1 July:
The good news is the #Cubs broke their streak. It was bound to happen; the team is solid enough to avoid the extended losing streak. You get out of them by tossing a shutout.
Which they did. #Kyle Hendricks went six, and three relievers went an inning each to earn the victory.
#Matt Szczur drove in Kris Bryant with the sole run; enough to beat the punchless #NY Met team. After facing the relentless
#Jon Niese (L, 3-8) took the loss. He was being scouted by the Cub hierarchy as a possible rotation candidate via trade, and threw reasonably well. His stuff is ‘Travis Wood like'; average stuff with good command and location.
He’s certainly no #Jacob deGrom, who the #Cubs could have had but is now pretty much off the table. The rumors were deGrom for either Castro or Baez and another prospect or two; #Dan Voglebach was mentioned as a possibility.
However, the 27 year old rookie of the year is now one of the top hurlers in the NL. He will be expensive to obtain if the Mets are even disposed as to trade him, which is doubtful.
Then again, the Mets are the most pitiful offense out there; they are currently dead last in the NL with a .233 team average. They made the Cub pitching staff look really good.
The same one the Cards were able to take advantage of at will.
The lesson the baseball gods want everyone to take?
1) You can develop all the pitching you can, ignore the offense and lose a lot of 1-0, 2-1 games, and 2) Hendricks was better than Niese, who the Cubs were scouting.
They will need more than what he brings if they want to compete. He’s a little better than Wada (just about any major league left handed starter is) but not a winning component. The Cubs need an impact bat at LEAST as much as a pitcher and maybe more.
The baseball gods are telling BOTH teams something.
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