The Cubs certainly have exceeded expectations five weeks into the season. And that’s a difficult task considering they were nearly everybody’s pick to win the World Series. Sure it’s early, but Chicago is on pace to win 130 games and the Pirates couldn’t slow them when the clubs met last week.
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ODDS ANALYSIS
Many baseball pundits said the NL Central is the best, most competitive division in baseball. They may be correct in their assessment, but the Cubs are running away from their competition early in the year. Chicago held on to beat San Diego on Tuesday for their eighth straight win, improving their overall record to 25-6 for the best start by a major league club in over 30 years.
The Cubs have opened a big lead thanks to their 13-2 record against division foes. Included in that ledger is a three-game sweep in Pittsburgh just last week. Chicago outscored the Pirates 20-5 behind some dominant pitching to start their stretch of winning baseball. The teams played above the total in all three games and the over is 7-2 in Chicago’s last nine and 19-10-2 overall.
PROBABLE PITCHERS
Jeff Locke (1-2, 4.68 ERA) tossed a quality start but did not factor into the decision in Saturday’s loss to the Cardinals. He surrendered four hits, three earned runs and two walks over six innings while also striking out a batter. It was his third straight quality start following an outing in which the normally docile Padres touched him for 11 hits and eight earned in just three innings.
Locke has walked multiple batters in each of his six starts but has kept the hit total low in his last three, producing a 2.84 ERA in that span. The lefty hasn’t fared well in four career starts at Wrigley Field, going 0-1 with an 8.31 ERA and 2.08 WHIP across 17.1 innings.
Jason Hammel (4-0, 1.85 ERA) had his worst start of the season Saturday against Washington, giving up three earned runs on four hits in five innings. He wasn’t awful, but he wasn’t sharp, either. He walked four with three strikeouts throwing a season-high 97 pitches. The Cubs came back to win, taking him off the hook, but it was his second straight start in which he lasted just five innings.
After allowing just two runs over 24 innings of his first four outings, Hammel has been touched for five earned over 10 innings in his last two, raising his ERA to 1.85. Hammel tossed five innings giving up five hits and two runs in a 7-2 win at Pittsburgh on May 2. One of the hits was an Andrew McCutchen home run.
LIVE BETTING
The overall numbers aren’t all that impressive, but put runners in scoring position and Addison Russell becomes lethal at the dish. The young shortstop had two hits in Tuesday’s win over San Diego for the third straight game, extending his hitting streak to five games. He’s also hit safely in seven of eight to raise his average from .214 to .255.
More impressively is his clutch hitting. Russell is batting .361 and has 19 RBI’s when hitting with runners in scoring position. He’s equally competent with two outs and runners in scoring position, hitting at a .357 clip. As a team the Cubs have a .267 average but lead the majors in runs and have outscored their opponents by 103 runs.
QUICK PICK
It will be hard for the Cubbies to continue this pace for an entire season and don’t expect them to. But they are good and are doing what they need to early on. They got in the heads of the Pirates during a three-game sweep last week, outscoring the Buccos 20-5 and shutting them down at every turn. Not easy against one of the top baseball teams in the NL, and that proves to us just how potent the Cubs are.
Locke hasn’t had a lot of success throwing in the friendly confines, and some of those outings came against clubs not as lethal as the current version. It’s hard to imagine him shutting down the Cubs over the long haul.
MLB Odds: Chicago 5, Pittsburgh 3
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