Cubspodcast

Well, it's been a real sh*t sandwich of a homestand that began with two wins over the Mets, followed by a 4 game losing streak, followed by an absolute gem from Marcus Stroman yesterday. With two games remaining against the owners of MLB's best record, who knows what to expect at this point. We talk about Kyle Hendricks' return, Miles Mastrobuoni i…

Well, it was another up and down week punctuated by a brutal walkoff loss in Houston, some frustrating games in Philly, and a nice win over the New York Metropolitans last night. Christopher Morel AKA Christopher Meowrel AKA Christ Morel has homered in 5 straight games and has 9 in his first 12 games since his callup and Stroman, Steele and Smyly c…

So, on May 17, 2023, the Cubs are closer to the bottom of the National League than they are to the division-leading Brewers. Not ideal…BUT! Steele showed real guts this week, Mervis hit his first homer, Seiya is heating up/normalizing, and Hendricks is on his way back. We also talk about some of the upcoming, triple digit throwing bullpen options o…

Matt Mervis and Christopher Morel have joined the party, and we hope it's a permanent move. We talk about the Cubs having a significantly better roster today than they had on opening day, a very difficult past couple weeks and another difficult stretch coming up. Oh, and the Cardinals took 2 of 3 at Wrigley and Willson Contreras made his return and…

New episode is up and Kevin is back from his travels! We talk about the Cubs being essentially where we thought they'd be (around .500), a tough sweep in Miami and the case for bringing up Morel and Mervis ASAP. We also talk about Taillon and Hendricks working their way back from injuries and look ahead at a difficult May schedule for the Cubs. Fol…

New episode is up and our old pal Ken Schultz is pinch hitting for Kevin! After a disappointing weekend in which the Cubs dropped 3 of 4 to the Dodgers at Wrigley, they got off the schneid in a big way last night with an impressive shutout W against the Padres. Justin Steele continues to show that he has ace stuff, Yan Gomes had a big day at the pl…

Ian Happ — an all-star caliber player who always wanted to stay a Cub — got an extension of PLURAL years! We celebrate that, and talk about how his extension and the contracts of several other key players (Nico, Seiya, Wisdom) gives us an outline of a mini-era that now runs through 2026. We look back on the series wins against the Dodgers and A’s, …

After Nico Hoerner’s first career walk off hit, the Cubs are playing a geniunely division-winning pace (ahem, 5-4…but It’s a bad division, so we’re not wrong). We talk falling for Dansby and his gorgeous backhand, Nico’s path to + offense, Seiya’s return date and how mystifiying the roster management has been to this point in his absence, particula…

Kevin and Adam cover week one of the Cubs, their 2-3 start, what’s looked good, what’s bad, and what’s exactly how we expected it to be so far (most of it). We also make all our picks for the season! Division winners, World Series, MVP, Cy Young, Rookie of the Year and we each make at least one insane prediction for the year that we think might ACT…

In our annual tradition, Kevin & Adam are joined by Ken Schultz for our jumbo-sized season preview podcast. We predict team MVPs, breakout/regression candidates, and a lot of sillier things. We also get into a little “state of the Cubs fan” talk, and we end with something really great: Ken’s 29 Things To Be Excited For This Season. Follow us everyw…

There’s a little Cubs talk here (full season preview coming next episode!), but today it’s mostly all WBC talk. The tournament that the best players in the world universally loved playing in ended with Japan defeating the USA in a one-run game that came down to a full count, between the world’s two best baseball players: Ohtani & Trout. If you don’…

5th starter talk — can you feel the excitement?! There actually IS some excitement among the three candidates for the role: Javier Assad is ripping 97 mph heaters in the WBC for Team Mexico, looking better than ever, Hayden Wesneski has been almost literally perfect (and seems to have a stranglehold on that #5 spot) and Adrian Sampson has been givi…

Cubs Twitter favorite @InfieldFlyGrl joins Kevin to talk about the World Baseball Classic! We talk about the tournament format, what teams to look out for for both quality and fun, introduce some great players you might not know about (yet), and highlight some truly 80-grade, top-tier nicknames. IFG follows international baseball more closely than …

The (fake) games have begun, and Seiya Suzuki’s oblique has shut down. We talk about the impact of Seiya’s injury, the timetable for his return, and who might fill in in right field while he’s out. We also talk about the first week of spring games, the automatic ball and strike fiasco, and the Cubs who have been most fun to watch in the early going…

The Cubs have signed a new reliever, bringing the Spring roster almost to completion with Michael Fulmer joining on a 1-year, $4 million deal. Baseball has announced a series of new rules that will begin with Spring Training game #1, including bigger bases, limited pickoffs, the (almost) elimination of the shift, and a pitch clock. And, we talk abo…

Our friend Ken Schultz (Outsports) joins us to give us a rundown of all the news and fun from this week’s Cubs convention: Ryno’s statue, Ian Happ’s live podcast, Tom Ricketts’ attempt at crowdwork, and Nico’s rugged look. Also, analyzing the Cubs new signing, 1B/OF Trey Mancini. Follow us everywhere @awaygamespod!…

On our first episode of the new year, we go in depth about new Cubs signings Tucker Barnhart (official) and Eric Hosmer (not quite yet, but, pretty surely a Cub). And because it might be a little more fun, instead of a “Happy New Year 2023,” we skip ahead to 2024, look in the crystal ball, and analyze where the Cubs are at in January of NEXT year. …

For the first time since Yu Darvish, the Cubs have signed a $100 million dollar player. Dansby Swanson signed a 7 year, $177 million dollar deal to presumably take over shortstop and join with Nico Hoerner in the league’s best defensive middle infield. Drew Smyly also reportedly has agreed to return, filling out the Cubs rotation and giving it trul…

With the top three shortstops off the board, it’s time to talk about how we got here, where we go from here, and we welcome the rest of Cubs world to the emotional state we’ve been occupying for about two years. Ricketts & Kenney say the money is there, Jed Hoyer seemingly can’t find it, and now we wait to see what combination of free agents left w…

The Winter Meetings have been crazy: shortstops are all signing for 11 years, Willson Contreras is officially a Cardinal, and Cody Bellinger and Jameson Taillon are new Cubs. We talk through all of that, and ask where do we go from here? We’ve opened the checkbook…now It’s time to keep signing those checks. Follow us everywhere @awaygamespod!…

Unlike almost everyone in baseball media, we keep receipts on ourselves and hold ourselves accountable at the end of the year. Kevin and Adam look back at their picks for 2022 Cubs breakout stars, regression candidates, record predictions, and more. And it might shock you how much this season…did not shock us. We also talk a little about recent Cub…

The Astros did indeed defeat the Phillies in 6 games, and now we can finally throw the 2022 MLB season in a trash can and move on. We talk about the series, how the Phillies will be remembered, Willson Contreras turning down the Qualifying Offer, Hoyer’s absolute refusal to use an exclusive negotiating window with any player, ever, early Contreras …

A Happy Anniversary, A Gold Glove Winner, A Homer Party in Philly & Some Real Bad Tweets Happy Cubs win the 2016 World Series Anniversary Day to all who celebrate! We open up with some happy memories before moving on to talk about Ian Happ winning his first gold glove (yay!), a bad injury for Cubs prospect Alexander Canario (boo), the Phillies 2-1 …

The Astros and Phillies are matching up the 2022 World Series, and as we write this, Kyle Schwarber is probably just now waking up after singing Robyn songs and riding mechanical bulls. We analyze the two league champions, place our bets (hypothetical and actual), and talk about watching so many former Cubs, still in their prime, helping teams all …

We’re down to the final four, and we analyze our feelings on the remaining group of Padres, Phillies, Yankees and Astros. We also say goodbye to the teams who have left us, from the extremely quiet group of Cardinal “legends” who slept through two games, to the Mets who pulled a real 2018 Cubs to end their great season, to the Guardians who were fu…

Our guest today is Joe Maddon. You may know him from winning the World Series as the manager of the Chicago Cubs. What else do we need to say? Joe teamed with Tom Verducci for a new book out TODAY (October 11), titled “The Book of Joe: Trying Not To Suck At Baseball and Life.” We talk about what non-2016 Cubs team Joe thought was closest to winning…

Every year Kevin and Adam predict how the season will go, and this year…they actually got a whole lot right? Weird. We preview the wild card round, make our new predictions for the weekend, and look back on how we said things would go. We also talk about 2022’s final week of Cubs baseball, and takeaways from the end of a weird but pretty darn predi…

This episode starts with a standard recap of the past week of Cubs baseball, one that actually saw the streaking Cubs win 5 of their last 6 games (as of this recording). Adam and Kevin talk about the continued development of Sampson and Wesneski, Esteban Quiroz making the most of his opportunity, and a cool opportunity for some of the Cubs' top min…

Adbert Alzolay finally returned to action this week, and he looks pretty good, even if we might be looking at a full-time reliever now. Wesneski dominates again, Sampson just keeps pitching well, and we talk about what this all means for how next year’s pitching staff shapes up. We also talk free agency rumors, the draft lottery, Canario’s 3-homer …

The Cubs are trying to flip the script from 2004 and ruin the Mets season, and folks, we’re enjoying it! The Cubs defeated the division-leading Mets in the first two games of their series, including a win over Jacob deGrom. We talk about what holding onto the division would mean for the Mets in a year with an even more expanded playoff, and Adam pr…

Forget the St. Louis sweep, we’ve moved on to bigger things like Hayden Wesneski’s dominating debut against the Reds. The man traded for Scott Effross made his MLB debut and dominated, possibly putting himself in line for the next long relief —> starter progression that previously worked so well for Steele and Thompson. We also talk about Jeremiah …

Kevin is out of town and unavailable this week so Adam is flying solo today to recap the past week of Cubs baseball. The good: Happ's big game on Friday, Steele continuing to show off unprecedented dad strength, and random fans having sex at a Blue Jays game. The bad: atrocious baserunning, bullpen struggles, Willson's injury, and random fans havin…

Kevin and Adam talk about the Cubs recent run of winning ways, Nico’s talk about winning to attract free agents and motivate this team to be a winner next year, the realness of Justin Steele (and #DaddySteele is accidentally created), what a winning rotation for 2023 would reasonably look like, and a check-in on the farm. We also talk about drinkin…

Adam is back from Great American Ballpark and has some strong opinions on Skyline Chili. We talk about the Field of Dreams game, the Cubs amazingly going for a fourth straight series win today, Justin Steele's continued development, and Nico's breakout season. We also discuss players who we've seen enough of (sorry, Rafael Ortega) and dream on Fran…

After a chaotic trade deadline episode last week, the boys are back with a slightly less stressful episode this week. We talk about Willson's go-ahead HR and walk-off caught stealing and what it might take for the Cubs to re-sign him this offseason. Then, with news breaking this week that Jason Heyward won't be returning to the Cubs next season, we…

In a chaotic podcast, Adam and Kevin went YouTube Live to talk about and experience the countdown to the trade deadline, and boy, were there surprises. Mainly, of course: Willson Contreras and Ian Happ remain Cubs. We talk about the return for Scott Effross, David Robertson and Mychal Givens, and the big Soto deal as well as Toronto taking their sh…

With Kevin out of town this week, longtime friend of the pod Ken Schultz (Outsports, Bleacher Nation) joins Adam to absolutely fume about Jed Hoyer and the Ricketts. Honestly, indignant Ken is our favorite Ken. We discuss the emotions of what very well may have been the last homestand for Ian Happ and Willson Contreras, Ken's experience at Wrigley …

Kevin and Adam are in sweltering NYC, where the weather is as hot as the Cubs are cold. We recap the Home Run Derby (Schwarbs got robbed AGAIN), the All-Star Game (more mic'd up and less John Smoltz, please) and the MLB Draft. We also talk about the looming trade deadline on August 2nd and how the Field of Dreams game may very well end up feeling l…

This week we start with a lot of positive stuff, which means we don’t talk about the Dodgers series until about halfway through. Willson Contreras is now a THREE-time All-Star starter, and Ian Happ made his first all-star team as well. Isn’t it nice to have all-stars? We think so, and hope the Cubs organization agrees. We also run down the home run…

After a two week hiatus the only way we could make it up to you was by starting this week's episode with a 3 minute Cameo from Pat Hughes to Kevin "The Face" McCaffrey for his 40th birthday. And to Kevin's wife Jaimie who ordered said Cameo, let us just say, "YOU THE REAL MVP." After listening to the dulcet tones of Mr. Hughes (sadly there was no m…

The Cubs beat the Braves two out of three behind strong performances from young starters Justin Steele and Keegan Thompson. Kevin is in Vegas for the week and put a bet on…a different Cubs game. Whoops. Willson Contreras leads the NL in All Star votes at catcher (vote Willson online, folks!) and Ian Happ continues a truly strong year at the plate, …

Adam and Kevin each went to two Cubs/Yankees games this weekend, and it was a close race as to who got the worst of it. We talk about that three game series against the best team in baseball that went just about how you’d expect, the DFA of Clint Frazier, Justin Steele’s promising turn against the Padres, and the value of actual Major League Baseba…

With the Cubs heading to Yankee Stadium this weekend for three games in Adam and Kevin's territory, we break down the Cardinals series, last night's stinker against the lowly Orioles, and Willson Contreras continuing to be an 80 grade teammate (deep breaths). We also discuss Caleb Killian's highly anticipated debut, Matt Swarmer and Christopher Mor…

It took until almost June but one of the Away Games boys finally made it to Wrigley! Kevin talks about his experience at game one of Monday's Memorial Day double header and the fact that beer prices haven't gotten any cheaper at the old ballpark despite, you know…(gestures at everything at the ballpark). We talk about recent Cub callups Morel, Higg…

Justin Steele followed a 10K performance, with a possibly even more dominant 9K performance, and he’s now the rotation’s leader in ERA. Patrick Wisdom homered in 4 consecutive games while showing off his bat’s big knob (all of that is literal, not dirty, no matter what it sounds like), and Christopher Morel has impressed at multiple positions while…

Willson Contreras. What else do you want? His 100th homer was a grand slam, appropriately at what should be his forever home of Wrigley Field, and his intensity for a 14-20 team is still World Series-worthy. We talk about him, and how there is no reasonable way forward but an extension. We also talk about the two newest Cubs called to the bigs: Chr…

Ian Happ and Justin Steele both had big weeks: within 24 hours, they each got engaged…and that’s the best news we’ve got! Marcus Stroman also dominated in Milwaukee (Cubs beat Corbin Burnes AGAIN), Alfonso Rivas looks like he is inching toward “regular 1B status,” and we consider Ian Happ as a sensible extension candidate (lol, we know the Cubs don…

What we know: there was one good Cubs game last week. A 21-0 win over the Pirates. And then, close loss at home copy/paste over and over. In the beginning of season #3, we talk about where we stand on David Ross’s managerial style, and talk about the good (Seiya & his insanely selective plate approach), the bad (consistently playing 1/3 of this tea…

Two podcasts, two weeks of the Cubs being over .500. We talk about the new look, high contact bats the Cubs offense is relying on (and the downside of all those double plays), NL Player of the Week Seiya Suzuki and his perfect plate approach, a weird series in Colorado, and the exciting young bullpen arms and two fun veterans doing the job at the b…

The season is underway, the Cubs are series winners, and the Brewers could not accidentally bean enough Cubs to keep from being series losers. Hendricks looked vintage, Steele outdueled a wild Woodruff, Stroman brought the energy and a great five innings that the Cubs had slip away by the length of a fingernail — and Seiya Suzuki looked gooooood. F…