8.10 The Justin Steele Alec Mills Experience

[SouthSideRyan]

On paper this team to me doesn’t seem like a 100 loss team. Don’t get me wrong it doesn’t look like a good or average team. 2-9 since the trades is inconsequential but a little annoying. I’d like to occasionally enjoy a win

 

Is that because they seem like a 110 loss team?

[jersey cubs fan]

On paper this team to me doesn’t seem like a 100 loss team.

I don't get why people say things like this.

 

On paper this team is trash.

 

They have no pitching. The strength of the staff was the bullpen that is all gone. The rotation has one guy and a bunch of garbage. They have one major league hitter, who is a catcher, and have been getting complete lightning in a bottle performances out of a collection of nobodies and it's still not enough to make up for the full roster. This is an incredibly bad baseball team that will need to add several very expensive players in the offseason to be competitive next year.

 

If they went into the season with this current roster they'd lose 120, easily.

[Bertz]

On paper this team to me doesn’t seem like a 100 loss team.

I don't get why people say things like this.

 

On paper this team is trash.

 

They have no pitching. The strength of the staff was the bullpen that is all gone. The rotation has one guy and a bunch of garbage. They have one major league hitter, who is a catcher, and have been getting complete lightning in a bottle performances out of a collection of nobodies and it's still not enough to make up for the full roster. This is an incredibly bad baseball team that will need to add several very expensive players in the offseason to be competitive next year.

 

If they went into the season with this current roster they'd lose 120, easily.

 

You know there's pretty easy ways to verify how silly this is, right?

[jersey cubs fan]

On paper this team to me doesn’t seem like a 100 loss team.

I don't get why people say things like this.

 

On paper this team is trash.

 

They have no pitching. The strength of the staff was the bullpen that is all gone. The rotation has one guy and a bunch of garbage. They have one major league hitter, who is a catcher, and have been getting complete lightning in a bottle performances out of a collection of nobodies and it's still not enough to make up for the full roster. This is an incredibly bad baseball team that will need to add several very expensive players in the offseason to be competitive next year.

 

If they went into the season with this current roster they'd lose 120, easily.

 

You know there's pretty easy ways to verify how silly this is, right?

by watching them lose every game with a collection of career minor leaguers and should be retired pitchers? And Jason Heyward.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

ZiPS says 75 wins if you run the players under contract in 2022 for all teams. And the Cubs will have among the highest resources in both $ and trade capital to use to move that higher.

[SouthSideRyan]

Think of this as projecting the 2022 standings if every team had an “average” offseason;

 

That's for the 75 wins.

 

He says it projects to 71 wins as currently constructed. And that's including Madrigal.

[Sammy Sofa]

 

 

 

 

Edited August 11, 2021 by Sammy Sofa

[UMFan83]

I don't get why people say things like this.

 

On paper this team is trash.

 

They have no pitching. The strength of the staff was the bullpen that is all gone. The rotation has one guy and a bunch of garbage. They have one major league hitter, who is a catcher, and have been getting complete lightning in a bottle performances out of a collection of nobodies and it's still not enough to make up for the full roster. This is an incredibly bad baseball team that will need to add several very expensive players in the offseason to be competitive next year.

 

If they went into the season with this current roster they'd lose 120, easily.

 

You know there's pretty easy ways to verify how silly this is, right?

by watching them lose every game with a collection of career minor leaguers and should be retired pitchers? And Jason Heyward.

 

Fangraphs is only one metric but they have the Cubs as currently assembled a 69-93 team over a full season. And that's taking into account the performances thus far since the deadline. Though its also taking into account playing in the Central so maybe they are a 100 loss team in a normal division. I definitely dont think its a 120 loss team, especially if Nico is healthy and Happ looks more like the .800 OPS hitter over his first 1200 PA than the completely garbage hitter over 350 PA this year. They'd have to sort through the bullpen, that would be the biggest issue for me because like you said it was the teams biggest strength. They'd have to take some time to sort through the mess and cobble together something with Heuer, Wieck (if healthy) and Brothers, the 3 relievers who have provided positive value to the Cubs this year.

 

I'm willing to walk back on the definitely not a 100 loss team but I think the roster is better than you suggest, though still bad. I guess its silly to argue whether a bad team is 100 loss bad or 120+ loss bad. Bad is bad, and they are bad.

 

 

Edit: I guess others have already chimed in using Zips

[SouthSideRyan]

I mean no team is ever going to project to be a 120 loss team.

[jersey cubs fan]

Fangraphs is only one metric but they have the Cubs as currently assembled a 69-93 team over a full season. And that's taking into account the performances thus far since the deadline. Though its also taking into account playing in the Central so maybe they are a 100 loss team in a normal division. I definitely dont think its a 120 loss team, especially if Nico is healthy and Happ looks more like the .800 OPS hitter over his first 1200 PA than the completely garbage hitter over 350 PA this year. They'd have to sort through the bullpen, that would be the biggest issue for me because like you said it was the teams biggest strength. They'd have to take some time to sort through the mess and cobble together something with Heuer, Wieck (if healthy) and Brothers, the 3 relievers who have provided positive value to the Cubs this year.

 

I'm willing to walk back on the definitely not a 100 loss team but I think the roster is better than you suggest, though still bad. I guess its silly to argue whether a bad team is 100 loss bad or 120+ loss bad. Bad is bad, and they are bad.

You mention the bullpen, which is far from an easy to answer situation, but what about the rotation? It's really bad. You need 7+ starters to make it through a season, and it's probably 8 or more when you talk about a rotation with a group like this that doesn't have a couple reliable workhorses. When your bullpen AND rotation need an influx of help your season can slip away from you very quickly.

[CubinNY]

ZiPS says 75 wins if you run the players under contract in 2022 for all teams. And the Cubs will have among the highest resources in both $ and trade capital to use to move that higher.

Given what you know about ownership...

[squally1313]

Fangraphs is only one metric but they have the Cubs as currently assembled a 69-93 team over a full season. And that's taking into account the performances thus far since the deadline. Though its also taking into account playing in the Central so maybe they are a 100 loss team in a normal division. I definitely dont think its a 120 loss team, especially if Nico is healthy and Happ looks more like the .800 OPS hitter over his first 1200 PA than the completely garbage hitter over 350 PA this year. They'd have to sort through the bullpen, that would be the biggest issue for me because like you said it was the teams biggest strength. They'd have to take some time to sort through the mess and cobble together something with Heuer, Wieck (if healthy) and Brothers, the 3 relievers who have provided positive value to the Cubs this year.

 

I'm willing to walk back on the definitely not a 100 loss team but I think the roster is better than you suggest, though still bad. I guess its silly to argue whether a bad team is 100 loss bad or 120+ loss bad. Bad is bad, and they are bad.

You mention the bullpen, which is far from an easy to answer situation, but what about the rotation? It's really bad. You need 7+ starters to make it through a season, and it's probably 8 or more when you talk about a rotation with a group like this that doesn't have a couple reliable workhorses. When your bullpen AND rotation need an influx of help your season can slip away from you very quickly.

 

Have you seen other rotations?

[Ding Dong Johnson]

I mean no team is ever going to project to be a 120 loss team.

There was a team JUST LAST YEAR that only won 19 games all season.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

ZiPS says 75 wins if you run the players under contract in 2022 for all teams. And the Cubs will have among the highest resources in both $ and trade capital to use to move that higher.

Given what you know about ownership...

 

Ownership being conservative about one off losses in a pandemic and generally being unwilling to be repeat luxury tax offenders(among their many other unattractive qualities) is not the same as slashing payroll 100+ million from what it was in recent seasons. I don't have any love lost for them, but it'd be more helpful if we're talking about the team's options to be able to separate the distaste for them(very reasonable) with a caricature that they're running the team like Jeffrey Loria(citation needed). Maybe that conservatism does mean they aren't going to sign a mega deal for someone like Seager without seeing the CBA dust settle, and I'm basically expecting that payroll next year is not going to flirt with the current LT levels(for reasons both reasonable and not). But even with those caveats they'd still have pretty abundant resources to make the 2022 Cubs better.

[SouthSideRyan]

Let's give the benefit of the doubt to an ownership group who has never spent money in a season they didn't expect to compete.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

Let's give the benefit of the doubt to an ownership group who has never spent money in a season they didn't expect to compete.

 

The Ricketts-owned Cubs have carried a 105+ million payroll in 12 of their 13 seasons. In 2013 when they had no intention of competing they spent 37% of their 107 million payroll on free agents that offseason(plus extended Starlin). That 105 million mark would be 40 million lower than this year's opening day payroll(which itself was 30-60 million lower than the peak seasons), and would still offer them ~35 million to upgrade the roster. Claiming the team won't have financial resources to get better as soon as this offseason is aimless cynicism.

[squally1313]

aimless cynicism.

 

Tim, if you ever wanted to replace 'Easily the least terrible faction...' on the headline image.

[d_money]

21 Ks so far today in the two games. Shortened games.

Burnes on the bump tonight. I predict 15K’s

[CubinNY]

Let's give the benefit of the doubt to an ownership group who has never spent money in a season they didn't expect to compete.

 

The Ricketts-owned Cubs have carried a 105+ million payroll in 12 of their 13 seasons. In 2013 when they had no intention of competing they spent 37% of their 107 million payroll on free agents that offseason(plus extended Starlin). That 105 million mark would be 40 million lower than this year's opening day payroll(which itself was 30-60 million lower than the peak seasons), and would still offer them ~35 million to upgrade the roster. Claiming the team won't have financial resources to get better as soon as this offseason is aimless cynicism.

 

I hope you're right, but payroll expenditures were mostly before they overextended themselves buying and delveloping real estate around Wrigley. I'm thinking the new CBA is going to benefit the owners in such a way that they are further able to suppress payroll and then claim they are handcuffed by "the rules" they are handcuffing on themselves. I think the Ricketts will be more than happy trying to win with a mid-market team competing with the other mid-market teams in the NL Central.

[Sammy Sofa]

aimless cynicism.

 

Tim, if you ever wanted to replace 'Easily the least terrible faction...' on the headline image.

 

How dare you.

 

The cynicism here is always targeted and focused with diamond-shredding precision.

[PackLandVA]

21 Ks so far today in the two games. Shortened games.

Burnes on the bump tonight. I predict 15K’s

 

SCHNI-KIES!!

 

[d_money]

21 Ks so far today in the two games. Shortened games.

Burnes on the bump tonight. I predict 15K’s

 

SCHNI-KIES!!

 

I’m goin to buy a lottery ticket

[jersey cubs fan]

Let's give the benefit of the doubt to an ownership group who has never spent money in a season they didn't expect to compete.

 

The Ricketts-owned Cubs have carried a 105+ million payroll in 12 of their 13 seasons. In 2013 when they had no intention of competing they spent 37% of their 107 million payroll on free agents that offseason(plus extended Starlin). That 105 million mark would be 40 million lower than this year's opening day payroll(which itself was 30-60 million lower than the peak seasons), and would still offer them ~35 million to upgrade the roster. Claiming the team won't have financial resources to get better as soon as this offseason is aimless cynicism.

I mean, this is the same guy that thought criticism of the early Ricketts tank job was unfair.