Regular Season Rumors

[imb]

horsefeathering vomit at the idea of trading albert almora for kevin gausman.

 

Is that suggested somewhere? I haven't seen any specificity to Gausman/Bundy rumors.

 

As for Hamels, on one hand he's definitely been hurt by the funhouse at Arlington like Chavez. On the other hand, absolutely not.

 

just upthread a little

[davell]

Lavine mentioned us with some interesting guys in his article yesterday. Mentioned Archer, Bundy, and Duffy. All have some warts, but all are interesting on some level too. He also mentioned not necessarily having to deal off the ML roster. I could even see Chatwood being included in a Duffy trade.

[Cubswin11]

I'm just glad it appears we're very serious about adding a starter. It seemed like we were concentrating too much on relievers, based on some of the articles.

Given the emphasis on bullpens in the playoffs, I’d rather devote resources to the bullpen to make it as strong as possible for October. But I think the rotation has reached the point where we need to throw away some useless prospects to get a guy who will eat innings for the rest of the regular season.

This is why I like Wheeler so much. He can start the rest of the year, he’s throwing mid 90s on the FB and 90 on the slider. Move him to the pen come playoffs and he likely gets a velo bump and could be a huge weapon for 1-2 inning bursts

[squally1313]

It's hard for me to to commit to trading for a starter without any information on Darvish's health status. If they trade for a starter, that's telling me that Yu isn't coming back this year. But if they expect Darvish to be healthy for October, I don't see a lot out there in the mid-tier section (ie, besides DeGrom) that would be a safe bet to outperform Lester/Q/Hendricks/Yu. Sure, another starter would be insurance, but the Chavez move makes me think they're totally fine letting Monty go three and turning it over to the pen.

[Bobson Dugnutt]

I'm just glad it appears we're very serious about adding a starter. It seemed like we were concentrating too much on relievers, based on some of the articles.

Given the emphasis on bullpens in the playoffs, I’d rather devote resources to the bullpen to make it as strong as possible for October. But I think the rotation has reached the point where we need to throw away some useless prospects to get a guy who will eat innings for the rest of the regular season.

This is why I like Wheeler so much. He can start the rest of the year, he’s throwing mid 90s on the FB and 90 on the slider. Move him to the pen come playoffs and he likely gets a velo bump and could be a huge weapon for 1-2 inning bursts

 

if we trade for him, i have a hard time seeing wheeler not being a part of our playoff rotation.

[KingCubsFan]

It's hard for me to to commit to trading for a starter without any information on Darvish's health status. If they trade for a starter, that's telling me that Yu isn't coming back this year. But if they expect Darvish to be healthy for October, I don't see a lot out there in the mid-tier section (ie, besides DeGrom) that would be a safe bet to outperform Lester/Q/Hendricks/Yu. Sure, another starter would be insurance, but the Chavez move makes me think they're totally fine letting Monty go three and turning it over to the pen.

I think Theo has absolutely zero faith in Chatwood's ability to turn it around this year, and getting another starter allows us to bench Chatwood once Yu comes back. He can't be going four innings and walking seven every five days if we're in a division race in September.

[Cubswin11]

Given the emphasis on bullpens in the playoffs, I’d rather devote resources to the bullpen to make it as strong as possible for October. But I think the rotation has reached the point where we need to throw away some useless prospects to get a guy who will eat innings for the rest of the regular season.

This is why I like Wheeler so much. He can start the rest of the year, he’s throwing mid 90s on the FB and 90 on the slider. Move him to the pen come playoffs and he likely gets a velo bump and could be a huge weapon for 1-2 inning bursts

 

if we trade for him, i have a hard time seeing wheeler not being a part of our playoff rotation.

Lester/Hendricks/Q/Yu is the playoff rotation (in some order). Yu is gonna be back.

[Bobson Dugnutt]

This is why I like Wheeler so much. He can start the rest of the year, he’s throwing mid 90s on the FB and 90 on the slider. Move him to the pen come playoffs and he likely gets a velo bump and could be a huge weapon for 1-2 inning bursts

 

if we trade for him, i have a hard time seeing wheeler not being a part of our playoff rotation.

Lester/Hendricks/Q/Yu is the playoff rotation (in some order). Yu is gonna be back.

 

you can make a case that he's been better than all of them this season. he's had control issues, but he keeps the ball in the park and he racks up strikeouts at a really healthy clip. he has easily the highest WAR and FIP of anyone in our rotation and all the targets mentioned recently (bundy, gausman, duffy, shields, ross, eovaldi, hamels), and xfip second only to eovaldi. i don't know who the odd man out would be, but i don't know how it could be wheeler outside of clubhouse politics reasons.

[Cubswin11]

 

if we trade for him, i have a hard time seeing wheeler not being a part of our playoff rotation.

Lester/Hendricks/Q/Yu is the playoff rotation (in some order). Yu is gonna be back.

 

you can make a case that he's been better than all of them this season. he's had control issues, but he keeps the ball in the park and he racks up strikeouts at a really healthy clip. he has easily the highest WAR and FIP of anyone in our rotation and all the targets mentioned recently (bundy, gausman, duffy, shields, ross, eovaldi, hamels), and xfip second only to eovaldi. i don't know who the odd man out would be, but i don't know how it could be wheeler outside of clubhouse politics reasons.

Oh he certainly should be an option, just think he'd be an optimal bullpen guy in the playoffs to bullpen the horsefeathers out of games. He's already over 20IP from last year too, so a bullpen move would help keep him more fresh as well (you'd think).

[David]

Whew! I now seriously feel less dumb about my meh attitude towards Britton. TBH the only thing that excited me about dealing w/ the O's was the possibility of obtaining IFA money as a part of any deal.

 

why is this a thing that excited you

[davell]

Whew! I now seriously feel less dumb about my meh attitude towards Britton. TBH the only thing that excited me about dealing w/ the O's was the possibility of obtaining IFA money as a part of any deal.

 

why is this a thing that excited you

 

Its actually an extremely legit reason. There's a Cuban prospect that might be good enough to be the top pick in the draft that's becoming available. And the O's have consistently dealt their IFA money away. You could acquire enough to get him.

 

That said, the O's recently said that they're going to look towards signing these guys going forward.

[Cubswin11]

Yeah I’m totally down with something like Almora, Underwood, Short/Ademan, Mekkes/Maples and another whatever prospect for Gausman and Britton

 

https://twitter.com/gander_news_g3/status/1021852063758733317?s=21

 

[Cubs Fan Dan]

Duffy to a cubs??

 

Circulating his twitter started by a local guy @jon_sport. Says Duffy to Cubs being finalized.

 

We will see I guess.

[Bobson Dugnutt]

Duffy to a cubs??

 

Circulating his twitter started by a local guy @jon_sport. Says Duffy to Cubs being finalized.

 

We will see I guess.

 

where are you seeing this? i don't see any tweets from that guy this month. and he has like 100 followers.

[Bobson Dugnutt]

dp

[JennieGarthAlgar]

All I can see is that someone noticed Duffy changed his handle from Duffkc41 to Duffman and a few Royals fans are freaking out about it. He even responded to them with this

 

https://twitter.com/Duffman/status/1021846642629242881

[Bull]

All I can see is that someone noticed Duffy changed his handle from Duffkc41 to Duffman and a few Royals fans are freaking out about it. He even responded to them with this

 

https://twitter.com/Duffman/status/1021846642629242881

No harm no foul, but probably not the best time of year to do that.

[Cubswin11]

[sweetpeteman]

All I can see is that someone noticed Duffy changed his handle from Duffkc41 to Duffman and a few Royals fans are freaking out about it. He even responded to them with this

 

https://twitter.com/Duffman/status/1021846642629242881

No harm no foul, but probably not the best time of year to do that.

[SouthSideRyan]

Did I miss why everyone hates Almora now and is willing to trade him for whatever? Is it just because of banking on getting Harper and him having nowhere to play?

[Tim]

Did I miss why everyone hates Almora now and is willing to trade him for whatever? Is it just because of banking on getting Harper and him having nowhere to play?

Now?

[Cubswin11]

Did I miss why everyone hates Almora now and is willing to trade him for whatever? Is it just because of banking on getting Harper and him having nowhere to play?

I just don’t think he’s anything special and his stats now are likely his peak. He doesn’t walk, he doesn’t hit for power or the ball overly hard, he doesn’t hit RHP, he has to run a crazy high BABIP to carry even a decent average and he’s slow as horsefeathers so I don’t buy the infield/GB hits continuing, he’s an awful base runner and he is a good but not great fielder who already is slow and as he gets slower I fear he can’t handle CF. He has a nice contact/hit tool though and handles lefties well, which obviously is nice to have on the current team construction. But to me he seems like a 2-3 WAR OF as his ceiling who is incredibly contact/BABIP dependent for value, not exactly hard to replace and if someone wants to buy in to his unsustainable batting average and diving/running/jumping catches meaning he’s an elite defender I’d be all for selling out now.

Edited July 25, 2018 by Cubswin11

[Tryptamine]

Did I miss why everyone hates Almora now and is willing to trade him for whatever? Is it just because of banking on getting Harper and him having nowhere to play?

 

He's playing as well as he ever will. He's not particularly great on the bases, he has average power at best and his average is being hoisted up by a crazy high babip that shouldn't exist for a guy who hits as groundballs as he does. Yeah he's great defensively, but the offense is a mirage and if someone wants to pay for that mirage then I think most of us are willing to let them.

[Bobson Dugnutt]

Any realistic upgrades left on the reliever market now?

[Cubswin11]

Any realistic upgrades left on the reliever market now?

Britton, arguably, wasn’t even a top 5 option. So yes. Conley, Yates, Pressly, Soria, Barraclough, Steckenrider, Lugo to name a few.