Hello Cubs world, 

in prior posts, I've made the argument that our pitching is gonna be fine, so long as we land another serious closer/setup player to split duties with Hodge. The Cubs were 10th in starter ERA, and 6th after the All-Star Break. Their bullpen was stellar in August and September as well. 

Long story short, this team needs to slug.  It can't play with the big boys without big bats. Let's take at look at last year's team slugging rankings. You will notice a clear pattern - the top 6 slugging teams were the 6 best teams overall. Furthermore, slugging has the largest correlation to wins. Pitching, fielding, or smallball stats are highly interdependent. This is why the highest paid players of all time are always the biggest bats. Oh, and: All the postseason teams outslugged the Cubs 

 
Let's face it: in a league where strikeouts are hovering around 8.5 per nine innings, batting averages are down, and yet home runs remain on par with historical levels, you really can't dominate the regular season on pitching alone. Furthermore, smallball, although it pairs very well with great fielding and pitching, rarely beats super-teams. Your smallball strategy has to be ridiculously good in all dimensions to catch up to a 2023 Atlanta Braves or 2025 Dodgers lineup.

How Far Off the Mark is the Cubs' Slugging?

To be a serious contender last year, you needed a slugging of .415 or higher (Mets = .415, Dodgers, .446). Cubs were .393 - even with solid seasons from Suzuki, Happ, and Busch. Does Kyle Tucker get us there alone? Not quite, he doesn't - He brings the team up to about .410 if he's having an awesome year. We need Busch, PCA, and Swanson to all take a small step forward, too. However, to approach a competition with the Dodgers  -- lets say, .435 SLG --  the Cubs need all that, plus no regression from Suzuki or Happ, plus 2 out of 3 more miracles: 1) Shaw explodes and slugs well over .450 as a 23 year old rookie with no MLB experience; 2) Hoyer signs an elite bench platoon bat to be the 26th man, who brings a sky-high slugging percentage around .520+ ; 3) Both our catchers hit for power, averaging over .450+.  

Cubs were 18th in slugging last year and 20th in home runs, and it made their post-season hopes nearly impossible. The best smallball team in the 2024 National League was arguably the Milwaukee Brewers (13th in slugging) - and they haven't been able to get past the pennant with that strategy either. A key smallball stat is stolen bases. The Cubs stole 143 bases, but the Brewers stole 217. We can expect a marked increase in 2025 due to a full season of PCA and the addition of Jon Berti. We are also a marginally top 5 fielding team in the MLB, but even still we have a ways to go to catch the Blue Jays' defensive runs saved. And how have those Blue Jay been doing lately, eh?  
 

Team	GP	AVG	AB	R Runs	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	SB	CS	BB	SO	OBP	SLG	OPS
L.A. Dodgers	162	.258	5522	842	1423	291	26	233	815	136	23	602	1336	.335	.446	.781
Arizona	162	.263	5522	886	1452	271	37	211	845	119	30	569	1265	.337	.440	.777
Baltimore	162	.250	5567	786	1391	262	33	235	759	98	25	489	1359	.315	.435	.750
N.Y. Yankees	162	.248	5450	815	1352	243	15	237	782	88	26	672	1326	.333	.429	.762
Philadelphia	162	.257	5534	784	1423	285	24	198	750	148	30	515	1370	.325	.425	.750
Boston	162	.252	5577	751	1404	311	30	194	724	144	44	493	1570	.319	.423	.742
San Diego	162	.263	5526	760	1456	259	18	190	726	120	28	458	1077	.324	.420	.744
Houston	161	.262	5530	740	1448	264	16	190	701	93	24	448	1176	.322	.418	.740
Atlanta	162	.243	5481	704	1333	273	15	213	674	69	20	485	1461	.309	.415	.724
N.Y. Mets	162	.246	5510	768	1357	279	15	207	735	106	22	514	1382	.319	.415	.734
Minnesota	162	.246	5490	742	1352	309	23	183	702	65	23	473	1306	.315	.411	.726
Kansas City	162	.248	5421	735	1343	264	35	170	711	134	31	429	1161	.306	.403	.709
Milwaukee	162	.248	5472	777	1359	249	33	177	742	217	42	597	1459	.326	.403	.729
Colorado	162	.242	5454	682	1319	277	25	179	655	85	31	453	1617	.304	.400	.704
San Francisco	162	.239	5460	693	1303	266	30	177	661	68	22	492	1452	.305	.396	.701
Cleveland	161	.238	5310	708	1263	245	18	185	670	148	46	466	1196	.307	.395	.702
Athletics	162	.233	5432	643	1267	240	19	196	619	98	26	493	1502	.301	.393	.694
Chi. Cubs	162	.242	5441	736	1318	253	29	170	696	143	30	546	1362	.317	.393	.710

What is our team strategy for 2025?

Hoyer prefers smallball/fielders over sluggers. Cub position players under Hoyer maintain are top 10 fielders, high on base percentages, high walk rates, and average power. In essence, Hoyer has refused to pay the premium for home runs with the apparent argument that the price per WAR goes through the roof for multi-tool position players who also hit homers.  However, these prices are fairly accurate to their true value. Teams that can slug, hit, field, AND run are generally paying the most per win, resulting in a fair amount of overkill - that is, wining by unnecessarily large margins within a particular game, and within the club's division. Basically, Hoyer is attempting to win "exactly" the number of games necessary, by "exactly" the margin of runs necessary. Teams that spend well over the luxury tax are padding their stats with lots of insurance runs - essentially brute forcing a win at a financial loss rather than winning profitably. Statistically, carrying "Excess inventory" is necessary - that is, paying for a few dozen insurance runs is easier than threading a neeedle every game, unless you've got the best bullpen in MLB. Well, the Dodgers just leapt up and took that chance, while the Cubs still under-emphasize relievers. I digress.... 

 Hoyer is committed to winning profitably somehow - a similar approach to today's Astros, Braves, Red Sox, Padres, and Rangers, but with a reverse strategy. Most of those teams are willing pay free agents for slugging and rely on internal coaching to develop smallball support players. Cubs have been paying for and trading for elite smallball/glove free agents and prospects, while snubbing the pricey bats and trying to develop their own slugging youngsters in -house. All of these 2nd tier spending teams, who like the 200-240 million dollar payroll range, aim for balanced rosters with above average results, but with a bias towards their unique division and home field situations; however, 4 of the 5 mentioned teams have outperformed the Cubs consistently since 2019. The lone exception is the Sox, who have been at about parity with the Hoyer strategy. 

In essence, time is running out on Hoyer to prove that his rebuild approach has created a 2025-2030 dynasty. If this strategy has failed, then Hoyer himself is a colossal failure and a laughingstock for this tier of franchise. If it has succeeded, his form of backloaded success with a 7 year runway still seems to require the patience of a saint. I respect the need to "save for retirement", but I don't think retirement planning is the right model for a baseball team. 

Hoyer Knows his Weaknesses  

All indications suggest that Hoyer is aware of his rosters' weakest stats. Every off-season, he attempts to adjust and improve on his strengths first, and then attend to weaknesses second. This isn't stupid- if you have no strengths, you just plain suck. Now that he's got the fielding, starting rotation, and on base percentage, he's going to work on slugging and bullpen next. Let's see if he does enough...  

Sampling from his past, we can see that Hoyer has a clear pitching strategy - he plays Moneyball and collects the best "deals" at pitching, with a focus on minimizing walks, pitch to weak contact, and control pitchers with many offerings. However, Hoyer's teams rarely fall into the top 5 in ANY statistic in baseball, except fielding - and even then, rarely top 3 in fielding. Overall, one can argue he has a moderate smallball bias to his roster construction.  

Committing to glove-first stars at SS and 2B pretty much assures the Cubs struggle to slug with teams who have a Mookie Betts or Francisco Lindor. However, it is not a death sentence by any means. Being #1 in slugging isn't nearly as important as being top 5 while balancing other roster needs. Optimistically, the Cubs are VERY CLOSE to pulling off that optimization trick in 2025, after years of teasing it. With the current roster (including Jon Berti), Cubs have a ceiling of about #8 in slugging. Adding an elite platoon bat now or mid-season, they could max out at #6 and be a serious contender. Keep in mind the other teams are adding to their rosters. For example, the Braves just added Jurickson Profar and will be slugging monsters again. 

My Recommendations

I think the Cubs are striving for these team ranks in 2025, which are unlikely to all occur: 

Type       Current Roster Ceiling Rank 

Fielding            3

Basestealing   3

OBP                  6

Slugging          8

OPS                  7

I think we will hit our fielding and basestealing goals, but fall short of the hitting goals by at least 2 ranks each. It should be enough to beat the Brewers by 3 wins, but that makes me nervous. It's unlikely enough to beat the Phillies, Braves, or Dodgers, who will all have slightly better hitting stats and markedly better pitching. 

This is a very volatile projection relative to injuries, and could be much lower with the MOST unfortunate injuries to our best players, but I currently project the Cubs pitching (assuming they sign Kenley Jansen), as follows:

Starting ERA  7th

Starting walks  4th

Starting Strikeouts 16th 

Bullpen ERA 12th 

Bullpen walks 10th

Bullpen strikeouts 12th 

However, if the Cubs make a couple of mid-season pitching acquisitions, those numbers will improve for the post-season. Overall, I give the Cubs a power rank of about #8. To increase that rank, they MUST pump up the pitching mid-season with at least 1 All-Star acquisition.  Ideally, improve the slugging NOW with one more bench piece - a lefty killer with at LEAST 25 HR per 162 games and a high batting average.