Chicago Cubs Lineup (8/17/26): Imanaga Facing Sox
It’s a rare occasion when both Chicago baseball teams are in playoff contention, but that’s exactly what’s happening over the next three days at Wrigley. The White Sox are up by 5.5 games in the AL Central with a 65-58 record that would see them in third place at best in any NL division, not to mention a game out of the Wild Card, but those are the breaks. The more pressing matter is that they’ve won three in a row and have the most potent offense in the Junior Circuit.
That remains true against left-handers, with a 106 team wRC+ that ranks sixth in MLB, so Shota Imanaga is going to have his work cut out for him. With hindsight being as clear as it is, you’d rather have seen him going yesterday afternoon against the Cardinals, even if that meant having David Peterson on the bump today. Peterson was going to be in the bullpen to accommodate Edward Cabrera’s return, but Cabrera is likely done as a starter for now even if he avoids the IL.
They’re facing longtime Reds nemesis Luis Castillo, who is making his third start since being acquired from the Mariners around the deadline. After a spotty debut that saw him give up five earned runs on six hits over just four innings, the former Cincy ace went seven shutout innings with 10 strikeouts against his old team five days ago. That was easily his best game of the season, not all of which has been spent as a starter.
Though Castillo is still a few months short of his 34th birthday, he’s aging like guys used to before advanced training methods pushed primes back a few years. His 95 mph fastball is down two full ticks from a few years ago, and his strikeout rate has dropped by 10 points from his heyday.
He’s still capable of generating chase with a repertoire that includes that run/sink heater and heavy 96 mph sinker, the latter of which has been his only plus pitch so far. His 86 mph slider plays like a death ball, but it frequently backs up and stays in the middle of the zone, and the 88 mph change hangs up in the zone too often. You would think Castillo was a big-time grounder guy with that sink-heavy repertoire, yet his 38.6% rate is in the 30th percentile.
Part of the problem is that his 5.5-foot extension puts him in the second percentile, giving hitters a few extra fractions of a second to identify and adjust to his stuff. That’s why he’s giving up barrels and hard contact at a high rate, which bodes very well for the Cubs tonight. This one could come down to which team takes the most opportune advantage of mistakes, and the breeze blowing out lightly to left could be costly for these starters.
First pitch is at 8:05pm CT on Marquee and The Score.
