Cubs acquire Tyson Miller from Mariners for Jake Slaughter

[Transmogrified Tiger]

Miller was a Cubs 4th round pick in 2016 and has bounced around AAA since leaving the org.  

[Tim]

Looks like Miller's significantly changed his pitch usage this year. He's going almost exclusively with cutters and sliders and it's obviously been working so far.

[Tim]

Also, I initially just saw that we were acquiring Miller from Seattle for Slaughter and I was wondering what sort of devil magic was happening.

[Rex Buckingham]

Seems like a worthwhile move

[UMFan83]

If he’s been so good, why was he DFA’d? Roster crunch in Seattle?

Not criticizing the move, just curious

[Post Count Padder]

Slaughter was one of my sleepers this season and I had hoped he'd make his debut with us this year. But he's not on the 40-man and there's several 1B/3B/OF ahead of him on the depth chart. So it goes.

I liked Miller during his first run in the organization and I hoped he'd get a shot elsewhere. He's looked good this year and it seems like he's the odd man out in a roster crunch vs. getting bumped for bad results. Given the instability of the pen in the early going it's not a bad pickup. We'll see if he keeps it up.

[chibears55]

Cubs trade Jake Slaughter to Mariners for RH Reliever Tyson Miller

https://twitter.com/mlbtraderumors/status/1790242775016820972?t=PCDHjncsuNavsvZU6V4mUg&s=19

[WhyCantWeWin]

Feels like a lot of trades Hoyer makes are for previous Cubs prospects that he or Theo bailed on. 
 

[Tryptamine]

Yup, keep throwing horsefeathers at the wall instead of just addressing it properly.

[JHBulls]

I am just going to pretend that says Mason Miller. 

[We Got The Whole 9]

Totally expecting him to walk like 5 guys in his first outing with the Cubs 

[CubinNY]

This seems like a pretty decent right-place, right-time trade. 

[Jason Ross]

This is another bite of the same apple that Jose Cuas is from. Righty, side-arm delivery, cutter/slider/fastball mix (the slider is very new and seemingly a quality pitch). Really solid extension numbers. The hope here is that he continues to throw strikes and develops into a quality mid-inning RHH neutralizer. 

Slaughter is a nothing burger for me when it comes to prospect capital. There's a world he is a decent bench bat, but he's blocked at every level with the Cubs right now and wasn't a worthwhile 40-man add long term for the Cubs. Wish him the best with Seattle and he could earn a bench spot there. Worst case, the Cubs got back a similarly roster-crunched player they can use and Seattle did the same. Both teams win here.

[Bertz]

He's always had the makings of a good ROOGY he's just been varying levels of awful against lefties.  With how left handed the rotation is and Adbert dead there's probably honestly room for him and Cuas both in the pen.

Probably about as much as you can hope for in mid May.

[Tim]

6 hours ago, Tryptamine said:

Yup, keep throwing horsefeathers at the wall instead of just addressing it properly.

lol - you understand he's working on bigger moves, also, but that those take time as the other team has a say in when the trade is made, right?

In the meantime, he's being opportunistic and looking for minor improvements when they're available.

[sneakypower]

1 hour ago, 1908_Cubs said:

This is another bite of the same apple that Jose Cuas is from.

[chibears55]

https://twitter.com/Cubs/status/1790386140135985395?t=WttW5K26o9B-o0mfPawpkw&s=19

[Bertz]

The opener is often used to protect lower end SPs, I wonder we could use it to protect our poor middle relief.

Like against an opponent that's righty heavy, let Tyson Miller open the game and then bring in Assad.  You're not getting the platoon advantage that you're normally utilizing the opener for, but you're putting Miller in a more advantageous position so hopefully the collective 6 innings you're hoping to get from Assad + Miller feature better results.

Keegan's another great example.  He's very effective when he's got 3-4 days of rest and is tasked with working a clean inning.  Do you proactively use him as an opener (for two innings probably) rather than potentially being forced to use him in situations where he'll be diminished?

It's not something I'd want to do long term but I wonder if it would stop some of the bleeding while we wait for the circle of trust to develop.

[Tryptamine]

3 hours ago, Tim said:

lol - you understand he's working on bigger moves, also, but that those take time as the other team has a say in when the trade is made, right?

In the meantime, he's being opportunistic and looking for minor improvements when they're available.

And what was the reason for not addressing it in the offseason? 

[Transmogrified Tiger]

12 minutes ago, Tryptamine said:

And what was the reason for not addressing it in the offseason? 

I think the reason is he did and then his existing leverage relievers evaporated and also rotation and depth injuries have robbed them of further depth.  There are no solutions that prevent 'Merryweather misses the first half of the year and Alzolay turns to dust, Almonte, Palencia, and Smyly all have a DL stint in the first 6 weeks, and they get minimal bullpen innings from Assad, Wesneski, or Brown due to rotation injuries' from being a problem.  As it stands, Neris has been wild but effective, and Almonte was nearly on the Merryweather track before his injury.  Adding that to the existing back end along with the stuff guys who could've but haven't yet broken through(Palencia, Little) with the long relievers/rotation depth they have should be fine, but no pitching staff can just shrug off 4 starters and 5 relievers needing DL stints in a 6 week span.

[Bertz]

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/2024-positional-power-rankings-bullpen-no-1-15/

Cubs were projected 13th in reliever WAR coming into the season, it wasn't like a vintage Brewers or Yankees bullpen but there was no reason aside from September PTSD to think the group wasn't fine.

[squally1313]

Sorry, both of you are unfortunately incorrect. The correct answer is:

• Sign Hader, but make sure he doesn't get unlucky like he has been and also that it doesn't impact our other signings
• Don't sign Suter or Chapman or Emilio Pagan or Matt Moore because they've been bad or mediocre and we can't accept that here
• Sign David Robertson because he's been good (except for the last time out, so just know not to pitch him then)
• Sign Kimbrel, but tell him to only have good stretches
• DEFINITELY don't sign Robert Stephenson
• Sign Reynaldo Lopez, turn him into a Cy Young starter

This isn't hard guys

[Tim]

1 hour ago, Tryptamine said:

And what was the reason for not addressing it in the offseason? 

What TT said.

[Tryptamine]

8 minutes ago, Tim said:

What TT said.

So the answer was almost 10m for a guy with mediocre peripherals and a trade for a  guy coming off a terrible season

[Transmogrified Tiger]

20 minutes ago, Tryptamine said:

So the answer was almost 10m for a guy with mediocre peripherals and a trade for a  guy coming off a terrible season

No, the answer was to get one of the more consistently good relievers of the past 5+ years, and to rescue an undervalued reliever that took basically one week to be excellent(Almonte after the first 2 series/3 appearances of the season: 13.2 IP, 4 H, 2 ER, 19/5 K/BB, 0 HR).

But most of all, the answer is "you cannot offseason your way out of 4 starters and 5 relievers getting hurt more or less simultaneously".  Not every negative thing that happens is an avoidable failure.