sontensei

I gotta make a thread hoping we win here goes Is it just me but does soler look like he is not running full speed ever? i feel like his legs arent right... or is that his top speed?? Addison looked like he tweaked his ankle in the 8th as he ran in the dugout.... is he gonna be ok? Those guys are both in top 50 of fangraphs "trade value" trading soler might not actually be so bad... if the return is nice..

he wont, maddon will use teagarden and coghlan.. fck nl needs dh now. lol all because of schwarber

True but he is putting up 15-20 mil/yr type performance this year. They only have him a couple more years

They're 1-3 in this easy stretch that was supposed to catapult them. I get that they're young but the NL is so wide open right now it would really suck if they blow it this year. It wouldn't suck man. Where did you except them to be back in march?

I really hope they don't go crazy at the deadline.

Well tmrw lineup is going to have castro Ross Lester Herrera

No they should just stay quiet call up baez when he is back and let the kids take the bumps the rest of the season

J Herrera / Castro in the middle for the strech run ... please say it ain't so!

Oh [expletive] looks like Russell tweaked his foot

RIP

Plz Plz just 1 more out Plz plz!!!

Time for a dong or 2!!

I never seen a pitcher scared to throw a curve/slider

But I think he can do it. Just needs to block them balls better

Schwarber bat is gonna be great.. but [expletive] he looks bad behind the plate his error is the difference in the game

Game hasn't even started and you're already starting your doom boner. that what she said.

Probably No way! Rizzo is the leader of the team and he is very awesome i wouldnt do this!

hoping for at least 5 runs tonight. blow them up cubbies!!!!!!!!

i dont think schwarbers D is AS BAD as everyone says it is tho. That said -- CUBBIES PUT UP 7 + tonight

With schwarbs up on the big club adding another guy in the LF mix is just too much imho You already had Coghlan Denorfia and now Schwarber If you add Fowler, thats too many guys for 1 position

4 of 50 not bad! http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/ #50: Jorge Soler, OF, Chicago Controlled Through: 2020 Guaranteed Dollars: $18 million 2016 ZIPS WAR: +2.4 Five year ZIPS WAR: +12.6 Last Year: Unranked Soler’s first season as the Cubs starting right fielder hasn’t gone that well, with injuries and a surprisingly low power output limiting him to more potential than performance. But Soler remains one of the most intriguing young power hitters in the game, and a few hundred poor at-bats doesn’t wipe away the tools and the minor league performance. He’s still just 23, and while his contact problems might keep him from ever becoming an elite player, he looks like a quality above average regular for the foreseeable future. And he possesses the skillset that teams will overpay to acquire, as young middle-of-the-order hitters are just not really available on the market anymore. Soler is one of the guys who can opt into arbitration, so he will probably make more than $18 million over the next five seasons, but even with a couple of arbitration raises, he’s still going to be a significant bargain. The Cubs have a ton of premium pieces, so it’s easy to overlook Soler in the crowd, but he’d be the best young talent on most clubs in baseball. #32: Addison Russell, 2B, Chicago Controlled Through: 2021 Guaranteed Dollars: None 2016 ZIPS WAR: +2.8 Five year ZIPS WAR: +22.0 Last Year: Unranked Obviously, the fact that Russell was traded as part of a package a year ago — for 1 1/2 seasons of Jeff Samardzija and half a season of Jason Hammel — is going to make this ranking (and this whole series) somewhat controversial, no matter where I put Russell on the list. On the one hand, he was traded for the kinds of short-term upgrades that aren’t included in this series, so perhaps Russell is evidence that I’m overrating youth long-term value relative to short-term upgrades. On the other hand, it’s an n of 1, and the general consensus seems to be that the A’s shouldn’t have made that trade in the first place. Does the A’s decision a year ago mean that Russell doesn’t actually have this much trade value, or did the A’s overpay for Samardzija and Hammel last summer? By putting Russell this high, I’m placing myself pretty firmly in the latter camp, and I bet if we could slip Billy Beane some truth serum, he’d say he’d like to have that one back. I might not be quite as high on Russell as ZIPS is — seriously, those are some bullish forecasts — but six years of a quality middle infielder with significant offensive potential is a scarce asset, and I’d bet the Cubs would demand a much larger haul to get him off their roster at this point. Even if Russell is more of a good player than a star in the making — his contact problems are legitimately concerning for a guy who isn’t likely to be a big time power hitter — he’s still a plenty valuable piece, especially with a few league minimum years still to come. And if he’s the potential superstar that ZIPS is forecasting, then this is too conservative a ranking, and Russell should actually be 10 or 20 spots higher. #7: Anthony Rizzo, 1B, Chicago Controlled Through: 2021 Guaranteed Dollars: $34 million 2016 ZIPS WAR: +4.7 Five year ZIPS WAR: +22.6 Last Year: #12 Rizzo’s breakout came a year ago when he converted a bunch of doubles into home runs, and turned into one of the game’s best first baseman in the process. To follow that act this year, he’s decided to just stop striking out and start stealing bases, taking his game up even another level, and now he’s just one of the best players in all of baseball. Being a first baseman limits his upside a little bit compared to guys who can play more demanding positions, but Rizzo’s even a plus defender at first base, so he’s a star with no real flaw. And, of course, the Cubs locked him up pre-breakout, so they’ve got him at a massive discount. The $34 million in guarantees covers the next four seasons, but then they have two team options at $14.5 million each, but they only add a marginal $25 million to the total because the Cubs almost certainly won’t be paying the buyouts on those years. If those options are picked up, Rizzo will cost $59 million over the next six years; if he were a free agent this winter and teams were limited to six years offers, he’d probably still be pushing $200 million, so yeah, this is a pretty good deal for the Cubs. #4: Kris Bryant, 3B, Chicago Controlled Through: 2021 Guaranteed Dollars: None 2016 ZIPS WAR: +4.4 Five year ZIPS WAR: +23.0 Last Year: #29 A friend in the game — who has seen plenty of Bryant this year — told me a month ago that his comparison for Bryant was Mike Schmidt. While expecting him to match the career of the best third baseman of all-time is probably unfair, Bryant is clearly a pretty special talent, as he’s on track to put up a +5.5 WAR rookie season despite spending the first couple of weeks in the minors. And that’s without hitting for a ton of power, which was supposed to be his calling card. If you add a bit of a power spike to the surprisingly strong defense and baserunning he’s shown early on, you have a perennial MVP candidate. But, there is one little hiccup; Bryant swings and misses a lot, and the comments I made about Joc Pederson apply a bit here too. And that’s likely one of the reasons why ZIPS seems relatively conservative about his future growth, thinking Bryant is already maxing out his skills, because it’s just really difficult to be consistently better than a +5 WAR player while striking out 30% of the time. In fact, from a statistical perspective, Bryant and Pederson aren’t all that different, though I don’t know anyone in the game who would take Pederson if given a choice between the two. As long as he hits for power and draws walks, Bryant will be fine, even with the strikeouts. But the contact issues do seem to potentially put a bit of a lid on his ceiling. Overall, he profiles as a something like a healthy version of Giancarlo Stanton — with a little less power but a little more value in other parts of the game — which gives him one of the highest floors of any player with a half season of big league experience you could imagine. So while Bryant might have a little less best-player-in-baseball potential than some of the others in this area of the series, he’s a relatively safe bet to be a top 20 player, especially since it looks like he might be able to stick at third for a while. And it’s probably worth noting that Mike Schmidt had a serious strikeout problem at age-23, but then fixed it on his way to a +10 WAR season at age-24. If my friend’s aggressive comparison is right, Bryant might very well be number one on this list next year, and all my comments about a limit on his upside will look quite silly.

yeah man that would rock!

My feelings exactly. I wouldn't be mad if he ended up Mike piazza jr.

His numbers to this point look good, but are not likely to be indicative of his true talent. During that 2 month hot start his BABIP was .436. The numbers I posted after his BABIP was like .356 or something around there. As the BABIP drops, so do his numbers, and he's exposed for being what he truly is: a no power, slap hitting, zero patience guy who relies on his speed to get base hits on his weak grounders (2nd in majors in infield hits, IIRC), and steals bags indiscriminately regardless of whether or not he should (leads majors in caught stealing). I also can't find a leader board for it, but he's probably in the Top 10, maybe even Top 5 of outs created. Castro is #1 (yay) with 276 (his number is bolded on B-R). Gordon is at 260, which I would assume is not far behind. So we might could possibly have one of the least productive middle infield offenses in history if Gordon was in the lineup instead of Russell. Also his OBP since June 1st is only 9 points higher than his batting average. His average is .286. You have to be some kind of terrible to pull that off. He's seriously Juan Pierre incarnate. And I know the discussion has moved off of Gordon, but still. Gordon is snake oil, and if he's as good as others think then the Marlins have no reason to move him, but if the Marlins end up being keen on moving him then something is rotten in the state of Denmark, IMO. Some team will overpay for him. And folks will lol when he has a avg of .245

It's funny a few years ago 670 was full of cubs haters but this year everyone is positive (hosts) I know it's partially due to recent success but they even have the Joe Maddon show already len and pat pop on for interviews weekly.. anyways I do sales so I have the radio on driving around all day. Lol