Javier Assad’s Incredible Night, Dramatic Development, Excited Teammates, and More

Aug 12, 2023

I’ll do the normal Bullets shortly, but once I started gathering things I wanted to say and share about last night’s starter, Javier Assad, I realized I had to give him his own set first …

Javier Assad, barely even on the prospecting radar to the hardcore folks just two years ago, has developed and pitched his way into being a part of – short-term or not – the rotation for a playoff-caliber team. There is now zero chance Assad doesn’t get at least one more start, regardless of anything else that happens in the rotation. You can’t have a guy do what he did last night against the Blue Jays, after being solid in his fill-in start last week, and not keep him going.

Javier Assad has allowed two runs or fewer in five straight starts dating back to Sept. 29, 2022.

FUEGO 🔥 pic.twitter.com/TZl5GaWp4e
— Chicago Cubs (@Cubs) August 12, 2023

Assad’s ERA is now down to 3.12 on the season, which is pretty wild considering where it started over his first handful of outings. Assad has thrown 35.0 innings since mid-June, and in that time his ERA is just 1.29. There is definitely some good luck baked into those results (.209 BABIP, 92.9% LOB), and that’ll probably have some natural regression. But consider that those 35.0 innings also came with a dramatically improved strikeout rate (21.5% versus 14.2% before mid-June), walk rate (9.6% versus 11.5%), and a nice improvement in his groundball rate, too (46.7% versus 43.9%). The guy’s barrel rate over this stretch has been a comical 3.2%. His success the last couple months has definitely not ALL been predicated on luck.

I think it’s tremendous how Assad is performing when he gets the chance for these longer looks. This is a guy who was always a starting pitcher, and was in the big league bullpen mostly because (1) there wasn’t an opening in the rotation to start the season, and (2) he’d looked too good in spring and in the WBC to send down to Iowa. It was never a foregone conclusion that Assad was going to be converted to a reliever permanently – his role(s) this year were always a matter of need and ability, with “opportunity” the only absent slice. I said it on the podcast yesterday: even as I wouldn’t argue that Drew Smyly was moved to the bullpen SPECIFICALLY to accommodate Assad in the rotation, I do think the opportunity to see Assad in that role for another start or three was a bonus factor.

I also think we’re seeing continued steps forward from Assad, who was initially thought of as maybe doing some later-inning, one-inning work, but then got moved into long relief, then briefly got sent down to stretch back out, then had to come back up to eat innings … that’s a lot of movement and transitioning for a guy. But as soon as he was put in a relatively consistent role – true long relief – the performance not only took off, but you were seeing things under the hood that directed that improved performance. He was refining the pitch mix. He was getting more movement on the sinker and the slider, and the cutter had become such a great weapon to steal strikes and generate poor contact. He was missing more bats. He was, somehow at age 25/26, becoming more projectable. We were witnessing a pitcher develop at the big league level. That’s how it looked to watch him, and increasingly it’s showing up in the numbers.

This happens, though! Sometimes I think we forget that players can and do develop during the course of a season. It doesn’t all take place in the offseason, to be captured by scouts and prospect lists. We’ve seen it most recently and most loudly with Christopher Morel the last two years, but I think we’re seeing it again with Javier Assad.

Now, that doesn’t mean Assad is now a lock to stay in the rotation and keep tossing quality starts the rest of the way. The samples here are still small, and even as I can better project performance for this version of Assad, he still doesn’t QUITE have the stuff of a guy you’d confidently say is a 3 or a 4. But I can and will loudly say that this is now a guy who has improved this season. There have been real changes in the quality of his stuff and his execution (and it’s not like he was starting from zero, either). I could not be more impressed by what he and the Cubs have been able to accomplish on the developmental side WHILE pitching in the big leagues in a kind of fill-in/bulk role. It’s what good players, and good organizations, are able to pull off.

David Ross on Assad (Tribune): “I don’t think much fazes him. He’s a quiet competitor for sure and has a lot of belief in himself. He never backs down from a challenge. He does a really nice job of going out there and competing with his best stuff. I’ve said that a lot about a lot of these guys, we’re wired the right way, like, just going to go in and give it his best and nothing seems to faze him as far as role shifting or any distractions. He has just been really good at anything you asked him to do.”

Javy’s teammates know how impressive and talented he is. From Nico Hoerner (Cubs.com): “I think just in the last six weeks you’ve seen him in every kind of situation there is, which you don’t see a lot of pitchers in baseball doing these days. And this isn’t just a guy filling innings. This is a guy who’s throwing 94 [mph] with command of five pitches. It’s a legit mix. Not at all surprised by what he did today, but it’s still impressive, for sure.”

"Just another great, great outing from him today."

Cody Bellinger on Javier Assad. pic.twitter.com/aKV3s58rnf
— Marquee Sports Network (@WatchMarquee) August 12, 2023

Cubbies W 🤌🏻🤌🏻🤌🏻🤌🏻 .. Javier Assad is a big dog .. good night cubs nation
— Adbert Alzolay (@adbert29) August 12, 2023

"He's one of the best pitchers in baseball."

Mark Leiter Jr. on Javier Assad. pic.twitter.com/7L7VL0qKju— Marquee Sports Network (@WatchMarquee) August 5, 2023

written by

Brett Taylor

Brett Taylor is the Lead Cubs Writer at Bleacher Nation, and you can find him on Twitter at @BleacherNation and on LinkedIn here. Brett is also the founder of Bleacher Nation, which opened up shop in 2008 as an independent blog about the Chicago Cubs. Later growing to incorporate coverage of other Chicago sports, Bleacher Nation is now one of the largest regional sports blogs on the web.

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