Bertz

So it is too early to get overly attached to specifics. The market doesn't really kick off for two more months. But generally if you are Jed and you want a team that is aiming not just to sneak into the playoffs but to compete for a 1st round bye you need four major additions: - A starting caliber catcher. Even with Amaya's big 2nd half he still feels more likely to settle in as a premium backup or a 2nd division starter. And honestly even if that underrates him the attrition at catcher is high enough to make overpreparing worth it - A playoff caliber SP. Having a 3rd high end veteran starter improves the team's impact talent as well as depth. It also makes it so you can feel comfortable dealing a pre-arb SP helping address one of the other to-dos - A closer. The Cubs have Hodge and a small army of live arms you can feel cautiously optimistic about. One guy you can slot in at or near the top of the hierarchy should prevent a repeat of this April and May as the team figures out the right mix of arms in '25 - A power bat in the 1B/OF/DH mix. We've seen in the 2nd half here that the biggest need for the offense was getting the bottom of the order to stop hitting like pitchers. But to further level up the group another power bat is needed Again, I'm trying to not get too attached to specific names at the moment, but my mind's eye this looks something like Trade with Oakland for Shea Langeliers and Brent Rooker (this trade will hurt) Sign Nate Eovaldi Sign David Robertson You'd probably want to do a little bit of additional fiddling with the bench and the bullpen too, but these three moves would be the principle. This adds a ton of pop to the lineup, Rooker and Langeliers have 60 dongs between them with a few weeks left in the season. Eovaldi and Robertson are both older but still excellent, so they likely ask for short term high AAV deals which we know is right in Jed's wheelhouse. Even if Bellinger opts in this team is still likely under the LT as well.

Not his sharpest outing but glad to see Keegan back up here and pitching well. Assuming these last three weeks go well you probably write his name in pencil in next year's pen (a la Leiter last winter).

One good thing about this Yankees/Dodgers gauntlet is that the pitching matchups are pretty forgiving - Luis Gil had an amazing start to his season but the league adjusted and he's been bad lately as he's yet to adjust back - Clarke Schmidt is really solid but it's his first start off the IL - Gerrit Cole hasn't been right all year. He's still been good but he's not *that* much better than Taillon right now - Walker Buehler is washed - Yamamoto is great but making his first start off the IL - Bobby Miller is a mess and I've yet to see a good explanation for why Like against these offenses it might still be a rough week but 3-3 looks like a pretty reasonable expectation.

Aaron Judge has been slumping lately, so expect him to wake up and hit approximately 8 dongs this weekend

The term "Bugs Bunny Changeup" gets over-used but....

Do we know if Kilian got hurt? Left after 1.2. He threw 50 pitches so maybe he got pitch counted? Though it was the first where he labored he had only thrown 15 pitches in the 2nd.

Statcast says Bellinger would have 9 (!!!) extra homers if he played in Yankee Stadium or in Philly. It's not an accident those were the two teams getting tied to him most aggressively as a deadline acquisition before he went on the IL in early July.

To this point, I do wonder how much PCA weighs into Bellinger's calculus. Right now I think it's pretty easy to say Cody's played limited CF the last few months due to circumstance. PCA being all-universe out there plus the fluke finger injury. But if PCA is indeed the guy, a year and a half gap in Cody's CF resume feels hard to get over regardless of how viable the excuse is. And if Bellinger's peers are suddenly corner outfielders and 1st basemen, the bar for a nine figure contract gets real high.

Kiley McDaniel had an article just today where he had an offhand remark saying he thinks Cody'll opt out, which caught my eye. Overall we're not going to know until it happens. It more or less depends on Cody's confidence. If he thinks he is a star and will prove that next year he likely opts in and aims for next winter. If he wants to play it safe he'll opt out and bank a new deal this winter.

He is a smidge ahead of Swanson at 3.6. Barring a deep slump to close out the season it's going to end up being the best year of his career.

Good for him after Boras bungled last winter. I would not want him on that deal though. This feels like throwing bad money after good because the Giants can't get anyone to take their mega contracts.

Trueblood did a writeup and the long and short was they moved where he stands on the rubber and pared down his repertoire to closer to pure fastball/slider. I think he's viewed as a late inning reliever, and the 2 inning stints have just been a way to get more work on those changes. With Lopez hurt, I'd like to see them treat him as the #2 in the pen. If you've got a September of Hodge and Pearson locking down the late innings with their high octane stuff you can really approach the pen differently heading over the winter.

I tend to think the Titans are going to be competing with the Vikings for the #1 overall pick. They look pretty damn bad. That said, September is always upset city. And even if Caleb's amazing as a rookie, it taking a month or two for him to become that guy is imminently reasonable.

Dansby Swanson up to 3.5 WAR. He's got an okay chance of ending the year over 4 PCA's at 2.2, which is nuts considering his playing time. With how much his bat has been shielded, particularly early on, prorating his numbers up to 600 PAs would be a bit intellectually dishonest. But still he's probably played at a ~3.5 WAR level as a 22 year old rookie. And that's not giving extra weighting to his 2nd half numbers at all.

Color me intrigued by Ariel Armas. Reportedly the best defensive catcher in the country, him hitting *at all* is worth keeping an eye on

The International League isn't as insane of a hitters environment as the PCL, but it very much does tilt towards offense so I assume if we had ERA+ for minor leaguers that would be pretty elite.

I would think playing down a man is a decent indication that whoever comes up for Steele will be a SP rather than a reliever?

I can't really imagine a situation where he comes over to the US prior to age 25 and comes to Chicago. You either go to the Dodgers who are now unofficially team Japan, or you try to blaze your own path and go to a team that doesn't have a major Japanese star and try to be *the guy* in that market. Either way the Cubs aren't a great fit. That said this should perk our ears up for Jed making an NPB signing this winter. I believe this year beyond Sasaki it's mostly relievers?

Dansby Swanson wOBA and xwOBA by month April - .294 / .339 May - .211 / .291 June - .326 / .321 July - .255 / .345 August - .339 / .317 September - .599 / .433 Aside from May where he played pretty poorly leading into his IL stint and September which is three days old he's been largely the same guy all year. The difference is that in the second half here fewer balls are finding gloves. His xwOBA bar on baseball savant has been saying 60-something percentile for months now and his actual production is finally mercifully catching up.

If this ends up being more than a one start deal (and how often do elbows, however mild, not require an IL trip and 3-4 missed turns?) I wonder if Kyle gets the subsequent starts. Feels like if there's more time to prep plus Thursday's off day Birdsell should be the guy.

I wonder if we see another Kyle Hendricks start this year. There are four weeks left in the season, and 3 of those feature a Thursday off day. The one week that doesn't, the week of 9/16, the team is facing Washington & Oakland at Wrigley. So you need a 6th starter maybe one or two more times this year? Kyle's probably the favorite to take those starts, but it could easily be Wesneski (assuming no setbacks) or Kilian.

Playing a night game on Labor Day is kinda messed up?

Something kind of funny is happening with Dansby Swanson. He's now after today's game hit the 3 WAR mark for the year. He is tied with Trea Turner at 3.0 WAR, and both guys are way ahead of Xander Bogaerts' 1.6 (strong consideration for worst contract in baseball). Carlos Correa played like an MVP the first half of the year and put up 3.6 WAR. But he's injured with no timetable I can find for a return. Decent chance he's done for the year. Both Turner and Swanson likely pass him in that case. So if Dansby outplays Turner over the next month he probably has the best year from his little FA SS cohort even after the rough first half.

So if Long has let's call it 55 grade in game power, it feels like he's probably a MLBer. Certainly if he can hack it anywhere but 1B. Something in the Mark Canha neighborhood if things go right?