After a pair of wins over the Pirates last weekend, the Cubs‘ misery picked up again on Monday with a 7-0 drubbing at the hands of the Brewers that knocks them back to 9.0 games behind the NL Central leaders. More important, it drops the Cubs to 11-15 in their last 26 games and provides an exclamation point on an offense that is just not working anymore.
In that span, the Cubs have scored 92 runs, or 3.5 per game, and batted just .227 with an OPS of .649.
In the 98 games before that, the Cubs averaged 5.3 runs per game, and were batting .256 with a .773 OPS.
To be sure, the Cubs’ pitching has struggled, too, compared with the first three-and-a-half-months. The team’s ERA was an excellent 3.77 back on July 19, but over the last 26 games, the pitchers’ ERA has been 4.08. That’s not bad–unless paired with an offense that has struggled as much as it has in the past month.
Owen Caissie Was Red-Hot in Triple A
In the search for answers, many a Cubs observer has suggested the team try a lineup alteration, especially with star outfielder Kyle Tucker struggling–not to mention fellow outfielders Seiya Suzuki and Ian Happ–and top prospect Owen Caissie now in the big leagues.
Caissie hit .289 at Triple-A Iowa this season, knocking 22 homers and posting an OPS of .955. But in the five days since the Cubs brought him up, the team has not used him much. Caissie finally played on Monday but still, the Cubs have played five games and he has gone just 1-for-8 at the MLB level thus far.
But if there is a hope that Caissie could rescue the offense, GM Jed Hoyer pretty much rained on that parade on Monday.
“You have three really good players that would be playing ahead of him,” Hoyer said of the Cubs outfield. “He’s going to get some at-bats, but certainly, in order to play every day, it’s really sitting down a veteran player who’s a really good player who projects really well. So I think that’s the reason.”
Cubs Won’t Make Change
So the question becomes, with the Cubs’ offense struggling, why not at least give Caissie a try? How long should the Cubs wait to admit that Tucker, Suzuki and/or Happ are not “really good players” at the moment?
Hoyer said, essentially, that the Cubs won’t be doing that.
“I’m going to give an answer that will frustrate people, but hit your best players at the top of the lineup,” Hoyer said. “Hit them the most often. I was taught that 25 years ago by Bill James when we’re talking about lineup construction. I think you want to avoid clusters of handedness to make it easy on the opponent.
“Hit your best players the most often is really simple, and it works. And you got to do that.”
Cubs Sticking With Veterans
Hoyer also said that shaking up the team’s lineup is not likely a solution either. The Cubs plan to address the offensive problems, it seems, is to sit and wait, hoping the bats come back around.
“What I’m really saying is I just think that the answers to our struggles are not lineup construction,” Hoyer said. “I think sometimes you can simplify it down to, our best players haven’t been producing at the level they were in the first half.
“That’s the reason that we’re not scoring as many runs. It’s not the order in which they go to the plate.”
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