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<\/p>\nWith a quarter of the 2026 season in the books, the Chicago Cubs are on pace to win 100-plus games and drawing comparisons to their last World Series team a decade ago.<\/p>\n
Their odds to make the playoffs, entering Tuesday, were 85.9, 94.5 and 98.1 percent, respectively, per FanGraphs, Baseball Reference and Baseball Prospectus. Buoyed by 15 straight wins at home, the atmosphere at Wrigley Field has been electric.<\/p>\n
Despite all that momentum, the club is still dealing with one glaring issue \u2014 injuries. Part 1 of this week\u2019s mailbag focuses on that problem.<\/p>\n
Questions have been edited for length and clarity.<\/p>\n
What the hell is going on with the pitching injuries? \u2014 JWoody<\/p>\n
Sahadev Sharma: The Cubs have to look into this, there\u2019s no doubt about it. Even one injury usually leads to a look back at what may have gone wrong and if anything could have been prevented. This is also just the reality of pitching development in today\u2019s game.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n After his outstanding rookie year of 2025, Cade Horton made two starts this season before having elbow surgery. (Jason Miller \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n
Are the Cubs that unique? The Los Angeles Dodgers regularly deal with pitcher injuries, and it\u2019s not been limited to just one season. When you train for velocity, which almost every organization does, injuries will likely go up.<\/p>\n
The good news for the Cubs is that it isn\u2019t a rash of one type of injury. That usually means there isn\u2019t a trend. Pitchers get injured, and the Cubs have just been hit with a string of them.<\/p>\n
Should they ignore this? Absolutely not. Is it unique to the Cubs? That\u2019s just not the case. This has been said for years, but the person or team that finds a breakthrough in preventing pitcher injuries or just keeping them healthier in general will change the game.<\/p>\n
Are there any internal conversations and questions being asked regarding the consistent pitcher injuries the past two years? \u2014 Eamonn M.<\/p>\n
Patrick Mooney: Without question, the Cubs are analyzing each individual situation and reviewing their entire process. At the moment, there just may not be an obvious answer.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou always look at that,\u201d Cubs president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer said at the beginning of May. \u201cWe\u2019ve had knees and backs and lats and elbows and shoulders, so it\u2019s not like we\u2019ve consistently had one injury or another. Obviously, in any situation, you\u2019re going to try to think about what you could do better. I think that\u2019s probably how we spend all our time, trying to figure out how we can get better. But I also think there\u2019s probably some randomness in there as well.\u201d<\/p>\n
Club officials believe it\u2019s too early to draw any big conclusions. Taking everything into account so far, Chicago\u2019s pitching staff has performed at a high level, which reflects well on the organization\u2019s infrastructure. Staffers spend countless hours behind the scenes, doing the work that is not glamorous, helping players prepare for competition and maintain their programs. Blaming one aspect of the operation would not be fair.<\/p>\n
Everything about this season will be viewed through the lens of what happens in October. If the Cubs wind up peaking at the right time, then this trend may be forgotten.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re still sort of in the middle of everything,\u201d Hoyer said. \u201cWith every injury, we do a really thorough (analysis) on what happened, what could have been prevented. Listen, I think that, in these jobs, being self-critical (is important). I probably take that to an extreme, at times. Whether it\u2019s a trade, a free-agent signing, an injury, you\u2019ve got to always be looking at: \u2018What can we do better? And what can we change?\u2019 It\u2019s certainly no different here. And if we find anything that led to this, certainly we\u2019ll address it.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn a weird way, I hope we find something. Otherwise, it\u2019s just randomness.\u201d<\/p>\n
Will any starters from the Cubs\u2019 Opening Day rotation remain healthy past Memorial Day? \u2014 Tim N.<\/p>\n
Mooney: Stay tuned.<\/p>\n
Edward Cabrera, the injury-prone pitcher the Cubs acquired from the Miami Marlins over the winter, has remained healthy, though his contributions through eight starts have been worth zero bWAR. Given his track record, it\u2019s reasonable to expect better results and some time on the injured list at some point this season.<\/p>\n
Shota Imanaga is again performing at a dazzling level, but his strained left hamstring last season showed how everything is connected. One injury \u2014 it doesn\u2019t have to involve an elbow or the shoulder \u2014 can disrupt a pitcher\u2019s mechanics and throw off his timing and rhythm.<\/p>\n
Jameson Taillon has averaged 28 starts and 150-plus innings over the previous five seasons, which is an encouraging track record, but there are no guarantees that he will be able to carry the same workload and repeat his clutch performance from last year\u2019s playoffs.<\/p>\n
This is why the Cubs are already being mentioned so prominently in connection to All-Star pitchers such as Freddy Peralta, Logan Webb and Robbie Ray, nearly three months away from the Aug. 3 trade deadline.<\/p>\n
Tiger Woods was riddled with injuries later in his career as he tried to optimize his body through lifting and pushing his swing to the extreme. Is it not worth considering if the Cubs\u2019 pitching lab may be putting the same stresses on their pitchers trying to get more miles per hour or spin rate? \u2014 Michael T.<\/p>\n
Mooney: It\u2019s not necessarily a \u201cCubs Way\u201d thing. That\u2019s the trade-off at every level of the baseball industry. Amateur pitchers chase velocity to get recruited and drafted, minor-league prospects try to boost their stuff to get to the next level, and major-league players know the projection models reward certain types of free agents. Executives, managers and coaches are all trying to keep their jobs and win. It\u2019s impossible to do that through only finesse.<\/p>\n
Have you heard more on Jaxon Wiggins\u2019 injury and progress toward a return? \u2014 Gerry W.<\/p>\n
Sharma: Wiggins was supposed to throw a live BP over the weekend, and the latest I\u2019ve heard is that he\u2019s currently building back up. The Cubs are intentionally being very careful about this process to try to keep him as healthy as possible. Can they actually do that? Well, see above \u2014 it\u2019s not easy.<\/p>\n
But rushing Wiggins into game action isn\u2019t in the cards. Getting him back on a minor-league mound may not happen until June (the Cubs aren\u2019t sharing a timeline), and him helping the big-league club probably isn\u2019t a realistic possibility until later in the summer.<\/p>\n
What can the Cubs do to start a pipeline of major-league-capable pitchers in their farm system? It seems pretty empty of top-level talent right now. \u2014 J.R.<\/p>\n
Sharma: This is going to take a combination of drafting and development, with strong collaboration between departments. It should be said that even before Tyler Zombro was promoted in the offseason to vice president of pitching, the Cubs were going to make some changes.<\/p>\n
They\u2019ve wanted to get back to velocity training, which was a focus under Craig Breslow but slowed in recent years. They are also likely going to start drafting some pitchers with different characteristics this summer.<\/p>\n
Will they go big in the first round? They haven\u2019t since Cade Horton. Drafting more pitchers higher should lead to more talent infusion into the organization. But that can\u2019t be the only way. The Cubs need to find some hidden gems and polish them with smart player development plans.<\/p>\n
It should also be noted that they\u2019ve traded away some solid pitching prospects in recent years. Not all have panned out or will, but if names such as DJ Herz, Ty Johnson, Jackson Ferris and Ryan Gallagher were still in the organization, perhaps there wouldn\u2019t be such a negative view of the Cubs in this department.<\/p>\n
Still, they are aware that things need to be better and the work is being put in. They aren\u2019t where they want to be in this area. Right now, two names (beyond Wiggins) to watch are Brooks Caple and Kaleb Wing. Beyond that, it will take a surprise or two for the Cubs\u2019 current minor-league pitchers to pop.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"With a quarter of the 2026 season in the books, the Chicago Cubs are on pace to win…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":668697,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[64,63,5158,591,85],"class_list":["post-668696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-chicago-cubs","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=668696"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668696\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/668697"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=668696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=668696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=668696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}