The Cubs starting pitching was the single biggest issue dragging down the performance of the team in 2011.  The problem can be stated very simply – there were essentially two rotations for the team.  The opening day rotation of Garza, Dempster, Zambrano, Wells and Cashner actually performed fairly well as a group when they were on the mound.  However, the latter three of that group missed huge chunks of the season.   While they were on the shelf, the fill-in rotation of Russell, Coleman, Ortiz, Lopez and Davis effectively destroyed the season for the Cubs.

How on earth did the Cubs get into that position in the first place?

Let’s look at the performance of the starting five first.  At the top of the rotation, Matt Garza came to the Cubs in a winter trade with Tampa Bay.  In short, Garza evolved into a true ace last season.  He improved most every facet of his game and ended up ranked 12^th in all of baseball in wins above replacement (WAR) according to Fangraphs.  While the Cubs had to give up significant prospects to get Garza, the trade has to be called a success for the Cubs.

At first glance, Ryan Dempster had a miserable 2011 season.  He “lost” fourteen games.  His ERA climbed from 3.85 to a lousy 4.80.  He just didn’t look as effective out on the mound.  However, the underlying numbers were extremely similar to his 2009 and 2010 seasons.

So what the heck was the difference between his nominal results in 2011 and the underlying performance?  For one thing, there was an increase in BABIP.  In 2010 it was .294 and in 2011 it was .324.  That explains some of the difference.  However, if anyone can explain the rest of the difference in the comments, it would certainly be appreciated!  It seems a pretty safe bet, though, that Dempster is going to experience much better results in 2012 than he had in 2011.  There doesn’t seem to be much degradation in his underlying performance that would represent any kind of major decline.

That pretty much ends the good news.  Now begins the ugliness that was the rest of the 2011 starting rotation.

Carlos Zambrano had off the field issues last year.  What remains to be said?  In the end, I’m not really sure if he quit on the team or the team quit on him.  One way or another, his season ended in mid-August after a lousy performance in Atlanta.  There is no question that Carlos has issues with his makeup that he has yet to overcome.  The worse news for Cubs fans is that the physical gifts that once made him worth having anyway are in serious decline.

For one thing, it has to be noted that Zambrano has yet to pitch 200 IP in a year since 2007.  It’s a positive that 2011 was Z’s first healthy season since that year.  But we’ll never know if he would have made it through remainder of the year healthy.  What we can be sure of is the decline in his overall  performance.  At his peak, Carlos was a high strikeout and heavily anti-home run pitcher.  This past year he suffered from a sharp decline in his strikeouts and a spike in his home run rate.

Part of this was due to an increased reliance on his cut fastball.  Most telling is that his swinging strike percentage dropped from 8.4% - 8.0% - 6.7% over the past few years as he’s used the cutter more and more.  On the bright side, his fastball velocity remained fairly consistent from 2010, though it is several ticks slower than when he was in his prime.

In the end, there’s hope for Carlos if he can get his head on straight.

Randy Wells, on the other hand…

In 2009 and 2010, Randy was a decent back of the rotation pitcher.  He kept a low strikeout rate, which limited his ceiling, but he didn’t walk many and was ok at keeping the ball in the park.  This kind of profile made him a perfectly acceptable option to eat innings.  He never had a whole lot of margin for error, though.  In 2011, he struck out fewer batters, walked more and nearly doubled the allowed home run rate.  His pitch data doesn’t look pretty, either.  He lost a tick and a half off his fastball from the year before.  His swinging strike percentage also dropped significantly.  Not to mention he suffered from shoulder issues and is a big injury risk going forward.

You know what happens when a marginal pitcher declines in all of those areas?  He gets replaced.

Andrew Cashner pitched really well in 2011.  He just didn’t pitch much.  Immediately after his first start of the season, Cashner suffered from a shoulder problem that kept him sidelined until September.  The one notable thing from his performance in 2011:  As a starter, he pitched 5.1 IP and had a 1.69 ERA.  As a reliever, he pitched 5.1 IP and had a 1.69 ERA.  Yep, that’s all I’ve got.

That pretty much ends the bad news.  Now begins the terror that was the rest of the 2011 fill-in rotation.

James Russell took one for the team.  A loogy by trade, the Cubs curiously put him in the rotation for five starts.  He posted a 9.33 ERA as a starter.  This is what happens when you put a pitcher that can’t get right handed batters out into the rotation.  As a side note, he was excellent in the pen.  When he could face mostly lefties.  Like he was supposed to from the start.

Casey Coleman came up through the Cubs system as a finesse pitcher.  He didn’t strike out many, but didn’t allow many walks and was strongly anti-hr.  He was kind of a lighter version of Randy Wells.  Which is why his performance in 2011 is so confusing.  He struck out 8 batters per nine innings.  He walked a ton of guys.  He allowed more HR.  Yet he threw nearly the exact same mix of pitches as the previous year.  He threw at almost exactly the same speed as the previous year.  But his swinging strike percentage went from 4.4% to 7.3%.  In the end, though, he outpitched Randy Wells.  Unfortunately, that was a low bar to hurdle.

Then we get to the trio of desperation and destruction.

The best thing that can be said about Ramon Ortiz is that the underlying stats were ok.  But let’s never, ever put ourselves in a position where we need Ramon Ortiz or his like again.

Rodrigo Lopez was…meh.

Doug Davis is one of my all-time least favorite pitchers to watch.  He’s slow.  He has a weird delivery.  He’s really, really slow.  He may be getting to the point where he’s releasing the ball, but it may yet be a while.  He also sucked.

Ok…that about sums up the performance of the 2011 rotation.  I just have one more quick note on how the Cubs got into the mess they did after Wells and Cashner went down at the beginning of the season.  It’s easy and very tempting to bash Jim Hendry for not being prepared with enough pitching depth to begin the season.  However, in addition to losing Wells and Cashner at the beginning of April, our minor league depth at the upper minors also took some big hits.  Jay Jackson was hurt at the end of spring training and was unavailable (and had a rough season once he did come back).  Trey McNutt suffered through an injury filled season and wasn’t available as planned.  Hendry made a lot of mistakes, but it was nearly impossible to foresee losing two pitchers in the rotation and your top two options to replace them from the minors at the same time.

Well, that’s about all there was to say about the disastrous 2011 rotation.  Next article I’ll take a look at the 2012 rotation and how we can address some of these issues.