Juan Soto or Corbin Burnes for the Cubs This Winter? Why Not, You Know, Both?

With as much energy and era-defining excitement as there is in Major League Baseball these days, the game is better when the Chicago Cubs are elite. Due in large part to a much more passive spending strategy in free agency than the club's most loyal fans would like, this is not the case. But with another gargantuan winter of first-class free agents looming, it could be. Should Tom Ricketts and Jed Hoyer ante up and shock the baseball world, a lot of things would change quickly.

There are plenty of great baseball cities across America, all of which can stake a legitimate claim as to why their favorite club is essential to the big-league experience. I'm not about to unload another think piece full of 1060 West Addison romanticism on your screen, though the team's play in the 2024 campaign reminded us all why the North Side of Chicago needs the postseason. We need it worse than the left-field bleachers needs a tremendously elongated beer snake.

A plethora of missed opportunities and heartbreaking losses over the summer denied the Cubs a true shot at slithering their way into a Wild Card spot in these last couple of weeks. The team, though missing the final splashy pieces, are not devoid of weapons. They possess a shutdown defensive middle infield of Dansby Swanson and Nico Hoerner; a promising starting pitching staff; and a rapidly blossoming farm system, with dudes just about ready to hit the ground running. What the club does not possess, however, is a killer instinct. This practically goes without saying but I'll say it anyway: You need a killer instinct to win a championship in this league. Bringing Juan Soto and Corbin Burnes into the fold would resoundingly shift the narrative for Craig Counsell's ball club. And here's how.

Since the ex-Brewers skipper already managed him for some time in Milwaukee, let's start with the 29-year-old righty starter, Burnes. Despite navigating some costly injuries in 2024, the Cubs, led by southpaw studs Justin Steele and Shota Imanaga, have a reasonably good starting rotation. A nasty veteran arm like Burnes would make that group one of the best in the game. With a career 3.22 ERA, a 14-8 record with the Orioles, and 164 strikeouts on the season, Burnes boasts consistency. He'd plug a hole in the middle of the Cubs rotation, which has seen guys like Ben Brown go down to injury, and the fading Kyle Hendricks saddled back into a starter's role he clearly is no longer built for. His strikeout rate dip dents his case as a certifiable ace, but only two pitchers (Aaron Nola and Logan Webb) have thrown more innings since the start of 2021 than has Burnes. He's a pillar for the rotation.

To me, pitching wins championships, but I'm not naive enough to think that's all it takes. Enter Soto, who at just 25 years of age would bring a projectable decade of offensive excellence to a team that needs exactly, specifically, excruciatingly that. He's famous for his generational plate discipline, but this season has been a reminder that he also has legitimate, top-end power, too. With a 13.9% barrel rate, Soto towers over the league average, nearly doubling it. He'd give the team the strongest ownership of the strike zone in MLB. By the end of this season, he'll edge past Ernie Banks on the all-time walks list--that is, at 25, he'll equal Banks's career walk total. Imagining a scenario where he is in the middle of a lineup with the likes of Isaac Paredes and Ian Happ conjures up images of a blocked-off Michigan Avenue, allowing for parade traffic. 

Are you buying in? Hopefully the top brass in the organization is. Baseball is better when the Cubs are better. This course of action puts that reality on the immediate horizon. We know that it's not the usual mode of operation, for Hoyer or for Tom Ricketts. Sooner or later, though, that has to change. This pair of superstars is as good an occasion as any.