IGT 8/27 CHC vs NYM: The Team. The Time.

[seawolf17]

Marcus Stroman vs Yu Darvish tonight.



Darvish pitched against us in June at Wrigley; gave up homers to Conforto and McNeil and we beat Brad Brach (!) out of the pen.

Stroman last faced the Cubs in September 2014, and threw a complete game shutout.



Edge: Mets



Cubs vs Stro:

Castellanos 2-14, HR

Lucroy 4-5, 2B



Mets vs Darvish:

Conforto 2-9, HR

Rajai Davis 2-5, 2B

McNeil 1-3, HR

deGrom 1-1



Edge: Mets



Cubs last 10: 5-5

Cubs last 20: 10-10

Cubs last 30: 15-15



Mets last 10: 6-4

Mets last 20: 13-7

Mets last 30: 21-9



Edge: Mets



Mets home: 37-24

Cubs away: 25-39



Edge: Mets

[Vic Sage]

so your picking the Cubs, then, right?

[G-Fafif]

Amed Rosario – SS

Jeff McNeil – RF

Pete Alonso – 1B

Michael Conforto – CF

Wilson Ramos – C

J.D. Davis – LF

Joe Panik – 2B

Todd Frazier – 3B

Marcus Stroman – RHP

[Frayed Knot]

This series, though not as hyped or maybe as personal, really has a lot more 'Bigness' to it than the recent ones against Atlanta.

Beating the Braves would have been good because it would have brought the whole division closer, and it would have kept alive the slim hope of winning the East.

But to even have a hope of that we really needed to take four, or more likely five, of the recent six games. Obviously the 1-5 record squashed any thought of that.



So the attention turns solely towards the WC and the Cubs are thick in the middle of it. They're currently holding onto slot #2, four games behind the Nats for the top

slot but only 1.0 ahead of Philly, 2.0 up on us, 2.5 clear of the Brewers, with ARZ & SFG sitting 4.0 & 4.5 back. They're also now 3.0 full games in back of StL.

They're also not playing real well. Just got swept by the Nats by a combined score of 23-10. They're essentially a .500 team (36-35) since June 1 and their manager

who took them to their first WS in 458 years is without a contract beyond this year and no one seems in a hurry to do anything about that. Oh yeah, and their bullpen

stinks.



Injured (or otherwise not available):

Anthony Rizzo - not IL'd but a back issue definitely has him out of tonight's match. After that, he, like the rest of us, is day-to-day.

Wilson Contreras - Hammy. Victor Caratini-top and Jonathan Lucroy (cut by LAA then signed by sCrUBS 3 weeks ago) have been donning the tools in his absence

Derek Holland - the reliever just picked up at the deadline has since been picked up and put on a shelf

Brandon Morrow - singed to be the closer in winter '17-'18, hasn't pitched since July of '18

Ben Zobrist - left the team in the first week of May to deal with a divorce from his cheating whore (or so it has been hinted) of a Christian singer wife. New rumors suggest

that he may actually be back with the team by next week. No word on what (or who) she'll be doing next week.



We should see Kyle Hendricks (their best, even if not their best known/paid, pitcher) vs Syndergaard on Wednesday and then Jon Lester (four clunkers in his last five starts)

vs deGrom on Thursday. Both games scheduled for 1910 EDT

[Vic Sage]

with a groundball pitcher like stroman on the mound, frazier over lagares makes some small amount of sense.

[Edgy MD]

Interesting how that trade-off came into play so early.



A lot of hard-hit ballz in the second, including a triple by Conforto, but the goose egg prevails.

[Gwreck]

Leadoff triple against Cubs and failing to score the run? During a wild card chase? Going to trigger PTSD...

[Edgy MD]

Gotta chase Darvish here. And chase him with prejudice.

[kcmets]

This game kinda sucks. Just sayin' lol...

[Edgy MD]

Well, when watching the offense is waiting around for a solo homer to happen, which is the look the Mets are giving of late, things get to be a snore.

[Edgy MD]

Edgy MD wrote: Gotta chase Darvish here. And chase him with prejudice.

Going down meekly in order is, um ... well, that's a good Plan B.

[Edgy MD]

Nothing against Matzoh, but this game needs a little Sewald.

[Lefty Specialist]

The Team. The Time. The Faceplant.

[Edgy MD]

And Mazzanine proves me RIGHT!

[LWFS]

They'll thwack you if you leave the offspeed up

They'll thwack you if you leave a fastball down

They'll thwack you if you hang a slider in

They'll thwack you if you hang it out again

Poor Stroman shouldn't feel so damn attacked

Everybody will get thwacked

[G-Fafif]

The stirrups story alone is good for a half a Schaefer point for Mazza tonight.

[kcmets]

Three more outs and I think we can consider things thwacked!

[Edgy MD]

Here we go.

[Frayed Knot]

A thoroughly dispiriting game.

Perhaps not scoring after the Conforto triple should have been a sign.

[Edgy MD]

OK, J.D. Davis is cooperatin'.

[G-Fafif]

Fun parts. Inadequate sum.

[Fman99]

So far Stroman has been mostly pretty bad. I'm not impressed yet.