The one good reason is positional, since this team that tried to build itself on defensive excellence seemingly has half a dozen guys that should be DH.
I really don’t envision a trade having a negative effect on future Japanese player recruitment. They’ve had several players come through the system, and traded away bigger names without damaging their rep.
The cubs should not be trading quality major league starting pitchers for guys that fell down prospects lists because of poor performance. They need quality. At this point quantity is worthless to this organization.
It’s almost as if the cubs have black holes every year that literally could just be fixed with magical average players they somehow never seem to find.
Interesting choice for a team whose biggest issues are whether or not to extend their own soon-to-be free agents. That decision making was what led to the downfall of the Blackhawks that were largely built by Bowman’s former boss. He was a terrible salary cap manager that had to let quality young players leave in order to get rid of over paid vets because other overpaid vets couldn’t be moved.
The availability or lackthereof of third basemen has nothing to do with what you should do with Morel. He has proven beyond a doubt to be incapable of playing the position.
and waiting to deal guys is how you get a lesser return
I feel like this is exactly the type of season a lot of people had in mind for morel. Grossly incompetent at third base was assumed by everybody and not nearly good enough offensively to make up for it. He’s a role player thrust into a role he has no business playing because Jed refuses to pay for major league talent and can’t produce a position player internally that can hit.