(670 The Score) Cubs manager David Ross and former team ace Jon Lester grabbed dinner Sunday evening as Lester was in town visiting.
Earlier in the day, Lester was in attendance at Wrigley Field for the Cubs’ 5-2 loss to the Brewers, a game in which left-hander Justin Steele threw six scoreless innings before the club’s bullpen let the game get away late. It continued a really strong stretch for Steele, who has a 0.79 ERA in four starts in August and a 3.25 ERA in 23 starts for the season. Naturally, Steele was a topic of conversation at the dinner, as Ross sees some Lester in Steele.
“There’s just a lot of similarities,” Ross said during an interview with Dan Bernstein and Leila Rahimi on 670 The Score on Monday. “When Jonny first came up (with the Red Sox), he was talking about throwing to (Jason) Varitek, and it was one side of the plate, into righties, trusting his fastball and cutter. The curveball wasn’t even that well developed yet and just like sticking to his strengths, not even knowing why he was doing what he was doing. But really just trusting in like, ‘OK, here’s where my stuff plays, this is where I’m most successful’ and not deviating from that until the hitters tell you. So we were talking about the evolution of pitching and just how that comes.
“Justin has figured out like, ‘This is what I do well.’ Reading his quotes from yesterday a little bit, talking about watching, reading the body language of the hitter, watching the swing. That’s an evolution that I think guys have as they get into more competition and what hitters are trying to do. You evolve into having into a changeup and the backdoor slider and the two-seam fastball and the four-seam, cutting it, sinking it, breaking it with the breaking ball. Those are things that come as you mature and when you get to work on adding things to your repertoire into the offseason. But right now, I think the similarity is both those guys came up with real plus stuff and just maximizing their strengths within the strike zone and having a lot of success.”
Listen live to 670 The Score via:
Audacy App | Online Stream | Smart Speaker