There comes a point at which lip service will no longer suffice to answer questions that have been repeated daily for a period of weeks. So a few days after saying the batting order didn’t matter as much as who was in the lineup, Craig Counsell finally made a big chance for Tuesday’s series opener in Pittsburgh. Carson Kelly, the NL’s fWAR leader at catcher, moved up to the cleanup spot with the slumping Dansby Swanson sliding down from fifth to eighth.
If getting instant results makes a manager look smarter, Counsell just became the 1,340th member of MENSA’s Chicago Area chapter.