Lance Brozdowski on Cade Horton: 'This is his season' (Hour 4)
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Softly, and this is going to do it. Peter over to first, and that's the ball game. And the Nationals come into Wrigley and take two of three to open the season. Not the start to the year the Cubs will have won. No, no, not ideal.
It really is not ideal. This is Rahimi Harris and Grody. That is courtesy of Marquee Sports Network, Boog Shambi and Jim Deshaies, JD, on the call. And another Marquee employee who we always enjoy talking to joins us via Twitch, twitch.tv slash thescorechicago. And our hotline is Lance Brodzowski, Marquee Sports Network player development analyst, co-host of the Cubs Now podcast. I just think seam head, Lance. You love baseball on a level that is... That is impressive to those of us who love baseball.
I appreciate that. Thank you for having me. Hope you guys are good. It's warm today in Chicago. Oh, my God. Oh, we know.
We're excited.
Oh, yeah.
We're in a chilly studio. In the meantime, not only have you been analyzing, I think, some really great work you've been doing on your TikTok regarding pitches and mixes that a lot of the pitchers of the league are doing, you're also analyzing what you're seeing on the Cubs. What stood out to you after, unfortunately, going down 2-3 to the Nationals?
Cade Horton is the best pitcher on the staff. I said it preseason and I'm standing by it. I just think this is his season. The reason it's funny I liked him heading into the year is that I thought the strikeouts would tick up. Last year he was on a pitch count. He wasn't throwing like more than 80-ish, 85 pitches a start down the stretch. And as a result of that, he just pounded the zone and got a ton of outs. And he was incredibly effective. One of the best pitchers in baseball. My thesis was that he would lean into more whiff. But we didn't really see that in this Saturday's game where he threw against the Nationals. And I'm curious to see how he develops as a pitcher and whether that's something that he embraces more or whether we just see Wrigley wind blowing in.
He's throwing a bunch of foreseam. And as a result of that, he ends up carving through a lineup. But he has multiple paths that he can go down as a pitcher. He can embrace the wind blowing in and throw a bunch of fastball. And alternatively, I think there are going to be situations where he's on the road in a park that's maybe more advantageous for hitters where he can go and generate some whiff. So I love the malleability he has as a pitcher to be able to strike the ball, but also generate a ton of swing and miss.
Listen, I love that talk about Cade Horton because I think he is, without a doubt, the ace of the staff. Going to the other end of the spectrum, what we saw yesterday from Shota Imanaga, I would argue it's not as bad as everybody wants to make it out to be because guess what? The wind was blowing out at Wrigley. He's going to give up home runs. Craig Council understands what the story is. We should all understand what the story is. That being said, what did you make of his performance yesterday? And is this in line with what we should be expecting from Shota Imanaga?
Is it in line? Yeah, I mean, he's going to allow homers. Council said this in his postgame presser. I think that is who he is. These guys with these more vertical shapes that want to pound the zone as aggressively as he does are just going to run into barrels more often, and you're just really hoping the wind's blowing directly in from right field when he allows those barrels to righties. I'm encouraged by the velocity being back. We went through this dance all of last season where we were thinking that he could just command the ball better at 91% 90 and he would be fine I always just didn't believe that I thought there was some residual from the hamstring most of the time if someone's not telling you about an injury you can look at ball velocity or just raw bat speed we saw this with Kyle Tucker kind of back into the fact that he's not entirely healthy and we saw that what showed us so the fact that he was 92 is really encouraging to me that looks a lot more like 2024 I will point out to the ball that Joey Weimer hit it was the weekend of Joey Weimer for some reason I have no idea why
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Chapters
5 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:05–4:46
2
What insights does Lance Brozdowski provide about Cade Horton?
4:46–9:11
3
Why is Cade Horton considered the best pitcher on the Cubs staff?
9:11–11:19
4
How does Cade Horton's performance compare to last season?
11:19–19:17
5
What are the expectations for Edward Cabrera as a new Cubs pitcher?
19:17–42:19
Speakers
5 identifiedMore from Rahimi & Grote Show
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