Will Daniel Palencia ever save another game?

Daniel Palencia came back off the IL on 5/3, and pitched in a game on 5/5. Since then, he has a grand total of 2 saves, which occurred on 5/7 against the Reds and 5/14 against the Braves. He has not even had a save opportunity for over a month.

The Cubs have only won 9 games in that 28-game stretch, so that’s the biggest reason for no saves – as no other Cubs has a save during that stretch either. But none of their wins were save-eligible: they had 2 walk-off wins, and the margins of their other victories were 5 runs, 6 runs, 5 runs, 5 runs, 6 runs, 4 runs, and 5 runs.

I’ve not been able to find and definitive record for the longest stretch for a team without a save, but the Atlanta Braves had a stretch of 31 games last season without a save, which was identified as a franchise record since saves started to be tracked. But this has certainly been a long stretch.

And while Palencia has not gotten opportunities for saves, there are also some concerns with his performance this season. His ERA is still solid at 2.87, but there are a few signs of concern elsewhere in his stat line. His WHIP is 1.404, up from 1.139 last season, which is due to allowing 9.8 hits per 9 innings, up from 7.5 in 2025.

Here is the heat map for his fastball from this season

And here is the heat map from last season

One thing I’ve noticed is that he has been missing with his fastball very high. The ball to strike ratio is the same across the two season, but he seems to be missing more drastically this season But when I dig into the number, his fastball appears to be very effective this season, with hitters having a .238/.267/.286 slash line.

His slider is not doing as well. Last season hitters slashed .259/.310/.359. But in 2026 those numbers are .333/.429/.583. And his splitter, which he uses infrequently (only 39 times in 2025 and 18 times so far this season), is getting dstroyed this season, with a .667/.667/1.667 as compared to .143/.143/.143 in 2025.

Here is the heat map for those pitches in 2026

And 2025:

The big difference is that he is putting many more sliders and splitters in the middle of the plate this season, which is likely leading to many of them being hit hard.

If we take a look at his most recent outing, where he took the loss to the Rockies, we can see some issues with both pitches.

He walked the first hitter, throwing 4 fastballs well out of the zone

The next hitter took a low and inside slider into right field, putting runners on the corners. This was not a terrible pitch, but he did not put any fastballs in the top of the zone, and Sullivan could have been sitting on a low and in slider.

and finally, he threw a fastball in the “hot zone” of the hitter and he slapped a single to right

Let’s look at another game from June 6th, where he was trying to maintain a tie game in the 9th (which the Cubs eventually won in the 10th).

He struck out Willy Adames to start the inning, but two slider up in the zone were a bit of a bad sign:

Next was a fastball down the middle that Jung Hoo Lee slapped to left for a single

Next was a slider that got too much of the plate that was hit for another single, with Lee heading to 3rd.

Then a sac fly on another middle-middle fastball

And finally a line-out on a middle-in fastball

So with 5 hitters and 19 pitchers, he had no fastballs up in the one or just above the zone. And no sliders low and away to the 3 right-handed hitters that were close enough to induce a chase.

I’ve heard a theory that closers can sometimes do better in games where they have a save situation versus other times they are brought into a game, but I have no data to back that up. It probably is more of an anecdotal observation, that is brought out whenever a closer struggles in a non-save situation.

This season, Palencia has been much better in save situations, but that is because he has such a small sample size for save situations: a grand total of 3.

Situation	IP	H	SO/9	ERA	WHIP
Save	2.1	1	15.4	0.00	0.43
Non-Save	13.1	16	8.1	3.38	1.58

Here’s what we saw in 2025:

Situation	IP	H	SO/9	ERA	WHIP
Save	30	24	11.7	2.70	1.10
Non-Save	22.3	20	8.7	3.18	1.19

So, it does appear that Palencia, for whatever reason, pitches better when he has a save situation. Perhaps if the Cubs can get more of these opportunities moving forward.