Everything went right for the Chicago Cubs last season in route to their first World Series title since 1908. They won a league-high 103 games during the regular season and ended their championship drought by beating the Cleveland Indians in a thrilling Game 7. This year, on the other hand, has not gone so well. The Cubs have been hovering around .500 for a while and currently find themselves looking up at the Milwaukee Brewers in the National League Central.
A lot of Cubs players have also seen their numbers drop across the board. Some have been minimal, while others have been total disasters. Let’s take a look at what you should do with these guys in fantasy.
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Out of all the struggling players on this team, nobody has been as bad as Schwarber. His average currently sits at .171 and he hasn’t been above the Mendoza line since April 30th. If you look at his game log, you’ll see a steady decline in average since the start of the season.
To start the season, Schwarber had both catcher and outfield eligibility. Having a fantasy catcher that doesn’t actually endure the physical toll of catching is a fantasy luxury. However, his average has sunk to the point where it’s not even beneficial to start him at catcher. That’s pretty bad when a player of this pedigree can’t even be relied on as a fantasy catcher. But that’s unfortunately where we’re at with him.
If you drafted Schwarber this spring, you’re probably trying to figure out what to do with him going forward. It’s tough to give up on a guy with this much power potential, but sometimes those moves have to be made to position yourself to win a fantasy championship.
When you look closely at his statistics, you’ll see that his walk and strikeout rates are almost exactly the same as his 2015 rookie season. The big difference this season is the contact he’s making. Overall his contact percentage is up 7% over 2015, but he’s making much softer contact this season.
In Schwarber’s rookie season, where he hit .246 with 16 home runs in 273 at-bats, he only made soft contact 15.4% of the time. This season, that has risen all the way to 21.8%. On the other end, his hard contact percentage has dropped 5% from 39.7% to 34.7%. That has a lot to do with his near 100 point drop in BABIP. It’s not so much that he’s been unlucky, it’s that he’s just been flat out bad this season.
That brings us back to the question, what do you do with him in fantasy? First off, find a new starting catcher for the time being and bench him. There are a few catchers, like Alex Avila and Tyler Flowers, that are probably free agents in your league and can provide much more for your team right now than Schwarber.
If you can find a trade partner that believes Schwarber can turn it around, I’d try and make a move. This horrific start isn’t going to turn around until he starts making better contact.
Over the past few seasons, there has been an invasion of talented young shortstops that have taken the fantasy world by storm. Unfortunately for Cubs fans and fantasy owners, Russell has not been one of them. Once regarded as a top five prospect, Russell has vastly underperformed expectations at the big league level. He’s currently hitting only .235 for his career and that average is trending in the wrong direction as he gets older. His current off-field issues, whether true or false, don’t help either.
When Russell was a prospect in the Oakland and Chicago farm systems, he was given 60 grades by MLB.com for both his hit tool and power potential. That power showed up some last season with 21 home runs, but that’s basically the only time it has surfaced. For a guy that many thought would have 25+ home run power annually, that hasn’t been the case so far. His 21 dingers and 95 RBI last season were nice but look less impressive when you see his mediocre .738 OPS. He has followed that up with only three homers so far this season to go along with a paltry .332 slugging percentage.
When you take a behind the scenes look at his advanced stats, the 21 home runs he hit in 2016 don’t add up. Russell doesn’t make consistently hard contact. Unlike his teammate above, he’s never made hard contact over 30% of the time in a major league season. In his first three seasons, his hard contact percentage has gone from 27.1 to 29.3 to only 22.9 so far this season.
At 23 years old it’s far too early to write him off in dynasty leagues. But if you play in a yearly redraft league, it might be time to cut ties if you can’t find a trade partner.
For a stretch in 2015, Arrieta was the best pitcher in baseball. He was even better than Clayton Kershaw which isn’t something that can be said too often. The last year and a half, however, haven’t gone as well for the veteran right-hander. He certainly hasn’t been bad, but it’s fair to say he hasn’t pitched as well as fantasy owners had hoped. Before the 2016 All-Star break, Arrieta’s ERA was a cool 2.68. After the break, it rose over a full run to 3.69. The second-half struggles have carried over to this season and then some, as his ERA currently sits at 4.46.
The drop in his fastball velocity might have something to do with the poor results. During his spectacular 2015 season, Arrieta’s average fastball velocity was 94.6 MPH. That dropped to 93.7 in 2016 and 92.1 MPH this season. His cut fastball has seen an even greater drop at 3 MPH over the same time period. Arrieta is only 31 so it’s doubtful he’s starting to break down yet, but something doesn’t seem right.
This isn’t the demise of Arrieta, but it’s probably about time we start valuing him a little lower. The Arrieta of 2015 isn’t walking through that door to be your fantasy ace again, but if you rely on him to be your No. 2 or No. 3 fantasy starter, you should be happy in the end. If you own him in fantasy, stand pat. The results should start to get better. Even with the lower velocity, Arrieta still has pretty darn good stuff and knows how to use it.
Quick Notes
Anthony Rizzo (1B – CHC)
Don’t fret the low .247 average for Rizzo. He started off slowly and has really picked it up of late. His average is .293 over the last 30 days and should continue to climb. He’ll be fine.
Javier Baez (2B – CHC)
Until he gets a full-time gig, this is what Javier Baez is going to always be. He does well when he plays but the stats will always fall short with the lower number of at-bats that he receives.
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Eric Cross is a featured writer at FantasyPros. For more from Eric, check out his archive and follow him @EricCross04.
