Some Perspective on Cam Smith and Kyle Tucker

[Brian Kelder]

There's a civil war brewing in Cubdom. Cam Smith has made the Houston Astros' Opening Day roster. As usual, the internet has several different takes, all of which are valid (in a way). Here is an attempt to be nuanced—and, of course, the most correct take on the internet.

Image courtesy of © Darren Yamashita-Imagn Images

Cam Smith, who was dealt (along with Isaac Paredes and Hayden Wesneski) for Kyle Tucker in December, burst onto the spring training scene. A .342/.419/.711 slash line with four home runs will garner attention for any prospect, even in the Grapefruit League. His callup was tear-inducing, and his teammates are calling him a 60-home run guy in the future. The Astros, clearly, are excited about their new toy.

Cubs fans should also be excited about Kyle Tucker! He is the legitimate star bat that has been clamored for. With the team feeling pressure after a teardown and an underwhelming 2024, they made this move to get exactly the type of player the Cubs needed to be division contenders in 2025. That does need to be factored in.

It's important to recognize where Smith would have fit in the Cubs organization as it currently stands. Matt Shaw was penciled in as the third baseman this year as soon as Paredes was dealt. Every spot in the outfield is occupied, with Ian Happ and Seiya Suzuki under contract through 2026 and Pete Crow-Armstrong under team control through 2030. Taking an aggregate of the major prospect-ranking outlets, Smith is roughly the 42nd-best prospect in the minors. He would not be under consideration for the Cubs' Opening Day roster even if he were still in the organization; he likely would have been ticketed for Knoxville to start the season.

For this year, there really needs to be no consternation about the trade. Tucker is going to be a great player in Chicago. Smith will almost surely struggle, be it right out of the gate or after going around the league once. It's not out of the realm of possibility that he returns to the minors at some point. When looked at under that lens, it's difficult to see an issue with the trade. 

Unfortunately, and possibly unhealthily for fans, the team's spending habits are a large part of the reaction to the trade. Given Tom Ricketts's history (and his hilariously implausible comments about lack of revenue), pessimism about Tucker sticking around past 2025 is warranted.

This would be perfectly fine in a normal world. However, Cubs prospect hounds have told us for years to be patient. They said the prospects are real, and they are spectacular. Now, Smith—a noted prospect who just plays and looks like a ballplayer—is dealt? Why did they switch their plan? It was not wise to deal a great prospect for one year of anyone given their plan and financial situation, says that segment of the fan base.

To get a homegrown star, it's necessary to have many bites at that apple. Crow-Armstrong has that type of potential. Kevin Alcántara seems to, as well. Smith does have tremendous potential, and Houston feels like that future will arrive now. Making the Astros is a huge deal, and it's absolutely fair to question if other teams scout the Cubs better than they scout themselves. The prospects sent to the Dodgers for Michael Busch are also rising quickly, though Busch himself had a great first season in Chicago.

After the trade, the Cubs famously dumped Cody Bellinger's contract. Despite multiple efforts, they didn't spend as much money thereafter as fans (rightly) demanded. Some of the optimism from the trade—the hope that this signaled a new era—was torpedoed by the parade of aging reclamation projects for the bullpen and bench. If they had truly been all-in, as the Tucker acquisition implied, we wouldn't be looking at oft-injured veteran Matthew Boyd as the main rotation addition and Ryan Pressly as the new closer. They did make big offers to Tanner Scott and Alex Bregman, and a trade for Jesús Luzardo died at the medical review stage, but the effect was the same as if they had simply stopped attempting to swing big. The offseason peaked with Tucker, and the anticlimax thereafter was frustrating.

This will be a fun season, and the Cubs will push for 90 wins. Long-term, though, the implications of this trade are less than ideal. If the Cubs won't sign a player like Kyle Tucker at market value, they should have just sat it out and maintained their plan (which was working). Smith being dealt wasn't the main problem; the main issue is a failure to go all-in on 2025-27, or to commit to signing Tucker. Of course, we won't know for months whether Tucker will actually be a one-and-done guy in Cubs pinstripes. However, If this is truly the case, they would have been better served to let the process in place play out.

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[chopsx9]

How great is this.

 

I'm a Cubs fan so I am fully prepared for both  Smith and Bellinger to outperform Tucker, who will hate Chicago and demand a trade, by Memorial Day, to the Tigers for the corpse of Javy Baez.