Bertz
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Everything posted by Bertz
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I'm glad you hit in the Marlins pitching development. They don't have especially great pitching development, they just sink a lot of resources into pitching. Like they're not the Royals a few years ago banging rocks together hoping to make fire, but this isn't a team like the Guardians where you go "well surely there's nothing left untapped." Of pitchers reasonably avaliable right now, I expect with Cubs' pitching dev Luzardo to be as good on a rate basis is as good on as good as anyone outside of Burnes and the Padres pair. The tradeoff for having to qualify the above with "on a rate basis" is we get a second cheap year (~$10M?) of Luzardo that does not come with any of the others. But the beauty of having 8-9 other viable starters is you can prioritize 120 good innings over 160 okay innings.
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Sasaki will likely make his decision in early to mid January. Money doesn't matter, whatever team gets him will use their entire international bonus pool on him, part of the reason for the timing is those reset on January 15th (he might agree shortly before that but wait until after the 15th to sign). The recruiting for Sasaki is going to be entirely soft stuff. How competitive your team is, how much he likes the teammates, pitching development prowess, geography, etc. The team that signs him is also probably going to need to utilize a 6 man rotation, or at least set things up so Roki is on a 6 day schedule. So teams will just do their shopping, and if he picks you he picks you. You need 5 non-Roki starters either way.
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Cubs Showing Interest in Mariners' Luis Castillo
Bertz replied to Brock Beauchamp's topic in Chicago Cubs Talk
Ken Rosenthal tonight -
Caissie/Alcantara and Assad for Luzardo and one of Miami's lefty relievers would make me a very happy camper.
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The Cubs' search for starting pitching was seemingly put on pause while the team finalized their deal for Jesus Luzardo, but it appears to have resumed in earnest. Jesus Luzardo had a lost season in 2024 with separate elbow and back injuries, not pitching at all after June 16th. However, in 2023, Jesus was one of the best pitchers in baseball and seemed to be a young budding ace. With that immense talent and two years of control at low arbitration salaries, Luzardo still figures to command a sizable prospect return even after his down year in 2024. View full rumor
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The Cubs' search for starting pitching was seemingly put on pause while the team finalized their deal for Jesus Luzardo, but it appears to have resumed in earnest. Jesus Luzardo had a lost season in 2024 with separate elbow and back injuries, not pitching at all after June 16th. However, in 2023, Jesus was one of the best pitchers in baseball and seemed to be a young budding ace. With that immense talent and two years of control at low arbitration salaries, Luzardo still figures to command a sizable prospect return even after his down year in 2024. -
LFG! Also this feels definitive enough I should probably write it up
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Cubs probably shouldn't be in on another low velo lefty, but curious to see what the damage is here prospect wise.
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Honestly it kind of feels like Long was the prototype for "what if we let our algorithm make a pick?" and it worked out so swimmingly they went hog-wild on it this year. Mathis is definitely a data darling like Long.
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This is so funny to me because a team projected in the mid-80's is pretty objectively where adding a star gives you the most bang for your buck. There's also the fact that these are usually the exact same people in a different year pissed when like a 72 win team doesn't sign the top FA on the market.
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He was announced as a 3B when the pick was put in on draft night. So they're presumably going to at least give it a shot. He had Tommy John pre-draft, but I don't think we know exactly when. I imagine he won't play a position with such strenuous throwing demands until mid-year, but I think we've seen position players back out there at 100% inside of a year. Corey Seager had TJ in May of 2018 and started at shortstop opening day 2019.
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Cubs Showing Interest in Mariners' Luis Castillo
Bertz replied to Brock Beauchamp's topic in Chicago Cubs Talk
I know Jude specifically put this out there after the the Tucker trade, but Tucker makes this feel exceedingly unlikely IMO. A) Dealing Hoerner now after dealing Paredes feels unworkable from the Cubs standpoint, and dealing Castillo without getting Hoerner back feels unworkable from the Mariners standpoint B) If the Cubs trade for Castillo and extend/re-sign Tucker they are already at next year's Luxury Tax. Castillo no longer feels like a talent warranting painting yourself into that kind of box -
With the org's 3B depth chart taking a huge hit yesterday, I'd like to see the Cole Mathis (when healthy) and Jonny Long at 3B experiments get a lot more forceful. Long especially, he got some decent reviews in the AFL and the bat has an outside shot at being 2025 relevant.
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Yeah kind of like how gathering depth on the pitching staff lets you take some bigger swings on risk/reward, I think on offense having a lineup anchor like Tucker does similar. Scouts love Shaw, the data loves Shaw (already projects as a first division starter), make sure you get a good hedge for the bench but otherwise let it rip.
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They didn't give him a single inning there last year even as 3B weighed the team down. I know there was some talk from Craig about being more willing to move Busch around now that he's comfortable at 1B, but I'd be shocked if he starts more than 15 games somewhere besides 1B or DH. The over/under is still probably a number you can count on your fingers.
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Potential Landing Spots For A Cody Bellinger Trade
Bertz replied to Brock Beauchamp's topic in Chicago Cubs Talk
Superficially pretty similar to Wesneski. High end sinker/slider combo but simply gives up too many dongs. The changeup IMO looks pretty nasty on video, so I'd think there's a better path to being a legit SP than Wes has at this point. But the fact that he got lit up so thoroughly at AAA probably means there's a higher chance he just can't hack it in MLB at all. -
I wonder if the Nats would make MacKenzie Gore available. I feel like at the start of the offseason there was some talk about them pulling a Jayson Werth 2.0 type of move, but it's been all crickets and the current Fangraphs projections do not think the team is at all close to competing. Currently projected as the 3rd worst team in the league. You'd get three more years of Gore and this is his first year of arb at a projected $3.5M, so even if you sent them a little more prospect capital than you're comfortable with that's not exactly a sell out for '25 move.
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I mean Soto's been worth nearly 4 WAR more the last three years, plus the age difference. I think if Tucker showed a continuation of what he did in limited time last year and puts up like 8 WAR, yeah he can probably approach $50/year in FA next winter. But I think if he settles in at his averages there's a decent chance he doesn't crack $400M. The Corey Seager deal plus inflation feels right IMO.
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Through May 11th his fastball was 96.5, right in line with the two years prior. Things dipped from there and about a month later his season ended. I feel pretty confident blaming his poor performance last year on injury. He obviously doesn't have to bounce back, but a year ago at this time he was considered a bonafide star. We are the exact type of team that should be buying low and making these sorts of gambles. There's a good chance he's still a star. And if he's still damaged goods? Oh well I guess the path to innings for Ben Brown and Cade Horton got less complicated.
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Big fan of adding Luzardo. This is the sort of risk you can take when you've got the pitching depth the Cubs do.
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Taking Castillo as an example, having him at $25M and Tucker at let's call it $40M, the team next year is already at ~$230M. Tom would have to significantly change his spending habits or Jed would be backed into a corner *having* to trade a salary to do anything beyond minor roster tinkering. Not impossible, Theo did it for Darvish, but I feel pretty comfortable saying this is one of those places where Jed and Theo have different sensibilities. Edit: Actually I think that $230 might be if Shota leaves, so more like $245M as a starting point.
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If you wanna give him 5-10 games over there cool, but he should not be an extensive part of the 3B plan
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Deal official, and surprisingly team friendly
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I posted something tangential to this in a comment under one of Trueblood's articles but now that this is real I think it's worth thinking about more. If you want to read tea leaves on how confident the team is about extending Tucker, I think there's is a direct correlation between how much multi-year money the team adds from here and how likely it is that Tucker walks. Tucker and some unlikely Shota option decisions aside, there is no money set to come off the books after this year besides Tucker. So if the team has real expectations of extending Tucker, they'll primarily stick to 1 year deals aside from Kelly (you always need a veteran backup at C). Reason being you want to to have some money to spend in addition to a Tucker deal. So like if Castillo or Flaherty is our next SP that's a bearish sign for an extension, while a guy in his walk year I take as a positive.
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BTW can we all agree in advance to be chill when Paredes goes nuts in Houston, and to a lesser extent when Bellinger goes nuts in NYC?
