Bleacher Bums Forum

Both those balls off Happ's bat had a great sound.

It may be a tad premature to anoint Happ just yet.

Almora is hitless thus far in camp.  It would be pretty cool to have a good young switch-hitting leadoff man with power who plays center.

It also would be pretty cool to have one who can actually play center.

Heyward seems to be even worse. Guy is going to be an expensive fourth outfielder.

Heyward seems to be even worse. Guy is going to be an expensive fourth outfielder.

Who's the third?

Unless Zobrist rebounds more than he probably will, it's hard to imagine Heyward won't get most of the starts against RHP.  Even if Happ and Schwarber are basically everyday players, I doubt Almora starts ahead of Heyward against a lot of righties.

Who knows?  Maybe Heyward will hang in their over .250 average and a little north of .700 OPS, and will continue to play.  The computer projection on baseball ref has him hitting him .257 with .717 OPS. 

But computer projections have struggled with Heyward.  And Vander's comment was that Heyward looks even worse. 

This is baseball, so I think it's at least hypothetically **possible** that instead of the .250-Heyward, that we'll get something more like the playoff version, where he's a career .153 hitter (.458 OPS).  Built largely on his St. Louis season; with Cubs he's a .108 hitter.   His early spring (0.077) looks in keeping. 

I hope not, but probably have to acknowledge the *possibility* that he's going to be even worse than last year, and that he'll meritocracy his way to more bench time.  Who knows?   

Cubs live on MLBN tonight...

Ian Happ hit by a pitch to lead off the Cubs at Indians.  Len and JD are on the MLB Network and WGN local.