Bertz
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Everything posted by Bertz
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Josh Rojas has about 1.5x as much WAR the last three years, is nearly 3 years younger, and as a lefty more naturally compliments our current infielders.
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This isn't really true at all. 23 of MLBTR's top 50 free agents are still on the board. Options are slim if you want one guy to give ~$25M per year on sure. But there's still plenty of talent available and even with the $35-40M we think Jed still has to play with there's still some tough decisions to make to fill out the roster.
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There are three times where the team has not spent up to the LT: 1. Circa ~2015 when Bryant et al were so cheap the team more or less couldn't spend up to the line without getting worse 2. When the team was really bad in 2012/2013/2022 3. In 2021 coming off of COVID with in person attendance plans being very tenuous Ive yet to hear anything of substance about why this year would be a new 4th category. It's mainly just specious "it hasn't happened yet so it won't happen" ninniness.
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Canario's fungible at this point. I expect he has a fight ahead of him to make the team, and even if he makes the team there's a decent chance he's out of the org by Memorial Day.
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Yeah this is pretty close to the mental math I've got in my head as well. I expect they add another domestic SP regardless of the Sasaki decision but that's my only quibble. A pretty easy illustration for signing Thielbar is the bench and Trueblood's article yesterday. The team needs a backup 1B. Connor Joe would probably cost $3M, while Mark Canha would cost closer to $10M. Would you rather have Thielbar and Canha or Minter and Joe? It's not a trick question, either is defensible, these are just the types of tradeoffs we're talking.
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I dunno in the year 2024 I'd prefer the team actually put some thought into their signings rather than just sort a leaderboard by ERA and make their decisions that way.
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Funny thing I just saw: Thielbar had a higher Stuff+ than Minter last year A big part of that is that Minter was diminished last year likely due to his hip injury, but also the pitch models really like Thielbar.
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That's pretty melodramatic
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Thielbar's good when kept to LOOGY work, and intermittently can be effective against righties. Very similar to Hoby Milner who they were tied to earlier this winter. He's very much our Tyson Miller from the other side of the plate rather than a full setup man. I'd expect he gets ~$5M and the other reliever we end up is pretty unequivocally the closer as opposed to a Chris Martin type.
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Connor Joe has a 190 wRC+ against the Cubs and an 88 wRC+ against all non-Cub opponents for his career. I don't think that's meaningful but I thought it was funny. I think Joe's probably on the Mt. Rushmore of active Cub killers with Ozzie Albies and Paul Goldschmidt. I think Canha is obviously the preferred option, but I'd guess he takes $8-10M to sign while Joe's more like $2-3M. Feels like this decision is pretty closely linked to the second SP. If we end up with someone low salary, like your Feltner idea a few weeks back, the team can basically grab whoever it wants for the bench and bullpen. Someone on a closer to market rate salary will require some skimping elsewhere and settling for Joe over Canha is one of the less painful places to skimp.
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Yeah Steamer has him at 2.0 WAR/600 PAs and ZiPS has him at 1.5. That's a quality second division starter and realistically if you start setting your sights much higher you start getting into guys who aren't going to settle for sharing the position with Shaw.
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So you'd like less transparency into the team's decision making?
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Oh?
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All 30 teams are operating based on basic concepts like the marginal value of a win. The differences between teams are the specifics of their models and how much they use that kind of language publicly. But it's more or less settled science.
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Yeah Canha/Rojas/Kelly/Brujan is a pretty strong bench. Should still leave plenty of financial room for the rest of the pitching we want too. I wonder if they'd let Canha play CF. He's fast enough for it but hasn't done it regularly in several years. Maybe at Wrigley with its tiny CF?
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Yes, sorry, we're in a bad time of year for me to be using ambiguous phrases like "next year" lol. I meant a budget crunch in 2026. I'd love if the team is willing to loosen the purse strings, especially since it's obvious it would only need to be for one year, but I'm now firmly in believe it when I see it mode for the team exceeding the LT by more than a nominal amount. Tom's done it once but only once. And I'd love a relief ace, but honestly there's value in just getting quality. One of the things Jed said in his end of season presser is to avoid another situation like last April he almost needs to approach the bullpen assuming three guys will go down to injury/ineffectiveness right at the start of the year. I'd very much expect, especially when you consider Jed's aversion to multi-year commitments, something like $8M each to Martin and Minter than $16M to Scott. That said there were some rumors last winter that Jed was considering going out of his comfort zone to give Counsell a relief ace to lean on, so maybe that's coming now.
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Following the Kyle Tucker trade, Cubs' GM Carter Hawkins indicated that the team would look to free agency to help backfill the 3B production the team lost with Isaac Paredes headed to Houston. Mark Feinsand reports today that the Cubs are looking at former Mariners and Diamondbacks infielder Josh Rojas. It seems all but certain that Matt Shaw is being eyed as the primary 3B for 2025, but given his limited time in AAA and then risk associated with just handing any rookie a full time job, and strong backup is a necessity. Josh Rojas is a strong defender and a solid hitter, and as a lefty can help compliment Shaw by taking matchups versus tough righties. Rojas can also cover 2B, possibly useful if Nico Hoerner's recovery from surgery stretches into the new season. Rojas was non-tendered by the Mariners last month, and was projected by MLBTR to make $4.3M in arbitration. Therefore even on the open market it's unlikely he costs more than about $5M per year to sign. View full rumor
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Following the Kyle Tucker trade, Cubs' GM Carter Hawkins indicated that the team would look to free agency to help backfill the 3B production the team lost with Isaac Paredes headed to Houston. Mark Feinsand reports today that the Cubs are looking at former Mariners and Diamondbacks infielder Josh Rojas. It seems all but certain that Matt Shaw is being eyed as the primary 3B for 2025, but given his limited time in AAA and then risk associated with just handing any rookie a full time job, and strong backup is a necessity. Josh Rojas is a strong defender and a solid hitter, and as a lefty can help compliment Shaw by taking matchups versus tough righties. Rojas can also cover 2B, possibly useful if Nico Hoerner's recovery from surgery stretches into the new season. Rojas was non-tendered by the Mariners last month, and was projected by MLBTR to make $4.3M in arbitration. Therefore even on the open market it's unlikely he costs more than about $5M per year to sign. -
So I think the team needs to add another SP either way, but I think if you land Sasaki it impacts A) How deep you're willing to dip into the farm for a trade and B) how much you might value talent vs. durability. I think the other thing is how it impacts other teams. Specifically San Diego, I could see the Sasaki decision impacting their willingness to move Cease or King.
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Tanner Scott is great, but I think it's very unlikely this is the year that Jed adds a multi-year deal for a reliever for two reasons: 1. There is a budget crunch in 2025. The team is at ~$185M against the LT next year right now. Retaining or replacing Tucker plus a multi-year deal for Scott would have the team already at the LT before addressing anything else. Unless Ricketts is willing to let Jed rock a $270M payroll for a year it's probably a bad idea to lock into a reliever right now 2. There's a shocking depth of quality relievers who will only require a 1 year deal. Kenley Jansen, Kirby Yates, Chris Martin, and David Robertson are all too old to demand a long term commitment but are still very much getting it done. You also have guys like AJ Minter and Paul Sewald coming off an injury but who were impact guys before that. These guys will want to re-build value and the Cubs' pitching dev and lack of an entrenched closer should make them a valuable destination
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It's very interesting to me that the Luzardo stuff was so hot and heavy, then it fell apart, then Jed immediately pushed Cashman to make the Bellinger deal, and now it's just crickets. In hindsight I'm assuming Toronto was about to pull their offer for Bellinger. And now the Cubs are largely just hanging out until the Sasaki decision?
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Apparently Hyeseong Kim's posting windows runs out on Friday, so we should hear where he's going in the next day or two. He feels like a plausible option here in a post-Paredes world.
