OmarComing25

Given Dombrowski's history and the recent departure of some of Boston's FO analytics guys, that gives me more hope that a Sale deal will actually happen.

QUOTE (bmags @ Oct 19, 2016 -> 09:43 AM) The only thing with Urias is how deep will he go? If he only gets to 5th there's a lot of opportunities there, especially with Jensens 1.1 innings pitched last night. My guess is they're hoping for two times through the order.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Oct 19, 2016 -> 09:48 AM) Kaplan's meltdown was the best of all to watch. What was he saying?

QUOTE (JUSTgottaBELIEVE @ Oct 19, 2016 -> 09:37 AM) Montgomery reminds me of Travis Wood. Effective in short spurts out of the pen but very average if used as a starter over the course of a full season. Best case scenario, he's a #4 or #5. An effective 4th or 5th starter is still pretty valuable though.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Oct 19, 2016 -> 01:52 AM) Schwarber has nothing to do with their losing this year. It would be quite easy to argue that it gave Baez an opportunity to emerge, and Contreras as well. Not to mention they had Soler there in reserve as well. The odds are greater of a pitching going down next season, and that will have much more of an impact than removing one cog in that offense. I actually think they were arguably better without Schwarber this year, if he doesn't go down does Contreras even come up? Schwarber was probably a 2-2.5 WAR player this year, and that was more than covered by extra playing time from Baez/Contreras. Plus the biggest strength of the Cubs this year is that amazing defense, and Schwarber would have only hurt them there.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Oct 18, 2016 -> 10:31 PM) There is a day off on Friday, he will be fine. What happens if Baez gives up a few runs, then who do you bring in? It's the playoffs, you don't f*** around with your bullpen, you ensure the victory. They had a 99.9% win probability at that point, doesn't seem worth it, especially with three straight games.

QUOTE (Buehrle>Wood @ Oct 18, 2016 -> 10:22 PM) I'm sure he will be Still makes no sense, it's not like the rest of their bullpen is Giants-like. You're actively hurting your chances of winning Games 4 and 5 with the smallest of benefits in this game.

Get one more and ensure that Jansen doesn't come back out.

Was hoping Jansen wouldn't have to be used today.

So is Arrieta still an ace? He's been pretty mediocre for five months now.

QUOTE (pettie4sox @ Oct 18, 2016 -> 08:44 PM) Grandal is getting thrown at next AB. What did he do? I missed it. Stare it down?

I'd probably be OK with Benintendi/Devers/Kopech/2 wild cards.

QUOTE (2005thxfrthmmrs @ Oct 18, 2016 -> 03:15 AM) Probably destined to get smacked by the Cubs. They reek of a team who comes up short on the final test, highly overachieving right now and winning too many close games. They've been more lucky than good if you ask me. I have not been following them closely, but on surface Tomlin and Bauer are absolutely not #2 and #3 PO starters. Even if Salazar comes back, he was horrific in the post ASB. Their OF and catcher position players are probably the worst in recent postseason memory. Bullpen is a question mark outside of Miller and Allen. That said, Miller is a real life video game player right now, easily cutting the game from 9 to 7 innings. Their defense plus timely offense has been incredible (only 3 players hitting above .230 in the postseason), let's see how long this could hold up (I'd like it to hold up for another 5 games). Tomlin and Bauer aren't any worse than any of the Royals SP from last year.

QUOTE (TheTruth05 @ Oct 14, 2016 -> 01:13 PM) Personal and few friends I have are having the same talk. I've been hearing how the Cubs wanted the Dodgers all along and SF was their only obstacle. We'll find out. I don't really understand that sentiment. Aside from the usual "playoff baseball rarely goes how you expect", Fangraphs playoff odds has this series as a literal coinflip, and I have to agree. Yeah the Dodgers suck against LHP but Lester can only go twice. The Dodgers have the two best pitchers and they can go 4 times. The Cubs will have the pitching advantage in Games 1 and 5 but assuming Kershaw starts Game 2 the Dodgers will have the advantage in 2,3,6 & 7. Game 4 is basically a tossup because I think the Dodgers will hit around Lackey. LA has the better bullpen and the better offense when a LHP isn't on the mound. Before the playoffs began I thought LAD/CHC would be the optimal matchup out of all possible playoff combinations for a potential classic playoff series.

Should be a fun series.

QUOTE (chw42 @ Oct 13, 2016 -> 11:50 PM) What if I told you Jansen made up almost half of their bullpen's fWAR? Even without Jansen the rest of their bullpen still had more WAR than the entire Cub pen.

QUOTE (SoxAce @ Oct 14, 2016 -> 12:26 AM) Dodgers have a solid bullpen, but Kershaw might not pitch till game 3. Could be huge break for the Cubs. I see no reason why Kershaw couldn't go Game 2 without issues, it's not like he threw 6 innings today.

QUOTE (chw42 @ Oct 13, 2016 -> 11:44 PM) What's scary is that the Dodgers bullpen outside of Jansen is pretty barren. The Giants have a bunch of alright relievers and no great ones, but the Dodgers have one great one and a bunch of mediocre ones. First in ERA and third in WAR, it's a pretty good bullpen.

QUOTE (Footlongcomiskeydog @ Oct 12, 2016 -> 10:33 AM) Regular season stats mean very little right now. Hill looked like garbage a couple of games ago and I don't think he will fare much better this afternoon. It's the 4 postseason innings that mean nothing. Jansen getting hit means very little too. Do you think Anthony Rizzo is a concern after the terrible series he just had? That'd be silly.

My concern is that I'd take pretty much all the proposed packages in this thread without thinking twice, which makes me think Boston wouldn't do it. I think it would cap at something like Benintendi/Devers/Kopech/Swihart.

So the Nationals score a few runs off Hill and it suddenly erases what he's done all year? He's been the 2nd best pitcher this year next to Kershaw.

QUOTE (fathom @ Oct 7, 2016 -> 09:23 PM) Why's that? Concern I have is how awful they are against LHP Kershaw/Hill, Nationals are banged up, great bullpen.

QUOTE (fathom @ Oct 7, 2016 -> 09:21 PM) Since the thread is active, which team do you think matches up better with Cubs if they beat the Giants...LAD or Wash Definitely the Dodgers

Terrible baserunning by the Giants so far.

QUOTE (TheTruth05 @ Oct 3, 2016 -> 01:38 PM) I forgot where I saw that the Mets have the best record since like August 12th, wouldn't it be better to ride the hot hand and hope the Mets can pull the upset? Not when Colon would be the Game 1 starter.