MWL South Bend Cubs

Toyota Road Report: Peoria 8/24-8/29

Published on August 23, 2021 under Midwest League (MWL)
South Bend Cubs News Release


Peoria Chiefs

Affiliation: Cardinals

Ballpark: Dozer Park

South Bend vs Peoria

This Season: 4-2

Last Season: 2-0

Since becoming a Cubs affiliate: 15-4

The South Bend Cubs (42-53) are back on the road this week as they head west to Illinois to take on the Peoria Chiefs (37-59). Peoria is coming off a 3-3 series split on the road against Beloit and South Bend is coming off a 4-2 home series defeat at the hands of Quad Cities.

Peoria has the worst record in the High-A Central overall as well as the worst home record at 20-28 and worst run differential (-121). Peoria won two of the first three games vs. the Cubs at Four Winds Field earlier this month but South Bend captured the series with three-straight wins to close it out.

Players to watch on Peoria

Connor Lunn, RHP: Lunn and Wilfredo Pereira have been great in the starting rotation for the Chiefs in the month of August. The right-hander from Carlsbad, Calif. is climbing the league-leaders chart and now sits tied for third in starts (19), fifth in strikeouts (95) and seventh in ERA (4.03). This month across four starts he's tossed 12 innings, allowed seven earned runs (3.00 ERA), struck out 24 and walked just three batters. Opponents are hitting just .211 in August off the 11th-rounder from 2019. Back on August 4, Lunn got the win in a dominant outing against South Bend (7 IP, 5 H, 2 ER, 0 BB, 7 K) at Four Winds Field.

Wilfredo Pereira, RHP: Meawhile Pereira has been right there stride-for-stride with Lunn in August but somehow doesn't have a win in his four starts (0-2). The right-hander has logged 19.2 innings this month with a 2.75 ERA, while striking out 24 and walking 10. The opposition is hitting a mere .203 against the 22-year-old from Panama. His first start of the month came on August 5 in Downtown South Bend and he went five shutout innings, allowing just three hits, walking two and striking out seven Cubs batters. That night Pereira faced 16 batters and struck out seven of them (44%).

Jordan Walker, 3B: Last time South Bend played the Chiefs, Walker was ranked the Cardinals number six prospect on MLB Pipeline; after a midseason update to every organization's top-30, he is now the Cards number three prospect behind just Nolan Gorman and Matthew Liberatore. Walker has reached base in 16 of his last 17 games and has at least one hit in 10 of his last 11 starts. Walker was a first round pick out of high school last year and started the season in low-a Palm Beach. The 19-year-old was promoted to high-a on July 29 after raking to the tune of a .374./475/.687 slash line across 27 games. In those 27 games he produced six homers, 21 RBIs, 18 walks and 18 extra-base hits. So far in 35 games with Peoria, Walker is batting .288 with a .755 OPS.

Players to watch on South Bend

Joe Nahas, RHP: Nahas has been filthy in August. His last road appearance he went six innings without allowing a hit and struck out six, carrying the bulk of the innings in the Cubs combined no-hitter. That performance led him to being named the High-A Central Pitcher of the Week. In his next appearance, a start last week vs. Quad Cities he tossed another six-inning gem. This time he allowed three hits, one run, walked two and struck out six (again). This month the 21-year-old has a 2.04 ERA, a 26.5% strike rate, a 1.02 WHIP and an opposing batting average of just .206. Ryan Jensen took home Cubs Minor League Pitcher of the Month in July and Nahas is making a case to make it back-to-back South Bend Cubs to receive that honor. Nahas is scheduled to make two starts this week vs the Chiefs.

Luis Vazquez, SS: Vazquez started the season as the Cubs leadoff hitter and shortstop but in the fourth game of the year he was injured sliding headfirst into third base and was shelved on the 60-day IL until he was activated on August 15. Since then Vazquez has a hit in all seven games he's played and dating back to Opening Day he's reached in all 11 games he's played for South Bend this season. In the seven games since he returned we've seen the speed (3-3 stealing bases), the power (he hit his first homer of the season last week, and every day we see the smooth glove and killer arm at shortstop.

Max Bain, RHP: This is a tale of the bounce back. In July Bain went 0-4 with an 11.34 ERA in five starts and opposing hitters batted .338 and slugged .623 off the Division II product. Since coming off the Development List though he has been a different pitcher. In August across four starts the opposition is hitting just .164 off the kid from Clarkston, Mich. and they're slugging a lousy .299. This month Bain has an ERA of just 3.36 and a WHIP of 0.98. Since returning to the rotation and deciding to pitch exclusively from the stretch, Bain has looked more and more like the pitcher the Cubs thought they were getting when they signed him in 2020.

Schedule

Tuesday, August 24 through Saturday, August 28 - 7:35 ET first pitch.

Sunday, August 29 - 2:35 ET first pitch.

You can listen to Max Thoma call every game of the series on the flagship station of the South Bend Cubs, 960 AM WSBT.

Check out the South Bend Cubs Statistics

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