Jason Ross

When I say margins, I mean more along the lines of building a really wonderful defense/speed team. Players who win on the margins. Sorry if that was unclear, I could have worded it better on second thought!

So I'll say this: I actually think Jed Hoyer is a good GM. I think he's got a good vision in his head, and I think he's really good at identifying margins-players. I think he can communicate his vision to others well. I think he's good at determining a market, and a value, and I think he's highly disciplined in that regards. My fear is that this is all Jed is, however, and that the thing he's missing is the thing Epstein had: he had the ability to get irrational about a player. Maybe to a fault (why I think Jed and Theo were a good pairing to begin with). If that's the case, then I still think Hoyer's a good GM...just maybe not for a large market team like the Cubs. There seems to be a hesitancy to go past that value in both trade and free agency, however. We'll see. I hope this is wrong. There's still time in 2023/24's offseason to change my perception of him.

I'll take a crack at the rest of the offseason or the plan right now: 1) I think the Cubs will trade for Shane Bieber. I'll guess Canario fits the bill here. My guess is that Jed likes the price on Bieber more than Glasnow. 2) I think they'll shortly (before Christmas) pick up a decent leverage reliever. Maybe Stephenson, but I bet lower than that. 3) I think the bulk of the FA work at this stage comes in January. I think they're going to wait this out. They'll grab another SP, like a Snell or a Montgomery if the market doesn't come together. They'll be out on Imanaga, however. McDaniel posted yesterday on ESPN that his contract is coming in higher than expected. Cubs don't do bidding wars. They'll wait out Bellinger, Chapman and Hoskins, too and grab at least one. Maybe two on higher AAV shorter deals if possible. If only one, they'll grab a lower tier of second bat. Belt, Pederson, Turner...those guys. DH types. But I think the FA stuff comes after New Years. This feels like a pretty conservative way to spend $60m+, in my books, which is how I'm starting to feel this team works. They're slow. They're patient (to a fault). They'll spend a decent chunk of money on the surface, but it'll all be on their terms.

Might not have to. Work in a mutual option for year 2 and a hefty buyout.

This guy contracts. Good thought.

Yeah the extension is pretty perplexing. Might be a combination of knowing they have the depth to baby him (this is more for the playoffs than, say, May) and that he's pretty fresh off TJS and likely has a handful of years (rates of reinjury usually take 6-7 years based on more recent studies) before they truly need to worry about another.

Nope. Been reported this kind of a move wouldn't stop them. Remember when Hoyer said it wasn't good to win the offseason? The Dodgers are winning the offseason and I have to say, I'm really jealous. I'd like to win the offseason like this.

The extension is something I agree with, I wouldn't be super excited about that. With that said, the trade itself? The Cubs should have been in on that. I'll be bummed about missing on Glasnow the 1 year guy.

I'm trying to tell myself that there's something out there that I'm not seeing. That the reason for the silence on the Cubs end is because there's a really fun move that we don't know about. That there's a thing out there that's going to lynch pin all of this and we'll end up going "oh wow!". But then there's another voice that's pretty defeated laughing at that voice. And that one's starting to win.

Yeah, I'll admit being a bit frustrated on the lack of velocity in the rotation. Glasnow was tailor made for the Cubs lack of that. Sigh. This offseason has been a bunch of disappointments.

Always love Zumach's stuff. Honestly anyone from NSB. Todd even did the thing I really wanted to do, but just wasn't brave enough to do...put Cade #1.

Glasnow...never, it sounds.

So they didn't play their young players last year like Morel in the infield, and Mervis at all, so that they could play them this year instead, so they'll go after Soto next year? Love the optimism, but think you're huffing some hard hopium there.

Ah yes! Duh. Hell we can even add in MO Alou. I remember that being a big deal.

Add in Darvish and Kimbrel, IMO.

From Passan, thats a name drop. He doesn't accidentally bring up names. Passan is a professional. That doesn't mean they will sign him, it means there's likely some form of interest, in some way, shown by the Cubs. Is it a ton of interest? Are they actively hunting him? Maybe not. But Jeff Passan isn't the "throw a name out" because he feels like it type. And yes, Jed is tight lipped. But he's not immune to leaks. We heard the Cubs connected to Swanson plenty last season. It didn't come out of left field. The Cubs can work very quietly. But they're not complete ghosts where every move comes out of nowhere.

Yeah. I'm trying to find it in me to remain positive and having a good outlook, but I just don't understand what the Cubs would do with Wacha. He doesn't get ground balls. He doesn't have velocity. He doesn't really strike people out. He feels like someone who had his HR/FB% numbers suppressed by San Diego's ballfield. It feels like we have 2 or 3 middling arms who can slide into the rotation already. I don't even know if he makes sense if we trade someone like Wicks. Would I really rather have Michael Wacha in the rotation over, like Asad? He's going to get a rotation spot somewhere, and I bet he gets two years. I guess I don't see it. Maybe there's some kind of big trade brewing where the Cubs need a one year arm and Wacha would take one? Maybe it's just agents leaking things and trying to drum up interest? Just due diligence? Or speculation? I don't know. But if the Cubs do Michael Wacha it feels like Trey Mancini v2.0 where the Cubs will sign a player with some real underlying issues past his ERA to a two year contract and hate themselves for it later.

Passan just name dropped Michael Wacha as a Cub target.

Part of it? Yes. The reality of first base is that it's much more "bat reliant" than centerfield (per league data). Primary DH have the highest league wRC+, and first basemen have the second highest (by pretty large margins). In 2023, centerfield was the fourth lowest (behind C, 2b, and 3b). And as recently as 2021 was down all the way to the 93 wRC+ level (95 wRC+ the season before). While there seems an upward trend on CF again, it's likely going to be among the four lowest for the foreseeable future. It's certainly not the only reason, but if we're going to have some questions on his bat, than these questions of "how does the bat play?" and "where does he play?" are probably questions on the forefront of needing to be asked and answered for Bellinger.

I don't think it's fair to point to any single slice and say "that's why", but I don't think we can simply ignore massive hard%, barrel% and EV issues, either. That runs deeper than just the 2 strike BABIP, but I add that into my critique, like every other slice, because each slice adds up. We're talking the 213th best exit velocity in baseball, the 221st best max ev, the 143rd best barrel%... These are all better than they had been recently, but aren't good indicators moving forward, either. We're already trending down to a 123 wRC+ with just BABIP on 2 strike question. But the 2 strike approach can't be the only reason his hard hit% is in the tanker, too. Most hitters who put up the barrel%, the hard% and the EV he put up last year run south of 120 wRC+ so I think it's fair to worry that Bellinger, moving forward, is closer to that of a 115 wRC+ hitter than that of a 125 wRC+ hitter. I appreciate he has versatility, but that versatility really only interests me if we're going to use it. If the goal is to slide him to 1b and let him moonlight in CF on off days once PCA comes up, then I'm not overly excited about paying for that, for say, 6-7 years if we're not confident on the bat playing up past 115 wRC+ at first base. It would offer nice coverage in the even Pete Crow-Armstrong is a failure, but that's when you have to have some reliance on your internal scouting and projections. If the Cubs believe in PCA, then paying for a long term "oh horsefeathers" solution has much less value. None of this is to say I think Bellinger is a bad player. I know FG ran an interesting article on the concept of Parades and Bellinger and their data recently, too. And I understand he's been successful in the past, but I am not sure the past (circa pre-2020) Cody Bellinger has much to do with Cody Bellinger in the future, either. What we have is the most recent version of Bellinger being the most likely thing moving forward, IMO. Where I question Bellinger is on a $180m+, seven year deal. I'm all in on short term, high AAV (when I think his versatility really becomes interesting as that coverage) but then that comes into a host of other questions like "can the Cubs truly afford to wait out their offseason with those hopes?". The Cubs are going to be the true arbiter of how scary those numbers are and perhaps there's more to this than I can see. Maybe the vision is to trade PCA, in which case, as a CF'er, I'm far more willing to cut the bat some slack. Maybe the Cubs are more worried in PCA than I think they are. But as I said, I have my concerns that this is the right player for the Cubs to sink that kind of long term money in. None of this is to suggest your lesser-concern isn't valid, only that I'm not sure I share your confidence in the profile moving forward.

It's not that I want to bargain basement this, it's that we have to ask ourselves "just how much do we believe what Bellinger did in 2023 is repeatable going forward"? He had a ,400 BABIP on 2 strike pitches last year. League BABIP in every count was .297 last year. If Bellinger had a .400 BABIP in general we'd be sounding the alarm bells, but a .400 BABIP with 2 strikes is even scarier. Part of this likely explains why his hard hit% was in the 10th%, his barrel% was 27%, and his exit velocity was in the 22%. There was likely a conscious effort to just...put the ball in play any way and this likely resulted in helping his K% be where it was, while also, likely resulting in a lot of luck based hits. But those numbers are more than just a two strike approach too. Those aren't great indicators of future success. So there's some real concern there, and there should be. Can Cody Bellinger continue to BABIP his way to two strike success? Can he hit for power while not hitting the ball very hard? These are all very real questions a team has to ask. If he's going to be a long term CF, these matter less; CF'ers had a 98 wRC+ last year. But if he's not going to be a CF then the line for league average jumps considerably to 108 wRC+ for a 1b and 110 wRC+ for a DH, At that point, those questions really matter, because his position is important. He's a good CF if he's going to wRC+ 114 next year. He's only a slightly above league average 1b then, and that's just not worth 5-7 years. I don't want the Cubs to play cheap-o small market horsefeathers. I also don't want the Chicago Cubs to lock in a slightly above average 1b because that's just what's available. What this comes down to, for me, is that batted ball data. You have to be very sure this is going to be a 125 wRC+ bat moving forward for the next 4+ years because the likelihood is that even if PCA doesn't work out, he's going to force Bellinger over to 1b for minimum of a year or two, and likely, his best defensive years left for a soon to be 29 year old. Personally...I'm not that sure. I don't have the data that the Cubs do, so they get final deferral here. But I'm pretty skeptical of those things. All of this might change though. If you can get him on a cool-Carlos-Correa-type 3 year, high AAV, multi-opt out thing, you have to be less worried about those things. Grab him for a year, or two, or three and you don't have to worry so much about everything working out perfectly. The Cubs are a big market team and they can do that. But I also don't really want the Cubs to wait out his market hoping that kind of a deal falls into their lap in mid-late-January either. It's a balancing act, and why, I come down on the end of "I'm just not sure I'm that gaga over the idea of Bellinger".

Found it. I guess I read it a little differently than you. This line " No deal ultimately got done yesterday, and there have been reports of the Rays discussing Glasnow deals at a similar level of seriousness with other clubs." sounds less like new information and more along the lines of "the Rays had been previously connected to other teams and no deal happened there, either". But it's kind of murky, so I can see where we may see that sentence in trying to portray a different point. Here is the full quote and the link to the article for anyone who would like it: "News broke recently that the Dodgers and Rays were discussing a deal that would send Tyler Glasnow and Manuel Margot to L.A. in exchange for Ryan Pepiot and Jonny Deluca. No deal ultimately got done yesterday, and there have been reports of the Rays discussing Glasnow deals at a similar level of seriousness with other clubs. Could a deal come together soon? The 6’8” right-hander has struggled to stay healthy throughout his career but would be a major addition to the front of any would-be contender’s rotation; dating back to the 2019 season, Glasnow owns a 3.03 ERA and 2.89 FIP across 60 starts (332 2/3 innings)." Link to MLB Trade Rumors article.

Yeah, I think this is a good point. I'll throw it out there again for anyone who doesn't know me quite that well yet; I cannot stand Tom Ricketts. Cannot. Stand. Tom Ricketts. But he's no better or no worse than almost...any other owner in baseball right now except for the extremes. He's not Steve Cohen. He's not John Fisher. He's...everyone else, basically. I think the next owner will be very much the same guy. Owners now a days want to invest in a team because it's a safe money making venture, especially long term. It's a symptom of being an owner right now across the sport. That's not to absolve them in the least, only stating the reality. But in the end, he's just one of the other guys. We'll get a new Tom Ricketts. Whomever that would be...

Not doubting, but curious on the source?