Craig Counsell Defends Debatable Decision to Start Matthew Boyd in Game 1

Saturday showed what happens when your best option isn’t really your best option. Craig Counsell has previously displayed a willingness to live and die with his proven veterans, and that was the case in Game 1 of the NLDS in Milwaukee when Matthew Boyd made the start on three days’ rest. Yes, the same Boyd who had faltered in the second half as his innings count climbed well past anything the organization had planned for him before the season.

Pitching coach Tommy Hottovy said back in January that the Cubs would be “really happy” getting Boyd to 120 innings, which would have been about 10 more than he’d thrown in the previous two seasons combined. That’s how they saw the pitching puzzle laid out in the early going, and it seemed to be working quite well for several months. But as rotation injuries mounted, Boyd went from thoroughbred to workhorse.

He ended up being the Cubs’ only qualified pitcher during the regular season, making four more starts and tossing 20 more innings than anyone else on the staff. We’ll get to the second-place finisher in a bit, but suffice to say having Boyd lead the way in terms of workload was never part of the plan. Nor was the idea that he’d open two postseason series, but circumstances conspired to make it so.

Among Cubs pitchers with at least 20 innings in the second half of the season, Boyd’s 4.63 ERA was higher than everyone but Shōta Imanaga (4.70) and Ben Brown (5.33). Boyd’s 4.34 FIP was higher than everyone but Imanaga (5.12), and his 18.7% strikeout rate was lower than all but Jameson Taillon (18.3%) and Javier Assad (15.0%). That’s a guy whose performance might lead to you to question his fitness to start any postseason game, let alone an opener on the road against the best team in baseball.

“We picked Matt Boyd to pitch,” Counsell told reporters after the game. “I don’t know what to say. He pitched, it didn’t go well. We’ve got to make decisions. We went with Matt.

“We’re very comfortable — I was very comfortable — putting Matt Boyd on the mound today. The whole organization was comfortable putting Matt Boyd on the mound today.”

I’d be willing to bet Counsell would have spoken differently under the influence of truth serum, but the fact of the matter is that he was in a lady or tiger situation. Now, we can all say with confidence that we could hear that tiger roaring behind its door well before the manager chose to open it, but he’d have been lambasted at least as badly for starting Colin Rea and getting a similar result.

Not that I personally believe Rea would have pitched as poorly, mind you. The former Brewer is the aforementioned pitcher who trailed Boyd in starts (27) and innings (159.1), but those totals were almost identical to last season. His 3.95 ERA was by no means spectacular, but it was the best mark of his MLB career. And don’t we always talk about how winning in the expanded postseason format is all about getting hot late?

To that end, there was no hotter (healthy) Cubs pitcher than Rea, who allowed one run with 18 strikeouts and one walk over his last two starts. He had also thrown just 15 pitches over 1.2 innings in the Cubs’ 0-3 loss to the Padres a few days earlier. So, again, why Boyd?

The answer Counsell offered after the game was a bit terse and defensive, understandably so, but he shared a more nuanced breakdown of the decisions with ESPN’s Jesse Rogers prior to the game.

“Probably since Matthew got to the dugout in Game 1, he was thinking about pitching this game,” Counsell explained. “I think we were thinking about him pitching this game. That’s kind of how this all went down. Obviously, he was up on Thursday night — he was also talking about throwing after the game if we won, and we’re like, ‘You’re not doing that, that makes no sense.’

“I joked with him after the game that I got you up so you wouldn’t throw after the game here. If it was a normal start and he threw 90 pitches, we wouldn’t consider this. But because he threw so few pitches, he knew he was going to be able to recover, and we thought he’d be able to recover quickly.”

The more I look at this, the more I get a subtext of concern. Others might go so far as to call it flat-out ignorance, particularly in that last line about the team thinking the 34-year-old would recover quickly. Boyd looked cooked for much of the last two months of the season, and he was a veritable pot roast out there Saturday afternoon in Milwaukee. Now the Cubs have to hope the same isn’t true for Imanaga, the presumptive Game 2 starter.

Though Imanaga will be on regular rest for Monday’s game, you already saw above that he’s had a rocky road down the stretch. That includes giving up 21 homers in his last 13 appearances, which would be a poor indicator of success even if he wasn’t pitching at a stadium with the 10th-highest home run park factor in MLB. Three of those 21 homers were hit by the Brewers, with two coming back on July 30 at American Family Field.

Granted, Imanaga got the win in that game by giving up only three runs and striking out eight with no walks. Even with that in mind, I would prefer to see him going at Wrigley, where the conditions have been less favorable to hitters. He would also be on six days’ rest, which has previously yielded much better results for him.

In the end, though, Counsell will almost certainly choose to roll with his best pitchers rather than who’s pitching the best right now. And since there’s no Cade Horton to turn to, that means turning the knob and hoping it was actually a lady making those tiger noises.

None of those extra runs from Saturday carry over to Monday, so it’ll still be 0-0 when the game starts. And an 0-1 series deficit is hardly insurmountable, at least as long as the offense shows up and the staff doesn’t dig a massive pit right out of the gate. I can’t say I agree with what Counsell chose in the first game, and I don’t particularly care for what he’s likely to do in the second, but he’ll look a helluva lot smarter if Imanaga shoves.