Transmogrified Tiger

things are not going great early for the U-17s

If you include Baez in that group(even though his odds of getting dealt are near nil), then it's him. After that, it's probably very situational depending on a team's evaluation and their needs. There's arguments to be made for Schwarber, Almora, and Happ.

http://i.imgur.com/2bvyUhu.gif

- They're going to add 2 SP for sure. Which is fine, but I better not need to clamor for Montgomery while Tseng gets starts in May if someone is hurt. - pre-2018 Javy and Almora are in line for bigger roles than pre-2017 Javy and Almora. Well deserved given their progress this year. - Because Javy and Almora are in line for bigger roles, there truly is a position player glut. Not that you'd never find a use for all of Javy, Almora, Schwarber, Zobrist, Heyward, and Jay's replacement, but it's reached a point of diminishing returns where someone(my money's on Happ) is going to be traded for something more impactful. - More acknowledgement of pitcher walks being a problem

The Cubs have averaged 97 wins a year for a 3 year span(most in MLB), have made the NLCS all 3 years, and won a world series. They lose 2 of their best 15 or so players, and only one or two others are on the downside of their careers. Whether they've met the narrow definition of dynasty, and worries about future seasons aside, it's annoying that there's this sentiment of missed opportunity. Literally every offseason for the last 4 years: "where are they going to find pitching?" Literally every season after: *Cubs find pitching and win a ton of games*

Hinske is the assistant hitting coach

Bryant was awesome again, Baez had his best year ever, Happ hit the ground running despite being a high risk profile, and Almora got better as the season progressed. Schwarber's start and Heyward's continued slump were disappointing yes, but Zobrist and Russell battled injuries too. I see all that but Baez' improvement was marginal, the real test for Happ comes now that the league has a book on him, and he appears to be major trade bait for us, Almora's approach vs RHP is a little too Vittersish for me to feel comfortable that improvement is around the bend, and we basically have to bank on him continuing to crush LHP that well to produce average offense if that same-side hitting doesn't improve. Speaking for myself here but when I looked at that core last year I just expected more. That's my own fault but I was really sold on this glut of positional talent and it has underwhelmed to a fairly significant degree. Just thank horsefeathering god for Bryzzo, obviously. They mask a lot of problems the offense has. When they suck, we are hopeless, collectively. I'm trying to be diplomatic, but good grief this is textbook fatalism. When the two best offensive players on the team who play corner infield positions slump, they look bad. Baez only got somewhat better. Almora got better but I wish it had different proportions. Happ was good but I'm worried in the future it might not be good. I mean, say this stuff out loud, it's ridiculous.

Bryant and Baez had better numbers this year than last. Rizzo was slightly down but not in a meaningful sense. Contreras continued to be great, Happ was very good offensively, Almora got better and better as the season progressed. No one is saying 'things are perfect, can't change a thing', but there's far more good than bad, and when you're talking about a dozen hitters there's always going to be disappointments. That's not the organization or hitting coach's fault. The offense not performing quite as well as it can is like 71st on the list of things to worry about, shortly after the video board affecting wind patterns and if they have the right ratio of organ music being played at home games.

Bryant was awesome again, Baez had his best year ever, Happ hit the ground running despite being a high risk profile, and Almora got better as the season progressed. Schwarber's start and Heyward's continued slump were disappointing yes, but Zobrist and Russell battled injuries too.

To be clear, this wasn't directed at anyone in particular, and it's a much more common sentiment in national media(even the more educated baseball media) than Cubs media or posters here.

Heyward will be 29 on opening day 2019 and will be guaranteed 5/106 if he stays. He'd have to really crush the ball to be sure he would get that type of money. Heyward does have a second opt out after 2019 though, so if he puts together consecutive good not great offensive seasons, I could see him opting out of 4/86 at 30.

are you for serious? yes, I can't find the preseason projections, but I think they were projecting better than a wRC+ of 105 and 101, and IIRC many here thought the projections were too low. wRC+ isn't going to be the best option to compare team-wide for an NL team. One NL team has had a wRC+ above 108 in any of the last 5 seasons, the AL has had 8 instances. The last 2 years combined, the Cubs have the best wOBA and wRC+ in the NL. They have been tremendous from an OBP standpoint, leading the way in BB% and only the Rockies come within 10 points of OBP(which is a huge gap at the team level). Are they capable of leading the pack by even more? Probably, but 'underperformed' is a real tough sell for me.

Schwarber Minor league career (621 PA): .463 wOBA Rookie year (273 PA): .364 wOBA Pre-demotion (261 PA): .294 wOBA Post-demotion (225 PA): .377 wOBA After the demotion he was shielded from LHP, having only 17% of his PA against them and putting up a .328 wOBA against them. If you add on additional PA at a .275 wOBA until the proportions are more normal(~25-27%), then his post-demotion wOBA is about .365, just like his rookie year. Defensively, Schwarber has a +5 UZR in over 1100 innings, and DRS says he's -12, which is a pretty big disparity. If you split the difference and even round down and call him a -5 defender, his performance outside April-June has him as a 3+ win outfielder. That's basically what Domingo Santana was this year, and there's also the possibility Schwarber progresses further offensively and/or defensively(getting more reps and being further from the knee injury). The Schwarber has to go narrative is nonsense.

Doing a CTRL-F for Schwarber in his recent chat is hilarious.

I'd say you can judge approach right? So, P/PA is about the only tangible metric you can point to, and we've been exceptional there over the last 3 years I mean, you can get some broad strokes indicators, but extracting how much of that is the hitting coach's influence v. talent level/inclination of the players v. organizational edict independent of a hitting coach is basically impossible.

I think a fanbase's ability to judge a hitting coach(or pitching coach) is basically 0.0%. I think the front office is full of smart people, so I'll have to trust their judgment when it comes to what coaches to retain or fire.

http://mlb.mlb.com/images/4/7/6/220217476/032017_wbc_pr_baez_talk_to_the_hand_med_7gbvoqev.gif

Yeah, if you buy into the idea that winning a title has a hangover effect for whatever reason(exhaustion/lack of rest after long playoff run + celebration, lack of urgency having just won a title, etc), then the Cubs are a huge success. They're the first WS winner in 6 years to make the playoffs the next year, and the first in 8 years to win 90 games.

Lester money, with a chance at needing another year on the deal

FYI I made the executive decision to remove the FA from the thread title, since I think the FA and trade options here are intertwined. Trade names that jump out to me: Brad Hand - terrific two years and likely available Colome - like you mention, had a down year. Velocity wasn't down but appeared to be scattershot from outing to outing. Not sure how Tampa stands on him, but seems a similar candidate to what Davis was post-2016 Herrera - Another guy who is very similar to Davis post-2016, right down to being the Royals closer. Almost certainly available Robertson - the Yankees have no less than 4 other terrific relievers, and they might view Robertson's 13 million as more of a luxury than they want to bear if they want to get under the luxury tax before the 2018 FA class. Trading Robertson doesn't look absolutely necessary to do that though. Britton/Brach/Givens - Who knows what the Orioles are thinking, at the moment they seem to be content to run it back and miss the playoffs before losing Machado. If they do blow it up we have yet another Davis-esque closer candidate in Britton, Brach is very good and wouldn't command a huge haul as he is 1 year from FA, and Givens is also quite good and has several years of control

He needs to be posted, which means everyone in the world will bid the max of 20 million, and then he'll basically have FA negotiations even though his contract will be subject to IFA rules. Otani will have 30 days after being posted to agree to terms with someone. We have two examples that have been under the CBA with the 20 million cap, Tanaka and Maeda. Tanaka was posted on 12/26 and signed 1/23, and Maeda was posted on 12/10 and signed on 1/7. Given that type of timeline, and that the team signing Otani isn't going to have to pay out a bunch of cash(20 million means little to the real suitors and doesn't count towards the luxury tax), I would expect everyone to treat their offseasons(GM meetings, winter meetings) as if they aren't getting Otani, and let him be a happy bonus if he chooses them. If Nippon posts him much earlier, then that changes things. EDIT: Thinking on this a little more, I wouldn't be surprised if Otani has a smaller gap from posting date to signing. The others strung things out to try and get a maximum offer, but Otani can't do that.

Yes, Happ + prospects for Yelich and Volquez is my current fantasy that will inevitably be shattered by reality. I think it would be pretty closely tied to something like Otani picking the Cubs though, because it's almost certainly lower priority than SP and RP, and using trade assets of that caliber and taking on 20 million is only something you can do if you're more confident in what you have on both of those fronts.

COUNTERPOINT [tweet] [/tweet]

Theo thinks some of the problem with walks, especially in the playoffs, was due to the organizational approach, e.g. being too fine in hitters counts: http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2017/10/19/theo-epstein-takes-blame-for-cubs-pitchers-wildness-notably-in-bullpen/ So if that's correct, then hopefully you see some slight improvements from the likes of Edwards and Montgomery(if he's in the pen) from doing a little less nibbling. That said, I think you'll see a bit of a priority in strike throwing this year as a result. Guys like like Shaw and Nicasio. From the left side, I imagine they'll find another Duensing, but it's tough to tell about targets since LHRP are heavy on guys with control problems, and Duensing is an example of a guy who did not look at all desirable after his 2016.

I'll ask they said who cares