Jason Ross

The rotation isn't looking too strong right now either. And we know how Jed felt about MLB SP prices last deadline. I'm not saying it will happen, or that it's even the best course, but I think "Wiggins MLB SP" is probably still on the table come August. Assume that he will build up innings for the next month and change and it's his "spring training" for lack of better term.

Man I bet Corbin is mad as hell his catcher didn't ABS that ball. Kirk would have.

I also think it's important to note how (seemingly) dedicated the Cubs are to grabbing the younger Wiggins as well. It definitely makes you think the team thinks there is something really there.

Jefferson RojasPedro RamirezJaxon WigginsJosiah HartshornKevin AlcantaraEthan ConradKane KepleyJonathon LongKaleb WingOwen AyersJames TriantosCole MathisBrooks CapleMason McGwireJuan CabadaTy SouthiseneWill SandersJostin FlorentinoEli LovichGrant Kipp

Jefferson RojasPedro RamirezJaxon WigginsJosiah HartshornKevin AlcantaraEthan ConradKane KepleyJonathon LongKaleb WingOwen AyersJames TriantosCole MathisBrooks CapleMason McGwireJuan CabadaTy SouthiseneWill SandersJostin FlorentinoEli LovichGrant Kipp

Zumach dropped his first mock:: https://baseballtribune.substack.com/p/mlb-mock-draft-2026-10?r=1tfnx7&utm_medium=ios&triedRedirect=true Has Cubs taking UGA, C Daniel Jackson. Mentions iffy reviews on Dietz. Cubs could underslot Wiggins if they don't think he will last to 62 (I read this as the Cubs are going to try to take Wiggins at some point as well). Mentioned a few other names

I even made Dansby get a hit.

Y'all want to start a gofundme to get me season tickets? Been here one inning and 6 runs and even Dansby got a screamer.

Fun comparison for sure. Especially considering Hartshorn is a switch hitter and still has a decent shot to end up off of 1b.

If we win, you can all thank me today for my attendence. I did a lot of work, clearly. If we lose, I'm sorry I'm a curse.

This was my challenge team. I'm really proud of that outcome. Red Kress was a complete and utter dart throw.

No more than the Twins, who have a 104 wRC+ without RISP and a 109 wRC+ with RISP in the same time period. But compare the top-10 teams in wRC+ from that same span to the top-10 with RISP and you'll find this: the only team in baseball who was a top-10 team in wRC+ but wasn't a top-10 offensive team with RISP was the Tampa Bay Rays. How far off the top-10 pace were they? They were 11th, just one point of wRC+ behind Boston. Why? It's not a definable skill. Good offensive teams are just good offensive teams. It doesn't matter if a runner is on second base or first, or no bases; they're just generally good. The Brewers are the only team in baseball who was not a top-10 offensive team in context neutral situations but are with RISP. It's an outlier, but not one that we can trace back to any discernable skill trait. We know this because in a league of copycats, no one else is doing it.

When Pete Crow-Armstrong was a prospect the same talk of "the Cubs have a lot of exciting prospects but no stars" was also the discourse. That discourse looks rather silly now. As I pointed out to someone else, Jacob Misiorwski never was ranked higher than 44 in BA and mlb.com had him preseason in 2025 as #100. Elite prospects pop up like this at times. It's probably best just not to worry about who "looks like a star" because the consensus was that PCA wasn't a star (leading the NL in positional player fWAR) and Misiorwski wasn't a star based on his rankings (arguably best SP in baseball).

They should be open minded, but we are playing a very dangerous game of "hypotheticals" here. There is no report suggesting the Astros as entertaining Yordan Alvarez trades right now outside of speculation. The Astros have shot it down. He's signed and isn't an upcoming FA. The Nationals also have not signaled any reason to trade Abrams. Nor do we have any idea if the Cubs have enough to make that happen (If probably argue they don't unless you're okay moving Hartshorn and the Astros want a Hartshorn). Here's the reality; the Cubs are far better positioned to trade for a pitcher. They need a pitcher more. Both now and next year. What prospects do they have who will be MLB ready next year? Most of them are hitters. Wiggins is about the only exception pitching wise and he's spent the entire year hurt so far. I think the Cubs trading for a Reid Detmers is entirely more likely than them trading for Yordan Alvarez. Detmers is even rumored to be available.

I'm not sure you have any idea of who the Cubs do or do not have in the farm system. The Cubs system is not universally ranked as a top-10 system. However: 1. The Cubs system has a big green arrow UP this year 2. The system has a handful of top-100 or fringe top-100 types.

No. I'll bring this back to a school setting, being a teacher and all. You're someone who scores really well in Math. You're not labeled gifted and talented but you usually score high B's and low A'. But you've got a C+ in Math class. Why? Combination of not trying hard enough, got a little behind and missed some time sick. You also have a a D in English. You're not a gifted writer. You struggle. In fact, you probably need a tutor. Would you spend your time with a Math tutor, even if it was the best Math tutor on the planet? Or would you expect your natural math ability, plus things just going your way will help you get back to where you should be (B+/A- area) plus an English tutor would get you the best combination of grades? There isn't enough time in the day for both, so you have to make a choice. I think this is what the Cubs are facing. Yes, Yordan Alvarez is a great hitter, but how much better of an offense are the Cubs going to get? If the offense as a whole doesn't get going, adding on excellent hitter isn't going to fix it (has PCA's hot streak fixed it?). If the offense does get going, how much better are you getting offensively? But how much easier would it be for the Cubs to get a pretty good arm, or a few, and go from a bad pitching staff to a slightly better than average? The jump on pitching is both easier to make happen and likely has a bigger impact.

I do not believe the Cubs need to add any major pieces to the offense right now, no. That isn't me saying the offense is great as is, but that the solution offensively is internal. Part of that is mental; I think the team is pressing (and I don't think fan sentiment and media is helping with that, but I'm not blaming anyone for being frustrated). I think the team has been the recipient of some bad luck. I think some players have been the recipient of bad play (Swanson particularly is bad right now). But on paper this is a good offensive team and the solution is for the good players to be good again. The same cannot be said for the pitching. The issue there is that players are hurt and some of them aren't coming back. It was also the aspect of the team on paper entering the year that was projected to be worse. Your best hope internally is maybe Justin Steele comes back, but that's far from a guarantee. And you don't pick up any more ouchies. The Cubs only have so many prospects to make a move in July and so much time. Opportunity cost is a real thing. So between the offense, which I believe can be fixed internally and the pitching, which I do not believe has any immediate internal fixes, you have to spend your resources on pitching. The Cubs can re-evaluate the offense in the offseason.

Javier Baez has better numbers over his career with runners in scoring position than without runners on base or with runners on and not in scoring position. I know, it feels like someone like Baez wouldn't; but it's probably another reason why we shouldn't use it. Swanson, as well, has better numbers with RISP over his career than any other game state. And has a 104 wRC+. It's true that Nico Hoerner has better RISP numbers, 116 wRC+ to Swanson's career 104 wRC+, but couldn't that just be because Nico Hoerner is a better hitter? Hoerner is a career 101 wRC+ hitter and Swanson is a 95 wRC+ hitter. I don't think hitters are magically better because someone is on second. When we see hitters doing well one year versus another, it's almost always down to "small sample size". Like, Hoerner has 326 PA's this year but 76 are with RISP. Many batting statistics aren't even stabilized at 76 PAs (stabilized in this just means they are large enough that dumb luck isn't affecting the numbers; certain stats require higher thresholds than other).

No. That's an anecdote. What is the skill? You can't just say it's a skill. What is the skill? As an example, I can define the skill of getting on base: some hitters have a better ability to to determine strikes and balls. This helps raise their ability to walk. Hitters who have better contact rates, also have an ability to get on base better. We can track these underlying skills through things like baseball savant. We can prove that hitters have a better OBP when these things go up. There are underlying metrics to these skills that add up. As well, you ignored entirely the "predictive and repeatable", We don't see hitters strike out 30% of the time one year and then 15% of the time the next, yet we see hitters like Ian Happ go from a 122 wRC+ last year with RISP to a 91 wRC+ with RISP this year. https://www.vivaelbirdos.com/2024/11/23/24273174/the-mysteries-of-hitting-with-risp This is a study that also proves it's not a repeatable statistic. Do you have a study to support your point of view? So again, I ask the same two questions: 1. Define the skill 2. Prove it's repeatable Until these two things are defined, it's not a worthwhile aspect of the game to focus in on. The issue is that the Cubs aren't hitting. Hitting with RISP is a symptom of that issue but is not the issue.

It's only worth bringing up if we believe that hitting with RISP vs hitting without them is: 1. An independent skill 2. Repeatable and predictive If it isn't an independent skill (as in, hitting with a runner on second base requires some sort of a skill in which hitting with a runner on first or no runners does not) and it isn't predictive and repeatable (as in we see trends year over year and through large sample sizes that show hitters across the league remain somewhat consistent) then it isn't something that we should really be focusing on. So if we'd like to have this discussion, it's probably important for you to define those two things for us. I'll go on the record: I do not believe it is an independent skill, and when we look across the board, players tend to waffle heavily year over year unlike things like wRC+, or K%. That isn't to say the Cubs offense is fine today; they have flaws. It is that I don't believe this data set is indicative of anything. At best it's a symptom.

I think he's a useful MLB piece who will first find his footing as a plus defensive OF'er in the corners while adding big power numbers against LHP. I think his upside is "Jose Siri" type; he's going to have a low batting average but pace himself with defense and 25+ home runs. That's roughly a 3-win player. A contending team will likely use him in the above situation as a rookie and then plan on slowly expanding that role to see if he's more of a situational piece or more of a 500+ PA guy. A second division team will likely give him far more runway initially.

He's a 23 year old OFer with 15 home runs in 46 games in Triple-A. He's going through a swing change but his contact rates have been going up as he's gotten more used to it. I'd focus more on the development of that data than a single number like K%. "Prospect development is not linear" is a great view to have on these things. A good look here shows his quality of contact is through the roof right now in Iowa. He's had a decent amount of PA's in Triple-A but he's 23...he's not some elder prospect, either. A good reminder that headed into 2025, Jacob Misiorwski was ranked the number 100 prospect by Jon Mayo and his highest was number 44. He's a golden goose in the mound. I'd highly recommend that we don't use top-100 lists as end all be alls or how teams internally rank these guys. They're an interesting lens into a specific evaluation, but the difference between #83 and #142 or whatever is largely "my personal preference". Do I think he's going to carry a trade for a SP with 5 years of control and ace upside? No. Do I think he's an MLB hitter of a short side platoon with plus defense in the corners and capable of playing CF? Yes. And that carries value for the Cubs and another team in trade. It isn't to say there isn't risk here, but the way you're acting, he's a 27 year old former top-prospect who's been toiling in the minors for years. He's a 23-year old with great batted ball data who has inherent risk his contact ability but it's not dire, either.

Yeah the MLB has a problem. And candidly, we have a human problem too. Really, what happens to a guy in 30 years after he's had three TJS? Do we really know? These are people and while science has gotten way better, there has to be some ethical questions too. But putting those aside, I agree, there isn't an easy solution. And unless this becomes a real CTE type "guys are dying" thing, I'm not sure the MLB is really going to step in.

I'm sure one of them will. But they also have players like Rojas, and Kepley who will also be available via trade. Those aren't the only three options they have who can be moved.

Yes. However should be important to note that Horton and Harvey, who were here to help that issue, are both essentially dead for the season (Harvey isn't officially listed as our but his prognosis sounds bleak based on recent reporting). I also don't think it's unrelated that they're among the hardest throwing guys in the team and are both hurt, too. Velo and arm issues tend to go hand in hand.