As fans sometimes we tend to generalize certain terminology such as floor, ceiling, upside, peak years, etc.. We look at Javier Baez and Jorge Soler and we immediately think ceiling. We look at Anthony Rizzo and Kris Bryant and we think polished players with more limited ceilings. Tommy LaStella and Matt Szczur are players we settled on as low-ceiling types. We see a player reaching his age 30 season like Dexter Fowler and we tend to think we've already seen their best. Even more to the point, there is Ben Zobrist, nearing 35, and we just hope we aren't getting a rapidly declining player -- and we certainly don't expect him to continue to improve in some areas. And nobody would have argued with you if you thought David Ross was just here to be a quasi-coach and a caddy for Jon Lester.
Yet, here we are.
Somehow, regardless of age, prospect pedigree, or perceived ceiling limitations, the Cubs just keep getting better. How are they doing it? In large part it has to do with something we talked about during the 2014/2015 offseason. The Cubs were reshaping the team to be one that controls the strike zone whether that be through their plate discipline, pitch-framing, or command on the mound.
We're already talked about the improvement of Javier Baez, but that doesn't surprise us because he is a young player with lots of room to grow. We expect a player with his ability and strong makeup to keep learning, developing, and maturing. Let's take a look at where the other Cubs position players have improved in terms of their command of the strike zone and how it has translated to other areas of their game.
Dexter Fowler: Career high 15.4% BB rate. Fowler is swinging at pitches outside the zone at a ridiculously low (even for him) 17.3% rate. Fowler isn't a hitter known for great plate coverage or contact ability, so limiting his swings to those in the strike zone have increased the frequency of hard contact for him. He leads the Cubs right now with a 41.5% hard hit ball rate. He has hit a career high 26.4% of his batted balls for line drives and his ISO% (isolated power) is at .213, by far a career high. His career ISO is .158 and it was still just .161 last year. And we haven't even discussed how Fowler has defied all the so-called experts by continuing to improve his defensive play when some insisted he was done as a CFer.
Anthony Rizzo: The walk rate is at a career high 15.9% and the K rate has decreased to a career low 11.6%. Always a disciplined hitter, Rizzo has taken it up a couple of notches, decreasing his swings outside the zone to 21.3%, a huge drop even from his big season last year, when it was 31.7%. The ISO is at .333, nearly 100 points higher than last season (.234).
Kris Bryant: We know that Kris Bryant has taken down some of the upper cut from his swing, which means his bat will stay in the zone just a bit longer. Theoretically that should lead to more frequent contact -- and it has. He has cut down his K rate to just 20.6%, down 10 points from last season. He has increased his line drive rate to 24.8%, just about 4 points better than last season. It isn't just the swing mechanics, however. Bryant has lowered his swings outside the zone 2%, down to 27.7%. He has improved his contact rate to 73.1%, up from 66.3% last year. That contact rate has improved both outside the zone (where his more level swing helps) and within the zone, where he now makes contact 81.2% of the time.
Addison Russell: He was my surprise pick for player with the highest WAR in our predictions piece and while that seems like a longshot, we can see a path to how he might accomplish that, if not this year, then perhaps in a year or two. We can already count on Russell to play outstanding defense at perhaps the most important position in baseball, but this year he is improving by leaps and bounds at the plate. Russell has improved his walk rate to 13.7%, a big increase from his 8% of last season. The K rate has dropped from 28.5% to just 20.1%. Russell is a big framed player with plenty of room to add strength, something that was evident this spring. That increase in strength works nicely in concert with that improved discipline. Russell, just 22, is swinging at just 26.7% of pitches outside the zone (the league average is 27.7%). Perhaps one of the biggest reasons for his improvement is his proficiency using all fields. Russell may have the best balance of all Cubs players, hitting 32.2% of pitches to left, 32.2% to center, and 35.6% to RF. At some point Russell will probably learn to turn on more pitches for power, but this balanced approach will make him a more complete hitter long term.
Ben Zobrist: Who said an old dog can't learn new tricks? Zobrist is having his best offensive season since his peak 2009 season, when he put up an incredible 8.6 WAR. Zobrist is not likely to match that WAR simply because he has lost a step and will not likely match his defensive or baserunning value of that season, but he is on pace to match that season offensively. That is in large part to his off the charts plate discipline. We can start with the basics -- an 18.3% BB rate vs. a 10.5% K rate. That alone is telling as both are career bests. If we look deeper, we see that Zobrist is swinging at a career low 16.1% of pitches outside the zone, down almost 7% from his career norm. His contact in the zone is a ridiculous 95.1%, his overall contact is an outstanding 90.1% and a paltry 3.3% swinging strike rate. All are career bests. Consequently his line drive rate is at a career high 26.4% and he has made less soft contact 10.2% than in any season except his rookie year and his hard contact rate is at 30.6%, tied for 3rd best in his career. Like Fowler, it seems that whatever Zobrist may be losing from the neck down due to age, he is more than adequately compensating for from the neck up.
David Ross: Even grandpas aren't too old to learn. Ross is swinging at a career low 22.4% of pitches outside the zone and has increased his contact rate to 77.3% compared to 65.8% last season. Not coincidentally, his strikeout rate is just 17.1%, about 10% lower than his career average and he is hitting a career high 28.3% of his batted balls for line drives.
Jorge Soler: We've often said that results often follow process but sometimes those results aren't immediate. It may not look like it but Soler is improving the nuances of his game. He has increased his walk rate to 10.1% from 7.9% last year, while also decreasing his K rate from 30% to 25.3%. He is swinging at less pitches outside the zone -- a very respectable 26.3%, an improvement of about 5.5% from last season. What we haven't seen yet is better quality contact...yet. Soler has hit more flyballs (47.6%, up from 29.8% last year) than usual this year and an unusually low percentage of them are leaving the yard (6.7% -- about half the rate of last year of 13.5%). It's frustrating right now, but Soler is just in the process of making some adjustments and the hope is that we start to see those results as the year goes on.
We mentioned Matt Szczur and Tommy LaStella who have similar improvements in plate discipline and quality contact. Two players who some considered fringe roster players have become important role players for the Cubs. And then, of course, we cannot forget Jason Heyward, who has struggled to start the season, but would it surprise anyone if he came out a better player when all was said and done?
And it isn't just the hitters.
Jon Lester had just one 5 WAR season before the age of 30. He's had 2 in his first two years since turning 30 -- and is well on his way to a 3rd straight 5 WAR season.
Jake Arrieta essentially skipped the normal statistical projection and went from replacement level pitching to 5 WAR pitcher in 2014 to the dominant, elite level ace he is today. Recently we talked about how that renaissance is as much mental as it is physical.
Many were ready to give up on Jason Hammel after a poor 2nd half and yet now he is 5-0 with a 1.77 ERA. And while peripherals indicate he won't sustain that performance, there are many who believe Hammel is better able to maintain better performance because of better physical conditioning.
Kyle Hendricks has actually improved on his already great command. His walk rate is down to 1.77 per 9 IP and he is keeping the ball down, substantially decreasing his HR rate to just 0.25 per 9 IP and increasing his GB rate to 61.9% -- more than 10% better than last season.
John Lackey has always had good control but his walk rate is just 1.86 per 9 IP, which would be a career best if he can sustain it through the season. The same can be said of his 8.75/9 IP strikeout rate.
And it goes all the way down the organizational chain...
We've seen Willson Contreras dramatically improve his walk rates and decrease his K rates over the last two seasons. Albert Almora's approach can still waver at times, but we have seen improvement there as well. He's just looking for more consistency -- but even if he never walks at an average rate, Almora has been much better at working counts and making more frequent hard contact -- something we always knew he was capable of. We've seen Eloy Jimenez learn to go the other way this season and he too, will soon be able to get more efficient at picking out pitches he can turn on and drive out of the park. Ian Happ has some of the plate discipline in the system and Donnie Dewees is among it's best selectively aggressive hitters, waiting for pitches he can drive and then slashing them into the gaps -- yet willing to taking the occasional walk when it's given (7.5%, which may not seem like much, but it is a good incremental improvement from last seasons 4.6%). The contact rate has improved as he has swung at better pitches, the K rate has dropped about 5.5 points to just 12.3% this year. On the mound, Jake Stinnett and Trevor Clifton are better utilizing their good stuff with better control of the strike zone, just as we saw that leap from Duane Underwood last year. I expect we will see improvement from Justin Steele as well. Pitchers like Ryan Williams and Adbert Alzolay have also maximized their stuff by commanding the strike zone. We have seen that kind of improvement from Paul Blackburn as well. I could go on and on here, but you get the general picture.
And if you've read my notes from the backfields, you have seen it starts at the very beginning. Recently I talked about DJ Wilson practicing going the other way in extra BP, then applying it the next time I saw him with a rocket line drive triple the other way. Wladimir Galindo is similarly trying to improve against those pitchers who try to exploit him with breaking stuff away and is taking more balls to RF. One the mound, Dylan Cease knows he can probably blow everyone away with his plus fastball/curveball combo as Bryan Hudson knows he can get hitters out consistently with his hard two-seam FB and filthy curve combo -- yet both are have been working on developing their change-ups and developing a more sophisticated approach on the mound. Sometimes the results suffer for it, but both pitchers seem to understand they will be better served in the long run. In fact, Cease's change has already improved to the point where it looks like it can at least be an average pitch.
As a teacher, you talk about trying to develop a life-long love of learning. It appears the Cubs have instilled a career-long love of development. Their players never seem to stop finding ways to improve whether they are the teenagers at the backfields or 30 year old and over players like Fowler, Zobrist, and Ross. Physically there may be limitations and even the best physical skills will decline with age, but the Cubs are finding out there are no limits to learning the game and that any player, from the lowest level prospect to the wily veteran, can still have some upside.
bottom 12. Bases loaded, no outs, Bryant moves from LF to 3B for 5 man infield, no one in Left. Flyout to Fowler. Bryant moves to 1B, Baez to 3B. Pop up to Russell. Bryant back to LF, Baez back to 1B, La Stella back to 3B, pop up to Baez to end the inning. 
