The Cubs have found themselves in a difficult loop lately, putting themselves under added pressure as they continue to scuffle, and finding that putting more pressure on themselves is only exacerbating their problems.
Chicago has gone 9-14 since it sat 20 games over .500 back on July 19. The starting pitching has been wracked with injuries, the bullpen has struggled and the offense has slipped, pretty much leaving the North Siders without a reliable aspect to their game.
What’s difficult about it these days is that it does not seem as though anyone has answers.
Cubs’ Craig Counsell: ‘This Is Baseball’
Frustrated manager Craig Counsell was out of excuses on Friday, the day the Cubs lost, 3-2, toa Pirates team that has struggled mightily.
He wondered if Chicagoans were not blowing the team’s troubles out of proportion.
“There’s a tendency to make everything sound worse than it is in our game,” Counsell told reporters. “That’s the nature of it when it’s every day. Things not going right is not what’s happening. I think that’s what you fall into. This is baseball that’s happening. You have to be tough enough to roll with that.”
Cubs Toughness in Question?
And maybe that’s the issue. Maybe this team is good at handling success but not tough enough to handle adversity. It certainly feels that they’ve hit a rut in which they can’t seem to fix their own sometimes basic mistakes.
The Cubs are batting .236 in the last 30 days, and they’ve scored just 98 runs, which is the second-fewest in baseball. The team has managed to stay in games with its pitching, but the depth is running out for Counsell there.
Stars Struggling to Hit
Stars have struggled for the Cubs. Heck, everyone has struggled at the plate. Nico Hoerner is hitting .333 in the last 30 days, but the next-ranked regular is Dansby Swanson, who is hitting .231 in that stretch. Sieya Suzuki is hitting .200, and Kyle Tucker is at .198 in the last 30 days.
Pete Crow-Armstrong has seen some of the shine come off the hot start to the season that he put up. He is batting .230 in the last 30 days which, compared to his teammates, makes him Tony Gwynn-like.
PCA said pressure is only causing more pressure for the Cubs.
“It becomes the self-inflicted pressure when you feel like you’re not playing your part in contributing,” Crow-Armstrong said, via ESPN. “When stuff starts to kind of pile up like that, it sucks, but it’s also baseball and I still have however many fricking weeks left this season, and it’s still a lot of time to begin to produce again.”
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