2024 Cubs Heroes and Goats: Game 57

11-20 in the last 31 games. That’s a little less than 20 percent of a season. When analyzing a team, you can gloss over a losing streak, even if it stretches over several games. But to gloss over an extend period of bad baseball would be disingenuous. Great teams will have losing streaks. But they don’t often have an extended stretches that are this bad. But nobody came into this season thinking that this was a great team.

A good team will sometimes have a stretch like this. Some do, some don’t. The closer a team is to ordinary, the more likely they are to have stretches this bad but also stretches that are the reverse. So a stretch like this doesn’t mean the season is over. You didn’t need a stretch like this to recognize that this Cubs team had some challenges.

Not the least among the reasons for recognizing the flaws of this team is that this team is largely the same team we saw last year. We can hope for and believe that certain players would take a step forward and improve. There are some good young players that are still growing. There were also additions of people like Michael Busch and Hector Neris.

Counting on internal development is a little bit of folly. That’s because the passage of time cuts both ways. Any given team can expect some players to continue to improve. Young players give you the best chance for growth. But it isn’t necessarily only young guys. A veteran like Mike Tauchman can take a step forward. Years of hard work and experience can unlock a more consistent and higher level of production. The problem is, that pendulum swings in both directions. Some players will progress but some will regress. That can just be a guy reverting to normal production after a very good season, it can result from injuries and of course, father time claims the production of all eventually.

Was Adbert Alzolay regressing from a player who just wasn’t as good as what we saw in 2023? Or was he dealing with a physical issue that didn’t boil over for a little while? Does it matter? Time wasn’t kind to Adbert this year. It has been downright brutal to Kyle Hendricks. We’ve watched his once dominant skills erode little by little and then largely vanish entirely this year. Yan Gomes is another guy who made significant contributions last year and just looks overmatched this season.

We’ve watched many of these guys grow and develop and contribute to success for the Cubs through the years and so to watch them diminish before us is rough at times. The most frustrating and disappointing thing for me though is that this team appears to have a starting rotation capable of excellence. With a reasonable level of consistent offensive production, this rotation looks capable of performing at least near to championship level. But they are saddled with an inconsistent offense and a largely overmatched bullpen.

The good news is that none of this is etched in stone. That starting rotation looks young and healthy. Shōta Imanaga and Ben Brown have been so dominant that it is reasonable that they will take a step back. But at the same time, if we’re being reasonable, Jameson Taillon and Justin Steele missed a number of starts each in the first third of the season and also underperformed past results. Imanaga and Brown are both good pitchers. Putting up less historic numbers is expected, but there is little reason to think their performance will crash. So as a group, the strength of this team is likely to remain a strength.

Every one of the six players who regularly play the infield and both catchers have struggled to produce. The outfielders have probably all under produced their skill level. This should not continue. So there is reason to believe that this offense can return to being a productive one. The good news out of this very bad series in Milwaukee is that the offense finally showed some signs of life.

It’s not particularly a hidden secret that from the best teams down to the worst, the bulk of any player’s production comes against lesser teams and lesser pitching. This team has faced a ton of elite pitching and pitchers with elite stuff, to the extent that eventually virtually the entire lineup was slumping over an extended period of time. This should pass. The only question is, is it too late? Did this team just stack too many losses? Last year we saw a Cubs team miss the playoffs in large part because they dug too big of a hole. Will history repeat?

Let’s find three stars out of this one.

1. Christopher Morel had a pair of hits including a game-tying homer in the eighth inning. If you spend much time looking at numbers, it’s hard not to think that we are due for a Morel hot stretch at any minute.
2. Cody Bellinger homered in the first inning, giving the Cubs an early lead for what felt like the first time in forever. He added a double later.
3. Seiya Suzuki had a two-run pinch homer in the seventh inning that tied the game.

Game 57, May 30: Brewers 6, Cubs 4 (28-29)

Fangraphs

Reminder: Heroes and Goats are determined by WPA scores and are in no way subjective.

THREE HEROES:

• Superhero: Christopher Morel (.229). 2-4, HR, RBI, R
• Hero: Seiya Suzuki (.219). 1-2, HR, 2 RBI, R
• Sidekick: Cody Bellinger (.087). 2-4, HR, 2B, RBI, R

THREE GOATS:

• Billy Goat: Tyson Miller (-.330). ⅓ IP, 2 batters, H, R, K
• Goat: Mark Leiter Jr. (-.176). ⅔ IP, 4 batters, 2 H, R, K, WP
• Kid: Ian Happ (-.114). 0-4

WPA Play of the Game: Gary Sanchez’ two-out, two-run homer in the eighth inning provided the margin of victory. (.333)

*Cubs Play of the Game: Seiya Suzuki’s two-run, pinch homer in the seventh inning tied the game. (.270)

Cubs Player of the Game:

Yesterday’s Winner: Ian Happ picks up 79 of 89 votes.

Rizzo Award Cumulative Standings: (Top 5/Bottom 5)

The award is named for Anthony Rizzo, who finished first in this category three of the first four years it was in existence and four times overall. He also recorded the highest season total ever at +65.5. The point scale is three points for a Superhero down to negative three points for a Billy Goat.

• Ben Brown +14
• Shōta Imanaga +12
• Javier Assad +10.5
• Jameson Taillon +9
• Mark Leiter Jr. +6
• Matt Mervis/Nico Hoerner -6
• Miguel Amaya -8
• Adbert Alzolay -10
• Kyle Hendricks -20

*Morel escapes the bottom five. Let’s hope this game launches Christopher on the kind of run he can go on.

Up Next: The Cubs return home to face the Reds in a three-game series. I’m going to guess it has been a few decades since the Cubs have reached May 31 without having played the Reds. Because of the years that these two teams were in different divisions in the NL, their rivalry doesn’t get mentioned alongside the one with the Cardinals. But this is one of the oldest and longest rivalries in sports history.

The Reds come to town at 24-32, a disappointing development for Reds fans. This is one of those clear examples of the road to the top not being straight. The Reds took a big step forward in 2023 but appear to have taken an even bigger step backward here in 2024. This is a real opportunity for the Cubs against a team that hasn’t played well.

Javier Assad (4-1, 2.17) will look to bounce back from a rough start and continue his strong first full season as a starter. 26-year-old Graham Ashcraft (4-3, 4.67) starts for the Reds.

Let’s get a win and get on a streak.