Edward Cabrera Put Cubs in Dire Straits by Concealing Blister Issue

Edward Cabrera had looked so good in his last two rehab starts that the Cubs were excited to get him back into the rotation before eventually moving him into the bullpen down the stretch. That excitement faded 10 pitches into the game, when the big righty surrendered a two-run homer to Alec Burleson. Cabrera exited after loading the bases on two walks and a single, then another walk, after which reliever Ryan Rolison allowed a single and a homer that pushed all of the inherited runners home.

It took Cabrera 77 pitches to record 11 outs, and he struck out only two batters to go with his three walks. Not exactly the kind of performance that justified bumping David Peterson from the rotation and Javier Assad from the active roster for the time being.

“It didn’t go well. And I think the lack of swing-and-miss, again, is concerning,” Craig Counsell said after the game. “He obviously got some big swing-and-miss in some of his rehab starts. To me, it looks like the separation between the changeup and the fastball right now; the hitter is not showing you that it’s a lot.”

As it turns out, part of the issue was a blister on his middle finger that developed over the course of the outing and that Cabrera kept from the coaching staff until after he was lifted. That’s the same thing that sent him to the IL for the first time this season, and it’s likely he hid the issue for fear of heading right back immediately after being activated.

“That’s what really affected me,” Cabrera explained through interpreter Fredy Quevedo Jr. “That final inning, I tried to push through it, but I wasn’t able to.”

While it’s entirely possible the Cubs would have lost this one even without Cabrera’s disappointing effort, his lack of transparency isn’t a good look. Like, at all. This isn’t like when he was in Miami, where the games stopped mattering for the team after the break. And it’s not like Cabrera has the kind of track record like Max Scherzer, to where he can tell his manager to pound sand when he’s about to be pulled from the game.

Not to take Counsell completely off the hook here, as Cabrera was clearly rusty and shouldn’t have been left out there to put the Cubs in that predicament in the 4th inning. You can say all you want about saving the bullpen, but that doesn’t matter much when your starter is burying you in a game you really needed to win. The Brewers won their last two games to push their lead back to five, so I’d say leaning on the ‘pen would have been a better option.

Easy for me to say from this end, but there are several relievers getting ready to come back from the IL right now. Then they’ve got Peterson stretched out and able to work as much as needed over the next two days. This loss was frustrating because it felt preventable, or at least like there were some decisions that could easily have gone the other way. When combined with Dansby Swanson‘s going to the IL with an oblique injury suffered shortly before Cabrera imploded, this could be one of those games we point to at the end of the season.

Or maybe the Cubs will go on a run and we’ll forget all about it. That sure would be nice. Thing is, and this could just be my general cynicism, I’d have a very hard time trusting Cabrera again in the near future. It’s going to take a lot of custom kitchen deliveries without further incident for me to feel comfortable with him pitching in an important situation.