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Posted at 11:00 AM EST.

8:05 PM EST. The Cubbies are coming on again. After a somewhat stagnant start to the year perhaps due to a World Series hangover, Chicago has woke up by scoring seven runs or more in five of its last six games. John Lackey will make this start and he doesn’t need much of an introduction. Surely we're not going to question this old dog, who keeps sniffing out success wherever he goes. He throws strikes, gets whiffs (with additional swing and miss support), and limits baserunners. At some point the snarl will eclipse the stuff, but no signs of that yet. He’s a loyal and reliable old friend that we’re happy get behind here.

The real deal here is fading Ty Blach, who is one of the worst starters in the game. Blach’s horrible skills have been masked because 29 of the 35 innings he’s thrown this year have come at AT&T Park. Elton John could throw a good game at that park. Blach’s 4.15 ERA is by far the most misleading ERA in the game today. His xERA of 8.22 will very likely come out in full force here. Blach has a BB/K split of 10/11 in those 35 innings. His swing and miss rate is 4%. Blach is currently filling in for the injured Madison Bumgarner but given how poor his underlying skills have been, the window to fade him will run out as soon as the Giants get a healthy body back. With Blach’s extreme lack of strikeouts, his only hope is that balls are hit right at people but that’s a big time stretch at Wrigley with favorable hitting conditions. Blach is the type of pitcher that you might think could use more time in the minors, but at 26, he's already logged 328 IP at Triple-A. This stiff is no better than a pitching machine and must be faded.  

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