ST. LOUIS — As the Chicago Cubs try to find the best ways to deploy left-hander Drew Smyly in the rotation, they have optimized matchups the last two turns through.
Twice Smyly was lined up to start against a right-handed-heavy St. Louis Cardinals lineup, and amid his struggles over his last two outings, the Cubs opted to start a righty and piggyback Smyly in relief. That meant reliever Michael Fulmer serving as a two-inning opener Saturday versus the Cardinals at Wrigley Field and Hayden Wesneski getting the call Friday at Busch Stadium.
The Cubs recalled Wesneski from Triple-A Iowa and optioned reliever Michael Rucker before the game.
“Trying to get the best pitchers as a whole, get our best arms up here,” manager David Ross said of the move. “He’s been throwing the ball really well and we’ve had some some taxing innings on the bullpen a little bit so, just giving (Michael) Fulmer or whoever we would have started today a little bit of a breather before we go to Drew.”
Wesneski on Friday gave up a leadoff home run to Cardinals left fielder Lars Nootbaar on the third pitch in the bottom of the first inning. It was the only run Wesneski allowed in his two innings before Smyly replaced him to start the third. Wesneski gave up two hits and one walk and struck out four Cardinals. Nootbaar also took Smyly deep to put the Cardinals up 2-0 in the third.
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Wesneski’s return to the Cubs came five days shy of the one-year anniversary of his trade from the New York Yankees organization. He pitched well in three starts for Iowa — two earned runs, two walks and 19 strikeouts in 11 innings — after getting sent down earlier this month.
Wesneski found consistency and was able to build back up to starter workload, tossing five clean innings in his last outing. He will need to be more effective versus lefties in his return to the majors, an issue that has burned him too often. Nootbaar’s homer Friday night was the 11th by a lefty off Wesneski in 16 big-league games this season.
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“The way we’ve played lately, it’s just important we get the best arms up here and that they can help us in any capacity we see fit,” Ross said.
Friday represented a chance for Smyly to end his tough stretch and get back on track. He owns a 6.89 ERA and 6.20 FIP over his last 10 games (nine starts) dating to May 28. The metrics on Smyly’s offspeed stuff remain really good, Ross said, but he needs to more consistently get ahead and be aggressive with his fastball in the zone so he can more effectively use his offspeed stuff.
“He’s not far off,” Ross said. “Had a little bit of bad luck here and there, some defensive miscues behind him, but it’s a long season. He had a really good start. Little bit of a rough patch.”
Over the last two months, only three off the 77 qualified big-league starters have been more unlucky than Smyly and his .348 batting average on balls in play (BABIP). It’s an underlying number that suggests Smyly’s bad luck will turn at some point. He had a career .287 BABIP coming into the season.
“When you’re looking at players and guys that you’re expecting to do better, you look at a lot of those luck metrics and things that are out of the norm, and he’s definitely a guy that’s in that category,” Ross said. “So you hope that continues to even out and show trust in that guy and realize, like, where are the areas where we can maybe be a little bit better and be on the attack?”