The Rundown: Encouraging Trends in Cubs Pitching, Steele’s Family Growing with Rainbow Baby, Conforto Looks Like Good Bet for Roster
You know it’s spring training when you give up three earned runs over two innings and actually lower your era by over four runs. That was the case for Jameson Taillon, who served up two more dingers out of four total hits allowed to the Rockies on Wednesday in his second spring start. While there’s certainly no room for encouragement there, it’s wildly irresponsible to start freaking out.
Taillon and other veteran pitchers know what they need to do to get ready, so these spring outings are about nothing more than ramping up their workload. In fact, many would almost prefer to be shelled rather than to deploy their full arsenals in the pursuit of meaningless stats. As great as it would be for him to go nine up, nine down with nine strikeouts, that result would have just as much bearing on the regular season as surrendering four homers in less than as many innings.
Rather than focus on two abbreviated starts from a 34-year-old in his last season under contract, I’d prefer to look at how the Cubs’ overall pitching development appears to have changed. For years, the organization bucked the trend of increasing velocity in favor of starters whose fastballs sit in the low 90s. Pitchers left the Cubs for one reason or another and suddenly experienced velo spikes, largely because their new teams had different priorities.
Though they admitted the need to make philosophical changes to their evaluation and development of pitchers as far back as 2019, an overly conservative approach remained in place until last year or so. I’m perhaps cherry-picking the timing so it coincides with the arrival of Tyler Zombro from Tread Athletics, but it’s hard to deny the influence on their acquisitions since then. Zombro was promoted to VP of pitching after just one year, and this spring has seen multiple arms looking livelier than expected.
That includes Shota Imanga, whose fastball was at 93.5 mph in his first start after being under 91 mph last season. Cade Horton is already sitting 96-97 and touching higher, with Jaxon Wiggins doing pretty much the same. Ben Brown has gained confidence in the kick change Zombro helped him incorporate last year, and now he’s got a sinker to double his repertoire from two years ago. Jordan Wicks developed a new curveball at Tread over the winter, though he’s currently shut down with some forearm inflammation.
This is why I was so bullish on Zombro’s hiring, and the same could be said for other orgs hiring guys from Tread, Driveline, and similar outfits. Not all MLB front offices operate as conservatively as Jed Hoyer has, at least for the most part, but most don’t have the luxury of being wrong very often. With private parties, however, being proven wrong through constant experimentation is a function rather than a bug. Bringing in that kind of mentality can spur a team to make changes it might otherwise not have imagined.
As Zombro explained in The Tread Podcast episode from February 6 titled “The State of Pitching,” the Cubs supply all of their pitchers with Pocket Radars so they can track their velocity even when they’re not at the facility. The same doesn’t hold true for the Angels under the guidance of pitching coach Mike Maddux, whose eyedar ensures there’s no need for fancy gadgets. But it’s hard to improve what you don’t measure, and the Angels aren’t exactly a model of success.
Slowly but surely, the Cubs are catching up to the rest of the league. Their starters’ fastballs averaged 93.4 mph last season, 1.3 ticks faster than ever before and just the third time since 2011 that they’d thrown harder than 92 mph. That was good enough for 24th in MLB, their highest ranking since being 16th with 92.1 mph in 2016. Here are the Cubs’ rotation’s rankings in each of the seasons in between: 29, 29, 29, 30, 30, 29, 25, 30. Not great, Bob.
In addition to growth from within, Jed Hoyer also stretched beyond his comfort zone by signing Hunter Harvey and trading for Edward Cabrera. There’s inherent risk in any throwing athlete, and that climbs along with the numbers on the radar gun. What’s more, Cabrera and Harvey come to the Cubs with checkered health histories. But if you want to get a higher ceiling instead of just raising the floor a little, those are the kinds of risks you need to take.
Even with a decidedly non-zero chance that the gambles won’t pay off as well as hoped, I’m excited to see where this new direction leads this year and into the future.
Steele’s Wife Shares Emotional News
All the talk about Justin Steele so far has been about when he’ll be able to come back from an internal brace UCL revision that also included flexor tendon surgery, but his wife stole the show on Wednesday. Libby Steele shared an emotional pregnancy announcement on Instagram, announcing that their family will be growing with the addition of a rainbow baby. The Steeles lost a baby about a year and a half ago, and Libby’s subsequent complications led them to question whether they could ever try for another.
I’ve included the caption for those who can’t bring up the video for whatever reason, but I’d encourage you to check it out if and when you’re able. And for those who might not be familiar with the term, a rainbow baby is one born after a previous miscarriage, stillbirth, or other loss.
Nothing like god letting you know he heard you.
My darling we will see you soon.
About a year and a half ago we lost our baby. We cried in silence, I developed blood clots, & my health journey put a pause on more children. But god had other plans back in August on national rainbow baby day…. We found out we were having another child.
She came back to us. One of the most special moments of my life. It felt like the clouds shifted for me in that moment and that maybe it would all be okay. God is good.
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More News and Notes
- In his latest roster projection, Patrick Mooney of The Athletic has both Dylan Carlson and Michael Conforto making the cut. The loss of Tyler Austin for a number of months means he’s headed to the 60-day IL, as is reliever Shelby Miller. That will open up the spots for those two veterans over Kevin Alcántara, who is already on the 40-man roster, and Jonathon Long. The fact that both are right-handed hitters would seem to make them better options as far as short-side platoon options at DH and/or first base.
- Carlson is at least a switch-hitter, but Conforto is a lefty batter who’s been league average at best over the last three seasons. I can understand not pushing Long to MLB only to throttle his playing time, but — and I’m repeating myself for the umpteenth time here — keeping Alcantara at Iowa during his last option year could result in him withering on the vine.
- Max Scherzer is returning to the Blue Jays on a one-year, $3 million deal that could increase to $10 million with incentives. The belief is that he’ll serve at the back end of a six-man rotation that includes other new additions Dylan Cease and Cody Ponce. Shane Bieber, who surprisingly exercised his $16 million option, will open the season on the IL due to the same forearm fatigue that popped up during the postseason.
- Giancarlo Stanton is still determined to play the whole season, But NJ.com’s Randy Miller reports that the ongoing pain in his elbows is so great that Stanton “can’t open a bag of chips.” I’m better now than I was last summer, but I have dealt with elbow tendinitis off and on for years. It can be debilitating, especially when swinging a bat, and I don’t generate nearly the same force as the many formerly known as Mike.
- Longtime former Cubs wishful-thinking target Jake Peavy made the bold prediction that Daniel Palencia — another part of the Cubs’ quest for velo — will lead the NL in saves. Sierra Santos one-upped him by predicting that Dansby Swanson will have the third 30/30 season in Cubs franchise history.
- Randal Grichuk has signed a minor league deal with the Yankees.
- Former Cub Pierce Johnson has some of the best cleats in the game. This set of Air Jordan 12s is impeccable. You can get your own pairs by sending your shoes to Custom Cleats and paying $190 for the spikes/cleats and conversion.
- If you prefer a less expensive option, YardKicks sells DIY conversion kits starting at $35.
Trailer Time
I’m a sucker for action movies that let you turn your brain off for a while, and it’s even better if that movie taps into my nostalgia. That’s the case with Mortal Kombat II, which drops on May 8.
