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CHICAGO – After the Cubs' 10-0 win over the Pirates in their home opener in 2019, Chicago starter Jon Lester was questioned over Clint Hurdle's decision in the second run of Jason Heyward's run with the first goal open to face him. "You do not want?" Lester joked.
Lester, famous for his stickless punch after jumping from the DH league to the Cubs before the 2015 season, doubled on a 0-2 slider from Jameson Taillon who was floating in the area for too long:
A hitter later, Lester – now hitting .667 – slipped home on a blow hit by Ben Zobrist, but not before hitting the hamstring. Such is the occasional punishment of a pitcher who deigns to venture on the basics.
Lester took the mound to start the third inning, but after his first two throws, his coach Joe Maddon went on the mound. Maddon said after the match that Lester had convinced him to stay. "He was trying to protect the paddock," said Maddon. After Lester's next three throws, however, Maddon saw enough and lifted it for reliever Brad Brach.
Although the Cubs entered the game with a scary club of 7.51 for the season, Lester posted a 2.57 mark after three starts. Needless to say, his loss for a while would be a blow to the Cubs. The good news is that it is not an arm injury, but that hamstring injuries can be slow to heal. The Cubs and Lester hope of course that it is a minor illness.
The team and the pitcher will know more on Tuesday, when the veteran southpaw will undergo an MRI. A positive sign is that Lester after the match did not declare at any time that he was suffering significantly. He compared his injury to a cramp and pointed out that he felt nothing like a "pop" at the bottom of his hamstring. Lester explained that he had changed his hamstrings by running – about the time he reached the third base – and not on the somewhat awkward slide in the plate. Lester also said that he felt no discomfort when launching the third – "rather a mental thing," he called, "not letting me go to the back."
He plans to make his next scheduled departure, at least until he hears otherwise. "Everyone from workout always thinks the worst of scenarios, but I do not think so."
As far as Maddon is concerned, the disappointment after seeing his trump from leaving early with his injury was that Lester looked so good on Monday. "It's the best he's launched all year," said Maddon about Lester's first two innings. "He was up 92, 93, great on the fastball, the cutter was good, you could see by observing that he had great confidence there." He was about to To be really hot. "
If there is one benefit to this, it is that the Cubs' enclosure has entered the breach with a level of efficiency that had escaped them until then. "The good thing is that the office comes in and picks me up," Lester said. "It's huge – it's an unfortunate place in which I put them, but they went looking for our guys today."
The Chicago Rescue Corps entered Monday with an EER of 8.37 and 26 unintentional rides and eight home runs allowed in 33 1/3 innings. All this has given an opponent's strike line of .296 / .409 / .563, which is simply disastrous. On Monday, however, Brach dropped to a brace in the third, and Brandon Kintzler, Randy Rosario and Pedro Strop combined their efforts to complete seven innings with eight strikeouts over two goals. Of course, these were usually low-debt outs compared to a formation that had struggled in 2019, but the Cubs will be optimistic about prevention this season. "I want to believe that an afternoon like today will help build the trust they so badly need," Maddon said.
Now, the Cubs, 1-0 at home and 2-7 everywhere else, are advancing with the rise of some clean innings, but the uncertainty surrounding their spin stabilizer. For the 2019 Cubs, "hey, it's not so bad" is considered good news. The challenge now is to take advantage of it and bring back Lester, to get inspiring outs and hosannas from his manager.
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