squally1313
-
Posts
11,295 -
Joined
-
Last visited
-
Days Won
28
Content Type
Profiles
Joomla Posts 1
Chicago Cubs Videos
Chicago Cubs Free Agent & Trade Rumors, Notes, & Tidbits
2026 Chicago Cubs Top Prospects Ranking
News
2023 Chicago Cubs Draft Picks
Guides & Resources
2024 Chicago Cubs Draft Picks
The Chicago Cubs Players Project
2025 Chicago Cubs Draft Pick Tracker
2026 Chicago Cubs Draft Tracker: Picks & Bonuses
Blogs
Events
Forums
Store
Gallery
Everything posted by squally1313
-
Yeah....in his career, 640 PAs, 98 wRC, slightly overperforming the xwOBA and slightly above water defensively, gives you 2.2 fWAR. Certainly not terrible. But when you think about how a total of 9 full time corner outfielders gave you positive defensive value this year, and how Ian Happ, while almost assuredly being a negative player against LHP, still put up 2.6 fWAR in total....still seems better to at least go the platoon route.
-
Fair points in the top two paragraphs. To the last point....that's why I keep coming back to it being square peg round hole. Since ASB 2025 he's a 98 wRC against RHP. Setting aside the fact that he was a lot worse in 2026, and setting aside that the expected metrics on the whole think he's been overperforming, league average-ish, good against LHP, can competently handle one or two defensive positions that give you positive value add....that's a plenty valuable player. We just....don't have those openings. He's not blocked by a theoretical Michael Conforto. He's blocked by Nico and Bregman. I know it's not as simple as swapping him out for a version of Matt Shaw that can't play defense but can hit RHP, so I'm fine keeping him around to take the starts against LHPs opposite Happ/Conforto and also being the backup infielder while only taking up one bench spot. But the most likely result of Shaw getting 500+ ABs in a COF spot is average defense and below average offense, and I think we can do better by going down a couple different paths.
-
Definitely splitting hairs. I just think we should be hesitant to bake in some added defensive value to his theoretical overall contributions as a corner outfielder. He can most likely handle the position just fine, but the median corner outfielder is underwater in terms of the defensive component of their overall value calculation. It's why the position demands the type of offensive production that I just don't think you can rely on based on what's happened in his career to date.
-
Which is totally fine with me. Give him two starts a week, pair him with Happ, whatever. He's very far away from being an even below average corner outfield hitter against RHPs. Give Happ 1/$23m, or 4/$55m or whatever 'take a discount to retire as a Cub' you want to write up, bring back Conforto. You've got 3/4ths of two corner outfield platoons and probably $70m or more still to spend. Whether that goes to pitching or whether you want to splash on Arozarena to maintain the best offensive outfield in baseball (and solve the DH issue)....that can be figured out down the road. Going into next year with Shaw as a pseudo full time COF starter so that we can throw money at some new versions of Jameson Taillon (Tyler Mahle, as an example) would be bad.
-
This is probably pedantic, but this feels like we're pointing in both directions here. Like, it not being his natural position isn't a good thing, right? Savant has average LF velocity at 87.4% and average RF velocity as 90.7%. Shaw was at 85.1%, which is seemingly only based on his throws in RF. That still shows up as above average arm strength for full time RFs (Lawrence Butler and his 85.4% is 56th percentile). Long way of saying it's fine for the spot, not an asset. And 'fine for the spot' starts you in the red in terms of defensive contributions.
-
It still kinda feels like we're stretching too thin to try to make him sound better? He had 21 ABs against RHPs, 25 PAs, and had a 74 wRC against them. He has a career 82 wRC. I'll go a step further and say he's straight up not good against RHPs This seems pretty vague. He's got 209 games played and his defense, while noisy and all over the place, is net neutral. There's not much support anymore for the concept of 24 being some infant stage of your baseball career. He has a .307 xwOBA in that stretch while having 35% of his PAs come against LHP (league average this year is 30%). Short side of a platoon and backup infielder, sure, great, whatever. Getting significant at bats against RHP in a premium offensive position, where we got 127 wRC and 123 wRC from our starters last year, is a very large step back.
-
Shaw went .194/.318/.306 in September with a .294 xwOBA. In the first half he had 130 ABs and 32.4%/38.1%/29.5% Pull/Center/Oppo. In the second half he had 43 ABs and went 34.2%/44.7%/21.1% Pull/Center/Oppo. His first half OPS was .737, his second half was .735. I'm just....not seeing these supposed changes. As a third or second baseman with an at least average glove? Sure. As a corner outfielder? Not seeing it yet.
-
I know this is objectively dumb, but similar to me preferring the White Sox being good because it's more entertaining....the idea of the Cardinals having a super-MAGA third baseman is wayyyy more fun than like, broken down, previously very cool Nolan Arenado. Give me a good villain.
-
(Pulls up midterm predictions) Seems like he'd be a great fit for the Cardinals, Rays, Marlins or Royals, and hopefully that's it.
-
Ramirez had a wOBA that was 10 points worse and an xwOBA that was 29 points worse. I know their career trend lines are going in different directions, but unless we think he's somehow going to be a significantly superior defensive outfielder, it's hard to paint the picture of Ramirez being a roughly equivalent corner outfielder. That's kinda the general problem and/or opportunity with Shaw and Ramirez. Definitely projectible as valuable infielders, especially factoring in salary. Maybe falls apart when you try to slot them into premium offensive positions.
-
re: the 'hometown discount' talks, I would also take a 3-5 year deal on a reduced AAV (with the reduction from the QO number getting steeper the longer the deal goes). I can't imagine the Cubs even not wanting/needing an average/above average COF bat against RHP, especially one that should hold up reasonably well defensively.
-
There's obviously a difference in 'should we pay someone else's free agent $23m a year to be a platoon outfielder,' because those deals are almost inevitably multi-year, and 'should we pay a guy $23m for one year to be a platoon outfielder'. In his worst year in a long time, 2.6 fWAR is worth $20m at least. Matt Shaw and/or Pedro Ramirez would almost assuredly be worse. It's fine.
-
I'm sure this has been posted but can someone point me in the direction of an analysis of how much AAV cash we have to spend going into next year assuming nothing wonky/unexpected happens with arbitration/options? I'm probably being naive and buying into Happ being willing to take a hometown discount, but I also don't think it would come in the form of a short term deal. Being willing to take a hometown discount probably goes hand in hand with a realization that the best days are behind him, which then goes hand in hand with probably not wanting to be a free agent again at 34 or 35. But something like 5/$65 maybe? Basically a 'retire as a Cub' package that lets him avoid the financial implications of really falling off a cliff in his QO season. It's an underwater deal for the Cubs on the back end almost assuredly, but...if the 2030 Cubs are worried about $13m, there are bigger problems. We certainly don't want to make the whole boat out of 'above average offensive players in their 30s locked into reasonable but large deals', but....Arozarena being a lefty killer and also very good against RHPs solves a ton of the Happ/Busch/likely PCA related LHP problems. Like, if the LF/RF/DH set up next year is Happ/Conforto/Arozarena against RHP and Alcantara/Shaw/Arozarena against LHP, that's a pretty dangerous group? It's probably a little too much, salary wise, but it makes Ramirez trade bait at least.
-
yeah Griffin and Rogers stand out to me. Not sure what Peralta would command but a bounce back year though could be a strategic move. This is the definition of beating a dead horse, but once again the Mariners offense was terrible and they took their very good starting pitching and stacked Kade Anderson and Ryan Sloan right behind the established group. Go give them an infielder.
-
I'm discounting the soft contact rate given the top 2 teams in soft contact rate won 98 and 87 games (and Toronto and Seattle, the third and fourth teams, weren't awful either). The top 5 teams in terms of soft contact were a combined 24 games over .500. The bottom five teams were 5 games under. We scored the most runs in baseball. Occam's razor for me is just bad sequencing (not necessarily batter to batter but game to game) more than a problem that needs to be fixed.
-
I think in terms of Busch I'm just going to close my eyes and hope he gets better. Whether it's going back to predominantly hitting RHPs, or ideally keeping his slightly above average hitting vs LHP but taking a step forward against RHP. Agree that trading him would be a step back. Think it's likely that the next guy ready to replace him is Hartshorn, but at that point, if we want to go that route that means Busch is not a first division starter and he'll be down another 1-1.5 years of team control, so not sure that's worth much. Just need him to get back to where he was.
-
See I think, given the amount of help that we need, getting a cost controlled guy is really the only way to give yourself a chance at a top end guy. Otherwise, my fear is that you end up with (potentially multiple) 2027 version's of Taillon contracts. I'm not super inspired by the below, especially if the goal is improvement beyond relying on health.
-
I hope he keeps dominating and figures out how to stick in the outfield. But keeping an outfield spot carved out for a current 19 year old to maybe, best case, fill in 2028 is a small market move. Especially given we have two outfield spots open right now and (in my mind) zero in house solutions (by which I mean, league average outfield hitters) under contract for 2027.
-
Eh. Wind blowing in, wind blowing out.....just get on base. We're not necessarily stacking up a bunch of Jorge Soler/Sal Perez type players. We've scored 5 more runs than the Brewers over the last two years, even with them being the best in OBP (we're third), because we're outslugging them by 26 points. The offensive approach is fine. Especially given I have very little interest in....a slap hitting corner outfielder or whatever.
-
Hartshorn needs to show he can handle two more levels of minor leagues offensively and there are already a bunch of questions about his ability to play the outfield at all. Happ is absolutely flawed, but if we can get a +.800 OPS against RHP with good defense at below market rates, we shouldn't ignore it because a 19 year old had a good year in high A.
-
is there actually some support for this being important? somewhat of a legitimate question, would be interested to see if there's something that can prove that out. in my mind, just stack as many non-out getters as possible, if they can hit the ball far, even better.
-
I was right in line with you until this one. Any specific reason on this? Just don't want to further empty the farm after Rojas and Ballesteros? I'm kinda resigned to Ramirez or Shaw having at least the RHH side of an outfield platoon spot going into next year, but I still do not see either of them as viable outfielders and would rather get one certain OF and a cheap veteran platoon (Conforto/whoever) for the other. Which makes Shaw and Ramirez as valuable but very redundant pieces.
-
Relative to the 2025 Cubs bullpen? Sure. But we should set our sights higher than a 3.88 ERA/3.82 FIP. That's basically mop up duty numbers for the Padres and Brewers.
-
not calling him an 'impact arm', but Zeferjahn is also under control for a while
-
‘How good could this dude be he’s like the 4th best reliever in the pen’ *looks at stats, sighs dejectedly*
