Full Transcript for Cubs news and notes: Ben Brown steps up, Liam Hendriks’ comeback and more

00:00:05 Speaker 1: Welcome into Northside Territory. Foul Territory Networks. Cubs podcast. I forgot what I was doing there. I'm I'm Sharma with my. 00:00:16 Speaker 2: Illinois Hoops Illinois Hoops podcast. 00:00:18 Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, yeah, I wasn't sure what we were talking about. Patrick. The Cubs salvaged a game out in Atlanta. They were struggling a little bit for a while, got shut down by some good pitching. Uh just scuffled in general on offense. But I think, you know, we we've talked about this offense comes and goes. The pitching showday, Minaga remains brilliant. Ben Brown. I mean, I there's there's watching him, there's looking at the numbers, there's the stuff. It seems like it's all coming together. I know it was only four we still need the full test of turnover a lineup three times, but right now his return to the rotation is just I mean, it's going so well, and it's coming at a time where the Cubs desperately need someone to step up in the rotation. Like I said, Showeda's been there all season. But this is a guy that you know, we've talked about for a couple of years now, you know, I believe if I'm remembering correctly, he started in the rotation last year and it didn't go so well and he got moved out, and he's been a huge piece of the bullpen. I mean, I was a little cautious about this, like, ed, do you want to move a guy that's so important to the bullpen? Right now? It's working out so well that I don't think you can really question it. 00:01:51 Speaker 2: And understandably skeptical and this not everyone gets this many chances. And I think Ben Brown was kind of the classic spring training story because he's a really friendly dude, and he's extremely articulate, and he looks the part, and he does have a lot of backers in the organization, so you knew that they would kind of give him some runway. He just didn't know exactly what form or shape it would take. And you know, everyone's optimistic in Arizona. You know it's sunny. It was certainly hot this year, but it's usually you know, perfect perfect weather, perfect setting, working on stuff. Had a great offseason, but to his credit, he really applied everything and he would say that it took all of these experiences to get him to this point where, yeah, I mean he's awesome, and I think because he's had these stops and starts, we can't get too far ahead of ourselves. But this is also like what great seasons take of guys doing sort of unexpected things or overperforming, and he has certainly been a stabilizing force that they needed. 00:03:14 Speaker 1: Like I said, I want to see him turn over a lineup one more time, go get through the lineup a third time. That's not because he hasn't been doing well enough to do that. It's because you know, he isn't built up yet to do that. My guess is we're pretty close to seeing him do that as assuming he sticks in the rotation. But right now there's some things that look I don't know what came first. Did the confidence come first, or did the did the development of the other two pitches come and then that led to confidence? Probably it's kind of like it came together. He needed to get his head on straight and really like shake off any bad moments. There have been times where I'm like, huh, there's a walk and then a double is he going to fall apart? And he hasn't done that yet. We have not seen that the sinker is being used. I want to say, like twenty percent of the time, when last year his third pitch was used was a change up and was used less than five percent of the time. So he's using the change up more. It's over six percent now, and he's using the sinker twenty one point three percent, and then the four seam in the knuckler obviously he's go to knuckle curve is Obviously he's go to his go to pitches Era one point six whip at point eighty six. Like, the strikeout rate is high, the walk rate is low. Here's the biggest thing for me. He's missing barrels like he's not like he always struck guys out in he limited walks. What would happen is second or third time two through they were just sat on a pitch and then they hammered it. Now they can't do that anymore, and the hard contact is way down and that's leading to the confidence being way high. The results are awesome. Like you said, he's always had like supporters in the ORG, there's always been like this, Oh, if he can just figure it out, like he's got this nasty breaking ball. His velocity is actually up right now. That could be because he's been coming out of the bullpen, so we'll see how it is as he goes when they push him to six innings and whatnot. But this is this is a pretty big development for this year, and it feels like it's a potentially big development for the future of the team. We've talked about this a lot a lot of guys coming off of the books as far as starting rotation pieces. Matthew Boyd showed him Monaga Jamison ty Own those are right now the guy like, you know, two of those guys are holding things down and showed Jameson Tyon if you don't have them, like what where does this rotation? What does this rotation look like right now? Right? So huge pieces are are likely hitting agency and potentially leaving. This is a big development, especially with Jackson Wiggins hurt and you just don't know what his future is. You'd have loved to see him kind of take steps in the minors. That's not happening right now, so you need another piece of the and Kate Horton's hurt, so like there's no like future to hold on to when it comes to this rotation. So Ben Brown developing is just such a huge turn of events and kudos to him for really diving into what he needed to do in the off season and and he he came with a plan and he executed that plan, and it got some help from I believe Clay Holmes, and they they work together. And he doesn't have the same sinker. It doesn't sound like, but you know, I think how he uses it mentality that a lot of that stuff Clay Holmes helped with, and he's taking off. I mean, I don't know what we're