After an 11-game stint in Triple-A, Kyle Schwarber is rejoining the Cubs on Thursday, according to ESPN Chicago. The report further indicates that the corresponding move will be starter John Lackey hitting the disabled list with a foot injury, though he's not expected to miss a start. Keep in mind, the disabled list minimum is only 10 days now and the All-Star break is four games away.
Schwarber's short stint in Triple-A is of little surprise. The Cubs all along indicated they didn't want him to be down long. Further, club president Theo Epstein made some comments about wanting to see Schwarber get back to being more of a well-rounded hitter than just a boom-or-bust home run guy. Schwarber was hitting .171 with 12 homers in 64 games before the demotion. In his 11 games for Triple-A Iowa? Schwarber hit .343/.477/.714 with four home runs and nine RBI. He had at least one hit in nine of the 11 games. That appears to be more complete without missing the slugging element, no?
It remains to be seen how the Cubs employ Schwarber here in the four games before the All-Star break, but manager Joe Maddon recently commented that he'd still love to use Schwarber in the leadoff spot. The .343 average and .477 OBP would obviously be wonderful at the top of the order, but those were Triple-A pitchers Schwarber was feasting on.
One item to keep in mind with Schwarber: For all the acclaim his postseason success has brought, he's still only 24 years old with just 135 games of regular season experience as a big-leaguer. Even if you wanna loop in his 14 career postseason games, he still doesn't even have a full season of experience. Having ups and downs is pretty normal with this level of experience.
The Cubs enter a Thursday make-up game against the Brewers, trailing said Brewers by 3 1/2 games in the NL Central.
