Post Winter Meetings Free Agency thread

[Rcal10]

12 minutes ago, chibears55 said:

Also with all the Bregman chatter and the QO attached to him, part of what theyll lose is IFA money if they were to sign him.

Hopefully Hoyer has something good brewing that they could announce before or during the convention 

Would the money they lose be next year? I mean conceivably they would have already spend this years money by now. Doesn’t really matter, I doubt they get Bregman. 

[Bertz]

I would imagine Alonso signing will move the position player group along broadly.  I'd also like to think given that we need a backup 1B it would help move things along for us finalizing the bench.

[Post Count Padder]

Jesse Winker back to the Mets and apparently the Mets expect Alonso to go elsewhere. Could he go somewhere like the Blue Jays and he or Vladdy take over DH? Seems to make sense.

[ILMindState]

 

 

[Jason Ross]

35 minutes ago, ILMindState said:

 

 

Good to hear. Much closer to Tucker's number, too.

[Bertz]

This feels like a good succinct way laying out the rough expectation from here.  Maybe broaden opportunistic beyond SP (though SP would certainly be the ideal).

[Rcal10]

1 hour ago, Bertz said:

This feels like a good succinct way laying out the rough expectation from here.  Maybe broaden opportunistic beyond SP (though SP would certainly be the ideal).

So it looks like it would be hard for them to spend $35M for a pen arm and 2 bench bats. So definitely well under the LT line and definitely on orders from ownership to cut payroll, not just make sure they are under the LT. Which actually sucks if that is the case. It is the difference between signing Rea or trading for Lopez, Cease, or even Montgomery with Az taking on a portion of his salary. Basically ownership saying they don’t care about having a good staff, they want to save money. 

Edited January 17, 2025 by Rcal10

[chibears55]

...

Edited January 16, 2025 by chibears55

[Bertz]

22 minutes ago, Rcal10 said:

So it looks like it would be hard for them to spend $25M for a pen arm and 2 bench bats. So definitely well under the LT line and definitely on orders from ownership to cut payroll, not just make sure they are under the LT. Which actually sucks if that is the case. It is the difference between signing Rea or trading for Lopez, Cease, or even Montgomery with Az taking on a portion of his salary. Basically ownership saying they don’t care about having a good staff, they want to save money. 

It's not hard to see that totalling $25M.  For instance something like

Yates - $12M

Canha - $8M

Moncada- $5M

That's not to say they won't go cheaper, but I think you could reasonably spend anywhere from $15-30M on this part of the shopping list.

[Rcal10]

12 minutes ago, Bertz said:

It's not hard to see that totalling $25M.  For instance something like

Yates - $12M

Canha - $8M

Moncada- $5M

That's not to say they won't go cheaper, but I think you could reasonably spend anywhere from $15-30M on this part of the shopping list.

You’re right. My bad. I meant to say $35M. They have that much that they can spend and still be comfortably under the LT. Spending $25M would be cutting payroll more than I thought  they would. I fixed my original post now. But your response is correct as it pertains to my original post.

[Rcal10]

Doesn’t look like the Cubs plan some surprise at the convention. Guess they are going with the big news being Sammy is back, Tucker is here for 1 year and, or course, new alternate uniforms!!! They sure do know how to excite the people who go to that thing.

[Bertz]

The Padres 

A) Just missed on a guy they've been courting for years

B) Have 6 (!!!) spots open on their 40 man

C) Haven't made a transaction of note since July

There's a real chance we're about to see some absolutely insane Preller-ing over the next week or two.

[Rcal10]

15 minutes ago, Bertz said:

The Padres 

A) Just missed on a guy they've been courting for years

B) Have 6 (!!!) spots open on their 40 man

C) Haven't made a transaction of note since July

There's a real chance we're about to see some absolutely insane Preller-ing over the next week or two.

Maybe Suarez? Seems Cease is not an option, since the Cubs said they are looking for pen and bench. Suarez for Assad and a prospect on the 40 man? Besides having to get guys in the 40 man roster, they want to do it without spending money. So it will have to be higher paid players traded for a couple of 40 man guys.

[chibears55]

Padres are out on Sasaki...

Dodgers or BlueJays and the Jay's just made a trade with the Guardians and recieved 2 mil in IFA money.

Be kinda funny if the BlueJays get him

[mul21]

16 minutes ago, chibears55 said:

Padres are out on Sasaki...

Dodgers or BlueJays and the Jay's just made a trade with the Guardians and recieved 2 mil in IFA money.

Be kinda funny if the BlueJays get him

Do you not look at other parts of the site?  You keep posting things in here that are being talked about elsewhere long after they've been discussed.

 

[jersey cubs fan]

Cubs traded for Tucker 

[Stratos]

Hoyer's specific quote:

“Mostly focused right now on bench and bullpen, just trying to supplement the roster as much as we can. I feel good about our team but there’s obviously ways to improve,” Hoyer said. He later added that the “bullpen’s been probably the area we’ve been focused on most in free agency. I feel like we’re trying to make sure we upgrade our bench. Adding a veteran presence to our bench would be good.”

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2025/01/cubs-pursuing-bullpen-bench-acquisitions.html

I guess Rea was likely the last of the SP.  They have a modest stable who can compete for the 4/5 spots and fill in for injuries.  We have 3 extra SP by my count, plus the guys in AAA plus some scraps like Poteet.  Sounds to me like they aren't getting close to the LT line.  How frustrating.

[chibears55]

35 minutes ago, mul21 said:

Do you not look at other parts of the site?  You keep posting things in here that are being talked about elsewhere long after they've been discussed.

 

No, im not going to go look into all the different threads and pages to see if someone posted something that I'm thinking about posting,  like why would I look into Dodgers sign Sasaki to see if someone posted about the BlueJays trade and Padres being eliminated?

There are too many threads that basically hold the same conversations but are titled differently in here, so I like to try to just stick to a minimal on that so I don't have to read 50  posts in each one to see everyone opinions. 

Edited January 17, 2025 by chibears55

[Rcal10]

13 minutes ago, Stratos said:

Hoyer's specific quote:

“Mostly focused right now on bench and bullpen, just trying to supplement the roster as much as we can. I feel good about our team but there’s obviously ways to improve,” Hoyer said. He later added that the “bullpen’s been probably the area we’ve been focused on most in free agency. I feel like we’re trying to make sure we upgrade our bench. Adding a veteran presence to our bench would be good.”

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2025/01/cubs-pursuing-bullpen-bench-acquisitions.html

I guess Rea was likely the last of the SP.  They have a modest stable who can compete for the 4/5 spots and fill in for injuries.  We have 3 extra SP by my count, plus the guys in AAA plus some scraps like Poteet.  Sounds to me like they aren't getting close to the LT line.  How frustrating.

Yep, that was what I was trying to say earlier. Just put a wrong number in. No idea why they can’t go to $233M or so and will be fine being around $220M. As it is, the LT line being the marker is insulting as it is to the Cubs fans. Now being this far below when they could have added maybe $10M to $15M to sign or trade for a starter better than Rea is very frustrating.

Edited January 17, 2025 by Rcal10

[Rcal10]

4 minutes ago, chibears55 said:

No, im not going to go look into all the different threads and pages to see if someone posted something that I'm thinking about posting,  like why would I look into Dodgers sign Sasaki to see if someone posted about the BlueJays trade and Padres being eliminated?

There are too many threads that basically hold the same conversations but are titled differently in here, so I like to try to just stick to a minimal on that so I don't have to read 50  posts in each one to see everyone opinions. 

But when you do this you are ending up posting things 2 hours after we are already discussing it. I think that is what some are trying to tell you. Your post are not breaking news. They are old news. I don’t particularly care one way or the other. Just telling you why it is being mentioned to you. 

[Stratos]

1 minute ago, Rcal10 said:

Yep, that was what I was trying to say earlier. Just put a wrong number in. No idea why they can’t go to $233M or so and will be fine being around $220M. As it is, the LT line being the marker is insulting as it is to the Cubs fans. Now bring this far below when they could have added maybe $10M to $15M to sign or trade for a starter better than Rea is very frustrating.

Leaving 1-2 WAR on the table for a borderline playoff team is pretty dumb.  Unless as an owner/ business your goal is only to fill seats in the regular season.

[Rcal10]

1 minute ago, Stratos said:

Leaving 1-2 WAR on the table for a borderline playoff team is pretty dumb.  Unless as an owner/ business your goal is only to fill seats in the regular season.

I am sure they are where they are in payroll,  by design of the owner. 

[Transmogrified Tiger]

9 minutes ago, chibears55 said:

No, im not going to go look into all the different threads and pages to see if someone posted something that I'm thinking about posting,  like why would I look into Dodgers sign Sasaki to see if someone posted about the BlueJays trade and Padres being eliminated?

There are too many threads that basically hold the same conversations but are titled differently in here, so I like to try to just stick to a minimal on that so I don't have to read 50  posts in each one to see everyone opinions. 

We try to have a light touch with this stuff and aren't super aggressive about siloing conversations, but we are going to ask that you do make some effort to match posts to where the discussion is happening.  It's not a chat room where all discussion happens in one place.  To mul's point, most of the time I've noticed you adding news tweets it's been after there's been discussion hours ago in another place, so a good rule of thumb is to at least check around because based on that history it's unlikely you're the first one sharing it.

[chibears55]

1 hour ago, Rcal10 said:

But when you do this you are ending up posting things 2 hours after we are already discussing it. I think that is what some are trying to tell you. Your post are not breaking news. They are old news. I don’t particularly care one way or the other. Just telling you why it is being mentioned to you. 

That fine to say it somewhere else being discussed, but I'm sure there's others like me who not going to go through the different pages, then the different topics in each page, then read everything to see if it being discussed there.

If I seen that there was a topic in regard to what I posted, then I wouldn’t post it or delete it, but yea, I'm not gonna look into all the different topics and threads to see if someone posted something already, and these news are usually minutes to maybe 30 minutes after it tweeted out, I know if of importance somebody will have mentioned it by then.

There are a bunch of posters in here,  just because a handful are discussing it at another thread doesn't mean everyone going to know to look there if they have something to say about, they're likely to look at the hot topic like here that been mostly used for discussions.

[chibears55]

1 hour ago, Transmogrified Tiger said:

We try to have a light touch with this stuff and aren't super aggressive about siloing conversations, but we are going to ask that you do make some effort to match posts to where the discussion is happening.  It's not a chat room where all discussion happens in one place.  To mul's point, most of the time I've noticed you adding news tweets it's been after there's been discussion hours ago in another place, so a good rule of thumb is to at least check around because based on that history it's unlikely you're the first one sharing it.

I get that and like I just mentioned above,  if i see a topic being written of it, I obviously won't post it or just delete it if I did.

Maybe we need to start closing some threads and limiting active topics.

We have a trade topic and FA topic, but then someone will start a cubs trade for or Cubs signed thread and now there's different threads of it to be discussed at.

This thread been most active that why I looked here to see if it was mentioned or if anything being discussed that interesting.