Reds @ Cubs: Stephens vs Lester (Game 161)

Submitted by CTSteve on Sat, 09/30/2017 - 5:43am

CIN (82-77): RHP Jackson Stephens (2-0, 3.86) 
CHC (91-69): LHP Jon Lester (12-8, 4.46) 
First pitch: 3:05pmCST

Lester rebounded from whatever that was in Tampa Bay to beat the Cards on Monday, giving up 1 ER in 6 innings. In three 2017 starts, he’s 1-0 with a 10.13 against the Reds. Overall, they are 46-166 (.277) against him. Hamilton is 7-17 with 2 HR, and Suarez is 8-25 with 2 HR.

Stephens chalked up his first Major League win in his debut against the Cubs on July 1 (5 IP, 3 ER, 8 K, 1 BB). He had a 6-inning, 1 ER no-decision against the Red Sox his last time out. The Cubs are 6-18 (.333) against him. Jay is 2-3 with a HR.

It’s McGuire (0-1) and Montgomery (7-8) in the final game of the regular season tomorrow at 2:20pmCST.

Go Cubs! 
 

Tags: 
2017 Season Game Thread

Comments

Submitted by crunch  on Sat, 09/30/2017 - 3:09pm  
the A-team backing up lester. maybe he can move that ERA below 4.40 :( what a waste of a season for lester...worst since 2012. it's not a useless performance, but it's some real end-of-rotation quality stuff.

Submitted by billybucks  on Sat, 09/30/2017 - 3:50pm  
Strange year for Lester: - Remove his 3 terrible starts and his ERA drops to 3.67. - 10 starts allowing 1 run or less -- including his first 3 and 2 of this last 4. So, not consistently terrible, but not reliable either.

Submitted by crunch  on Sat, 09/30/2017 - 4:06pm  
working deeper counts (and more walks to show for it) chipped away at his innings, too. 32 starts and he'll finish 25-ish IP off his usual workload...that's nearly 4 starts worth of innings. hopefully he'll turn that around in 2018...oh, and the post-season.

Submitted by Cubster  on Sat, 09/30/2017 - 5:30pm  
that's nearly 4 starts worth of innings. ---- Here are the four worst starts: Approximately 20 of the 25 innings can be accounted for if you project 6-7 IP for these games. The 10 spot in 0.2 IP vs Pitt and the 9 spot in 1.2 innings vs Reds. 6 runs in 3.1 IP vs LA and 3 runs in 4 IP vs Snakes (even though they won that game 16-4. http://www.espn.com/mlb/player/gamelog/_/id/2...

Submitted by crunch  on Sat, 09/30/2017 - 3:38pm  
schwarb gets HR #30...crushed to CF. bryant on #29 coming into the game today. if he gets #30 today or tomorrow that will be 3 30+ HR guys.

Submitted by billybucks  on Sat, 09/30/2017 - 3:41pm  
Nice for Schwarber!

Submitted by crunch  on Sat, 09/30/2017 - 4:18pm  
the current "bleacher culture" sure is something we didn't see in the 80s and 90s...and probably before, but that's before my time since i was a toddler for my chunk of the 70s. there's a "suburban-family-looking" mom out there with 2 small children and a baby. one of the children is holding up a sign announcing it's the baby's first game. the mom is busy digging around in a diaper bag while messing with her cell phone. *shrug* the classic oldschool bleacher creatures seem to have left the bleachers long ago, anyway. things change.

Submitted by crunch  on Sat, 09/30/2017 - 4:46pm  
la stella with a 17 pitch AB for a K. 12 foul balls. longest AB of the season by a cub.

Submitted by crunch  on Sat, 09/30/2017 - 7:19pm  
"Max Scherzer left Saturday's game in the fourth inning with an apparent leg injury." a 2-week injury would be nice about right now.

Submitted by crunch  on Sat, 09/30/2017 - 9:26pm  
it's supposedly a "right hamstring cramp" 2 hours to report it was a cramp...okay, then.

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  • tim815 26 min 58 sec ago (view)

    MLB.com rated the Cubs 22 out of 30.

    This season figures to tell quite a bit. No teams are terrible at player development anymore, and no teams look at the draft as a hopeless puzzle.

     
  • KingKongvsGodzilla 3 hours 41 min ago (view)

    Are these guys out of the org now? 

     
  • K Dub 8 hours 18 min ago (view)

    PHIL: Any velo readings on Ramos? Earlier reports also had him sitting 98-99. Thanks!

     
  • George Altman 14 hours 18 min ago (view)

    Phil, serious question: How good is the Cubs Player Development Department? Scale of 1 to 30 with 1 being best.  I mean, I can think of 5 teams right now who don't have near the Cubs resources but do better year after.

    I mean there are organizations across sports who seem to coach the crap out of their draft picks and signees. They just got 4 teenagers for Darvish, but do they have the coaches to get any of them to the show? 

    My pessimistic grade would be about 24.

     
  • Arizona Phil 14 hours 33 min ago (view)

    DJL: How about Eddy Julio Martinez as a spectacular miss? A $3M signing bonus out of Cuba and he never made it out of AA. 

     
  • Dolorous Jon Lester 14 hours 39 min ago (view)

    Wow, that's a pretty spectacular miss. He was so highly thought of when he signed.

     
  • Arizona Phil 15 hours 11 min ago (view)

    TIM: Richard Gallardo doesn't seem to be progressing as a SP, so he has apparently been moved to the bullpen.  He has a tendency to labor through innings and nibble too much and throw a lot of pitches. 

     
  • tim815 15 hours 25 min ago (view)

    Anything on Gallardo, of interest, from today?

     
  • Arizona Phil 15 hours 27 min ago (view)

    The Cubs have released LHP Ryan Kellogg, RHP Alex Moore, 3B Fidel Mejia, OF Jose Gutierrez, OF Eddy Julio Martinez, and OF Zac Taylor from Minor League Camp. 

     
  • Arizona Phil 15 hours 33 min ago (view)

    And despite what you might read elsewhere, It was - NOT - a "hot" gun.  

     
  • Arizona Phil 15 hours 59 min ago (view)

    He certainly could have forced the Cubs to release him with full salary as termination pay, so he must like it with the Cubs.  

     
  • Charlie 17 hours 50 min ago (view)

    Follow-up on last week's discussion of Baez's contact and plate discipline woes. Another Fangraphs article notes that he is among league leaders in combined positive change in zone swing rates (swinging at more pitches inside the strike zone) and reduction in chase rate (swinging at pitches outside the zone). See the last table: https://blogs.fangraphs.com/lets-look-at-some-earl...

    This makes his 45% strikeout rate and 1.7% BB rate all the more strange.

     
  • crunch 20 hours 51 min ago (view)

    he may not be worth much to us as fans, but every indication points to him being quite popular in the dugout.  nice to see him stick around as an emergency callup catcher.

     
  • Wrigley Rat 1 day 9 hours ago (view)

    Tony Wolters clears waivers and is sent to the Alternate Training site in South Bend.

     
  • bigsky33 1 day 13 hours ago (view)

    Hi Phil, are they letting you into Sloan?  Great to see your write-ups!! 

     
  • crunch 1 day 17 hours ago (view)

    DUDE.  STOP.

     
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