With Yu Darvish now joining the likes of Jon Lester, Kyle Hendricks, Jose Quintana, and Tyler Chatwood most fans are excited about the Chicago Cubs rotation. That starts to beg the question, how does the Cubs rotation stack up against the rest of baseball?
Cubs rotation
The first thing that should be answered is how the rotation will be set up. Here’s the most likely setup.
- Jon Lester, LHP, 13-8, 4.33 ERA, 180.2 IP, 1.323 WHIP
- Yu Darvish, RHP, 10-12, 3.86 ERA, 186.2 IP, 1.163 WHIP
- Jose Quintana, LHP, 11-11, 4.15 ERA, 188.2 IP, 1.224 WHIP
- Kyle Hendricks, RHP, 7-5, 3.03 ERA, 139.2 IP, 1.189 WHIP
- Tyler Chatwood, RHP, 8-15, 4.69 ERA, 147.2 IP, 1.442 WHIP
I’m sure there’s a slew of people that will argue this rotation, but most of those same people are still holding out hope that Jake Arrieta will come back. In all seriousness, you can dial the rotation up multiple ways, this just seems to be the way they should go. Lester, until told otherwise, is the number one of the staff. I like slotting Darvish between the lefties, and it gives the Cubs rotation a power arm up top. I’m certain some won’t like Kyle fourth but understand after the first couple weeks the rotation will likely flip around a bit.
There are reasons to be excited and concerned with everyone in the Cubs rotation.
Individual outlook
Jon Lester
Lester had been one of the most dominant and healthy pitchers in baseball for years. But he looked either tired or old in 2017. It is my belief that Lester has plenty in the tank, but with as many innings on his shoulder, it shouldn’t surprise you if he’s beginning to regress. But his 2017 playoffs were phenomenal, throwing 14.1 innings with a 1.89 ERA. I believe that the Cubs will get a Jon Lester that is closer to his career norms than the Jon Lester the Cubs had in 2017. If that happens, the Cubs rotation will have a solid number one.
Yu Darvish
We have all heard about the struggles Yu Darvish had in the World Series. Yes, it was pretty bad, no you shouldn’t expect it to happen again. Yu is too good of a pitcher to not be able to come up with a big game. In fact, Scott Lindholm (AM-670 The Score listeners might know him as Scott from Davenport) pulled some very interesting information on Darvish. Since Yu came to the states he has an actual record of 56-42, but when you measure his actual performance using his game score, adjusting for games he pitched poorly in but won and games he pitched great in but lost, Darvish had an effective record of 92-39. This pairs with the likes of Clayton Kershaw, Max Scherzer, Chris Sale, Corey Kluber — you know, the very best pitchers in baseball. Additionally, per batter faced, Darvish is the greatest strikeout artist the game has ever seen, that says something right there.
Jose Quintana
There are a lot of Cubs fans that haven’t really grasped just how good Jose Quintana is. Before the Yu Darvish signing, Fangraphs Paul Sporer predicted that Quintana will be the top Cubs pitcher in 2018. It makes sense too. Jose will have a full season of pitching to other pitchers, increasing strikeout rates. Jose will also continue to benefit from a much better defensive team on the Northside. After Quintana came to the Cubs via that July trade, he averaged a 58 game score which was the best on the team. That was also better than Darvish’s 57 game score in Texas and LA as well.
Kyle Hendricks
During the 2017 playoffs, Jon Lester suggested that Kyle is the Cubs ace.
“He deserves this,” Lester said. “It’s a huge honor to pitch Game 1 of any series. So I’m happy for him. It’s just kind of that next step. It’s a fun step to have, and hopefully, the next step for him is to go through the whole playoffs like that, and then be our Opening Day starter next year. Like I said, man, that’s a cool step. I remember back in the day when the torch was kind of passed to me to do that, and it’s a cool thing for him.”
Kyle has done it all and has excelled. He led the league in ERA in 2016 (2.13) and has a career mark of 2.94. While some peripherals suggest that his success is mixed with a bit of luck, perhaps today’s metrics don’t do enough to account for soft-tossing pitchers. With metrics that may give more leeway to strikeout pitchers, Kyle appears to go overlooked. He was potentially overlooked in the 2016 Cy Young voting (however I thought Lester had the better shot at winning), as well as in top 100 lists. I like Hendricks starting in the fourth spot as by April 11th he can be lifted to the third spot and by the 20th he could be in the first slot in the rotation.
Tyler Chatwood
I don’t believe you can downplay the home/road splits of Tyler Chatwood enough. Away from Coors he had great stuff, in Coors, he was a chump. His ERA was 2.5 points lower on the road, his BAA was 100 points lower on the road. Interestingly, he compiled more innings on the road but threw fewer pitches. In the past two seasons, Chatwood owns baseball’s sixth-best road ERA (2.57)What we know, Chatwood has an incredible spin rate on all pitches, but especially so on his curveball. MLB.com’s Mike Petriello compared Chatwood to Houston Astros’ breakout pitcher, Charlie Morton. The similarities are uncanny. Similar spin rates, increases in velocity, and relying more and more on a curve will allow Tyler to get out of more jams.
Ranking against the rest of the league
Being rather optimistic about the Cubs rotation, the natural next question is how does it stack up against the rest of the league? There are some really good rotations in baseball, and the Cubs should undoubtedly be in the conversation for one of the better ones. I don’t know if we say the best, but they should be up there. Here is how Bleacher Report rated the top 10 pitching staffs. This was of course before the Yu Darvish signing, but they had the Cubs as the eighth best rotation in baseball.
With the addition, the Cubs, of course, look better. The upside of the Cubs rotation should put them in the top five right off the bat. Bruce Levine believes the Cubs could end up having the best rotation in the game this season. I still see Washington’s rotation of Max Scherzer, Stephen Strasburg, and Gio Gonzalez as the best trio, but the Cubs could have the deepest rotation. The Cubs also have talented depth with Mike Montgomery and the likes of Eddie Butler, Jen-Ho Tseng, and Adbert Azlozay in the minors and expected to see time in the bigs at some point this season.
The postseason is a different animal compared to the regular season, a team can dominate with only three starters. But there hasn’t been a team to win a World Series in the past several seasons and owned a pitching staff rated below tenth in baseball. While a threesome can mow their way through the playoffs, it is incredibly important that the entire staff is great in order to win. As good as the Cubs young hitters were in 2016, starting pitching and defense was the real path to the Cubs first championship in 108 years. They very well could be back on that path.
Top Five Rotations
I think you have to rank these five as the tops in the league (in no particular order):
Washington Nationals – Max Scherzer, Stephen Strasburg, Gio Gonzalez – 2017 Stats Combined: 134 G, 129 GS, 810.1 IP, 9.7 K/9, 3.0 BB/9, 1.0 HR/9, 3.19 ERA, 21.6 WAR
Cleveland Indians – Corey Kluber, Carlos Carrasco, Trevor Bauer, Danny Salazar – 2017 Stats Combined: 142 G, 137 GS, 824.0 IP, 10.3 K/9, 2.2 BB/9, 1.1 HR/9, 3.64 ERA, 20.9 WAR
Houston Astros – Justin Verlander, Dallas Keuchel, Gerrit Cole, Charlie Morton – 2017 Stats Combined: 136 G, 136 GS, 820.0 IP, 9.2 K/9, 2.9 BB/9, 1.0 HR/9, 3.68 ERA, 17.6 WAR
Los Angeles Dodgers – Clayton Kershaw, Rich Hill, Alex Wood, Kenta Maeda – 2017 Stats Combined: 133 G, 126 GS, 724.0 IP, 9.6 K/9, 2.4 BB/9, 1.2 HR/9, 3.19 ERA, 17.9 WAR
Chicago Cubs – Jon Lester, Yu Darvish, Jose Quintana, Kyle Hendricks – 2017 Stats Combined: 152 G, 145 GS, 841.0 IP, 8.8 K/9, 3.2 BB/9, 1.2 HR/9, 4.01 ERA, 12.7 WAR
This is certainly where results and predictions separate. The 2017 results weren’t great for Cubs pitching, and the struggles of the pitching staff was widely spoken about. You can point fingers at a number of things; the way Joe Maddon managed them early on, natural decline after an amazing run, or the infamous World Series hangover. In any event, I think you can expect them to rebound and the Darvish and Chatwood acquisitions will prove to be tremendous upgrades.
Even with the improved staff, it is hard to predict them to be better than Washington’s rotation. I can make an argument that the Cubs staff is deeper than the Dodgers’ staff. They should leap CLevelands fivesome. I even think the Cubs have the potential to be better than Houston’s staff (with an assist from a World Series hangover of their own). The only staff I can’t predict the Cubs to better than is Washington’s. The top end of that rotation is so good it makes up for the bottom. The Cubs might be deeper, but the Nationals talent at the very top isn’t just so good.
In any event, I will put Jon Lester, Kyle Hendricks, Yu Darvish, and Jose Quintana up against any team’s rotation. Period.
