NLDS Game 3 Recap

Here’s some notes on last night’s game. Definitely a wild one, but certainly enough to build off as the Cubs look to take the series tonight 3-1. Preview/scouting report on the pitching matchups will be coming later.

The Good

1. KB went 3 for 5 with a double, single, walk and obviously this:

1b. And since you could probably use a pick-me-up after the impending heartbreak, here’s a perfect Yabo call in its native Español.

2. Which is obviously the most exciting Yabo in a Cubs’ uniform since Sosa v. Marlins (2003).

3. Also not a bad time to tip your cap to KB’s bone structure rounding second.

Heroes can get remembered. Legends may never die. But a jaw/cheek bone combo like that will get you laid forever with or without October Yabos.

4.  On a slightly more serious note, Bryant is now 5 for 12 in the series with a walk, 2 doubles, and last night’s homerun. Now, obviously he took a huge step this year from budding-superstar to bonafide-superstar. But it’s also nice to see that transition continue into October. Small sample size? No question. But 2016 October Kris Bryant is off to a tremendous start and that’s exactly what you want to see from the league’s odds-on-favorite MVP candidate. (Positive sidenote unrelated to NLDS: KB is -300 to win NL MVP with Daniel Murphy and Nolan Arenado trailing at +300 and +600 respectively.)

5. Arrieta looked fairly solid over 6 innings. Turning in a quality start on the road against a Giants’ team facing elimination on the heels of winning 11 straight playoff series is pretty impressive. So kudos to Jake for going toe-to-toe with Bumgarner on his turf. Also, kudos to Jake for giving himself a 3 run lead with his bat. For those keeping track at home, that made it 6 straight runs in this series produced by Cubs’ pitchers.

6. Almora’s catch in the 9th inning against Buster Posey was nothing short of remarkable. Unfortunately, he had a chance to make a very similar play in the 8th on Conor Gillaspie’s triple and came up just short. Here’s a great video that breaks down the differences in the plays.

I love that he comes back and makes this play in the 9th. I know we lost and I know he could have pulled a rabbit out of his ass to save the game in the 8th. But in the long run, this is the guy patrolling centerfield for the Cubs. It’s important for him to be involved both positively and (quasi) negatively this early in his career. So that’s good, I suppose.

7. Big props to Mike Montgomery for stepping up in extras last night and keeping the team in it. Obviously he wasn’t going to be perfect, but you can’t ask for much more from the last arm in your NLDS bullpen.

8. I’m really starting to reach here on positives from last night, so I’ll close this part with one final good note = the Giants played just about as well as they can possibly play… Every player in their starting lineup not named Gregor Blanco recorded a hit. Posey went 3 for 5 with a walk, run, rbi and then again the lineout above. Joe Panik – a guy who slashed .239/.315/.379 over 526 plate appearances this year – went 3-4 with a double and 2 walks. Conor Gillaspie, a player who records a league average 7.8% extra-base-hits-per-at-bat came up huge AGAIN with an XBH in the 8th inning to give the team a lead. Then defensively, the Giants got 6 scoreless innings from relievers Derek Law, Hunter Strickland, Will Smith and Ty Blach. Rizzo went 0-6 with 2 strikeouts on 21 pitches.  Zobrist went 1-5 on 18 pitches. The outfield platoon of Soler/Heyward/Almora went 0-6 with 2 strikeouts. The catching platoon of Montero/Contreras/Ross went 1-6. Then of course on top of all of this, Aroldis blew a save.

And you know what? The Cubs almost won the game and series. Despite all of that, the Cubs almost beat the unbeatable Madison Bumgarner in an elimination game in his backyard. Simply remarkable just how much it takes to beat this Cubs team.

The Bad and Ugly

1. I allude to some of this above but simply put, you cannot let guys like Joe Panik and Conor Gillaspie show up in big moments. You just can’t. These are replacement level players, and the fact that they’re showing up to game 4 with confidence makes me puke. It doesn’t make me want to puke. It legitimately has caused me to vomit.

2. Addison is 1-12 to start the series and he’s 3 for his last 63. He took pitches and battled deep into counts last night, but realistically that’s not his game. At least not yet in his career. He needs to stay in attack mode regardless of the slump. He just doesn’t have the experience or the demonstrated ability to try and work deep counts over and over so I’d like to see him get in there with a very aggressive purpose like we have most of the year.

3. On the opposite side of the spectrum is Rizzo, who is now being more aggressive than I have seen since 2012. He’s 0-13 without a walk. Of the 13 AB’s, he’s only put the ball in play while ahead in the count twice – once on a 3-2 count and another on an 1-0 count. Given that he hits .340 ahead in the count, we’d like to see more opportunities for him to get to 1-0. The reality, however, is that the Giants realize he’s so much more deadly when he’s ahead in the count, so they’ve done a good job of attacking him early with quality strikes. The surprising part is that Rizzo has seemingly allowed the Giants to expand the zone on him once they do get ahead with strike one, and he’s swinging at pitches that you literally never see him go after. Maybe it’s  the pressure. Maybe it’s trying to do too much. Maybe it’s just a small sample size. Whatever the case, we need Rizzo to step up and take control of his at bats from here on out.

@barstoolcarl