Well it’s that time.
Baseball is here and you are wondering what your team is looking like
heading into the new season. Well
I’m here to tell you with my team breakdowns. I started with the AL West, knocked out the NL East and have
now moved on to the NL Central. And
while I ranked teams alphabetically last year, this year I’ll rank them based
on last season’s standings. Using
last season’s final standings, the last team I’ll tackle in the NL Central will
be the Chicago Cubs.
Projected Starting Lineup
C- Wellington
Castillo
1B- Anthony
Rizzo
2B- Darwin
Barney
SS- Starlin
Castro
3B- Ian
Stewart
LF- Alfonso
Soriano
CF- David
DeJesus
RF- Nate
Schierholtz
Projected Batting Order
SS- Starlin
Castro
CF- David
DeJesus
1B- Anthony
Rizzo
LF- Alfonso
Soriano
RF- Nate
Schierholtz
C- Wellington
Castro
2B- Darwin
Barney
3B- Ian
Stewart
Projected Starting Rotaation:
Jeff Smardzjia, Matt Garza, Edwin Jackson, Scott Feldman,
Travis Wood, Carlos Villanueva
Bullpen:
Carlos Marmol, Shawn Camp, Kyuji Fujikawa, James Russell,
Scott Baker, Hector Rondon
The Cubs are in a full re-building mode. This team is moving from a big
spending/under performing unit to a traditional player development group that
wants to build from within and keep payroll under control. Theo Epstein did it in Boston and had
money to win some championships as the Red Sox got more successful. Chicago is a major market and Epstein
hopes to follow the same formula with the Wrigley bunch. However, in the short term, this team
isn’t expected to contend. They
struggled last year losing over 100 games. They hope that won’t happen this year, but they will
certainly struggle again as they are in the heart of a re-build.
Young shortstop Starlin Castro is a great place to start
with this club, and he was the leading hitter for this team at 283. However this youngster has plenty of
flaws. He made the most outs and
errors among shortstops last season.
He was also caught stealing the most. He plays hard and goes all out. A lot of people like that, but it leads to mistakes and
plenty of frustration among Cubs fans.
But he still led the team in AVG and SB while slugging 14 HR, 78 RBI and
scoring 78 R. The power leader of
this club was one of its older members, Alfonso Soriano. He led the Cubs with 32 HR and 108
RBI. While many lament Soriano and
the contract he was given, now that he’s healthy he’s finally contributing
again, even if it’s just as a power hitter. That’s an improvement over being a complete bust. He doesn’t steal bases anymore, though
he still swiped 6 bags last year, but his 262 AVG wasn’t bad while slugging all
those HR, driving in those runs and scoring 68 R for himself. But the future for this club is
starting to become clear. Part of
it is Castro. The other part is
Anthony Rizzo, who was a June call-up.
In what was essentially half a season, Rizzo hit 285 with 15 HR, 48 RBI,
and 44 R. If he kept that pace up
for a full season we’d be looking at a 30/90/85 season for the young first
baseman, and that’s great. They
let All Star Bryan LaHair go to Japan this offseason, so Rizzo is all set to
start at first. The rest of this
team doesn’t inspire much confidence.
The Cubs signed Nate Schierholtz to a deal after he played decently in
San Fran and Philly. In 114 games,
he went 257 with 6 HR, 21 RBI, 20 R and 3 SB. His defense is okay.
He’s basically a stopgap until some younger players are ready to start
in Wrigley. Center fielder David
DeJesus is viewed in the same way.
He was the starter in right last year, and hit 263 with 9 HR, 50 RBI, 76
R and 7 SB. The speed is fading
from this veteran, but he’s got a good glove, a solid bat and is a great
clubhouse presence. Soriano,
Shierholtz and DeJesus are the veterans on this club, manning the outfield and
guiding the youngsters on the clay.
Don’t be surprised if they are gone at the trade deadline. Other than the guys I already
mentioned, Ian Stewart is a mess over at third, Darwin Barney is pretty average
at second and young catcher Wellington Castillo will try to build on a solid
cup of coffee, with 5 HR in 52 games.
This offense isn’t too scary, and the guys about half the guys that
could scare you a little might be gone from the Windy City if they do their
jobs too well.
The Cubs may have finally found their ace in Jeff
Samardzjia. But when your ace
leads the team with only 9 Wins, you know you’re gonna need more help. He didn’t break double digits in Wins,
but a full season of starts (he only made 28) could have gotten him there. More impressive was his team leading
180 Ks in 174 IP. His WHIP and BAA
were a tick better than the league average and his 3.81 ERA (also the best of
the Cubs) was nice as well.
Generally your ace has a slightly better ERA, but he did have over a
strikeout an inning and played for a terrible team in an offensive park. Samardzjia is one of the few bright
spots on the North Side, and I’m not gonna nitpick about him. Samardzjia may have been the hot name
in Chicago last year, but Paul Maholm may have been the best pitcher. He won 9 games in only 20 starts and
paired that with 6 Losses before being traded to the Braves at the
deadline. He isn’t the strikeout
pitcher that Samardzjia is, but he did have a 3.74 ERA, which could have been
the team’s best had he stayed a Cub all season. Ryan Dempster actually had the best ERA at 2.25 in 16
starts. The record was unfortunate
(5-5) and he fell apart in Texas.
But he was a beast in Chicago with a 1.04 WHIP, 210 BAA and 83 Ks in 104
IP. But Epstien wisely cashed in
on the strong first half numbers of Maholm and Dempster and sent them out of
town. That’s what you do when you
re-build. You send away older veterans
for young prospects. It was the
right call. Epstein would have
done the same thing with Matt Garza if he could have stayed healthy. He was 5-7 in 18 games, but had a nice
3.91 ERA and 96 Ks in 103 IP. He
also keeps his WHIP and BAA better than the league average, and if he pitches
well in the first half this season we will almost certainly see him in another
uniform, as the Cubs were actively shopping him. So with Dempster and Maholm gone, and Garza likely to go
with a good first half, who else can we expect to join Samardzjia atop the
Wrigley Field bump? Well newly
signed Edwin Jackson expects to call Chicago home for a while after singing a 5-year
deal this offseason. Jackson has
played all over but is still fairly young. He’s not a star, but is generally able to stay healthy and
log innings and Ks. He struck out
168 in 189 IP last year, one of his weaker years in terms of strikeouts. He also turned in a 4.03 ERA, which is
higher than he’s used to as well.
His BAA and WHIP were pretty average, but if those numbers are a picture
of what’s to come, he’ll be a leader in Chicago, though likely won’t see 10
wins with that performance on this team.
Travis Wood is also expected to log a number of starts after being
second on the team with 26 starts last year. He was solid with a 4.32 ERA. His WHIP and BAA were better than average, so you could see
that ERA drop a bit if he pitches like that this year. All this is to say that there is
actually some talent in the starting rotation, though nothing overly
exciting. These guys should keep
the Cubs in games, but they likely won’t be winning too many. The offense will be partly to blame,
but an ugly bullpen is the real culprit.
Carlos Marmol is wild in the closers spot, and that may be the understatement
of the year. He walked 45 in 55 IP
turning in a 1.54 WHIP despite a 200 BAA.
He also struck out 72 so his stuff is electric, but he just can’t
control it. If he continues to be
a walk machine, Kyuki Fujikawa, a Japanese free agent who was a great closer in
his country’s league, will likely be second in line. Either way, there won’t be too many games to close as the
bridge from starter to closer looks like the biggest hole of all in the Swiss
cheese of a team the Cubs are sending out there.
2013 Prediction:
Not good.
Frankly, the Cubs don’t look much better than the Astros or
Marlins. But they’ve got less
negativity surrounding them because they’ve got a proven winner who’s already
performed one successful re-build in a major market guiding them. That would be team President Theo
Epstein. In addition, we already
see some of the pieces in place (Rizzo, Castro, Samardzjia) and last year they
proved their commitment to the process, painful as it may be. So all that is the good news. The bad news is that this season they
aren’t expected to be any better.
And next year probably won’t be their year either. The Cubs are re-building to be a major
force in the coming years. But I’d
be shocked if any of that future success manifested this season.
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