NLCS 2015: Joe Maddon's 'psychobabble' not likely to help sinking Cubs

Bob Klapisch

NLCS 2015: Joe Maddon's 'psychobabble' not likely to help sinking Cubs image

NEW YORK — The Cubs want you to believe there are still a few hidden weapons at their disposal, that the NL Championship Series isn’t lost yet. Manager Joe Maddon speaks passionately about coming home to Wrigley and how everything could change in the next 24 hours. He’s smart. He’s persuasive. He’s usually easy to believe.

But not this time.

MORE: Keys to NLCS Game 2 | Best NLCS photos | Syndergaard sizzles | Five takeaways from Game 2

The Cubs are halfway to being hoisted straight out of October after a 4-1 loss to the Mets on Sunday night. What was supposed to be a magic carpet right straight to the World Series, footsteps leading to the first championship in more than a century, is close to being vaporized.

Why? Because the Cubs, down 0-2, have run into the same locomotive the Dodgers did in the Division Series: too much velocity from the Mets’ starters, too many clutch from their hitters and way too much Daniel Murphy, who hit his fourth home in his past four postseason games.

No wonder the Mets are talking about destiny — theirs, not the Cubs’. And with all due to respect to a team that won 97 regular-season games, the Mets have every reason to believe this series is just about over.

As David Wright said, “to have that advantage at home and to be able to take care of business like that — that’s huge. Hopefully we can keep that momentum going in Chicago.”

Among the nuggets to consider with Game 3 just around the corner: The Mets will unleash their best starter, Jacob deGrom, against Kyle Hendricks, the weakest link in the Cubs’ rotation. And even with the next three games at Wrigley, the Mets have been beasts on the road, winning 31 of their past 45 away from Flushing.

The Mets don’t have to look any further than their epic victory over LA in Game 5 of the Division Series. They had everything going against them — a huge, pro-Dodger crowd at Chavez Ravine, Zack Greinke’s slider, the memory of having blown a chance to close out the Western Division champs at home in Game 4.

And yet, deGrom prevailed again, emerging from that Series as a cult hero in New York. He beat Kershaw and Greinke in less than a week, which is why it’s hard to envision a loss to Hendricks.

One more nugget to process: The Met are on such a roll, they effectively beat Jake Arrieta in just three swings in the first inning.

Curtis Granderson: sharp single to right.

Wright: massive double over Dexter Fowler’s head in center.

Murphy: home run just inside the right field foul pole.

Maddon wasn’t exaggerating when he said, “that was the game right there. It was really hard to recover from that.”

The Cubs never expected Arrieta to go down that fast, that hard. He didn’t pitch particularly well against the Cardinals in the Division Series, but still: He was a 22-game winner and was 11-0 with an 0.41 ERA down the stretch after Aug. 4.

Arrieta was supposed to dress the leftover wound from Game 1, when Jon Lester was supposed to handle Matt Harvey. But that didn’t happen, and when the Mets were suddenly leading 3-0 after just three batters in Game 2, you can bet the Cubs knew they were cooked.

That’s because it was 45 degrees and windy, turning every at-bat against Noah Syndergaard into a personal hell. He came out throwing 99 mph, and if the cold wasn’t enough to stop the Cubs in the tracks, the advanced metrics said they were cooked, too.

According to the research from ESPN.com, the Cubs are among the NL’s most vulnerable to elite velocity.

They hit .229 in at-bats ending in a pitch 94 mph or greater, last in the NL.

No team in the NL swung and missed more often (24.0 percent) at pitches of that velocity.

Only two NL teams (Braves, Rockies) posted a higher pop-up rate on high velocities than the Cubs.

DeGrom was throwing 95-96 against LA, which is very bad news for Chicago. Yet, Maddon was doing his best to channel his inner Zen.

“We're all about one-game winning streaks, very seriously,” he said. “I really preach daily the one-day-at-a-time approach. I know it's Psychobabble 101, but it actually works. So all I'm concerned about is the next game.”

What Maddon understandably ignores is how the Mets are beating the Cubs at every critical juncture. Such as: Curtis Granderson’s perfect leap at the wall, a symphony of timing and geometry, that robbed Chris Coughlan of a home run.

Or Jon Niese arriving in the sixth inning, just as the Cubs had finally broken through against Syndergaard, to strike out Anthony Rizzo with a 93 mph fastball, his best velocity in months. That’s what turned you into a believer, made you think the Mets are in some altered state. 

Niese at 93? Really?

That was the Cubs’ final rally of the night; the final three innings were just hurry-up calisthenics so everyone could come in from the cold. The fans loved it, of course — they'd been going wild all night — but by the end, it felt like everyone was celebrating a pennant, not just Game 2.

That’s premature, of course. There’s still time for the Cubs. But not much.

Bob Klapisch