GatewayRedbirds.com

most of the lineup will likely get better as the season goes on. Rizzo, even with a 1.000 OPS, has a .216 babip.

I'd also put money on the Cubs winning 100 games, but this is silly. Of course you have a low babip when 40% of your hits are homeruns. Rizzo is out of his mind right now, unless you think his true talent level is Barry Bonds (1.050 OPS, 180 OPS+).

haltz wrote:

most of the lineup will likely get better as the season goes on. Rizzo, even with a 1.000 OPS, has a .216 babip.

I'd also put money on the Cubs winning 100 games, but this is silly. Of course you have a low babip when 40% of your hits are homeruns. Rizzo is out of his mind right now, unless you think his true talent level is Barry Bonds (1.050 OPS, 180 OPS+).

Yeah, that was a little disingenuous, but I don't think 1.000 OPS is "out of his mind" (or over his head, whichever you prefer). I don't think it's outrageous to think he can sustain close to that going into his prime years.

Lets put it this way: the only everyday player on the Cubs who I look at and see almost certain regression from is Fowler. On the other hand, there are a few guys I think will get better as the season goes on.

Well if they ever get it together it will be interesting to watch. They're on pace to join the 1999 Indians as the only teams to score 1,000 runs in a season in the expansion era and that's not even the ridiculous part. They're preventing runs at 172 ERA+ clip, which is significantly better than the career mark of any starting pitcher ever (Kershaw, Pedro et al) and about 35 pts higher than any staff in history. I'd call that firing on all cylinders but I guess it's semantics.

AWvsCBsteeeerike3 wrote:

Magneto2.0 wrote:

jim wrote:I don't think 100 is given ... likely yes, but not given.

Yeah. I think 100 wins is possible, hell, the record is possible. But the probability isn't high (on the latter). They're playing out of their mind right now but I think people often forget how long this season is. They're not going to maintain this pace for the next 5 months. And Arietta is playing way over his head. His era is two full runs lower than his FIP. His K rate had declined and his walk rate has increased. He's been lucky and will come back to reality. He'll still be a top 5-10 pitcher regardless but not THIS.

Arrieta is pitching insanely well and has been for the better part of a year now, going back to last year. And, during that time his ERA has remained lower than his FIP by quite a bit. They're not playing out of their minds, though. Fowler maybe....but overall not really. They lost Schwarber and it didn't even slow them down. And, I'd venture a strong guess that they end up closer to 110 than 100.

Not questioning how good Arrieta is, I'm merely stating that he's out performing his FIP by a significant margin. Way bigger gap this year than last. Last year he out performed it by about half a run. This year he's out performing it by 2 full runs, and his xFIP by almost 2 and a half runs, while his K rate is declining and walk rate is increasing. As I said, he'll still be great but he's looking at a decent amount of regression.

And yes they are playing out of their minds as a team unless you think they're the best offensive team of the last 20 years with the 1996 Braves rotation. Because that's how they're playing now.

And yeah I think 110 wins is possible. Not likely though.

haltz wrote:Well if they ever get it together it will be interesting to watch. They're on pace to join the 1999 Indians as the only teams to score 1,000 runs in a season in the expansion era and that's not even the ridiculous part. They're preventing runs at 172 ERA+ clip, which is significantly better than the career mark of any starting pitcher ever (Kershaw, Pedro et al) and about 35 pts higher than any staff in history. I'd call that firing on all cylinders but I guess it's semantics.

Yeah I don't quite understand why anyone would argue that they're playing at a pretty unsustainable pace. Not saying their performances aren't matching the record up to this point, just saying the performance their putting up, for an entire season, would literally make them the greatest team ever assembled. And it's not, by any means. That's not hate.

XZero77 wrote:

haltz wrote:

most of the lineup will likely get better as the season goes on. Rizzo, even with a 1.000 OPS, has a .216 babip.

I'd also put money on the Cubs winning 100 games, but this is silly. Of course you have a low babip when 40% of your hits are homeruns. Rizzo is out of his mind right now, unless you think his true talent level is Barry Bonds (1.050 OPS, 180 OPS+).

Yeah, that was a little disingenuous, but I don't think 1.000 OPS is "out of his mind" (or over his head, whichever you prefer). I don't think it's outrageous to think he can sustain close to that going into his prime years.

Lets put it this way: the only everyday player on the Cubs who I look at and see almost certain regression from is Fowler. On the other hand, there are a few guys I think will get better as the season goes on.

Hamels, Lester, Arrieta, Fowler, Zobrist, are all looking at significant regression. Pitchers are outperforming their peripherals by quite a bit, and the two hitters are playing well above their career norms (Fowler at a ridiculous level). Rizzo is looking at minor regression. Heyward and Soler are what I'd be worried about as a NL central team. Both are mega talented and have been terrible at the plate. So I expect them to improve by a lot as the season progresses

Magneto2.0 wrote:

AWvsCBsteeeerike3 wrote:

Magneto2.0 wrote:

jim wrote:I don't think 100 is given ... likely yes, but not given.

Yeah. I think 100 wins is possible, hell, the record is possible. But the probability isn't high (on the latter). They're playing out of their mind right now but I think people often forget how long this season is. They're not going to maintain this pace for the next 5 months. And Arietta is playing way over his head. His era is two full runs lower than his FIP. His K rate had declined and his walk rate has increased. He's been lucky and will come back to reality. He'll still be a top 5-10 pitcher regardless but not THIS.

Arrieta is pitching insanely well and has been for the better part of a year now, going back to last year. And, during that time his ERA has remained lower than his FIP by quite a bit. They're not playing out of their minds, though. Fowler maybe....but overall not really. They lost Schwarber and it didn't even slow them down. And, I'd venture a strong guess that they end up closer to 110 than 100.

Not questioning how good Arrieta is, I'm merely stating that he's out performing his FIP by a significant margin. Way bigger gap this year than last. Last year he out performed it by about half a run. This year he's out performing it by 2 full runs, and his xFIP by almost 2 and a half runs, while his K rate is declining and walk rate is increasing. As I said, he'll still be great but he's looking at a decent amount of regression.

And yes they are playing out of their minds as a team unless you think they're the best offensive team of the last 20 years with the 1996 Braves rotation. Because that's how they're playing now.

And yeah I think 110 wins is possible. Not likely though.

Let's just look at it like this....Arrieta.....actually let's look at it like this.

Through 29 games, they've given up 79 runs. To get to 600 runs allowed for the season, they can give up 4 runs a game from here on out. Doable? Pretty easily. So let's just put them down as a team that gives up 600 runs this season.

They're on pace to score 1005 runs. Using the pythagoream win-loss formula and assuming 600 runs allowed, to win 115 games, they need 950 runs which is 5.5 runs/game from here out. To win 110, they need to get to about 865 runs or 5 runs a game. To get to 100 wins they need ~760 runs which is just over 4/game.

Obviously, games are not played like this. But, unless you have a better way of looking at them as a team and projecting where they'll be, I am going to stick with this. The cubs are good. We knew they would be. Their offense was a monster going into the season and is showing that it is in fact a monster. 22-28 year old mashers don't just grow on trees and the cubs have them in spades. Their pitching has over performed, but it's not like they're chop liver. We'll see how they do going forward. But, the numbers above don't lie. It's incredibly likely they finish with close to 110 wins unless the pitching just....implodes.

They won't maintain this dominance. It's impossible

Of course they won't maintain it but they are a good team with 30 games under their belt that you can't take away. They have those wins in the bank. If they are as good as I thought they were going in, and it certainly appears they are, then 100 is likely.

AWvsCBsteeeerike3 wrote:

Magneto2.0 wrote:

AWvsCBsteeeerike3 wrote:

Magneto2.0 wrote:

jim wrote:I don't think 100 is given ... likely yes, but not given.

Yeah. I think 100 wins is possible, hell, the record is possible. But the probability isn't high (on the latter). They're playing out of their mind right now but I think people often forget how long this season is. They're not going to maintain this pace for the next 5 months. And Arietta is playing way over his head. His era is two full runs lower than his FIP. His K rate had declined and his walk rate has increased. He's been lucky and will come back to reality. He'll still be a top 5-10 pitcher regardless but not THIS.

Arrieta is pitching insanely well and has been for the better part of a year now, going back to last year. And, during that time his ERA has remained lower than his FIP by quite a bit. They're not playing out of their minds, though. Fowler maybe....but overall not really. They lost Schwarber and it didn't even slow them down. And, I'd venture a strong guess that they end up closer to 110 than 100.

Not questioning how good Arrieta is, I'm merely stating that he's out performing his FIP by a significant margin. Way bigger gap this year than last. Last year he out performed it by about half a run. This year he's out performing it by 2 full runs, and his xFIP by almost 2 and a half runs, while his K rate is declining and walk rate is increasing. As I said, he'll still be great but he's looking at a decent amount of regression.

And yes they are playing out of their minds as a team unless you think they're the best offensive team of the last 20 years with the 1996 Braves rotation. Because that's how they're playing now.

And yeah I think 110 wins is possible. Not likely though.

Let's just look at it like this....Arrieta.....actually let's look at it like this.

Through 29 games, they've given up 79 runs. To get to 600 runs allowed for the season, they can give up 4 runs a game from here on out. Doable? Pretty easily. So let's just put them down as a team that gives up 600 runs this season.

They're on pace to score 1005 runs. Using the pythagoream win-loss formula and assuming 600 runs allowed, to win 115 games, they need 950 runs which is 5.5 runs/game from here out. To win 110, they need to get to about 865 runs or 5 runs a game. To get to 100 wins they need ~760 runs which is just over 4/game.

Obviously, games are not played like this. But, unless you have a better way of looking at them as a team and projecting where they'll be, I am going to stick with this. The cubs are good. We knew they would be. Their offense was a monster going into the season and is showing that it is in fact a monster. 22-28 year old mashers don't just grow on trees and the cubs have them in spades. Their pitching has over performed, but it's not like they're chop liver. We'll see how they do going forward. But, the numbers above don't lie. It's incredibly likely they finish with close to 110 wins unless the pitching just....implodes.

Well my point isn't that if they continue at this pace they won't win 110 games. I'm saying that the pace they're on isn't sustainable throughout an entire season. They have a good offense, they don't have the 1995 Indians offense. They don't even have mid 2000s Cardinals offense. They just don't. They're pitching at a pace, where Arrieta, Lester, Hamels are all pitching well above their peripherals and are all looking at some big regression. They are playing at a pace that would make them the best team ever assembled. They're not that.

Their offense is legit with tough outs 1-8, but Rizzo and Bryant are the only ones that are elite hitters. Zobrist has his highest wOBA in 7 seasons, Fowler is performing like the best player in baseball. Those won't be maintained. On the flip side Heyward and Soler have been awful, so when the other regress, I expect a significant improvement from those two.

They scored 689 runs last year, this year they're on pace for over 1,000 runs. Zobrist and Hayward additions are not accounting for those extra 300+ runs, even if you take into account their players reaching their full potential. It's just not realistic. Their offense isn't historically great. And the pitching isn't historically great to the point they'll only allow 600 runs either. Neither one of those things are sustainable for a full season with their roster imo.