Smyly for the camera

[davell]

Right now, we're sitting around 131.658, for the LT. Plus, you've got to add for the pre arbs and the 16 mill for insurances. Might as well say 152ish. Leaving us 45 mill, to grab a starter, a pen guy, and in season moves. Plus, a backup C, another pen arm, maybe a backup OFer, if we get the first two done relatively cheaply.....

 

Here's the thing though. You're at 113.358 for NEXT years LT, with just Heyward, Lester, Zobrist, Quintana, Rizzo, Strop, Morrow, and Smyly accounted for. The arb raises for KB, Addy, and Hendricks will be substantial. Those 3 are projected for 16.1 as 1st year guys. That could come close to doubling, as 2nd year guys, as a total.

 

Then, you've got Schwarber, Javy, Carl, and Monty all hitting 1st year arb......Combined, I can see those arbs putting us at 148-150. You've still got to add pre arbs and insurances.....Conceivably, you're sitting around 170ish after that.

 

Add a Cobb and Reed to the mix and you're sitting at 195. With an LT of 205 and Bryce sitting firmly in the plans.... Again, no doubt in my mind we're going over the LT next year. But, I don't see us going 40 over it. And it'd be hard not to, with a Harper addition, plus Cobb and Reed, or any combo that puts an extra 25 mill onto our books for next year too.

 

I'm definitely starting to think that one of those moves wouldn't happen. And how trading for an Archer has significant added value to us, just based on these numbers.....

When do we get the new TV deal? After next year? Maybe the just plan to say horsefeathers the LT (not Dodgers level disregard but fine going 30-50 over) starting next year with that coming in to place.

 

Its not that we can't spend that much, its the penalties involved. No team is going 40 over.

[toonsterwu]

Really big fan of this move. I thought they would take a flier on a lefty, but was thinking more Wade Miley, who the FO, I believe, used to be really high on (wouldn't surprise me if they took a flier on a guy like Wade Miley on top of this move, since Smyly likely won't pitch in 2018, and if he does, it'll be late in the year and probably out of the pen), but with Jim Hickey here, Drew Smyly makes sense. Always liked Smyly, and we are using our financial muscle in a positive way here ... a reasonable gamble on a guy who, when healthy, was a solid starter. Worst case is it's 10 million down the hole, but best case is we get a decent rotation option for 2019.

[Cubswin11]

Right now, we're sitting around 131.658, for the LT. Plus, you've got to add for the pre arbs and the 16 mill for insurances. Might as well say 152ish. Leaving us 45 mill, to grab a starter, a pen guy, and in season moves. Plus, a backup C, another pen arm, maybe a backup OFer, if we get the first two done relatively cheaply.....

 

Here's the thing though. You're at 113.358 for NEXT years LT, with just Heyward, Lester, Zobrist, Quintana, Rizzo, Strop, Morrow, and Smyly accounted for. The arb raises for KB, Addy, and Hendricks will be substantial. Those 3 are projected for 16.1 as 1st year guys. That could come close to doubling, as 2nd year guys, as a total.

 

Then, you've got Schwarber, Javy, Carl, and Monty all hitting 1st year arb......Combined, I can see those arbs putting us at 148-150. You've still got to add pre arbs and insurances.....Conceivably, you're sitting around 170ish after that.

 

Add a Cobb and Reed to the mix and you're sitting at 195. With an LT of 205 and Bryce sitting firmly in the plans.... Again, no doubt in my mind we're going over the LT next year. But, I don't see us going 40 over it. And it'd be hard not to, with a Harper addition, plus Cobb and Reed, or any combo that puts an extra 25 mill onto our books for next year too.

 

I'm definitely starting to think that one of those moves wouldn't happen. And how trading for an Archer has significant added value to us, just based on these numbers.....

When do we get the new TV deal? After next year? Maybe the just plan to say horsefeathers the LT (not Dodgers level disregard but fine going 30-50 over) starting next year with that coming in to place.

 

Its not that we can't spend that much, its the penalties involved. No team is going 40 over.

Fair enough and I entirely get that. Just trying to figure out where we are going with the rest of the offseason and using the LT as a way to figure out the type of contracts we'd be looking at adding.

 

A guy maybe possible through a trade to fill the last pitching spot that was discussed about earlier here that I just thought of is Ivan Nova.... He's signed for $17 mil total over the next two years, Pirates are rumored to be looking to sell (don't know if they'd trade in the division), he's the epitome of a strike thrower, and he isn't overly young or great that he'd cost that much (he's basically Alex Cobb).

[toonsterwu]

I actually think Ivan Nova is going to be pretty costly if the Pirates traded him. A decent starter for several years now who is signed for 2 years at a very reasonable number? It's hard to really gauge trade costs, and clearly, he won't be in that top level trade range, but it wouldn't surprise me to see the Pirates ask for 2 solid prospects in a deal, perhaps a typical high floor upper level guy and a low level lottery type.

 

____

 

As for the last rotation spot? I think the Cubs will pursue all the higher end options, but the Yankees look like they are clearing room to make a run at something this year, and Alex Cobb always made some sense as a kid from the Northeast. The trade markets would be highly competitive, in all likelihood. My guess is that they are still planning on a top level guy, but would prefer a trade, but again, wouldn't surprise me if they signed a few fliers (Wade Miley ... heck let's go all-Orioles and go the terrible Chris Tillman on some sort of 1 year gamble) and just held the fort if they thought the price on the FA's got too high or that the trades were too costly. The 1-4 for the rotation is fine - you hope for better, but it's fine, and I'm not particularly huge on Chatwood.

[Bertz]

Speaking of luxury tax and all of that. I put together a spreadsheet to track our payroll and here's where I've got us at the moment.

 

 

This should be pretty accurate for 2018, with the only discrepancies being with arbitration settlements (highlighted in blue). 2019 and 2020 obviously come with bigger much error bars, because of arbitration raises and contract options. For guys already in arb or whom we already have an estimate, I assumed a raise of 1.5x each year. For guys who hit arb for the first time, I tried to ballpark what they'd get by looking at comparable guys on this year's list, but honestly ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

Using this as a guidepost though, there's practically nothing we can do at this point to go over the cap for this year, short of Darvish AND Davis. Next year's what's interesting. Harper's probably going to be a cap hit of 35-40 million, so the question is how far above the cap can we go. I think what we do for the last spot in the rotation will probably give us our answer.

[Tim]

I'll pimp this site again: https://www.rosterresource.com/mlb-chicago-cubs-info/

[Omar]

Spring Training 2018 - What are the chances that Smyly could compete to start?

[davell]

Spring Training 2018 - What are the chances that Smyly could compete to start?

 

0%. He didn't have TJS until around mid season.

[Splendid Splinter]

Spring Training 2018 - What are the chances that Smyly could compete to start?

 

0%. He didn't have TJS until around mid season.

 

Yep. Late June/early July IIRC.