Screw Winter Doldrums! The Get a Big Bat and Call It an Offseason Thread

[mk49]

7 minutes ago, Neuby said:

Jesse Rogers says the Cubs plan on. exceeding the L/T this season and keeping Nico Hoerner

That's good.  If they trade Nico, signing Bregman would be a bad move, unless we actually get somebody better in the trade, which isn't going to happen.

[chibears55]

4 minutes ago, Neuby said:

Jesse Rogers says the Cubs plan on. exceeding the L/T this season and keeping Nico Hoerner

I hope so, I can live with Suzuki Mo and Alcantara but I'd rather not go into a season that has deep playoff run potential, with two (Mo and Alcantara) bats that could potentially be unproductive in that trio merry go round. 

 

[Rcal10]

27 minutes ago, chibears55 said:

I hope so, I can live with Suzuki Mo and Alcantara but I'd rather not go into a season that has deep playoff run potential, with two (Mo and Alcantara) bats that could potentially be unproductive in that trio merry go round. 

 

What does this mean? Alcantara doesn’t have options left. So if they get someone to take his spot he can’t be se t down. Mo should be fine as a DH. Who do you think they will get and who will he replace. I think the comment of them going over this year is just to reassure the fan base that Nico doesn’t have to be traded. I guess they could bring in a bat to replace Austin, but I don’t think they will. And that doesn’t solve the Suzuki, Mo, Alcantara merry go round. As I said, I don’t even know what that means. 

[We Got The Whole 9]

34 minutes ago, chibears55 said:

I hope so, I can live with Suzuki Mo and Alcantara but I'd rather not go into a season that has deep playoff run potential, with two (Mo and Alcantara) bats that could potentially be unproductive in that trio merry go round. 

 

Barring complete injury catastrophe theyre gonna be a playoff team. Let those guys get some run and see if they can be productive. We dont need to be so horsefeathers petrified of unproven players. The Brewers won the division with several unproven players playing big roles. You gotta give them a shot.

[Dfan25]

12 minutes ago, Rcal10 said:

What does this mean? Alcantara doesn’t have options left. So if they get someone to take his spot he can’t be se t down. Mo should be fine as a DH. Who do you think they will get and who will he replace. I think the comment of them going over this year is just to reassure the fan base that Nico doesn’t have to be traded. I guess they could bring in a bat to replace Austin, but I don’t think they will. And that doesn’t solve the Suzuki, Mo, Alcantara merry go round. As I said, I don’t even know what that means. 

I think Alcantara still has 1 option left . I think it was Arizona Phil who is really good at this stuff , who said it . Fangraphs still has him with 1 as well .
 

If he has 1 , my preference would be to have him start at Iowa as the main depth guy and get another bat for the bench ( OF ) who I  feel good about in case the of an IL trip from one of the regulars 

[Bertz]

13 minutes ago, We Got The Whole 9 said:

Barring complete injury catastrophe theyre gonna be a playoff team. Let those guys get some run and see if they can be productive. We dont need to be so horsefeathers petrified of unproven players. The Brewers won the division with several unproven players playing big roles. You gotta give them a shot.

The Mad Men "that's what the money is for" meme but "that's what the Bregman's are for."

Part of the incentive for adding guys like Bregman should be so that you can give the kids breathing room without worrying that those early season struggles will be the difference between playing in October or sitting at home.

[Hunter]

I'm already bored of the offseason again. Go resign Tucker.

[Hot Sauce]

1 hour ago, chibears55 said:

I hope so, I can live with Suzuki Mo and Alcantara but I'd rather not go into a season that has deep playoff run potential, with two (Mo and Alcantara) bats that could potentially be unproductive in that trio merry go round. 

 

I think you can add Suzuki to the two with potential to be unproductive. We’ve seen some dramatic hot and cold stretches with him.

[chibears55]

43 minutes ago, Dfan25 said:

I think Alcantara still has 1 option left . I think it was Arizona Phil who is really good at this stuff , who said it . Fangraphs still has him with 1 as well .
 

If he has 1 , my preference would be to have him start at Iowa as the main depth guy and get another bat for the bench ( OF ) who I  feel good about in case the of an IL trip from one of the regulars 

This is how i feel, if Hoyer has another move to make and can go over id like it to be on a guy like Tauchman.

Good LH veteran bat that could fill in well for a few games if needed, and give Suzuki and even Happ days off against RHers.

Alcantara has one option left according to fangraphs 

Edited January 12 by chibears55

[Stratos]

It's almost shocking how much Corbin Martin sucks.

[Jason Ross]

1 minute ago, Stratos said:

It's almost shocking how much Corbin Martin sucks.

I think he's been with some bad pitching orgs (Arizona, notably and the Orioles aren't stars here either), but also think if I was handicapping "who's the next Brad Keller" that Martin is next to Snider for that. He saw a big 2mph velo bump last year, and his curveball is nasty, with a 127 Stuff+ rating. It feels like if you can dial him in a bit, there's an MLB reliever in there. 

The ERA sucked last year, but the K% was way up, too and the xFIP was under 4.00. I wouldn't bet on him being Keller-good, but he's got a lot of signs of "the Cubs could get the most of him" too. 

[macarthur31]

24 minutes ago, Jason Ross said:

I think he's been with some bad pitching orgs (Arizona, notably and the Orioles aren't stars here either), but also think if I was handicapping "who's the next Brad Keller" that Martin is next to Snider for that. He saw a big 2mph velo bump last year, and his curveball is nasty, with a 127 Stuff+ rating. It feels like if you can dial him in a bit, there's an MLB reliever in there. 

The ERA sucked last year, but the K% was way up, too and the xFIP was under 4.00. I wouldn't bet on him being Keller-good, but he's got a lot of signs of "the Cubs could get the most of him" too. 

Cubs Pitching Infra was able to squeeze 43.2 IP, 3.09 ERA, 1.145 WHIP outta Chris Flexen last year.  Man, I'll take s'more of that.

[Rcal10]

1 hour ago, chibears55 said:

This is how i feel, if Hoyer has another move to make and can go over id like it to be on a guy like Tauchman.

Good LH veteran bat that could fill in well for a few games if needed, and give Suzuki and even Happ days off against RHers.

Alcantara has one option left according to fangraphs 

I thought I read Alcantara was out of options. If he has one then adding someone like Tauchman wouldn’t be a bad idea. Let Kevin get AB in Iowa. 

[Rex Buckingham]

25 minutes ago, macarthur31 said:

Cubs Pitching Infra was able to squeeze 43.2 IP, 3.09 ERA, 1.145 WHIP outta Chris Flexen last year.  Man, I'll take s'more of that.

Seriously, if they can coax a good month out of Martin, that's got real value for a minor league deal

Edited January 12 by Rex Buckingham

[Bull]

3 hours ago, mk49 said:

That's good.  If they trade Nico, signing Bregman would be a bad move, unless we actually get somebody better in the trade, which isn't going to happen.

Not necessarily. It would be a wash plus what was added. But only if it was in an area of need. Right now though, the only area of “need” this team has is elite closer.

 

the only way I trade Nico right now is for elite closer or in a package with Taillion for elite starter. Neither will happen.

[Tryptamine]

So let's say the Cubs are dead set on going over the cap what are even the realistic options?

Tucker would obviously be a significant upgrade and push Seiya to DH and Mo to AAA

Bellinger the same

Bichette would be great, but there's no way he's ok with being the DH so it's wildly unrealistic

After that, who is really going to significantly outperform Mo at DH? 

Eugenio Suarez has been between 105-125wRC+ the last 3 years and while Mo putting up a 125 wRC+ this year is optimistic, I don't think a 110-115 is at all unrealistic.

The only way I could see it happening is acquiring a bat via trade.

[KCCub]

3 minutes ago, Tryptamine said:

So let's say the Cubs are dead set on going over the cap what are even the realistic options?

I think the realistic option is not moving anyone to get under the cap and being able to add a couple pieces at the TDL without shedding salary.

[Rcal10]

3 minutes ago, Tryptamine said:

So let's say the Cubs are dead set on going over the cap what are even the realistic options?

Tucker would obviously be a significant upgrade and push Seiya to DH and Mo to AAA

Bellinger the same

Bichette would be great, but there's no way he's ok with being the DH so it's wildly unrealistic

After that, who is really going to significantly outperform Mo at DH? 

Eugenio Suarez has been between 105-125wRC+ the last 3 years and while Mo putting up a 125 wRC+ this year is optimistic, I don't think a 110-115 is at all unrealistic.

The only way I could see it happening is acquiring a bat via trade.

Yep. I don’t see a need unless they want someone other than Alcantara, assuming he does have one more option year left. Or maybe they add Goldy? Let Austin go. 🤷 I think the comment that the Cubs don’t have an issue going over is so that the Hoerner trade talk would die down. I don’t take it to mean they will add someone else. However, they could trade Taillon for a minor leaguer and sign Gallen. That would put them over. And I can see something like that. It helps the ‘27 team too. One less FA to have to replace in ‘27. 

[Tryptamine]

 

So I think my hugely optimistic scenario, assuming the Cubs are willing to go above the cap, but not crazily so would be something like this. It does not include unrealistic things like Bellinger/Tucker/Bichette and does not include Framber or Ranger because frankly it seems like the Cubs have no interest in them barring their market full on imploding 

1) Grab Zac Gallen at like 3/70 to 4/85 and follow that up with trading Taillon, hopefully for a SP prospect because god knows the farm needs it. This gives the Cubs a long term piece for the rotation and removes one of a half dozen or so guys that will need to be replaced at the end of 2026. There's a bit of upside there beyond Taillon, but mostly it's just trying to make Jed's life not a nightmare after this season.

2)  Grab Seranthony Dominguez on something like 2/14 to round out the pen, the stuff is good, the control is not, see if a better pitch lab can get him squared away

3) I'm torn on this because frankly I like non April Alcantara and he provides so much more upside, but if they wanted to play it safe, you could pick up Tauchmann. He's a good 4th OFer, he's not exciting but he's safe and that's pretty much his selling point. 

They'd be incredibly deep in the pen, rotation and with the bats which they need to be if they're not going to have a mega star to carry them.

[Stratos]

3 hours ago, macarthur31 said:

Cubs Pitching Infra was able to squeeze 43.2 IP, 3.09 ERA, 1.145 WHIP outta Chris Flexen last year.  Man, I'll take s'more of that.

I'd call Flexen's run with us extreme luck.  The stats point that way.  BABIP, K/9, xFIP

If they can get Martin to give up far fewer HR, walks. and hits, then yes he can be good.  Maybe he's made strides already this winter with his stuff.

Edited January 13 by Stratos

[Stratos]

6 hours ago, Neuby said:

Jesse Rogers says the Cubs plan on. exceeding the L/T this season and keeping Nico Hoerner

Great news!

[Dfan25]

Guys , don’t get confused . Rogers did say he thought the Cubs would go over , but were to going to hang around the tax . He meant that they would go over if they needed to make trades in season .

 

 

[Rcal10]

2 hours ago, Dfan25 said:

Guys , don’t get confused . Rogers did say he thought the Cubs would go over , but were to going to hang around the tax . He meant that they would go over if they needed to make trades in season .

 

 

I agree with you. Like I said, maybe if they wanted to lessen the exodus of FA next year they can sign Gallen and trade Tailon this off season. That would probably add $5M to the budget. But if they would go over at the TDL, this shouldn’t matter. Other than that I only expect them to go over if they make TDL moves. 

[mk49]

10 minutes ago, Rcal10 said:

I agree with you. Like I said, maybe if they wanted to lessen the exodus of FA next year they can sign Gallen and trade Tailon this off season. That would probably add $5M to the budget. But if they would go over at the TDL, this shouldn’t matter. Other than that I only expect them to go over if they make TDL moves. 

Do you think Gallen will pitch better than Jamo this year?  Possibly, but I'd rather keep Jamo just for the 2026 season.  I want to see those guys (Jamo, Shota, Boyd, Happ, Nico, Kelly, Seiya) play together just one more season.

[Rcal10]

19 minutes ago, mk49 said:

Do you think Gallen will pitch better than Jamo this year?  Possibly, but I'd rather keep Jamo just for the 2026 season.  I want to see those guys (Jamo, Shota, Boyd, Happ, Nico, Kelly, Seiya) play together just one more season.

I think Gallen is better.