Daniel Palencia gets vote of confidence amid spate of shaky outings

Despite the Chicago Cubs showing up and showing out this week against the Milwaukee Brewers, the team as a whole has struggled mightily since the All-Star break. The offense has gotten most of the headlines thanks to power outages from Kyle Tucker and several other hitters. However, members of the offense aren't the only ones who have struggled. Closer Daniel Palencia has hit a rough patch this month as well.

That rough patch continued on Wednesday night, when the Cubs handed Palencia a 4-2 lead in the ninth inning. However, he allowed one run on two hits and two walks and escaped the game with his 18th save on the season in large part thanks to a fantastic catch of a line drive by Nico Hoerner. In all, Palencia has allowed a run in four of his last seven outings and has an ERA of 5.14 in his last seven games. Despite the rough patch, Tommy Hottovy gave the closer a vote of confidence on Thursday morning.

Chicago Cubs pitching coach still believes in Daniel Palencia as closer

Appearing on 670 The Score, the Chicago Cubs' pitching coach was asked what the trust level in Palencia is at the moment and he didn't hesitate to say it's still where it should be.

"I think it's still high. Danny's done such a great job this season in some big moments. He's earned that closer role for a reason."

Hottovy did admit that there are things they'd like to see Palencia clean up, though at the moment, it's not an issue they're pressing, and expect him to just work out of it as the year goes on.

"The one thing for Danny that we've seen over the course of year is his willingness to attack the strike zone. If there's anything that's kind of waivered over the last two weeks, you've seen some of the walks pick up ... But those are all things that we've identified with Danny. And also, you know, with him not feeling great under the weather and some things that we didn't really want to, like, you know, hammer him about too much ... we've seen him have nine-pitch saves with weak contact, too. So, you know, you don't want him, overthinking things out there, especially mechanically." "

At the moment, it's clear there isn't any plan to replace Daniel Palencia as the Chicago Cubs closer. However, as the playoff race continues into September, he'll need to clean things up or the team will need to reexamine its confidence in him to do the job.