Nats Nation breathes a sigh of relief; it was just a cramp. Or was it? Photo via thesportsquotient.com
Warning: lots of judgments based on short sample sizes and possibly not taking into account other factors that may have been in play during 3- and 4-game series, which are in reality a small fraction of a season. And yes I know, past performance is no indicator of future performance. Just read and stop being a buzz-kill will ya? 🙂
So, we’ve known for a while that we were going to face the Cubs in the NLDS. But now its official. So lets peek back at our two series against them this year to see how our guys matched up to see if there’s any places to keep an eye on. On a macro level, we took the season series from the Cubs 4-3, outscoring them 39-28 in the process. We split four games at home in June, then took 2 of 3 against them on the road in August.
Nats Starters: Here’s how our playoff starters fared against the Cubs this year:
- Max Scherzer went 6, gave up 2 hits and a run with a victory over Chicago at home in June. That sounds pretty good.
- Stephen Strasburg went 7, punched out 13 (!) and gave up 3 runs (2 earned) in a home victory in June. I’ll take that.
- Gio Gonzalez went 6, gave up just two hits (good) but walked 5 (bad) , managed to give up just one run (good) and was an unlucky loser in the June home series.
- Tanner Roark went 6+, gave up 2 runs on 5 hits and took a loss in Chicago in August. Not bad.
- The other three starts against the Cubs were Joe Ross in June, Edwin Jackson in August and Erick Fedde in August, so the Cubs have only seen our starters once each this year.
So, all four of our starters basically had quality starts against the Cubs this year. That sounds promising. No red flags. We’ll ignore the fact that both Gio and Roark got bombed on the season’s closing day. Maybe they were hung over.
Cubs Starters: How did Chicago’s presumed playoff rotation fare against us?
- Jon Lester went 6, gave up 3 hits and a run in a no-decision in the June finale. Tough.
- Lester threw another QS in August, going 6 2/3rds, giving up 3 runs on 6 hits and getting a ND against Fedde. Not bad.
- Jake Arrieta was super-wild, walking 6 in 4 innings and taking the loss against Scherzer in June. Uncharacteristic performance.
- Kyle Hendricks went 7, giving up 3 runs on 5 hits and took a loss against Roark in the August series. About what you’d want out of a 3rd starter.
- Jose Quintana was a mid-season acquisition and did not pitch against us this year.
- The other starts against us were thrown by Eddie Butler (who hails from Chesapeake, went to power-house Greenbrier Christian and was a 1st rounder out of Radford a few years back) and Jon Lackey (twice).
So, Lester was solid against us twice, Arrieta had an uncharacteristic struggle, and Hendricks was good but not dominant. Quintana has thrown to a 3.74 ERA in his 14 starts, good but not lights out. I have no idea how they’ll line up for the playoffs but think it may be as they’re listed above (maybe Quintana is #3 and Hendricks is #4). It does look like Lackey is odd-man out of the Chicago rotation, which should be a fun conversation with their manager.
Summary: I like how our Starting Pitching lines up frankly; Scherzer is Scherzer, Strasburg has been unhittable for two months, and Gonzalez has been sneaky good all year. Gonzalez and Roark project to pitch in Chicago … but Gio’s away splits are pretty good this year (11-5 with a 3.12 ERA).
Nats Hitters; here’s how some of our key hitters have fared against Chicago starters in their career (thanks to the wonderful baseball-reference.com per-Pitcher stats):
- Bryce Harper is 1-7 against Lester, 4-14 against Arrieta, 4-13 against Hendricks and has never faced Quintana. At least his one hit against Lester was a dong.
- Daniel Murphy is 4-14 against Lester, 6-19 against Arrieta, 4-15 against Hendricks and also has never faced Quintana. Better.
- Ryan Zimmerman is 2-16 against Lester, 5-21 against Arrieta, 0-9 against Hendricks and has also never faced Quintana. Might be a rough series for Zim.
- Trea Turner is 1-2 against Lester, 1-2 against Arrieta, and has never faced either Hendricks or Quintana. Not much to go on here.
- Jayson Werth is 2-4 against Lester, 2-9 against Arrieta, 0-3 against Hendricks and has never faced Quintana. About what you’d expect.
- Anthony Rendon is 1-5 against Lester, 4-11 against Arrieta, 2-11 against Hendricks and has never faced Quintana. Not bad.
I didn’t bother looking up Wieters or Taylor numbers because I expect little from them this off-season; anything they contribute is gravy. Our 1-6 hitters need to make it happen.
Cubs Hitters; here’s the same analysis against our guys for Cubs key hitters (career figures):
- Kris Bryant is 1-10 against Max, 2-5 against Stras, 2-10 against Gio and a strong 5-11 against Roark. Might be an interesting series for the defending NL MVP.
- Anthony Rizzo is 3-10 against Max, 2-13 against Stras, 2-22 against Gio and 4-18 against Roark. Clearly the lefty and Roark’s swing-back fastball is effective against him.
- Willson Contreras has never faced Scherzer, is 1-3 against Strasburg, 1-2 against Gio, 1-3 against Roark. Almost no history go go on.
- Javier Baez is 0-5 vs Max, 0-6 against Stras, 0-6 against Gio and 1-3 against Roark. Not a lot of success here for Baez.
- Kyle Schwarber has just two ABs against any of our starters, going 1-2 in a game against Roark.
I’m not entirely sure that Schwarber will play (he had 30 homers but an awful BA), nor Baez (since the Cubs have Ben Zobrist). But these are the key bats for the Cubs and there’s not a ton to go on. It seems like Bryant will be a handful, Rizzo may be an issue against some of our guys, and the rest of the squad could hit or miss (which, perhaps, is what you’d say also having not seen any of these stats).
So how does it look overall? I like our chances, honestly. I don’t like how Harper has looked since his “return” so that’s a huge worry, but I like our chances with the Cubs having to beat Scherzer twice and Strasburg once in a short series, and I like Gio going against the power hitting lefties in Chicago’s lineup. I like our revamped bullpen, especially if we never have to depend on the 5th and 6th guy out of it.
It comes down to this injury scare at this point; is Scherzer going to be ok? Can the Nats survive if Scherzer is out and we’re forced to give a playoff start to Jackson?
Assuming Scherzer is ok, Nats in 5.