Cubs (Cabrera) vs Mets (Senga): 6/23/26, 6:10pm

[Brock Beauchamp]

Alright, let's try this again. Will they get the game in tonight, what's the weather looking like in NYC?

	THU	FRI	SAT	SUN	MON	TOT
Trent Thornton	0	0	13	0	0	13
Ryan Rolison	0	0	1	0	0	1
Phil Maton	0	0	0	0	0	0
Javier Assad	0	0	0	0	0	0
Jacob Webb	0	0	27	0	0	27
Hoby Milner	0	16	0	0	0	16
Gavin Hollowell	0	13	0	0	0	13
Ethan Roberts	0	10	14	0	0	24
Caleb Thielbar	0	0	13	0	0	13

 

[Derwood]

14 minutes ago, Brock Beauchamp said:

Alright, let's try this again. Will they get the game in tonight, what's the weather looking like in NYC?

[Tangled Up in Plaid]

maybe it starts late but they'll get this one in

[Stratos]

We could really use another effective reliever.  Jed get on the phone.

[mul21]

I assume they're going with Cabrera today because Shota probably used yesterday as a throw day and he'll start one of the games tomorrow?

[Rcal10]

4 minutes ago, mul21 said:

I assume they're going with Cabrera today because Shota probably used yesterday as a throw day and he'll start one of the games tomorrow?

I think holding Shota back helps on two fronts. First, when they can they like to give him an extra day or two of rest. Then, him not going Tuesday keeps him away from the Brewers on Sunday. They appear to have him figured out, so it is good he misses that series. I think Boyd will go Thursday so Brown can open the Brewers series. 

[mk49]

I think its tough for any SP to prepare (mostly, mentally) for a start 3 days in a row.  So, I think it's a good move not to start Shota today.  And, hopefully, Cabrera bounces back.  Senga has been bad.  We should win this.

[chibears55]

Off topic but seeing some Schwarber mentions on X, etc. and Hoyer saying that was one of his biggest regrets. 

Made me wonder if Hoyer ever even made Schwarber an offer to return this past offseason , definitely would of preferred having Schwarber (5/150) over Bregman (5/175).

Edited 12 hours ago by chibears55

[squally1313]

1 minute ago, chibears55 said:

Off topic but seeing some Schwarber mentions on X, etc. and Hoyer saying that was one of his biggest regrets. 

Made me wonder if Hoyer ever even made Schwarber an offer to return this past offseason , definitely would of preferred having Schwarber (5/150) over Bregman (5/175).

Just as an FYI, Bregman has deferrals but Schwarbar doesn't, so the AAV used for luxury tax purposes is essentially the same for both deals (Schwarber is a flat $30m, Bregman is $30.9m).

I leaned Schwarber in the offseason and probably still would have preferred that route (to the extent it was even feasible) but also think the Bregman struggles/related frustrations have been overly magnified with his failures in high leverage situations, which isn't really predictive going forward. Especially if he's going to keep his level of defensive quality, it's a pretty easy path to 3 wins/year for the next few years, so it's....fine. 

[cl smooth]

happy "sandberg game" day for those who celebrate:

 

[mk49]

38 minutes ago, chibears55 said:

Off topic but seeing some Schwarber mentions on X, etc. and Hoyer saying that was one of his biggest regrets. 

Made me wonder if Hoyer ever even made Schwarber an offer to return this past offseason , definitely would of preferred having Schwarber (5/150) over Bregman (5/175).

Before Schwarber re-signed, many fans talked about getting him back.  It's pretty obvious he fit the team better than other FA (Tucker, Bichette, Bregman, Bellinger, Alonso...)  Well, Tucker could be a good option, but he wasn't affordable, and what we saw in the 2nd half, many of us didn't want him back, especially for the price. 

That said, I don't think the Cubs wanted to offer 5 yrs for an aging DH.  Schwarber's wRC+ with RISP is 204 this year.😅

Edited 11 hours ago by mk49

[mk49]

BTW, Senga's HR/9 is basically the same as Jamo.

[muntjack]

That Bregman contract could have been Dylan Cease, and that stings.  I didn't love the Bregman signing,  but I thought it meant we'd trade Shaw + for a big arm,  which helped to make it palatable.   When that didn't happen,  it made much less sense to me.  We needed an ace then (and now) and we already had a young, cheap, solid 3B.  

[Derwood]

28 minutes ago, muntjack said:

That Bregman contract could have been Dylan Cease, and that stings.  I didn't love the Bregman signing,  but I thought it meant we'd trade Shaw + for a big arm,  which helped to make it palatable.   When that didn't happen,  it made much less sense to me.  We needed an ace then (and now) and we already had a young, cheap, solid 3B.  

Didn't the Bregman signing happen well after the Cease signing?

[muntjack]

Yes, and perhaps Cease was always going to Toronto, but the Cubs could have used the $ they eventually gave to Bregman to beat the Jays' offer.  

[Andy]

2 hours ago, squally1313 said:

Especially if he's going to keep his level of defensive quality, it's a pretty easy path to 3 wins/year for the next few years, so it's....fine. 

The thing is, though, it's an opportunity cost. The Cubs could have gotten basically what Bregman has provided from a guy they already had for really cheap (Shaw). Outside of the money, which as noted was pretty much the same, the opportunity cost of Schwarber's ABs were the ones that would have gone to Mo Baller or the rotating rest slot the Cubs are largely using the DH for right now. Probably a shallower opportunity cost there.

Maybe Bregman starts hitting like he was expected to, but if he's going to be a good-glove guy who doesn't hit like a star, the Cubs already had one of those guys at third base.

Edited 10 hours ago by Andy

[Soul]

Bregman doesn’t make any sense.  He’s very consistently been well above the average as a hitter and he’s just a guy now, almost 3 months in.  Yeah he’s changed leagues and I expected an adjustment period but not this long.  I don’t know how we can expect Jed to know this would happen.  He put up a 130 OPS+ last season and he’s at 99 as of now.  That 130 was his 4th best in a 10 year career.  He SHOULD be producing.  Whether you liked the signing or not it’s pretty bizarre how this has turned out.

[CubUgly]

3 hours ago, mk49 said:

I think its tough for any SP to prepare (mostly, mentally) for a start 3 days in a row.  So, I think it's a good move not to start Shota today.  And, hopefully, Cabrera bounces back.  Senga has been bad.  We should win this.

I don't have much confidence in Cabrera at all right now.  I think both he and the Cubs are searching and have not found!

[squally1313]

22 minutes ago, Andy said:

The thing is, though, it's an opportunity cost. The Cubs could have gotten basically what Bregman has provided from a guy they already had for really cheap (Shaw). Outside of the money, which as noted was pretty much the same, the opportunity cost of Schwarber's ABs were the ones that would have gone to Mo Baller or the rotating rest slot the Cubs are largely using the DH for right now. Probably a shallower opportunity cost there.

Maybe Bregman starts hitting like he was expected to, but if he's going to be a good-glove guy who doesn't hit like a star, the Cubs already had one of those guys at third base.

I think there's a lot of different layers in what is really a hypothetical either/or. Schwarber and Cease were both with the Cubs org and who knows what kind of feelings that they have towards the team. There's also, off the top of my head:

1. Matt Shaw has been worth 1.7 fWAR in 568 PAs, actually has a worse xwOBA this year than last year, and was worse than Bregman at third this year by most metrics (outs above average and then just defensive value generated - Bregman played 972 innings at third and nowhere else and had defensive value of 4.7, Shaw played 1,010 innings at third and 6 innings at second and had defensive value of 1.6). Fielding Bible did like Shaw better. Bregman in 2025 and in 2026 is better than anything we've seen from Shaw, though admittedly not $35m better.
2. This time last year everyone was convinced Suzuki had to move to DH, which would have made Schwarber an awkward fit.
3. I don't think the FO considered this, but I did when talking about who I wanted/what direction I wanted them to go in: Matt Shaw is almost certainly a garbage person and I don't like rooting for garbage people. 

I largely agree on the opportunity costs concept, When you couple it with the Nico extension, I don't mind signing players to good contracts if you think they're going to age well, but when it leaves you with valuable players with redundant skill sets, finishing the job is swapping the players who aren't going to play for players with different (needed) skill sets, not taking those players (Shaw this year, potentially Ramirez/Rojas down the road) and making them do something that doesn't align with what they do well. 

[mul21]

23 minutes ago, squally1313 said:

I think there's a lot of different layers in what is really a hypothetical either/or. Schwarber and Cease were both with the Cubs org and who knows what kind of feelings that they have towards the team. There's also, off the top of my head:

1. Matt Shaw has been worth 1.7 fWAR in 568 PAs, actually has a worse xwOBA this year than last year, and was worse than Bregman at third this year by most metrics (outs above average and then just defensive value generated - Bregman played 972 innings at third and nowhere else and had defensive value of 4.7, Shaw played 1,010 innings at third and 6 innings at second and had defensive value of 1.6). Fielding Bible did like Shaw better. Bregman in 2025 and in 2026 is better than anything we've seen from Shaw, though admittedly not $35m better.
2. This time last year everyone was convinced Suzuki had to move to DH, which would have made Schwarber an awkward fit.
3. I don't think the FO considered this, but I did when talking about who I wanted/what direction I wanted them to go in: Matt Shaw is almost certainly a garbage person and I don't like rooting for garbage people. 

I largely agree on the opportunity costs concept, When you couple it with the Nico extension, I don't mind signing players to good contracts if you think they're going to age well, but when it leaves you with valuable players with redundant skill sets, finishing the job is swapping the players who aren't going to play for players with different (needed) skill sets, not taking those players (Shaw this year, potentially Ramirez/Rojas down the road) and making them do something that doesn't align with what they do well. 

I think we probably need to pause before we just decide Bregman is a much better defender when you take into account he's been playing there for 10 years and Shaw has been playing the position part time for 2.5.  Just based on his athletic ability and baseball aptitude, I have to believe Shaw can approach or surpass Bregman defensively given time and experience.  That may not do us any good right now, but I don't think you can just completely ignore that part of the equation.

[squally1313]

11 minutes ago, mul21 said:

I think we probably need to pause before we just decide Bregman is a much better defender when you take into account he's been playing there for 10 years and Shaw has been playing the position part time for 2.5.  Just based on his athletic ability and baseball aptitude, I have to believe Shaw can approach or surpass Bregman defensively given time and experience.  That may not do us any good right now, but I don't think you can just completely ignore that part of the equation.

I mean, yeah, certainly a possibility. The line from Andy was 'if he's going to be a good glove guy who doesn't hit like a star, the Cubs already had one of those guys at third base'. Which...they didn't? They had a guy with a .300 wOBA/.302 xwOBA with worse defensive numbers than what Bregman did last year and what he's doing this year. 

I definitely agree with his point that the chasm between Schwarber and Ballesteros is bigger than the gap between Bregman and Shaw, but to me, even the 2026 version of Alex Bregman is better than anything we've seen from Matt Shaw thus far unless you start chopping up sample sizes. 

[mk49]

49 minutes ago, CubUgly said:

I don't have much confidence in Cabrera at all right now.  I think both he and the Cubs are searching and have not found!

Nobody does.  His ERA must be over 7.00, since May, and he gives up more HR than Shota, but not as bad as Jamo.  Oh, wait, I just checked.  Since May 1st, Cabrera has slightly higher HR/9 than Jamo.  He should be better than that, or not.  Like you said, they've been searching, and haven't found it.  I'm really hoping he gets better.  I didn't expect that much, when they traded for him.  But, I didn't think he would be this bad.

[JBears79]

4 minutes ago, mk49 said:

Nobody does.  His ERA must be over 7.00, since May, and he gives up more HR than Shota, but not as bad as Jamo.  Oh, wait, I just checked.  Since May 1st, Cabrera has slightly higher HR/9 than Jamo.  He should be better than that, or not.  Like you said, they've been searching, and haven't found it.  I'm really hoping he gets better.  I didn't expect that much, when they traded for him.  But, I didn't think he would be this bad.

In his defense, the entire Cubs pitching staff gives up homeruns.

[Derwood]

29 minutes ago, mk49 said:

Nobody does.  His ERA must be over 7.00, since May

7.59 since 5/4

[mk49]

I just saw the Astros hit back to back to back home runs against Bieber.  First time I've seen live.