Well, the rain stole one from us yesterday, which is a blessing and a curse. On the bright side, the bullpen gets an extra day of rest (on top of the day Hayden Wesneski bought them). But on the flip side, the Cubs have 18.0 innings to cover tomorrow. That’s never easy.
At least the two guys slated for Saturday’s double-header, Javier Assad and Shota Imanaga, have shown an ability to go 6.0 innings at least once this season. A little more of that would go a long way. That said, the Cubs will get an extra arm for the day, with no restrictive rules on whom it could be. The 40-man options not already with the big league club include Michael Arias, Jose Cuas, Luke Little, Daniel Palencia, or Hayden Wesneski.
Wesneski would be the obvious answer, especially if he never left Chicago after being sent out yesterday to make room for Jameson Taillon. Even though he pitched in parts of five innings on Wednesday, he was actually crazy-efficient (43 pitches). Plus, because he’s on a starters schedule, he might be scheduled to throw a bullpen session on Saturday anyway. He could just do that … in the game! It’d be higher intensity, certainly, but his ability to cover innings and the fact that he needed just 43 pitches on Wednesday makes me feel like this could be the play.
Of course, this could all change depending on how things go for Jameson Taillon today. If he has a super short 2024 MLB debut (he was up to just 68 pitches in his last rehab start), then the Cubs might have to dig deeper into their bullpen today and make more moves before tomorrow (in addition to the extra man). At least none of the relievers (besides Drew Smyly) have pitched since Tuesday. They should all be very rested. Ideally, you’d stay away from Smyly today to have him 100% for multiple innings tomorrow.
But that’s not really the whole story. Because there’s also Ben Brown. With Taillon back and Kyle Hendricks slated to start on Sunday, the Cubs technically have a six-man rotation and seven-man bullpen at the moment. How they choose to play that going forward, I have no idea. There is an off-day Monday, so everyone can go on normal rest next week, but is Brown really moving out of the rotation after making one of the best Cubs starts of the year? I kind of doubt it. But that too may depend on what happens with Taillon today, how the double-header goes tomorrow, and what happens to Kyle Hendricks on Sunday. Brown could be called upon to throw multiple innings tomorrow.
Speaking of Kyle Hendricks, I wouldn’t say this is his “last chance,” because I’m positive the Cubs would never play it that way. But I do think it’s a pretty pivotal start. After this one, the excuses will dry up. For one, it’s his fifth time out. That’s a nice round number. And if his fifth start is as bad as the first four were, the argument to just wait him out will lose potency. For another, it’s at home. Three of Hendricks first four starts have been on the road, where he’s historically been worse. I don’t think that has anything to do with it. But, sure, okay. It’s mentioned (I’ll stretch for Kyle Hendricks). And lastly, this next start is against the Marlins. They are not good.
Hendricks has so far had the misfortune of facing four pretty tough teams to start the season: Rangers (away), Dodgers (home), Padres (away), and Diamondbacks (away). But the Marlins? They have a combined slash line of .216/.279/.322 (69 wRC+) to start the season, which is better only than the absolutely miserable White Sox. It improves when you filter down to their performance against right-handed pitchers (89 wRC+), but this is still not a good team. If he can’t beat the Marlins, at home, making a fifth consecutive bad start in the process … I truly don’t see how a change can be avoided.
I’ll remind you all that you’re rooting interest is for Kyle Hendricks to bounce back in a big way. Not only because he’d help the Cubs win, but also because Ben Brown is simply not prepared to make a season’s worth of starts yet. Plus, Justin Steele is still out. Plus we have no idea how Jameson Taillon would look. Plus, you’d LOVE to have Ben Brown and Javier Assad back in the bullpen to help stabilize things there. I’m not counting on or expecting Hendricks to pitch as well as he did last season (don’t forget that, either), but that certainly is the hope and I think some of the conversation has drifted too far away from that.
It’s already almost foreign to think about pitchers hitting (especially in the postseason). Kinda crazy how fast that happened.
Kevin Alcantara, one of the Cubs top prospects (with maybe the highest ceiling in the org), got off to a wicked-cold start this year, going hitless in his first seven games with 11(!) strikeouts. But on Tuesday, his first hit fell in. On Wednesday, he notched his first double, homer, and multi-hit game. And last night, he went 4-4 with four singles. It’s very good to see.
In case you missed it, Patrick Wisdom also returned to the Cubs last night, taking the roster spot of Miles Mastrobuoni. With three lefties slated to start for the Marlins this weekend, I wouldn’t be surprised if we see Wisdom start all three games. And frankly, with Seiya Suzuki out, I wouldn’t hate it if he, Garrett Cooper, and Alexander Canario all got a good run here. It’s easy enough to accommodate two of them between DH and right field. But if you want to mix in all three, just give one of the Cubs three lefties/switch-hitters (Cody Bellinger, Michael Busch, Ian Happ) at least one game off each.