Chicago Cubs: Five ways that things could be worse

Chicago Cubs: Willson Contreras has led a high octane 2019 Cubs’ offense so far

The Cubs’ offense is pretty much nuclear right now (we had an off day on Sunday- it happens). They’re averaging 6.9 runs per game. (with one shutout and yesterday’s two spot factored in as well). They’ve already had four games where they’ve scored double-digit runs. That means nearly HALF of the games the Cubs have played so far this season have resulted in at least a 10 spot on the board. I’d say that the offense is not the problem at all. It’s also something to keep us all excited and give us a little bit of hope, at least a tiny morsel’s worth.

In the worst of all worlds, if things were really bad, wouldn’t our offense be broken too? I mean we could have the Cubs’ pitching and the Reds’ offense so far.

If the sky were genuinely falling, wouldn’t Kyle Schwarber, Jason Heyward, and Willson Contreras all look awful at the plate?

They don’t. The offense and just about everyone involved in the offense looks good. Sure, Kris Bryant and Albert Almora are scuffling a bit, but they haven’t been awful. Jason Heyward has grounded into five double play balls already this season, but he also hit three bombs in two games. Huh!?!? Yea, exactly. Heck, even Mark Zagunis looks like a world-beater at the plate, even if he looks like what people think Kyle Schwarber is in the outfield.

All told, there are 11 Cubs (including one pitcher in a really small sample size- big slugger, Jon Lester) who have an OPS higher than .786 after Sunday afternoon’s game (where almost all the numbers went down). Eight hitters are still higher than .874, and five hitters topped the magical 1.000 OPS mark. While this will be impossible to sustain, the success of the offense so far means things could be so much worse.