The Chicago Cubs are a very good team, one that employs a good manager and features a good front office. They’ve won a bunch of games over the past four seasons and, notably, claimed a World Series to end a century-long drought. The Cubs will have a good team next season, as well, and probably the one after that. The franchise has young stars around which to build, a front office that understands the importance of developing talent, and an endless supply of cash to ensure the team will contend for years to come. Things are looking good in Chicago.

And yet, following a Wild Card loss to the Rockies, one could be excused for regarding the Cubs as a bit of a disappointment. After that World Series title in 2016, a dynasty seemed inevitable to some. Chicago fans were thinking about the ’90s Bulls. Perhaps expectations were too high, though. Maybe the ’85 Bears were the better comparison.

If the Cubs had won this season, that would have given them three consecutive playoff appearances and two world championships in three years. In the last 40 years, only two franchises have pulled that off: the Blue Jays of the early 90s and Yankees of the late 90s. The Giants accomplished something either more or less impressive, depending on one’s criteria. On the one hand, they won three titles between 2010 and -14. On the other, they also missed the playoffs in the intervening seasons. The Red Sox won two World Series in the span of four years but also failed to reach the postseason in 2006.

Do any of those represent examples of a dynasty? Just the Yankees, probably. While there is no widely accepted definition of what constitutes a dynasty, it might be a case where it’s best to adopt Justice Potter Stewart’s view on such matters and say, “I know it when I see it.”

Let’s review the most recent contenders for the honor before returning to the Cubs.

The Yankees clubs of the late 90s and aughts were built around a core of Roger Clemens, Derek Jeter, Andy Pettitte, and Mariano Rivera and Bernie Williams. The team later added Jason Giambi, Mike Mussina, Alex Rodriguez to try and sustain their run, but they couldn’t do so, winning only one more time (2009) despite a decade of success.

For 14 consecutive seasons, the Atlanta Braves won their division. During that period, they made the World Series five times but won just once. In the Cardinals’ run from 2000 to -15, they missed the playoffs four times, lost twice in the World Series, and missed the playoffs in three out of four seasons between their two titles in 2006 and 2011. The Phillies won their division five straight times and won an average of 95 games during that timeframe, but they claimed just one title.

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Jon Lester’s experience in the postseason has been marked mostly by success. He’s made 21 career playoff starts and recorded a few important relief outings, too. In those games, he’s produced a 2.55 ERA and 3.62 FIP. In five World Series starts (plus one relief outing), Lester has pitched 35.2 innings, struck out 34, walked just eight, and conceded only eight runs (seven earned). He’s what one might characterize as a “big-game pitcher.”

The thing about so-called big-game pitchers, however, isn’t so much that they rise to important occasions, but rather that they simply replicate the performances that have brought them to the big stage in the first place. For over a decade, Lester has done just that. Tonight, however, the Cubs might require a little bit more of Lester.

In 2,366 regular-season innings over more than a decade, Lester has produced a 3.61 FIP. In 148 postseason innings, the 34-year-old lefty has a 3.62 FIP. Look at some of his other stats from the regular season and playoffs over the course of his career.

The numbers for Lester are pretty much the same across the board in the regular season and playoffs. His postseason ERA is lower than his regular-season mark due mostly to the .241 BABIP he’s recorded in the former. His slightly lower strikeout and walk numbers indicate that hitters have made more contact against Lester in the postseason, although it’s quite possible that some of that contact has been of the weaker variety if batters have traded in strikeout avoidance for power.

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This is the fifth installment of this year’s Team Entropy series, my recurring look not only at the races for the remaining playoff spots but the potential for end-of-season chaos in the form of down-to-the-wire suspense and even tiebreakers. Ideally, we want more ties than the men’s department at Macy’s. If you’re new to this, please read the introduction here.

In the National League playoff picture, we’re down to two teams — the Dodgers (89-71) and Cardinals (87-73) — fighting for one spot, as the Rockies (90-70) clinched a postseason berth on Friday night by beating the Nationals for their eighth straight win. That said, neither the NL Central nor the NL West races have been decided, nor have the actual Wild Card game participants, leaving open the possibility that we could have multiple Game 163 tiebreakers on Monday. The dream scenario of needing a third tiebreaker game, in the event that the two NL West participants (the Dodgers and Rockies) finished tied with St. Louis, is off the table given the Cardinals’ back-to-back losses to the Brewers (93-67) and Cubs (94-66).

On Friday afternoon, I had the privilege of appearing on MLB Network’s MLB Now, where host Brian Kenny put the spotlight on Team Entropy at the top of the show and allowed me to talk through the various scenarios:

Pretty cool! Except that the Cardinals were busy getting pummeled by the Cubs as that happened — the show kept cutting away to the action — simplifying the picture somewhat. So here is what’s left…

The Cubs, who are hosting the Cardinals, and the Brewers, who are hosting the Tigers, can still finish in a tie after 162 games if Milwaukee can pick up a game this weekend. Either the Brew Crew goes 2-0 while the Cubs go 1-1, or 1-1 while the Cubs go 0-2. That would leave the two teams playing on Monday in Chicago (which won the season series 11-8) to determine which one wins the division, and which hosts the Wild Card game. As of Saturday morning, our playoff odds ties page shows a 25.9% chance of such an occurrence.

Likewise, the Rockies, who are hosting the Nationals, and the Dodgers, who are visiting the Giants, can finish tied if Los Angeles can pick up a game. The Dodgers, who won the season series 12-7, would host a tiebreaker game on Monday to determine the division winner, and second Wild Card team. Our ties page gives this game a 34.1% chance of happening.

Alternately, if the Cardinals win both of their remaining games and the Dodgers lose both of theirs, the two teams would be tied for the second Wild Card spot. They would play on Monday in St. Louis, which won the season series 4-3. This scenario can happen in tandem with an NL Central tie if the Brewers also split their remaining pair of games. The odds of a Wild Card tie are down to 2.4%, but that’s better than nothing, particularly with a second tiebreaker game also still an option.

With the Cubs and Cardinals playing at 1:05 pm Eastern, the Dodgers and Giants at 4:05, the Brewers and Tigers at 7:05 pm and the Rockies and Nationals at 8:10 pm, we have the whole day to savor the possibilities for chaos. Enjoy!

The Cubs are just ever so barely hanging onto a division lead over the Brewers. For this, there could be any number of factors to blame. The Brewers, obviously, are half responsible, having played tremendously well after adding their best two players over the offseason. And on the Cubs’ side, what if Yu Darvish hadn’t gotten hurt? What if Brandon Morrow hadn’t gotten hurt? What if Kris Bryant hadn’t gotten hurt? What if Tyler Chatwood hadn’t underachieved? The division lead currently stands at half of one game. It wouldn’t have taken very much more to give the current Cubs a greater amount of breathing room.

Just glancing around, you wouldn’t think to fault Kyle Schwarber for anything. Schwarber’s been an above-average hitter and a three-win player, regularly playing an acceptable corner outfield. And before I proceed, I want to make one thing clear: Overall, the Cubs should be happy with where Schwarber is. They should be pleased with his overall health and development, and it seems as if his career is moving forward. But as you know, in a tight division race, almost anything could make a significant difference. And so we need to talk about Kyle Schwarber’s timing. I saw something in his splits I can’t in good conscience ignore. You know that I love a good fun fact.

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On July 20th, my colleague Craig Edwards wrote a piece for this site entitled “The Cubs Are on Pace for Their Worst Rotation Ever” in which he argued — in accordance with all observable objective reality at the time — that the Cubs were on pace for their worst rotation ever. It wasn’t an especially difficult case to make. At the time Craig published, the Cubs’ rotation — which still featured rather too much of Tyler Chatwood — had produced just 3.0 WAR as a group, which is the kind of figure that, as a measure of collective performance through nearly three months of a major-league season, is apt to make one physically recoil regardless of how you feel about pitcher WAR’s usefulness as a measure of overall performance. It was bad.

Since then, however, the Cubs’ rotation has been rather good, and that fact is the point of this article. Consider the following table, which presents the Cubs’ rotational performance up to and including the 20th of July, and also after that date (MLB ranks in parentheses):

You will agree, I hope, that the Cubs’ rotation has been better since Craig said they were bad, and will therefore turn your attention with me to why. Here is one reason: it has much less Tyler Chatwood in it. Here is another: it has much more Cole Hamels. These might sound like blithe (and, in Chatwood’s case, rather mean) things to say, and to some extent they are. But they are also true.

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It’s been a few years now since we first discovered that Javier Baez has an elite tagging skill. At the time, it wasn’t obvious that a player actually could have an elite tagging skill. Applying a tag seems like a pretty specific, rote act. There’s not a lot of variation. Baez, though, somehow found a way to do it better than everyone. Baez has a way of doing that.

Well, it seems possible Baez has managed to somehow find value where none seemed clearly available — in this case, by causing fielders to self-combust while he runs the bases. It’s a skill that leads to errors and extra bases for Baez and his friends, and it was on display Wednesday night as Baez stood at first base with Anthony Rizzo up to bat. The Cubs’ first baseman hit a single to center field. Then this happened:

Baez scored on the throwing error and Rizzo advanced to second, eventually making it to third thanks to another throwing error. A guy on Twitter with 1.7 million followers asked for a post on this.

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Bobby Wilson has caught for 16 seasons — nine of them at the big league level — so he knows pitching like the back of his hand. Particularly on the defensive side of the ball. With a .577 OPS in exactly 1,000 MLB plate appearances, the 35-year-old hasn’t exactly been an offensive juggernaut. But his stick isn’t why the Chicago Cubs acquired him from the Minnesota Twins this past Thursday. They picked him up for his receiving skills and his ability to work with a staff.

The quality and style of pitching he’s seeing today aren’t the same as what they were when he inked his first professional contract in 2002.

“The game is ever evolving, ever changing,” Wilson told me a few weeks ago. “I’ve seen it go from more sinker-slider to elevated fastballs with a curveball off of that. But what really stands out is the spike in velocity. There’s almost no one in this league right now who is a comfortable at bat.”

In his opinion, increased octane has made a marked impact on how hitters are being attacked.

“If you have velocity, you can miss spots a little more frequently, whereas before you had to pitch,” opined Wilson. “You can’t miss spots throwing 88-90. If you’re 95-100 , you can miss your location and still have a chance of missing a barrel. Even without a lot of movement. Because of that, a lot of guys are going to four-seam, straight fastballs that are elevated, instead of a ball that’s sinking.”

But as the veteran catcher said, the game is ever evolving. He’s now starting to see more high heat in the nether regions of the zone, as well. Read the rest of this entry »

Notes on prospects from lead prospect analyst Eric Longenhagen. Read previous installments here.

Note from Eric: Hey you, this is the last one of these for the year, as the minor-league regular season comes to a close. Thanks for reading. I’ll be taking some time off next week, charging the batteries for the offseason duties that lie ahead for Kiley and me.

D.J. Peters, CF, Los Angeles Dodgers
Level: Double-A   Age: 22   Org Rank: 7   FV: 45+
Line: 4-for-7, 2 HR, 2B (double header)

Notes
A comparison of DJ Peters‘ 2017 season in the Cal League and his 2018 season at Double-A gives us a good idea of what happens to on-paper production when a hitter is facing better pitching and defenses in a more stable offensive environment.

Reports of Peters’ physical abilities haven’t changed, nor is his batted-ball profile different in such a way that one would expect a downtick in production. The 2018 line is, I think, a more accurate distillation of Peters’ abilities. He belongs in a talent bucket with swing-and-miss outfielders like Franchy Cordero, Randal Grichuk, Michael A. Taylor, Bradley Zimmer, etc. These are slugging center fielders whose contact skills aren’t particularly great. Players like this are historically volatile from one season to the next but dominant if/when things click. They’re often ~1.5 WAR players who have some years in the three-win range. Sometimes they also turn into George Springer.

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Since 2004, the Chicago Cubs have belonged to a lucrative partnership with the White Sox, Blackhawks, Bulls, and some iteration of Comcast/NBC to broadcast games on NBC Sports Chicago, previously known as Comcast SportsNet Chicago. That partnership appears likely to end at the conclusion of next season, however, according to Bruce Levine at 670 The Score. While the current deal has been fruitful for the Cubs, the opportunity to own their regional sports network will give them a chance to multiply their television revenue several times over. Over the last few seasons, the Cubs have lingered just behind heavyweight clubs like the Dodgers, Red Sox, and Yankees in terms of payroll. A new television deal should put them on par with those teams for the foreseeable future.

The Cubs’ move to create their own network separate from their current partners has been in the works for several years now. The Chicago market has lagged behind cities like Los Angeles and New York in terms of the presence of RSNs. NBC Sports Chicago is still the only game in town, while LA and New York both have four networks broadcasting the major sports. Other big markets like the Bay Area and Boston also have multiple networks despite featuring the same number of — or even fewer — teams to broadcast.

When I last wrote about the Cubs’ option to start their own network three years ago, I noted the ominous cable bubble that has been pervasive for years but indicated the Cubs wouldn’t have a problem getting their channel carried by cable providers. It’s been three years, but the cable bubble refuses to burst. Even the Rays are getting billion-dollar local TV deals.

The market has changed in the last few years, as the number of cable subscribers continues to fall. Traditional cable providers have not only lost customers who no longer or never will pay for cable TV, but they are also facing increased competition from digital-only providers like DirecTV Now, Playstation Vue, Sling, and YouTubeTV. In 2017, cable companies lost 3.3 million subscribers, but digital providers gained 2.6 million, softening the blow dealt by those who no longer pay for television. In most cases, those digital providers are airing local RSNs and emphasizing to customers the opportunities available to watch sports without a traditional cable package. These models are new and it isn’t entirely clear how long they can last providing a skinnier, cheaper version of cable, but it has provided a lifeline to a model that, at one point, appeared to be on the way out.

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No team plays a completely balanced scheduled over the course of a season. Some divisions, naturally, are better than others. Because intradivisional games account for roughly 40% of the league schedule, there is necessarily some irregularity in the strength of competition from club to club. Interleague play, which represents another 10% of games, also contributes to this imbalance. Given the sheer numbers of games in a major-league campaign, the effect of scheduling ultimately isn’t a major difference-maker. Talent and luck have much more influence over a club’s win-loss record. In any given month, however, scheduling imbalances can become much more pronounced.

Consider this: at the beginning of the season, just one team featured a projected gain or loss as large as three wins due to scheduling. The Texas Rangers were expected to lose three more games than their talent would otherwise dictate. Right now, however, there are eight teams with bigger prorated schedule swings than the one the Rangers saw at the beginning of the season — and those swings could have a big impact on the remaining pennant races.

To provide some backdrop, the chart below ranks the league’s schedules, toughest to easiest, compared to an even .500 schedule.

The Diamondbacks have a pretty rough go of it. Outside of five games against the Padres, the other “worst” team they play is the San Francisco Giants. They have one series each against the division-leading Astros, Braves, and Cubs along with a pair of series against both the Dodgers and Rockies. If Arizona were chasing these teams for the division or Wild Card, their schedule would present them with a good opportunity for making up ground. Given their current status, however, it just means a lot of tough games down the stretch.

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