Rahimi, Harris & Grote Show - Did the Cubs give us a sneak peek at their Opening Day lineup?

Episode Date: March 23, 2026

Marshall Harris and Mark Grote discussed what the Cubs' lineup will look like on Opening Day.

You're listening to Rahimi Harrison Grotie on Sports Radio 104.3, the score. Doors closing. Patrick deals, Breckman swings. It's a high-fly ball, deep left-center field. Racing back, ground at the wall. It's gone. Alex Bregman, with his second home run of the spring. And the Cubs now up 4-0 over the Brewers here in the third.

Patrick kicks and fires. Haps swings and drives one in the air. Deep left. This may go. That's gone. Back to back home runs for the Cubs. First Alex Breitman. Now Ian Hap.

It's 5-0 here in the third. Zach Zayman on the call right here on the score. Yesterday, Cubs walloped the Milwaukee Brewers. Nice to see that so close to the real stuff. Cubs 12. Brewers nothing. Kate Horton's six shutout innings. You heard the back-to-back home runs in the sixth inning.

in the sixth inning for Alex Breggman and Ian Hap, and you will be able to hear Cubs baseball this afternoon on the score. That guy you just heard, Zach Zabman, and Ted Lilly, Lily, Ted Lilly will have the call of Cubs versus Yankees coming up at 155 p.m. with first pitch at 205 on 104.3, the score. Cubs spring training coverage on the score is sponsored by Sloan, the leader in smart water and commercial restroom solutions, as we officially welcome you back into the Rahimi Harris and Grody Show here on the score.

And yesterday, part of why I took that game seriously is because you could tell. Craig Counsel took the game seriously, letting Kate Horton go almost 70 pitches, the six innings. This isn't your usual three or four inning time getting these guys stretched out for real, putting Kate Horton in position for his start in the first series. of the season. The lineup yesterday for the Cubs could mirror very similarly to what the Cubs

do at least in the first couple weeks of the season as we assume that Sayas Suzuki will eventually be put on the IL on Wednesday for a short stay is the way it's looking like right now because of the PCL strain. But this Mars Hall was the lineup for the Cubs

yesterday. Michael Bush, leading off and playing first base. Alex Bregman, your third baseman batting second. Ian Hap gets to hit third and played left field. PCA, Pete Crowe Armstrong, the cleanup hitter and, of course, your center fielder. There's Nico Horner, batting fifth and playing second. Carson Kelly, the catcher batting six.

Moe Baller, Moises by Asteroes, the D.H. for the Cubs, batting seventh. Dansby Swanson hitting eighth and playing shortstop. And Matt Shaw, the number nine hitter, getting the first start in right field. And of course, the other candidates being in that spot would be Dylan Carlson, Michael Conforto, and Kevin Alcantra, I suppose. Chas McCormick, if you hadn't heard, if you even had ever heard that name, he was sent down. Marshall, what do you think about that lineup to start? Would you be pleased with that? Would you make any adjustments?

Because I might make some adjustments in this. It's fine on paper. Like you go down the list and you can see the thinking of Craig Counsel as far as how you put that together. I don't know that I would have Ian Hap that high in the lineup. Yep, there we are. And I understand his value as a switch hitter in that lineup might be what lends him to be in that third hole. But I kind of want Nico Horner to be in the top fourth of the lineup. And I think what I look at when I see it is why not have, and I know this is going to sound crazy, but Nico Horner batting behind Pete Crow Armstrong, who

Who hits third? Oh, okay, put PCA third. And slide Hap down. Yeah, I tend to agree with you. Yeah, that's the first thing that stood out to me. Nico's too far down, right? No, it's not even Nico. It's the, probably, yeah, but what popped off the page to me was Ian Hap, batting third,

batting third, just considering the up and down nature of his season and, like, are we ready to do this? And I get it. It's one day. It's one lineup. Craig Counsel has done a pretty good job. at moving around the lineups when he's had to. I mean, think about Dansby Swanson. Wasn't Danesby Swanson?

I would have to go back and look at last year, but didn't Swanson start way higher up and then eventually get demoted and then made his way back up and then back down, and it seemed to work to some degree? Yes, but really the thing was Matt Shaw was batting way too high off the gate.

If you remember in Japan, opening day, Matt Shaw was in the top above some of these veterans as a rookie. and that was not good. I love where Matt Shaw is. Put him in the nine hole, low pressure, another stolen base threat at the bottom of the lineup. Also, the Moises-Biosteros, at first peak,

I was like, ah, is that too low? But you know what? I kind of get it. He's behind Carson-Kelly. So now you've got to throw Kelly pitches because Biosteros will punish you otherwise with his bat. And then Swanson behind him, I'm okay with the bottom of the lineup.

I think that could be a very productive bottom third of the lineup, which is, that's where PCA was to start last season. And you remember how much extra kick they got out of the bottom of their lineup and turning the lineup over at the start of the season. I like this on paper. I just might, my biggest thing is Nico Horner's too far down in the world. Why are we waiting this far down to have one of your best hitters hit? Yeah.

Yeah. You're going to see him too with batting lead off probably sometimes against lefties for sure. So I feel like he's going to bounce around the lineup. also think your guy, Moises Besteros, that's where you start him. You know what I mean? Like, it wasn't even a slam dunk unless it actually was a slam dunk that he was going to make the roster out of spring training all along. Grody, did you hear the way Craig Counsel was talking about him?

Tell him the coaches, don't mess with Mo Baller, basically. He's perfect. But in Mo Baller's head, if you read that and watched that, he didn't know he was going to make the team. He was going, and maybe that's a healthy way to comport oneself if you're a young player, that you got to have that little bit of mystery, that you can't just have stuff handed to you. But then Craig handed it to him. Last time we were looking at Mo Baller and talking about whether he's going to make something, it was like, is he even going to be on the playoff roster?

So in his mind, that's fresh in his memory. He knows that it's hit or miss for him as far as making the roster, because he's lived in a reality where he was not part of the team in the most crucial juncture of the season. Now, out of the gate, I think he is earned by way of his I don't know, over 1,000 OPS and batting 359 through the spring, he's earned the spot that he has, and now it's just a matter of how often will they go to that well?

Because if you're thinking Matt Shaw for 140 games, how many games is Moises Biosteros going to be in the start? Wow, that's a great question, too. Do you think, I think even a better question is, not that my questions are better than your questions. Do you think Moises Biostaros will be hitting third by the time the season is over?

Like you have so, I love him, too. I don't think I could possibly in my life match the love that you have for Moises Biostaros right now because you think he's the best hitter in the line. Well, look, I'll say this. I don't see him hitting third in the lineup. What I do see is him hitting in the top five of the lineup. If he's going to be a 300 hitter who's hitting 30 plus doubles, hits 15 plus home runs, he gets to 20 home runs. If he's given the opportunity, here are the guys I see him hitting behind. And that's why I don't have him in the top three in the order. Nico Horner, Michael Bush, Alex Bregg

To me, those are the guys he's not going to jump in front of. He's just not. Yeah, no, that makes sense because I think, like, if I'm looking, I still think Alex Bregman is your best hitter, and I can't wait to see what Michael Bush does this season with the full. I mean, a guy had 31 ad bat, or excuse me, 31 home runs last year and was, what, seventh or eighth in ad bats last year on the Cubs roster? So, and you could argue that, as you did often last year,

that Craig did the wrong thing by not having him in there, I always go back to, They developed him the right way, eased him into lefties, and now he's a made man because he gets to go up against lefties. So I supported Craig Counsel on that. I don't think you did if I recall correctly. No, you're recalling exactly correctly because my argument was when they were struggling offensively and those days when a lefty was on the hill and he just wasn't in the lineup,

those are dark days, Mark. Do you remember the offense? Hot fell off? Yeah, it did fall up. But my God, they were world beaters in the first half. Like nobody could touch. So we were talking about run differential. It was 2016 last year for a while.

If it's, and this is why it looks so ridiculous now and why I was banging the drum I was banging. Mark, if it's Justin Turner. Yes. Or it's Michael Bush. Come on. Come on. Don't worry.

Justin Turner's not walking through that door again. Some great text messages coming up, or coming through here. From the 312-644-67, if you want to text us or call us today. From the 9-20 PCA clean-up, and maybe that's a question mark based on the lack of slug in the second half of the season. But I like the idea that the Cubs seem to be saying maybe, if this is their lineup, we're leaning more towards what he did in the first half of the season than the second half of the season. 815. Is Kevin Alcantra no longer a prospect? He's a plus defender and would be better in right defensive. defensively. I'm not arguing that he would be better defensively, but I will say this.

Matt Shaw, to me, has a better bat. Point blank. They're going to need runs. It's cold outside, or it's going to be cold for a while anyway. So I like Matt Shaw. I think Alcantra will get mixed in there, say as Suzuki's on the injured list. He's going to get mixed in as a defensive replacement, perhaps. But for the majority of the game, I want Matt Shaw getting familiar with right field and regularly.

Yeah, and he's got, Kevin Alcantra's got tools. it feels to me like there's some things that the Cubs coaching staff has said out loud that they haven't been particularly pleased with with Kevin Alcantra, one of those being base running. So I think he's still learning to play the game. He's obviously got options left as well and could see some time in the minor leagues. Who knows what happens when say it gets back. And also back to the first text you were talking about with PCA cleanup.

That's one where I would be very comfortable with Nico Horner batting cleanup, PCA being behind him. And then that to me makes more sense. The consistency of the bat there because when you have Michael Bush, Alex Bregman, Ian Hap in front of you, likely someone's going to be on base. And if you're talking about two outs, bottom of the first,

man on base, I just like Nico Horner in that spot more. Do you follow me on that? I do understand what you're saying right there. Oh, and then this one, I guess this one's aimed at me since I was so excited about the Cubs 12 to nothing went over the Brewers yesterday. From the 734, they played the, quote, baby brewers.

There's lots of guys with no names on their jerseys and very high NBRs, but it was still nice to see a win. Isn't that always the Milwaukee Brewers? They're always a bunch of no-name guys. I don't care that they didn't have names on the back of their jerseys. And Jacob Mizorowski wasn't out there flinging the baseball at the Cubs because this is the way it always goes with Milwaukee. Yes, they've got some guys on their team that are absolute stars and stalwart,

but there's always the no-name guys that kill the Cubs. Listen. On the Brewers anyway. Eventually, those guys are going to have names like, I don't know, Vaughn on the back of their jersey. And you have to deal with this. So just take what you can get and let the White Sox do the dirty work for you in the meantime. Yeah, yeah, get White Sox and Brewers, man. On Thursday, Le Miz is on the mound in that White Sox Brewers game if the game actually gets played.

coming up here on Rahimi Harris and Grody, we are, we've made it pretty clear that Marshall and I, and I think Layla too, we're all kind of like I feel like most of the world, casual college basketball fans. But we learned something in the pre-show meeting backstage today that we were both glued to the NCAA tournament. We will talk NCAA. We will talk about the WISE and some of the exciting stuff that happened over the weekend, including your fighting Aligni. Next on Rahimi Harrison Grotie on the score. Rahimi Harris.