckily the Cubs are playing an even more disappointing team over the next four days. Seriously, Cubs fans, whenever you start feeling bad about this season just look at the Mets. The team blew big leads in 2007 and 2008 and were shut out of the playoffs, and then saw nearly their entire roster go down to injury last season, including Jose Reyes, Johan Santana, Carlos Beltran, David Wright, Carlos Delgado, Jon Niese, John Maine, J.J. Putz, Billy Wagner, Gary Sheffield, Oliver Perez, and others. Beltran (the team's best player) is still unable to play after microfracture knee surgery in January, the cicumstances surrounding which are still unclear. The Mets claim they did not give him permission to get the surgery, and aired out all this dirty laundry to the NY Press. On top of this bizarre PR reverse-push, current manager Jerry Manuel was hired in 2008 after the bizarre firing of Jerry Manuel in the wee hours of the morning after the team had just won a game on a west-coast road trip, and most of the team found out from the media the next day.

To 'fix' the roster from last season Minaya went out and replaced the aging (and probably still injured) Delgado with Mike Jacobs, he of the .332 projected wOBA. Furthermore, he also acquired Angels millstone Gary Matthews Jr. to help fill in for the missing Beltran. The only big splash the team made in the offseason was signing the overrated Jason Bay, while seemingly completely ignoring their terrible pitching rotation. It seemed like the Mets were the second choice in every deal, and signed half a hundred backup catchers before Bengie Molina, who's not a great asset himself but was the only 'legitamite' starting catcher on the market, ended up re-signing with the Giants after the Mets kept dragging their feet. On top of that, midway through the previous season Minaya traded for my personal Bete Noire, Jeff Francouer, to be their everyday right fielder.

It's amazing how much of a joke this franchise has turned into.

The Cubs offense needs to wake up, and this could be just the series for it. The Mets are throwing three left-handers against the RHH-heavy Cubs, though their cavernous park should temper our expectations.

Mets lineup (with CHONE projected wOBA, UZR)

1. SS Jose Reyes, BHB (.366, 7.6)
2. 2B Luis Castillo, BHB (.329, -6.9)
3. 3b David Wright, RHB (.393, -6.0)
4. LF Jason Bay, RHB (.388, -6.9)
5. 1B Mike Jacobs, LHB (.332, -5.2)
6. RF Jeff Francouer, RHB (.327, -3.0)
7. C Rod Barajas, RHB (.304, 4.3)
8. CF Angel Pagan, BHB (.334, 6.1)

Pitchers (with current FIP, xFIP, CHONE FIP)

1. 1. Johan Santana, LHP (2.85,3.95,3.79)
2. John Maine, RHP (8.02, 5.70, 4.43)
3. Jon Niese, LHP (4.65, 5.33, 4.23)
4. Mike Pelfrey, RHP (2.66, 4.02, 4.36)
5. Oliver Perez, LHP (3.10, 4.35, 4.90)
6. Francisco Rodriguez, RHP (3.02, 4.65, 3.43)
7. Pedro Feliciano, LHP (5.35, 5.80, 3.94)
8. Ryota Igarashi, RHP (4.07, 5.52, xxx)

Injuries:
Currently, the Mets hospital lineup includes reliever Sean Green (rib injury), "1B" Daniel Murphy (knee injury, out 2-6 weeks), Carlos Beltran (knee surgery, out until at least May), and oft-injured pitcher Kelvim Escobar (shoulder soreness, not expected to contribute for months). For the Cubs, Lilly is expected to make his last rehab start on Monday before rejoining the team to make his season debut on Saturday in Milwaukee.

Players to watch:
Geo Soto's bat has warmed up in the past few days, and it would be great to see him (and the rest of the Cubs bats) warm up against the left-handed pitching they will see in this series. For the Mets, I'd love to see Francouer strike out about a dozen times in this series against the Cubs strikeout staff. I don't think he could draw a walk off even 2009 Marmol.

Pitching Matchups

Monday: Randy Wells, RHP (2.45, 3.78, 4.27) vs Jon Niese, LHP (4.65, 5.33, 4.23), 6:10 PM CT
Wells had a decent outing in his last start, even striking out the side in the first. He ran out of gas in the later innings too, and not surprisingly got into trouble after walking the pitcher. Niese looks like a decent young pitcher who could turn into a pretty good one. He pitched well in 5 starts with the squad last season before presumably going down with some sort of injury (with the 2009 Mets, it's a safe assumption). Fangraphs says that he throws mostly 90 mph fastballs and 89 mph cutters, though I'll trust HP more if he takes another look at him. He gets a decent number of ground balls though, so there's a chance that cutter is actually a 2-seamer.

Tuesday: Carlos Zambrano, RHP (6.17, 3.70, 4.08) vs Mike Pelfrey, RHP (2.66, 4.02, 4.36), 6:10 PM CT
Z had issues with cramps and wildness in his last outing against the Brewers. Despite that he still was as 'effective' as Brewers starter Jeff Suppan. Hopefully this will remind him to eat his bananas and gatorade this season. Pelfrey's leads the Mets in both wins AND saves so far, and closed out the 20-inning suckfest on saturday on his throw day (one day's rest). He'll probably still get the start here, I think. He's a sinkerballer, but so far this season his secondary pitches (splitter, slider, curve) have been pretty sharp this season.

Wednesday: Carlos Silva, RHP (2.02, 3.38, 4.67) vs Oliver Perez, LHP (3.10, 4.35, 4.90), 6:10 PM CT
The Fail Whale continues to impress Lou and surprise everyone. I'm still skeptical of Rothschild 'fixing' him, but so far it definitely seems he's earned the rotation spot that he and Gorz were fighting over for when Lilly returns. Silva struck out 5 and walked none in his last start, and the 2 runs he allowed were both unearned. Who knows what's going on with Perez. He's always had good stuff but shitty control, but apparently this year he's lost a nontrivial amount of velocity on his fastball. He mixed in a lot more offspeed pitches with uncharacteristically good control in his last start, but given his track record you can't expect him to keep that up.

Thursday: Tom Gorzelanny, LHP (2.48, 3.80, 4.43) vs Johan Santana, LHP (2.85,3.95,3.79), 6:10 PM CT
Gorzelanny took a liner off his arm in his last start and had to be pulled after three innings. From all reports he's okay, if a little sore, and should make his next start. The 'bright' spot in that game was actually the failpen, which pitched 6 innings and only gave up 2 runs, which isn't bad for a pen. Santana threw a great start to begin the 20-inning affair with the Cardinals, striking out 9 while walking one and allowing no runs in 7 innings. He's not the elite pitcher he once was, though he's still a great pitcher. The main source of his decline seems to be that he's lost his great change-up, which was one of if not the best changeups in mlb history.

Prediction: Split series. The Cubs win on monday and wednesday but get shut down by gb machine (and right-hander) Pelfrey and lose the mismatch with Santana.

Series Preview: Houston Astros (1-9) vs Chicago Cubs (4-5)

The Cubs won their last series against the Brewers, and now face the near-winless Astros. Many here were hoping that the Astros would win in their last game against the Cardinals, so that they wouldn't come into this series winless. I don't really see it as a big deal - they're the same crappy team either way. If it made any difference, I think a winless team would struggle more since they would feel the additional pressure to win.

I touched on a few of these in recent threads, but I wanted to reiterate the futility of this team. It's pretty bad. Small sample size caveats apply of course, but here's two 'fun' facts:

Number of walks, 2010:

• Daric Barton, Adam Dunn - 11
  
• David Wright, Nick Markakis - 10
• Chase Utley, Colby Rasmus, Nick Johnson, Jose Bautista, Denard Span - 9
• Entire Houston Astros team - 8

Houston's lineup Thursday vs St Lous

• Michael Bourn, CF
  
• Jeff Keppinger, SS
  
• Pedro Feliz, 1B
• Carlos Lee, LF
  
• Hunter Pence, RF
  
• Kaz Matsui, 2B
  
• Chris Johnson, 3B
• Humberto Quintero, C
• Bud Norris, P

There are two decent hitters in that lineup in Lee and Pence, but I find it hilarious that for one, Pedro Feliz, who was the worst hitter in the Phillies lineup last season, is in the slot traditionally reserved for the 'best' hitter in this lineup, and secondly, that he isn't playing third base (where his glove gives him most of his value). I don't know anything about this Chris Johnson guy, but I strongly suspect that he's not the second coming of Brooks Robinson. Take heart though, Houston fans - Ed Wade's contract extension kicks in next year!

Here's an overall look at their main lineup and pitching. As usual, I will list the players CHONE projected wOBA and UZR, and for the pitchers I will list their 2010 FIP, 2010 xFIP, and 2010 CHONE FIP projection

Batters (opening day lineup):

1. Michael Bourn, LHB, CF (.327, 0.9)
2. Kazuo Matsui, BHB, 2b (.309, 0.0)
3. Hunter Pence, RHB, RF (.358, 0.0)
4. Carlos Lee, LHB, LF (.365, -9.3)
5. Geoff Blum, BHB, 1b (.294, 0.5)
6. Pedro Feliz, RHB, 3b (.308, 8.6)
7. J.R. Towles, Done Deal Sealed, C (.326, 1.4)
8. Tommy Manzella, RHB, SS (.285, -6.8)

Holy balls, does this team miss Lance Berkman. Not that it would help that much

Pitchers

1. Roy Oswalt, RHP (3.29, 3.57, 3.81)
   
2. Wandy Rodriguez, LHP (5.27, 5.33, 3.54)
   
3. Brett Myers, RHP (3.20, 3.56, 4.72)
   
4. Bud Norris, RHP (5.29, 7.34, 4.40)
   
5. Felipe Paulino, RHP (3.84, 5.21,4.75)
6. Matt Lindstom, RHP, closer (7.54, 2.41,3.82)
7. Brandon Lyon, LHP, (6.86, 6.29, 3.75)
8. Jeff Fulchino, RHP (6.04, 3.37, 3.98)

So far, the Astros have actually gotten decent production from their starters (Bud Norris's numbers haven't been updated to include his last start v the Cardinals yet, where he struck out 9 in 5 innings). But, as you can see above, that offense is horrendous and sorely misses Berkman, who was projected to have a wOBA in the .380-.400 range. Going from that to Geoff Blum or any of the other stiffs they're rolling out there in his place is a huge dropoff. Sadly the lack of Berkman will also mean a dropoff of ridiculous/embarassing Berkman pictures from Mercurial Outfielder.

Injuries

Berkman is having trouble with his left knee. He bruised it somehow in workouts early in spring training and has been slow to recover, having it drained 5 times and having a small surgery since the beginning of March. It sounds like he's chased whatever problem it had, as the swelling hasn't returned since the latest draining, and he was able to run full speed today. Lee showed that there is little to worry about with his thumb injury, homering off the hittable Jeff Suppan on Thursday. Ted Lilly has seen his minor league starts pushed back due to back stiffness. He pitched 4 innings on Wednesday and is expected to make one more start before rejoining the team. Caridad is on the DL with a case of domus canis Piniellitis.

Players to watch

Hunter Pence is the only player with any real future in the Astros lineup, and he's not even really that great. Of course, I'm forgetting J.R. Towles who is finally going to have a breakout season this year. He'll hit 7 or 8 home runs in this series. Done deal sealed. For the Cubs, I'll go with Kosuke Fukudome, who has been leading the offense with yet another stellar April. Hopefully he can keep this going.

Pitching matchups (pitching numbers are the same as above)

Friday: Felipe Paulino, RHP (3.84, 5.21,4.75) vs Carlos Silva, RHP (2.04, 3.63, 4.67), 1:20 PM CT

Silva had a nice outing his last time out, going 6 innings in only 71 pitches while striking out 3, walking none, and giving up a lone run. I was surprised when he was taken out but apparently his shoulder was bothering him. He got a fair number of ground balls, but his GB/other ball ratio wasn't quite as large as I expected. Still, Silva throws strikes, and with a lineup as weak as the Astros' lineup it's a great matchup for him. Paulino was hit pretty hard in his first start of the season, but it's not too surprising considering it was the Phillies. He's a decent strikeout pitcher, but he walks too many and gives up too many home runs. If the wind is still blowing out tomorrow, he should have a short outing.

Saturday: Roy Oswalt, RHP (3.29, 3.57, 3.81) vs Tom Gorzelanny, LHP (1.78, 2.64, 4.43), 12:05 PM CT

The Astros nominal ace isn't the dominant pitcher that he once was, but is still pretty good. He's had two good outings wasted by the Astros anemic offense. I always think of Oswalt as a power pitcher for some reason, but really he's much more of a control pitcher. His BB/9 has always hovered around 2, and he has decent though not great strikeout and HR suppression abilities. Gorzelanny made his case to stay in the rotation in his last start, striking out 7 in 6 1/3 innings and getting a fair number of ground balls along the way. The jury's still out on whether Gorz will turn out to be an above-average pitcher. You could point to his excellent 2007 with the Pirates, when he posted a 3.88 ERA and 4.24 FIP despite a .311 BABIP. However, he had a lot of HR luck that year. Last season he put up the best numbers of his career, albeit in 47 innings. We'll just have to take a wait-and-see approach.

Sunday: Wandy Rodriguez, LHP (5.27, 5.33, 3.54) vs Ryan Dempster, RHP (3.53, 3.58, 3.89), 1:20 PM CT

I know I say this every time the Cubs face him, but I still can't believe Wandy Rodriguez has turned into an above-average pitcher. It must be some combination of my memories of him when he first came into the league (hittable) and his lame-sounding first name. He's had trouble fooling people so far this season, which is strange considering how much of a strikeout pitcher he's turned himself into in the past few years. Hopefully the Cubs right-leaning lineup feasts on him. Demp meanwhile had a very shaky outing his last time out, almost completely opposite of his sharp first start. Lou pushed him into the 7th inning with a decent-sized lead but he was having trouble finding the zone with all of his pitches. I hope Lou's new strategy of pushing his starters to avoid his bullpen doesn't have next-start type reprecussions.

Prediction: I was going to say Cubs sweep, but predicting a sweep of any team is tough even with a team as awful as the Astros. The matchups aren't as much of a slam dunk in this series as the last one, so I'll say the Cubs win the series, two out of three, and head to Citifield to face the New York Pile of Fail with a .500 record.

Road Trip Recap and Series Preview: Milwaukee Brewers (2-3) at Chicago Cubs (2-4)

(cross posted at ACB)

Well, that sucked. What did we learn from the opening road trip?

1. Alfonso Soriano looks even worse on defense than he did last season, despite the fact that he was playing hurt all of last year
2. He looks just as lost with the plate
3. Soto has forgotten how to swing his bat
4. Aramis Ramirez looks lost at the plate
5. The offense in general is having trouble scoring runs
6. The bullpen is going to kill Ron Santo
7. John Grabow should not face any RHH that can outhit Neifi Perez

Now, the good news

1. Carlos Marmol's stuff is still incredibly flithy
2. The starting pitching was pretty great. It's hard to pick which one was the best but I'd probably go with Dempster's outing vs Atlanta (6 IP 1R 3H 2BB 9K). Silva and Gorz were surprisingly effective too
3. After looking like crap in the first two games, Fontenot found his glove and showcased some great defense in the Reds series (and got a few hits too). Fukudome made some great plays in RF. All in all, players whose names do not rhyme with Garbanzo Italiano played some good defense.
4. It's only been a week. We have good reason to believe Ramirez will bounce back, and to a lesser extent Soto. Even Soriano should get hot at some point. The Cubs are mixing Colvin in, which is the right thing to do (though he should be replacing Soriano defensively earlier in games), but you have to give these guys at least a month or two before you make any major changes.

Anyway, enough blathering. Onto the first Wrigley series of the year!

The Cubs take on the Brewers in what should be a beautiful week (great weather, 6 straight day games) to watch a baseball game, drink some Old Style, and gaze at the Glorious Scoreboard™ and the regenerating ivy vines...except the boo-birds should be out. Who will get booed the most? Soriano is the best bet but Z should be up there too. But the best way to stop the boos is to win, and the Cubs are set up to do so in this series with their rivals and their Little Brother Complex fanbase from the north.

Here's a glance at the Brewers' lineup and pitching staff

Batters (CHONE wOBA, CHONE UZR projection)

* 2b Rickie Weeks, RHB (.364, -5.2)
* CF Carlos Gomez, RHB (.323, 11.3)
* LF Lloyd Braun, RHB (.404, -4.9)
* 1b Prince Fielder, LHB (.412,-3)
* RF Jim Edmonds, LHB (.334,-0.2)
* 3b Casey McGehee, RHB (.324,-3.4)
* C Gregg Zaun, SHB (.315,-1.2)
* SS Overrated Escobar, (.322,0.9)

My lineup-a-tron pegs this lineup at 3.719 runs/game

Pitchers (CHONE FIP)

* Yovani Gallardo, RHP (3.62)
* Randy Wolf, LHP (4.22)
* Doug Davis, LHP (4.57)
* Dave Bush, RHP (4.79)
* Jeff Suppan, LOL (5.24)
* Trevor Hoffman, RHP (3.84)
* LaTroy Hawkins, RHP (3.97)
* Todd Coffey, RHP (4.10)

That non-Braun/Fielder offense is much more pedestrian than I thought. McGehee played way over his head last season, though I think CHONE might have him pegged a little low. Gomez is graded out to be their only plus defender, but scouts have raved about Escobar's defense for a long time - his main problem is that he swings at everything. Their defensive numbers could see a slight bump up with those two in place of Cameron (who is about as good as Gomez defensively) and J.J. Hardy (who was also pretty good defensively), but don't expect a big defense-related turnaround with this team.

Injuries

Suppan not only sucks, but he's making his first start coming back from a neck injury. Future DH trade bait Mat Gamel has a shoulder tear and is expected to miss the first month or two of the season. For the Cubs, Lilly has had another setback and has had his next start pushed back to Wednesday. He'll throw a bullpen session on Monday. Theriot has been bothered by a sore calf but was well enough to play (and take some pitches) today. I wouldn't be surprised to see Fontenot get a start sometime in the next week.

Players to watch

I actually like several players on the Brewers, but it's kind of cancelled out by the douchiness of Braun and the crapulence of their pitching staff in general. Prince Fielder is one of my favorite players in all of baseball, and Rickie Weeks can still be an incredible player if he manages to make it through the season for once. He's an exciting player and can get on base. For the Cubs, I'm not going to pick someone specific. The offense in general needs to pick it up, and there's no better recipe than the starters the Cubs are facing this week (not to mention the shambolic Astros in the following series).

Pitching Matchups

Monday: Doug Davis, LHP (6.41,4.52,4.57) vs Ryan Dempster, RHP (1.41,1.86,3.89), 1:20 PM CT

I'm glad Demp gets the start in the home opener, since he is the nominal ace of the staff (if you define Ace to be best starting pitcher). We can't say enough about what a great job Hendry did in bringing him back after 2008. Everything was working for him in his last start. Adding further hope for a good start at home, Davis is a LHP, which the Cubs righty-heavy lineup should pound. Of course, I remember Davis giving the Cubs fits in many other starts. He's pretty wild (4+ BB/9 projected, and 4.07 for his career), but given the Cubs swing-happy clubs maybe it's not so surprising that he does well against them. In his first start, he was wild early and settled down as the game went on.

Wednesday: David Bush, RHP (4.14,2.81,4.79) vs Randy Wells, RHP (3.57,4.26,4.27), 1:20 PM CT

Bush has great control (2.15 BB/9 in his career) but his main trouble has always been the home run ball (1.28 HR/9 on his career, 1.41 and 1.50 in his last 2 seasons). He had a pedestrian outing vs StL in his first start, fanning 6 while walking two and giving up 3 runs (one homer) in 5 2/3 innings. Wells, meanwhile, had a great start against the Braves. He only struck out one batter, but he didn't allow any runs and managed to induce double play balls to get him out of jams. He got 13 grounders to only 3 FB and 5 LD. If he can keep the GB rate (and popup rate) going like he did last year, he'll keep putting up useful numbers.

Thursday: Carlos Zambrano, RHP (6.99,3.62,4.08) vs Jeff Suppan, RHP (5.23) 1:20 PM CT

This should be a fun one. There is a chance Gallardo could get this start (he's listed as the probable on mlb.com), but everything else I've seen points towards Suppan making this start. Luckily for the Brewers, this is the last year of his awful, awful deal. Hats off to Suppan, who turned 2 good weeks at the end of 2006 into $42 million dollars. Well played, sir, well played.

Fun fact: Z has a career 3.64 ERA at home and 3.35 ERA on the road

Prediction

Cubs win 2 out of 3, and a good chance for a sweep. I also think that Sean Marshall and Jeff Gray will replace Grabow and Caridad as the top 2 relievers behind Marmol by the end of the week.

Series Preview: Chicago Cubs (1-2) at Cincinnati Reds (1-2)

(cross-posted at ACB)

The pitching staff kept it exciting from time to time, but the Cubs pulled out their first win of the season vs the Braves last night, salvaging the series. Wells was a little rocky early on but settled down a bit as the game went on, managing to get himself out of jams (one of which he created with a throwing error on another DP opp) with two double play balls. Hopefully Lou has disabused the notion of using Grabow as a setup man, and will use him as an overpaid LOOGY instead.

I'm not that worried (or surprised) that the Cubs dropped this series to the Braves. They were playing on the road, against one of the top 3 teams in the NL. I think the main thing we learned from this series is pretty much ZOMG Jayson Heyward. And that Grabow sucks.

On to Cincinnati, the city I always have to look up to remember how to spell!

Here's a glance at the main contributers to the team, along with their CHONE projected wOBAs and FIP

Batters (lineup simulator: 3.2508 runs/game)

1. Stubbs, CF (.317)
2. Cabrera, SS (.320)
3. Votto, 1b (.392)
4. Phillips, 2b (.336)
5. Rolen, 3b (.344)
6. Bruce, RF (.379)
7. Gomes, LF (.355)
8. Hernandez, C (.325)

Pitchers

1. Harang, RHP (4.26)
2. Arroyo, RHP (4.81)
3. Cueto, RHP (4.67)
4. Bailey, RHP (4.66)
5. Leake, RHP (??)
6. Cordero, RHP (3.66) - closer
7. Masset, RHP (3.84) - RH setup
8. Rhodes, LHP (3.69) - LH setup

Wow, looking over those numbers, especially the pitching staff, I'm really scratching my head as to why people are high on the Reds to be on the fringes of contention this year. I'm sure it will be even uglier when I do the Brewers after this series, but wow, what a shambolic staff projection. Most of the optimism has to do with the upside of their young pitchers, Bailey (who had a good run at the end of last year), Cueto (who had a good run 2 years ago but is still young), and Leake, whose talent was overshadowed by Strasburg but is going to make his pro debut without throwing a single pitch in the minors, the first to do so since Jim Abbott in 1988.

Injuries:
Not much going on for the Cubs that will affect this series. Lilly had today's rehab start pushed back 2 days due to back stiffness. Jeff Gray pitched for Iowa last night, and will likely join the squad as soon as he's elgible. He'll probably bump F7 or Russell from the roster. Nothing seems to be cooking for the Reds, except that ROY candidate Edinson Volquez is still recovering from his TJS.

Players to watch:
I'm excited to see Leake pitch on Sunday. It's pretty rare to see a guy thrown right into the majors, but the Reds seem to believe his stuff. After a good series against the Braves, the Cubs player to watch is Marlon Byrd. He hammered both of his HRs, especially the second one.

Pitching matchups:
Friday: Carlos Silva, RHP (4.67) vs Homer Bailey, RHP (4.66), 6:10 PM CT
Silva had a good spring, but sadly we'll probably see something closer to the CHONE projection above. Rothschild has changed his delivery a bit, most notably moving him over on the rubber. It has worked so far, but I'm kind of skeptical, since if something so simple could 'fix' him, you'd think someone would have tried it in the past 5 years. Bailey is a former overhyped prospect who has now shed the labels that he had coming up - mainly because he flopped in his first few stints in the majors. However, Bailey finally seemed to figure it out last year - routinely going deep into games in the minors for the first half of the year, and then posted a 1.70 ERA in his last nine starts with the big league club at the end of the year. He doesn't have great control (4.13 BB/9 last season) or particularly dominating stuff (6.83 K/9 last season), but it seems that his MO is that of a slight GB pitcher (42.5%)

Note: for pitchers who have already pitched, I am listing their FIP, xFIP, and CHONE projected FIP.
Saturday: Carlos Zambrano, RHP (3.61,4.27,4.08) vs Aaron Harang, RHP (4.14,3.95,4.26), 12:10 PM CT
Well, let's see if Z can bounce back from that opening day nightmare. Great American Band Box might not be the best place to do it, given how HRs fly out of the place. I thought Z's pitches looked like they had lots of movement on them in his first start, but he threw way too many pitches up in the zone, and from what Z/Lou said, he didn't have great control either. He did have a great PA against Glaus, who he struck out on 3 94-95 mph fastballs, which was pretty much the only bright spot in the start. He'll have the same leaky infield defense behind him, so lets hope that by getting the ball down a bit more there will be less bloops and more balls hit past futilely diving middle infielders. Harang is another perpetually underrated pitcher, just like Z. He gets a ton of strikeouts, but far fewer ground balls than I expected. In fact, you'd think a fly-ball pitcher like Harang would be a recipe for disaster given his home ballpark. He's broken down a bit since Dusty's arrival, seeing his K rate drop and bb rate rise a bit, but that could just be due to aging. He was also quite hit-unlucky last year (.339 BABIP), so should see a little better luck this year.

Sunday: Tom Gorzelanny, LHP (4.43) vs Mike Leake, RHP (??)
Right now it seems like Silva has the edge on staying in the Rotation when Lilly returns, so Gorz pretty much has two starts to convince the Cubs otherwise. Lord of the internets Harry Pavlidis did a breakdown of Gorzelanny's stuff after the Cubs acquired him last season. He throws 4 and 2 seamers, a changeup, curveball, and slider. He's mostly a fastball-changeup guy against RHP, and mixes in a few more sliders vs lefties. Leake, having had no minor league stats whatsoever aside from his AFL stint last fall, doesn't even have a fangraphs page yet. He was a star at Arizona state though. Here are his lines from the past 3 seasons:

Year	IP	R	HR	BB	SO	ERA	FIP
2007	117.2	54	13	27	90	3.60	3.79
2008	121.1	61	7	20	104	3.49	2.73
2009	142	31	4	24	162	1.71	1.79

It sure looks like he's ready. That last year was Strasburg-esque. Per KG, he has an above-average speed fastball with good movement that he locates well, a good change, and an average curveball and slider. He also hit pretty well in college too. The main knocks against him are that he's short and he doesn't have one dominating pitch, just a collection of good ones. KG has him pegged as a third starter with upside. He's still young, so some of those pitches could improve with major league coaching, so long as his arm doesn't fall off

Prediction: I think the Cubs take the first two games and lose the third to Leake.