It's time

[CSF77]

Well luckily fangraphs does the leg work for us on this one with projections... This is their current SP projections per team.

Team		IP	ERA	FIP	fWAR
Astros		977	3.75	3.75	19.2
Indians		980	3.84	3.84	18.8
Dodgers		959	3.57	3.70	18.5
Cubs		960	3.76	3.84	17.9
Mets		949	3.94	3.87	17.2
Nationals	966	3.94	3.90	16.7
Yankees		958	4.11	4.16	16.4
Red Sox		982	3.96	4.01	15.9
Cardinals	947	3.94	3.94	15.7
Diamondbacks	946	4.08	4.06	15.7
Rays		947	3.97	4.03	14.7
Pirates		944	4.22	4.12	13.7
Blue Jays	950	4.27	4.28	13.6
Phillies	940	4.39	4.37	13.3
Rockies		938	4.65	4.52	13.3
Giants		986	4.06	4.12	12.4
Mariners	943	4.33	4.35	11.7
Angels		948	4.23	4.35	11.6
Brewers		937	4.52	4.51	11.6
Padres		942	4.35	4.32	11.2
Twins		940	4.54	4.57	10.6
Braves		936	4.43	4.42	10.5
Tigers		952	4.73	4.69	9.8
Rangers		946	4.71	4.71	9.7
Athletics	934	4.62	4.53	9.6
Reds		940	4.67	4.74	9.0
Royals		936	4.59	4.60	8.7
Orioles		938	5.02	5.03	7.2
White Sox	932	5.02	5.10	5.7
Marlins		936	4.73	4.85	5.3

I can buy the Indians. Dodgers I question behind Kershaw. Hill will most likely only toss 20 games. Maeda is a 4 at best. Wood has had 1 year that he was TOR and even then he disappeared in the play offs.

So honestly in season the staff is heavily weighed on Kershaw. After that you are crossing your fingers.

Cubs: 3 opening day starters from last year. A ERA leader. The 5 is the only guy you have to question and he maybe the best 5 in the league.

When you are running a top SO pitcher as a 3 and a 4 WAR pitcher as your 4 you are stacking the deck.

Dodgers are weighed heavy on 1 guy. Indians are like the Cubs where they are stacking. Astros it really depends on Cole. If the AL eats him up then they are not ahead of the Indians. That said if Lester and Hendricks put up 2016 numbers with career avg numbers of the others you are looking at 2016’s staff again.

 

[beckdawg]

I can buy the Indians. Dodgers I question behind Kershaw. Hill will most likely only toss 20 games. Maeda is a 4 at best. Wood has had 1 year that he was TOR and even then he disappeared in the play offs.

You're not really factoring in their depth. It's not just Kershaw Hill and Wood. Urias was a top 5 prospect and is still only 21. He's probably not back at the start of the seaosn but he'll be around by the end of it unless he gets hurt again. Buehler is the #12 prospect on mlb.com right now. And Ryu has been pretty good historically. He missed 2015 and most of 2016. Last year he was still coming back. But prior to getting hurt he put up 2 straight 3+ win seasons.

Would I want their rotation in a 7 game series? Maybe not though if Urias and Buehler are strong adds which they very well may be that totally changes my opinion. Regardless, over 162 games they have depth most teams can't buy.

 

[brett05]

I think you have to add Cleveland and Arizona who were the best rotations in their respective leagues in 2017 and have virtually the same staffs.

I'm not high on the D-Backs. I totally forgot about the Indians. They'd be in the discussion at the top for sure.

 

[TC in Mississippi]

I'm not high on the D-Backs. I totally forgot about the Indians. They'd be in the discussion at the top for sure.

Fair enough, certainly Greinke’s velo drop is concerning, but it tough to leave the 2017 best NL rotation of the list.

 

[CSF77]

You're not really factoring in their depth. It's not just Kershaw Hill and Wood. Urias was a top 5 prospect and is still only 21. He's probably not back at the start of the seaosn but he'll be around by the end of it unless he gets hurt again. Buehler is the #12 prospect on mlb.com right now. And Ryu has been pretty good historically. He missed 2015 and most of 2016. Last year he was still coming back. But prior to getting hurt he put up 2 straight 3+ win seasons.

Would I want their rotation in a 7 game series? Maybe not though if Urias and Buehler are strong adds which they very well may be that totally changes my opinion. Regardless, over 162 games they have depth most teams can't buy.

Like I said finger crossing. Most are innings fill. Hill is their weapon and they have to protect him inseason.

 

[brett05]

Fair enough, certainly Greinke’s velo drop is concerning, but it tough to leave the 2017 best NL rotation of the list.

Actually it was pretty easy

 

[anotheridiot]

So apparently Bryant's new goal is to be a 1:1 bb:k rate guy. If he does that he would legit be an absurd player. For what it's worth he is 7:7 in the spring. But this is a guy who 3 years ago was nearly at a 3:1 k:bb rate. Last year he was at 14.3%/19.2%. So realistically he's not *that* far off considering the massive improvement he's already made. I'd be shocked if he got his k rate under 15% but what could potentially happen is he ups his walk rate to 16-17% and brings down his K rate.

Bryant's 2017 line was .295/.409/.537. If you were to just fudge with only Bryant's walk/k rate last year and put them let's say at 16.9/16.9(to get a round bb/k total of 113) his triple slash would have been .304/.432/.554 which.... yes please.... And the thing is if he is walking and K'in at that rate his power numbers are going to go up. Last year his ISO was .242. If you look at players who had a walk rate over 16% and a k rate under 19% since 95, there were 77 individual seasons players had like that. 41 of them were over .240 ISO.

Bryant can get there easily by just cuing off those off the corner 2 strike pitches he usually watches get called strike 3. Umps dont like that and word gets around. He can also just knob them to second base for an out too, but it would get his rate down.

 

[beckdawg]

Hendrick's line today 6.0 IP, 3 H, 1 ER, 7 K, 0 BB

It'd be interesting if he takes another step forward this year. If 2016 wasn't his peak in terms of stuff(he's not going to beat that ERA IMO) he could be really fun to watch.

 

[chibears55]

Yes it Spring Training but it Spring Training and shouldnt be struggling against lesser pitching.

Almora Zobrist and Heyward struggling under .200

2 weeks til season starts

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[beckdawg]

Yes it Spring Training but it Spring Training and shouldnt be struggling against lesser pitching.

Almora Zobrist and Heyward struggling under .200

2 weeks til season starts

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Almora is 6-31. If he went 9 for 31 he'd be hitting .290. Considering he didn't get a hit in his first 13 or so AB's I'm sure he's fine. Like wise Zobrist hasn't really been playing because of his back. Heyward was 1-3 today with a HR. Wouldn't really draw conclusions on this small a sample. It'd be better if they were hitting .400 or whatever but frankly it doesn't matter. If they hit well in april then it is irrelevant.

 

[chibears55]

Almora is 6-31. If he went 9 for 31 he'd be hitting .290. Considering he didn't get a hit in his first 13 or so AB's I'm sure he's fine. Like wise Zobrist hasn't really been playing because of his back. Heyward was 1-3 today with a HR. Wouldn't really draw conclusions on this small a sample. It'd be better if they were hitting .400 or whatever but frankly it doesn't matter. If they hit well in april then it is irrelevant.

Like i said i get it ST and all, but offensive numbers are usually inflated in ST because they face lesser talented pitching for the most part and for cubs their in Arizona where ball travels better...

Almora 6 for 34 now .176 , 0-3 today

Zobrist 3-15 4Ks .. he struggled last year, this dont bother me much because i hope we dont see too much of him playing wise this year..

Heyward after his hit today is now 4 for 26 .154... this bothers me a bit because once again he worked on his swing over the winter and with the new hitting coach Davis and once again we dont see anything that makes you say , hmmm he looking good so far, hope he can keep it going into the season..

I dont expect regulars to be world beaters in ST but at least have a pulse..

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[beckdawg]

Like i said i get it ST and all, but offensive numbers are usually inflated in ST because they face lesser talented pitching for the most part and for cubs their in Arizona where ball travels better...

I mean yes and no. Sure Arizona is an offensive friendly environment but anyone who knows anything about statistics and baseball will tell you that small samples are terrible to draw conclusions on. Typically speaking anything below 100 PAs(which tends to be like 125-150 ABs) is just garbage. As I pointed out with Almora 3 hits is the difference from him hitting .200 and .290. That could literally just be him hitting 3 balls right at a guy. Case in point, Almora has 4 k's in 35 PAs which is an 11% k rate. In other words, his numbers are purely down to balls in play.

If you want to make the case of being worried about heyward I think there's more there on him. He's at a 30% K rate. But I'd also point out he's historically been a very slow starter. His aprils even before coming to the cubs were often notoriously bad.

Zobrist has 16 PAs. That's effectively 4 games and obviously because of his injury he's been set back some on where you'd normally want to be. He's at a 25% K rate which is high for him but not that bad especially on a small sample.

 

[chibears55]

I mean yes and no. Sure Arizona is an offensive friendly environment but anyone who knows anything about statistics and baseball will tell you that small samples are terrible to draw conclusions on. Typically speaking anything below 100 PAs(which tends to be like 125-150 ABs) is just garbage. As I pointed out with Almora 3 hits is the difference from him hitting .200 and .290. That could literally just be him hitting 3 balls right at a guy. Case in point, Almora has 4 k's in 35 PAs which is an 11% k rate. In other words, his numbers are purely down to balls in play.

If you want to make the case of being worried about heyward I think there's more there on him. He's at a 30% K rate. But I'd also point out he's historically been a very slow starter. His aprils even before coming to the cubs were often notoriously bad.

Zobrist has 16 PAs. That's effectively 4 games and obviously because of his injury he's been set back some on where you'd normally want to be. He's at a 25% K rate which is high for him but not that bad especially on a small sample.

Almora.. im not worried about, just mentioning him because he somewhat in a battle with Happ for PT in CF..

Zobrist.. i wish he would of just retired...

Heyward .. he been on his slow start since April 2016..lol..
I keep pulling for him but until he actually starts hitting consistently, he put over there in the suck ass bin...


Again i get that it ST and all and ive seen guys not hit much in ST start regular season with a bang and vice versa...
Heck i remember Tim Raines didnt even go to ST and i believe hit .400 in April and had and MVP year..

Just pointing out that these 3 regulars in which 2 (Zobrist and Heyward) struggled last year, are struggling this Spring so far and 1 (Heyward) was once again working all winter to improve himself...


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[CSF77]

Yes it Spring Training but it Spring Training and shouldnt be struggling against lesser pitching.

Almora Zobrist and Heyward struggling under .200

2 weeks til season starts

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G935A using Tapatalk

Was sitting behind the Cubs pitchers today. Didn’t catch the lefty’s name but he held it together. 9th inning guy (no name on jersery means scrub) was barely popping the mitt in the pen. Was tossing off speed crud. Every batter hammered him. I was like ok 2 to the exact same spot. Ok going for 3?

Kyle looked very good. His change was dropping and fooling the hitters.

Schwarber still looks jacked.

Sad that Happ was off. Would have liked to have seen him.

 

[CSF77]

Almora’s catch was pretty sick. The wind was cutting from left. Add to it the temp would jump up and down with each cloud passing over the sun. So it was pretty much playing havoc with glare and wind gusts.

But he basically turned himself around facing away from the sun as the ball was coming down to avoid the glare and was still able to make a last second adjustment when the wind grabbed it.

You just don’t teach that stuff.

 

[beckdawg]

Was sitting behind the Cubs pitchers today. Didn’t catch the lefty’s name but he held it together. 9th inning guy (no name on jersery means scrub) was barely popping the mitt in the pen. Was tossing off speed crud. Every batter hammered him. I was like ok 2 to the exact same spot. Ok going for 3?

Kyle looked very good. His change was dropping and fooling the hitters.

Schwarber still looks jacked.

Sad that Happ was off. Would have liked to have seen him.

Stephen Perakslis. He's pretty much a nothing arm. He's been stuck between AA/AAA since 2015.

 

[fatbeard]

Hendrick's line today 6.0 IP, 3 H, 1 ER, 7 K, 0 BB

It'd be interesting if he takes another step forward this year. If 2016 wasn't his peak in terms of stuff(he's not going to beat that ERA IMO) he could be really fun to watch.

 

[CSF77]

Stephen Perakslis. He's pretty much a nothing arm. He's been stuck between AA/AAA since 2015.

Sad really.

Staying at the wriggly west Sheraton. Over rated. Our room at Goodyear was bigger and cost $200 less. Found a nice pita joint just south. Not traditional at all. They are into fusing avacado and hummus. Pretty damn good.

But over all worth it to come out. Drove out from SD and seeing gas prices a dollar less is always a welcome site.

 

[chibears55]

Maples and Zagunis sent to minor league camp...
They wont be heading North

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[chibears55]

One thing i hope dont happen this season is Ian Happ goes into it with a slugger mentality and thinks he needs to crank one every at bat and instead starts to pile up the strikeouts swinging for fenches..

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