BALTIMORE — Alex Bregman had to chuckle.
With Bregman starting to feel a lot more like himself at the plate, Orioles first baseman Pete Alonso offered a reminder this week that the recent warm-up is coming at the same time as the All-Star break.
“Perfect,” Bregman recalled sarcastically responding.
But a break is not a break, apparently, when you’re the Cubs’ third baseman.
“He’ll be obsessed with it the four days we’re not playing, I can assure you that,” manager Craig Counsell said with a laugh Thursday. “That’s just who he’s going to be. He’ll have his helmet on six hitters before he’s ready to hit. That’s just who he is. That’s not going to change. He’s going to be sending people videos during the break, that’s just who he is.
“That’s what he’s going to do. That’s how he finds answers.”
The big-money free-agent addition has earned a reputation for being a hard worker behind the scenes, even as his production hasn’t been where he has wanted it to be.
Things are going better for Bregman of late, perhaps more so visibly than statistically.
He’s 60 percent of the way to matching the number of extra-base hits he had in June just seven games into July. But it was Bregman hitting the ball harder on an oh-fer day at the plate Wednesday that had Counsell raving, calling it “maybe one of his best days.”
Getting back to the Bregman version of normalcy? That means continuing to work, even as the rest of the sport takes a midsummer break.
“He’s been a worker, always putting in the time, really putting a lot of time in on his craft,” first baseman Michael Busch said. “Even when he was scuffling a little bit, as some would say, in my eyes he was still having really good at-bats, putting the ball in play, still getting on base. And now you’re seeing some of those balls maybe hit a little harder, more line drives.
“The focus on the craft every day has been pretty special.”
Peterson’s mixed bag
Lefty starter David Peterson bounced back from allowing 10 runs in a woeful second outing as a Cub to keep the Orioles to just a run in Thursday’s 3-2 loss.
Results were still mixed. The ground-ball specialist walked four batters and allowed a homer in his third straight start since being acquired from the Mets. But the Cubs saw positives, too, beyond the minimal damage on the scoreboard.
“It was, obviously, better than his last start,” Counsell said. “There’s still some inconsistencies there, but I also thought he showed the really good version of himself, too.
“It’s not going to happen overnight, but we took some steps today, hopefully. We’ve just got to work on getting more consistent. Certainly a good outing, and he got the job done.”
Backstop bats
Cubs catchers have once again been some of baseball’s best with the bat, waking up Thursday with the position’s best on-base percentage in baseball.
Mostly due to the work of Carson Kelly and Miguel Amaya (though Moises Ballesteros has also played eight games at catcher this season), Cubs backstops were reaching base at an eye-popping .370 clip, with a .264 batting average only two points off the league lead.
It was enough for a wRC-plus of 118, making the Cubs’ catching corps the second most productive in the sport, behind only the Twins.
“Our catchers, in general, have quietly, again, provided really good production,” Counsell said. “Last year, it was a bunch of home runs. This year, the best part has been their on-base [percentage]. They’ve just done a great job of getting on base.”
