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BN Chicago Cubs The Morel Foul Ball, Madrigal’s....

The Morel Foul Ball, Madrigal’s D, Busch Heads Up, Langford Respect, and Other Cubs Bullets

Brett Taylor Brett Taylor
Mar 29, 2024
Chicago Cubs

Ah, now the obligatory off-day after Opening Day. And an Opening Day loss no less, which always makes today that much better, right …

  • You could hang on so many things from the opening loss – one-run losses in heavily-scrutinized games will ALWAYS have multiple could-have-beens and should-have-beens – but the one I’ll probably remember most from this one is the 10th inning Christopher Morel foul ball that missed being a grand slam by a few feet:

  • That’s the kind of play that does two things for me: (1) Drives me freaking crazy that it couldn’t just have gone the other way to turn a loss into a win; and (2) reminds me that a single close game can never establish the true talent of a baseball team. It’s not like that ball glancing off a bug halfway in its trajectory, shifting it a degree to the right and sending it into the foul pole, would somehow suddenly mean the Cubs are great. That was a coin flip game. Cubs called heads and it came up tails.

  • After Morel popped out, by the way, David Robertson, a former Cub, was over there at first base to greet Morel and (I suspect) say, yeah, you almost got me.

  • The Cubs were making a whole lot of hard contact on Nathan Eovaldi early, but they weren’t finding grass. That’ll happen, of course, and it’s better to be hitting it hard than not. Seiya Suzuki, Cody Bellinger, and Dansby Swanson in particular all had multiple really well-struck balls that turned into outs.

  • Speaking of which, Cody Bellinger’s xSLG in the game was .543, so he’s clearly getting a head start on shutting down that conversation this year.

  • The first Rangers run came by way of a Nick Madrigal not-scored-an-error-butttttt situation at third base (which preceded a sac fly). Very hard grounder, but a play that he’s in there to make. I am of course not going to pounce on one single play, but generally speaking, he has to make some tough plays (and all routine plays) at third base to justify his spot in games when Christopher Morel is at DH (and raking). We had a suspicion this is how those two spots would shake out on days both were in the game (and with a groundball lefty on the mound for the Cubs, facing a righty-heavy lineup, I do get it), but, again, it only works or makes sense if Madrigal’s defense is WAAAAY better than Morel’s. Otherwise, you’re sitting – for example – Mike Tauchman against a righty for nothing.

  • Everything about Michael Busch’s scoring play to give the Cubs the lead in the 9th was so impressive, from his good speed to his situational awareness to his mental calculation of distances to the fact that he wasn’t going to stop going just because there was a CHANCE it was a foul ball:

  • As he described it to the Tribune: “I tried to follow the ball all the way and saw a separation between the catcher (Heim) and the ball and I saw him talking to the umpire and I didn’t know if it was a foul ball or not or what they call it. The umpire wasn’t doing much so I just went for it.” Exactly what you should be doing.

  • The Cubs were showing Wyatt Langford some respect in the 8th, with the lead run on second base and Hector Neris nibbling. Then, once it got to 3-0, Craig Counsell was screaming to just go with the intentional walk – he wound up having to get Madrigal to sprint over toward the pitcher so Neris would step off. Good that they found a way to get that sign in to Neris – he got the next batter to end the inning – but it’s not only a rookie, it’s a rookie on Opening Day like EIGHT MONTHS AFTER HE WAS DRAFTED. Langford is a freak, and everyone knows it.

  • Truly, baseball is back:

  • I love Willie Harris. Dives out of the way of a foul ball, has some fun with it:

  • Listen, I hate that it happened and I’m certainly not celebrating a Yency Almonte sweeper that didn’t sweep, but it’s hard not to appreciate *IN ISOLATION* how much Adolis Garcia enjoys himself in big moments:

  • Home and kitchen gear are among your Deals of the Day at Amazon today. #ad

  • Matt Szczur, extremely fun and extremely talented:

  • Miles Mikolas wound up giving up 5 ER on 7 H (2 HR) and 2 BB over 4.1 innings:

  • The new Orioles owners are already making fans:

  • Really love this:

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    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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