Deeg

I think Zo is done here. If he has the motivation to play another year, he'll want to do it for a contender.

There's absolutely no chance on Goc's green Earth the Cubs are going to try and sign Betts. You're 100% kidding yourselves.

No, that definitely was a huge part of what they did. In the last 4 years the Cubs payroll was 12% over the Cards, 88% over the Brewers, 74% over the Reds, and 102% over the Pirates. We were the Yankees of the NL Central. Why is that the measuring bar?

The contortions Brett is willing to go through to be a franchise apologist never fail to amaze me. You sometimes wonder if he literally is on the take.

Yeah, they might not get him. They could outbid everybody and still not get him. They could then go after Springer if they wanted and outbid everybody and not get him either. But none of that would make this an "inexplicable move" because they still have to address the 2021 pitching situation. Trading Bryant and Contreras isn't the only way to do that, but it is a viable way that has a ton of upside and a good floor. I'm not disputing that there are realistic, defensible scenarios where trading Bryant and/or Contreras makes sense. I just think it's folly to make any assumptions about the Cubs making moves because of some hypothetical multi-dimensional chess plan to sign a superstar at some point in the future. Much more likely that they're just being cheap.

Remember when we were excusing inexplicable moves because the Cubs were obviously positioning themselves to sign Bryce Harper?

Where are you getting 2/21 with Quintana? He's a FA in 2021.

Unless Puig is willing to sign for the minimum plus a box of Papa John's and Walgreen's coupons, he's too rich for our blood anyway.

That's a terrible approach to take, IMO. We haven't been the best team in the division the past two seasons, or we would have won it. We've already seen the results of standing pat once with a core that wasn't good enough - I don't think doing it again and rolling the dice is a good strategy. This isn't 2016. Bryant has regressed physically, Russell and Almora are just two more failed top prospects, Zobrist got old, Lester is a shadow of his old self and we've done nothing whatever to replace Fowler as a CF or leadoff hitter. Status quo was a bad option last winter - it's indefensible this winter.

So the argument is the best team in the division, which couldn’t win the division two years ago, did nothing to improve and got worse, can do nothing again and is still the best team in the division?

For all the whining about the front office, reading posts like these is a compelling reminder that it would be a lot worse if fans were making the decisions.

“Group think” in a post is dead damn give away that a post is worthless. The Cubs don’t have to trade Bryant. There is no realistic scenario where trading him makes the Cubs better. Again, you can’t say that authoritatively until you can measure the return. What strikes me in all these diatribes preemptively condemning a Bryant trade is the lack of an alternative plan. Staying with a failing core that will bail en masse in two years doesn’t sound like a winner to me. Contrary to Theo’s shilling, status quo is a very, very bad option. I don’t want to trade Bryant. But anyone could see that if the Cubs were going to make meaningful changes, one or both of he and Contreras would have to be dealt. We’re not in a great situation here but I’m not dismissing any option until I know the details of that option.

Trading Bryant is really stupid and if it's followed by trading Schwarber and the return is Robles and a few solid young pitchers, then it makes more sense. It makes sense except that you'd never get Robles for Schwarber straight up.

You could flee to Antarctica and it still wouldn’t be far enough outside that box.

I heard this was more an Attarche case.

Scroll up for Christ's sake, Man.

Bryant hit .325/.424/.661 in the minors. If anyone's ceiling is getting sold short between the two it's Bryant What does that have to do with what I said?

Robles was a career .300 hitter in the minors with an ,849 OPS (just as a tossed-off example, Andrew McCutchen was .785). It took Rendon until he was 26 to have a MLB season as good offensively as Robles was at 22. I'm impressed that folks can so confidently proclaim his limited upside.

A glove first CF, that's where like 75% of that 4 WAR comes from, still working out the kinks on offense sounds more like a Contreras ideal piece to me. Still sells Bryant short But we're not talking about a 1-1 deal here. As a main piece you'd realistically be hard pressed to do better. Also - how many hitters are finished products as 22 year-old rookies? Bryant was one, ironically - but what if we'd judged Rizzo or Baez by how they produced in their first full seasons in the bigs?

I have no idea whether Washington could be coerced into dealing Robles for Bryant (I suspect no) but if they are, that's exactly the sort of player we should be targeting in a KB deal. Already a 4 WAR player at 22, already a 20-30 HR/SB type with the potential for more power, and a super-premium defender in center. He's likely to get better and he's already damn good.

This "not a capped league" argument is a crock of shlt. The LT is a salary cap because the owners have colluded to treat it like one. And because they don't call it one - and because the union is a beaten dog and they have their stupid antitrust exemption - they got their salary cap without having to institute a salary floor. It's a win-win for the owners screwing the players and fans.

I think the Braves also make quite a bit of sense, and I wouldn't rule the Dodgers out either.

The continued obsession with Margot continues to astound me. For a player of Contreras' caliber he's a third piece at best.

I forgot about that trade. Notable that Leake had 2.5 years on his deal left and the Cardinals had sent the Mariners over money in the initial deal. I think the Cubs would have have to send some money for Heyward but would do it to free up the cap space. The one year guys like Quintana or even Chatwood maybe much less of a thing To backtrack a little...I guess I could see a scenario where Quintana or much more likely Chatwood have to be paired with a prospect, but from what I remember about similar kind of trades the prospect/s might be more along the lines of Riley Thompson/Kohl Franklin/Sanders/Faustinooo/Remy/Y. Cruz/J. Patterson. There's some flexibility here - the Cubs have a logjam of pitchers between A- and A+ for next year anyway so a trade might help more than hurt plus there's further off bats (one way or another) like Giambrone, the Morels, Pinango, Verdugo, Roederer (personally don't see him as so interchangeable with Ademan) - but I just don't see the precedent in these salary dumps where the Cubs would have to deal from Hoerner/Davis/Amaya/Ademan/Marquez I think Quintana (and Darvish) are probably about salary-neutral in trade value at the moment - I don't think you'd have to give up a prospect but I don't think you'd get one back. With only a year left and coming off an OK 2019 Chatwood probably costs you a B prospect to unload. But Heyward - with all those years and dollars left? That would be a huge haul of prospect talent, if you could even get someone to take him then.

I think the most objective reading of the tea leaves right now is that the Rickettses got what they wanted in 2016, and at this point they see the franchise as an ATM and nothing more. If someone wants to read them more positively that's certainly valid - I just don't see it myself.