Bobson Dugnutt

I think where I land on the Tucker trade is that it’s an odd one in a vacuum. I know there’s still plenty of time for an extension to come into place, but it’s hard to read tea leaves as of right now to determine if that’s even in the plans for Jed. So at this point he should be viewed as a one year rental. My general thought is “in for a penny, in for a pound.” Because of Jed’s track record of successful FA in the middle tier, we’ve for the past two seasons had rosters populated with good but not great players. We’ve had a huge need for, in my opinion, not one, but two WAR monsters that could take this thing from slightly above .500 to a true contender (either a hitter or a SP, makes little difference to me). Tucker was one. We have him for a year. We should be maximizing our chances at a World Series while we have him in the fold, but we fell short of reeling in that second one. I think one of the many ways Jed falls short of what we became accustomed to under Theo is that Theo would not have completed step 1 of the plan you outlined without knowing for pretty damn certain that he was going to pull off step 2. I’m thinking specifically of the Castro trade / Zobrist signing 1-2 punch that I think happened on the same day. To just fully whiff on adding an impact player in the subsequent three months after the Bellinger trade is a tough pill to swallow. And I’m not even saying I think the Cubs will be bad! They’ll probably be a playoff team (for the first time in five years under Jed’s stewardship, mind you). But boy do I miss the days of building teams that are equipped to win 103 games even when the starting LF blows out his knee the first week of the season. Ya know, striving to be great instead of good and making sure your roster isn’t particularly susceptible to variance.

I’m not looking for a gotcha. Im pretty sure Jolee Bindo is the only one doing that in this thread. But if we’re looking at it in retrospect, as we are today, the accounting you and Brock are doing is rather pointless. Again, the net of it is the Cubs are down $32 million in payroll YoY. If you want to spend time figuring out under which couch cushion they found money for Justin Turner, by all means, go for it. You can say they spent the money that came off the books from Hendricks and Smyly. Or you can say they spent the money they freed up by trading Bellinger and his contract for a 30-year old middle reliever that they just DFA’ed. But they didn’t spend it all, and that’s a problem. And for conversation’s sake, let’s accept what WGTW9 says and there was a $200 million cap on payroll, But there was an exception for their pursuit of Alex Bregman. So we have to also accept that Ricketts is open to listening when Jed makes a case, presumably that player X will help fortify the roster and push them past “well, shucks, hopefully we get some lucky bounces and stumble into 90 wins and win the division because the Brewers and Cardinals decided to punt the offseason” into more variance-proof territory. I don’t believe Bregman was the only option to further optimize the roster so Jed, in my opinion, is one or more of a) not persuasive enough b) not imaginative enough or c) not aggressive enough. Personally, I’m with IMB in that he’s not aggressive enough.

hahahaha

I don’t think it’s at all meaningful to note that they re-spent the Bellinger just because of the sequence of the moves made when their total payroll went down from 228 million to 196 million . Ok great, yeah I guess I’m glad payroll didn’t go down to 173 million but if that was ever truly a possibility in anyone’s mind then the Cubs are in worse hands than we thought. If this org doesn’t want to pay the luxury tax (they should, but whatever), then they damn sure should be butting right up to the line every year. Instead we get Jed telling us “if we outperform expectations we could be a 90-win team” while sitting well under the tax threshold.

The Cubs Will Absolutely, Unequivocally Re-Spend the Money They Saved on Cody Bellinger* *But not the money they saved on Kyle Hendricks and Drew Smyly

Ehhh. Their salary obligations went down $30 million year over year.

I can’t believe we’re on year seven of Ethan Hearn discourse

In 2009 I went to a Friday afternoon Cubs-Pirates game. It was one of my favorite games I ever attended. Cubs won 17-2 and the Air & Water Show was going on so there were constantly Cubs crossing home plate or planes buzzing over Wrigley. That Pirates team was awful. They lost 99 games that year. The starting pitcher for the Pirates was Charlie Morton. Andrew McCutchen batted leadoff and hit a single. 16 years later and Charlie Morton is the #2 pitcher for one of the favorites in the AL and McCuthcen is batting 5th for the Pirates.

G League Ignite wasn’t affiliated with the Bulls.

I think the “sees the game in a way his teammates can’t” originated with Underwood. He also used to say that about Curbelo. Personally, I think it’s BS. If you’re the PG and you’re constantly throwing the ball away because you’re not in sync with your teammates 35 games into the season, that’s on you. And half his turnovers seem to be on lazy passes 22 feet from the basket.

Yeah, I see KJ in the lottery in all these mocks and I just don’t get it. Slow, turnover prone PG and a negative on defense. He’s obviously gone and I’d be pretty shocked if Riley stuck around. Boswell, White, Ivisic and Johnson would be a nice foundation for next year, but they have a lot of work to do in the portal. Last I heard they were in good shape with Dame Sarr, SG from Italy and I believe a former KJ teammate. Sounds like a good Riley replacement. They’ll need someone who can facilitate the offense as well.

Darrell Taylor landed with Houston. Chris Williams is still around.

Here’s the blurb from PFF: Odeyingbo has had a patient but steady ascent over his NFL tenure after he sustained an unfortunate Achilles injury during the pre-draft process that still didn't drop him past the second round of the 2021 NFL Draft. His game has rounded into form over the past two seasons, headlined by eight sacks in 2023 followed by a career-high seven tackles for loss or no gain on 67% of snaps played in 2024.

He didn’t wait too long. Dayo Odeyingbo to the Bears https://x.com/underdog__nfl/status/1899170245329244281?s=46

He’s a FA.

He’s a FA.

He missed the end of last year with a concussion.

They still have Bates too.

They did just free up $16 million by cutting Grady Jarrett this morning. Maybe for a last ditch Dalman push?

What reports?

In terms of grabbing g multiple guys, yeah that’s probably true. One-off acquisitions, Pace, Bushrod, and Sitton were all pretty significant signings when they happened, though Pace turned out to have nothing left in the tank.

Bears cut Gerald Everett and DeMarcus Walker, adding about $10 million in additional cap space.

not sure if anyone posted this but cubs traded for ryan brasier

I’d prefer not to trade anyone. The Cubs have a fairly uninspiring bench. In 2016 we had ten guys for eight spots heading into the season and then our LF blew out his knee the second game of the season. Unless there’s a deal for a pitcher that’s just too good to pass on, I’d rather see them let things play out.