Cubs lose to Tigers, while bats show few signs of life
All it would take is one decent hot streak and the Cubs could be in the thick of the wild-card race.
So why does it feel like nobody expects it to actually happen?
The Cubs continued their recent trend of light hitting, managing only a home run by catcher Christian Bethancourt in an 8-2 loss at Wrigley Field. The loss left the Cubs with a 62-65 record, still a few wins short of .500.
“I don't think .500's like some magic number. We'd obviously love to be over it,” losing pitcher Jameson Taillon said. “It feels like we've definitely done it kind of where we play really well, then we taper off, we play really well, we taper off.”
Before the series opener on Tuesday, Chicago reporters were hanging around the visitors dugout, waiting for Javy Baez to talk. Detroit manager A.J. Hinch was holding court and a strange sound emerged — laughter. Hinch was yukking it up with Tigers beat writers and they all seemed to be having fun.
The Cubs haven't been much fun lately, maybe since the Mike Tauchman's walk-off hit against the Cardinals. Counsell can be pleasant and sometimes moves his pregame interviews to the dugout so there can be more small talk. The Cubs clubhouse is a dreary ghost town after losses and has been quiet even after recent wins. Maybe the old Joe Madden party room is getting some use.
Management doesn't have much belief in the Cubs making a playoff push. In the long run, releasing closer Hector Neris won't make a huge difference, but it's tough to tell how it affected the locker room. It clearly wasn't a move made with an eye on a September surge.
President of baseball operations Jed Hoyer was asked how much the team's record played a role in the Neris decision.
“I'd say similar to the way we looked at the deadline,” Hoyer said. “I don't think things have changed that much. We've played better, but I don't think our (playoff) odds have increased that much.”
The most obvious reason not to believe in a strong finish is the Cubs have hit yet another scoring lull, with 3 runs or less in six of the last seven games. They added Isaac Paredes, helped straighten out the swings of Pete Crow-Armstrong and Miguel Amaya, but the offense hasn't improved.
Since the all-star break, the Cubs rank 27th in runs scored, 24th in batting average and 22nd in slugging. They're in the top half of MLB in two major offensive categories in the second half, triples and stolen bases.
The biggest question on the North Side right now is how will they figure out which of their top prospects in Triple-A can succeed in MLB and whether those players will even get a chance with the current Cubs lineup locked in contractually.
“We'll definitely have those conversations,” Hoyer said about September call-ups. “It's fun right now to watch Iowa. We have a lot of players that are getting close to the big leagues and on the border, so to speak.”
Cubs starter Taillon gave up a pair of 2-run homers to Trey Sweeney and Riley Greene in Wednesday's second inning. Bethancourt got half of that back with a 2-run homer in the fifth, but the Tigers put it away by jumping on Jack Neely in his major-league debut for 4 runs in the ninth.
A few days ago, we mentioned Sweeney, the former Eastern Illinois star called up by the Tigers last week to essentially replace Javy Baez at shortstop.
The Tigers let Baez start Tuesday's game and hear the love from Cubs fans, but he struck out in all four at-bats. Sweeney belted a 2-run homer in his first plate appearance at Wrigley Field, so it's easy to guess how the Detroit lineup will play out the rest of the year. What the Tigers plan to do with the three years and $73 million left on Baez' contract is one of baseball's more interesting questions.