Chicago Cubs: Addison Russell coming alive in month of June

A forgettable start to the season

A historic 2016 postseason, capped by one of the greatest Game 7 performances in baseball history, led to unrealistic expectations this spring. The Cubs won 103 regular-season games last year – and fans fully expected them to, at the very least, match that total in 2017.

Chicago Cubs

That’s not exactly how things transpired.

Chicago finished April two games over .500. Russell did his part, driving in 14 runs with a .703 OPS. Not exactly eye-popping numbers, but if everyone else did their part, it’s enough to keep things moving in the right direction.

Then, May happened.

To say the wheels fell off is putting it mildly. Russell batted .162 with a sub-.300 on-base percentage. He struck out in 28 percent of his May at-bats, recording just five extra-base hits in the entire month.

Worst month of his career

Prior to this May, Russell had never batted under .200 at the big-league level in a full month.

With the team languishing, failing to capitalize on a weak National League Central, there were more questions than answers. Granted, Russell always received headlines for his glove more than his bat, but these were nightmares for Cubs fans.

Add in the fact he drove in 95 runs last year – the most ever for a Cubs shortstop not named Ernie Banks – and the Internet was ablaze with people ready to demote him, trade him – the works.