Cubs season may be a fluke

So Memorial Day was a bit windy.
Other than that detail, Indiana residents couldn’t have asked for a much better extended weekend weather wise. It was often sunny, and high temperatures were in the high 70s and low 80s.
So it’s only natural that readers’ attention turned to the boys of summer. (And also to wondering why, as June approaches, “winter” sports are still being played.)
So we’ll bookend a basketball/hockey question with a pair about baseball. Here we go.
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The Cubs are over .500. Is this a fluke or are they an actual contender for a playoff spot?
—Adam Gray,
Fort Wayne

At this point, it looks like a bit of a fluke.
Often, a good gauge of how well a team is playing is its run differential rather than its won-lost record.
That’s good news for St. Louis and Kansas City fans, whose teams are not only leading their divisions but have outscored their opponents by more than 50 runs.
It’s also good news for Pittsburgh fans, because despite their 22-22 record the Pirates have outscored opponents by 28 runs this year. If that pattern continues, they’ll start winning more frequently sooner rather than later.
Meanwhile, 24-20 Chicago has scored just three more runs than its opponents, meaning its margin of error is much smaller. A few plays here or there, or one injury, could send the Cubs careening.
With St. Louis (29-16) and Pittsburgh in the same division, the Cubs are facing an uphill battle to the playoffs. But for some encouragement, read on.
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June will soon be here. The Stanley Cup Playoffs are not completed and the NBA Playoffs are not complete. Are the winter seasons too long?
—Phil Ford, Dunkirk
In a word, yes.
But the playoffs, in all sports, keep getting longer, not shorter. The reason is simple: money.
More games equals more ticket sales. More importantly, it means more televised games, which means more advertising revenue and thus much more lucrative deals for the broadcast rights.
There was a time when first-round series were best-of-three. The playoffs moved along a little more quickly then, ending in mid-May.
It was changed to best-of-5 in 1984, nudging the finals into June. In 2003, the NBA pushed all of its series to seven games.
Last season’s NBA Finals ended on June 12. The year before, it was June 20.
The same is true for the NHL, which in the 1970s completed its playoffs in May. Now, the Stanley Cup Finals don’t finish up until mid-to-late June.
We’ve also seen Major League Baseball expand its playoffs, now including five teams per league. And the NFL has been talking about adding a seventh playoff team per conference.
So while the seasons are too long, we’re unlikely to see the problem solved. Money talks.
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If you had to pick, which MLB starting rotation would you chose as the best so far this season?
—Nathan Miller,
Wanamaker
Remember, we’re talking starting rotations here, not the top two or three pitchers on each staff, and not relievers. And we’re talking about performance so far this season, not pedigree or projections.
Given that criteria, I narrowed the list down to five teams — the Rays, Angels, Cubs, Pirates and Cardinals. (Notice three are from the National League’s Central Division.)
There are ways to make the stats say any of those teams, and probably several others, have the best starting rotation in baseball.
For me, it’s the Cubs.
I take a couple of factors into account when evaluating pitching — how often a pitcher allows a runner to reach base and how often he strikes a hitter out. The first is an evaluation of effectiveness, the second a measure of dominance.
Chicago’s Jason Hammel, Jake Arrieta, Jon Lester, Kyle Hendricks and Travis Wood, who have made a combined 42 starts, have a WHIP (walks and hits per inning pitched) of 1.14.
And though none of them are special strikeout pitchers, all sit down at least seven batters per nine innings.
As a group, no one has been better. They are certainly pitching well enough for the Cubs to finish above .500 for the first time since 2009.
Playoffs? Maybe.