If the Cubs are going to make good on the latent competitive advantages of a pitching staff that isn’t very intimidating on paper, pitching coach Tommy Hottovy has his work cut out for him. Backed by a redesigned infrastructure headed up by assistant GM Craig Breslow, Hottovy’s job is to identify areas of improvement when it comes to the kind of minutia that typically escapes public notice.
We saw several examples of that work in the shortened 2020 season, but a full spring training with a new group of pitchers should give us an even better idea of what Hottovy is trying to accomplish.