Bertz

If Steele doesn't take this to the house please get Bigge in the game. I would like to give him the opportunity to pull a Hodge and become circle of trust worthy inside of a month.

I wonder if that means this draft looks like '21 where they basically immediately threw all their extra cash at Triantos and that was that. I think Gray was a bit overslot and then everyone else was at or under?

I wonder what Skenes' innings cap is this year. He's at 93 right now which isn't excessive, but it does mean he's looking at probably 160+ if they don't skip any starts. That's not an unreasonable number but would imagine they're thinking something closer to 140. What they ought to do is put him on the IL for a breather the weekend before Labor Day, give him two weeks to rest up and then legit rip down the stretch. Go ahead and rest Jared Jones at the same time.

Hopefully it's just a hairline deal like Hoerner's and he's back shortly after the ASB.

Why Danny Jansen? By an order of magnitude the catcher position has been the most problematic spot on the 2024 Cubs. The difference in catcher WAR between the 30th ranked Cubs and, for example, the 15th ranked Astros is 3.4 wins. Meaning if the Cubs had average production from the position they'd likely be over .500 right now. The offense in particular has been so bad that it has single-handedly cost the Cubs a quarter of a run per game at the plate. Danny Jansen is a name most are probably familiar with, as with the Jays' catching surplus he's been in a number of rumors over the last few years. He has *major* durability concerns, but on a rate basis he has been the 5th best catcher in baseball (4.5 WAR/600) since the start of 2021. Why Now? The Cubs as an organization place a premium on a catcher's soft skills. They want a field general and a pitcher whisperer behind the plate, and offense is a secondary concern. They're not alone in that regard. The Yankees, Rays, Astros, and Dodgers have all at different points over the last 5-10 years made a similar emphasis. But clearly there is a limit to what level of offensive ineptitude they can accept and what Yan Gomes and Miguel Amaya have done to this point in the year passed it. The best way to assess those soft skills is directly. You could chat with former teammates and coaches on background, but the best way to know if Jansen will mesh well with Justin Steele and Shota Imanaga is to have them work together. If you trade for Jansen prior to the deadline, you have two months to evaluate him specifically with this team, these coaches, this technology, etc. He also gets a chance to get acclimated and can ideally hit the ground running next April for what needs to be a much more competitive season. The Cost As Cubs fans we know that catchers do not fetch high returns at the trade deadline. The best Willson Contreras could net two years ago before Houston ownership stepped in was Jose Urquidy, an up and down SP with intriguing stuff. While Jansen is better than Contreras on a rate basis, his Mr. Glass level durability likely means the cost will be even lower. Two 40 FV level prospects akin to what the team gave up for Jeimer Candelario last summer feels like the upper limit of what Jansen might cost. Honestly it will probably be a good bit lower. Next Year Just as catcher has been the biggest hole on the roster in 2024, prior to any external additions it projects to again be so in 2025. I am not totally out on Miguel Amaya as a viable major leaguer, and Moises Ballesteros has potential to impact the position, but unlike the bullpen or third base there's zero argument that we can just roll into 2025 relying entirely on internal options at catcher. Jansen, along with Travis D'Arnaud, are the two starting caliber catchers set to hit the FA market. D'Arnaud seems likely to stick in Atlanta so the Cubs' options over the winter are probably Jansen or the trade market for that external support. There don't appear to be a ton of teams looking to add catching this winter, but getting Jansen in house and letting him fall in love with Wrigley does give you a chance to make sure you're not left holding the bag over the winter. This Year Let's also not forget this year. The team is probably a bit too far out to make a successful run at this point, but with playoff odds right around 10% they're squarely in the "it wouldn't be crazy" part of the win curve. This move would address the black hole at catcher, while knock on wood internal reinforcements appear to be turning around the bullpen. It's likely too little too late, but a Jansen trade would not be a complete waste of on-field value because we're not quite yet at the point where 2024 wins are meaningless. tl;dr The Cubs should trade for Danny Jansen this month as an audition of sorts to see if he's the guy next winter. The cost shouldn't be high and the position has been so poor the potential impacts are actually quite large.

I do think Mastro's got more offensive production in the tank than he's shown thus far, but we're talking like an 80 or 90 something wRC+ depending on how aggressively you platoon him. The defense has looked spectacular this year so I'm happy to give him more playing time, but if he's a starter on this team things went really off the rails or he hit like a 99th percentile outcome. He's much more likely to be this generation's Tommy La Stella than anything more.

I think it's pretty clear that Jed is viewing contention on a longer time horizon than the fanbase, and it's pretty clear PTR is fine with that. The team was expected to win ~85 games coming into the year, and they're tracking towards ~79 at the moment. The standard deviation on preseason projections is in the 6-8 game range. This season has been a disappointment, but a pretty normal sized one. We're talking like a 20th percentile outcome? That's not to excuse the underperformance thus far, but it is to put its likelihood in perspective. Jed and the Cubs showed very little urgency this winter, and I remember specifically a Carter interview at the Winter Meetings where he mentioned not wanting to block all the kids. I imagine there was not a ton of additional payroll available, but if Jed's rolling a 1 or a 2 was going to cost Jed his job we would have skimmed more off the farm to bolster the team without majorly impacting payroll. Instead he stuck to his guns, got some left tail outcomes on a couple of positions that already didn't look great to begin with, and here we are. It's been mentioned that Jed's contract runs through next year, I'd guess that next year needs to go well for him to earn an extension, but that there's very little chance he's outright fired.

This was definitely the easiest matchup on paper coming into the week, but I still find it very hard to believe we'll be able to hold this offense down much longer. I just ask that if we lose we are able to do so in a way that saves the pen for this weekend.

The schedule should hopefully help. After they leave Baltimore they don't play another scary team until the Yankees in early September. There will certainly be tough series between now and then, but it's very much dependent on how the starting pitching lines up. E.g. the Pirates are scary if you draw Skenes and Jones in a series, very manageable if you don't. Ditto the Tigers' depending on whether or not you face Skubal. September's a little rougher, you have vs. Yankees @ Dodgers @ Rockies (I worry about games at Coors no matter how bad they are) @ Phillies But it's also interspersed with some light Nationals and A's matchups.

I haven't updated my little Christian Franklin on base bonanza fun fact in a few days. Starting with 6/19 he's played 19 games. Here are the number of times he's reached base by number of games 0x - 1 1x - 2 2x - 7 3x - 5 4x - 4 I assume Triantos and Shaw are heading directly from the Futures Game to Iowa and Franklin simply must join them.

Curious if this is an "it's broken" IL trip or an "he needs a couple days and the ASB is Monday so might as well" IL trip.

Assad is starting one of the games of the doubleheader on Saturday unless there's a setback. Wicks I believe is trending towards the end of the month, and Brown sounded not too far off until pregame yesterday they mentioned his neck is still bothering him. So tough to say on that last one but the others are close.

Honestly they haven't really had a prolonged easy stretch this season. They were supposed to have one in late May/early June with that heavy dose of Pirates and Reds, and then they got Skenes and Jones both Pirates series and Greene/Lodolo both Reds series.

I know the scouting reports say Birdsell's got a plus fastback but I was still expecting it to be 93.something when he got in front of tracking. But no he was 94.8 and topped 96 a handful of times. Good stuff even though he got hit around a bit.

The Cubs are 3.5 out of a playoff spot and depending on how you feel about the top of the AL Central the schedule is pretty light until September.

Horsefeathers, the last update on him was pretty promising

Oh for sure. I'm very much a "wins are wins" type and don't think having a big bopper does much extra beyond aesthetics. But based on the fanbase's whining they would hate him. I don't love Paredes specifically because like I said his lack of raw power makes his margins feel quite small. But on the other hand it's hard to overstate how much adding a 4 win 3B with such a light salary would have on this team in the immediate term. It would feel kind of like the Quintana trade.

I think Paredes has done it long enough to prove it's skill and not luck. However, he is the hitter equivalent of a finesse pitcher like Kyle Hendricks. I think it's fair to wonder how that will age. Also despite his true talent looking like a ~130 wRC+ I think considering a guy with raw power comparable to PCA does not feel like the "big bat" that anchors the lineup like so many people think the team needs.

This is the big thing I was hoping and expecting to see. Busch has probably been fairly fortunate from a batted ball standpoint, but also there's nothing in his profile that says his K-rate should start with a 3. Something in the 27/28% range is a lot more reasonable. So less luck on balls in play but more balls in play should mostly cancel each other out.

The fanbase scoffs at Suzuki/Happ being considered a big bat, so if you want someone substantially better than them your options are basically Vlad Jr. and Soto. This is the list of the top projected hitters in the league right now: https://www.fangraphs.com/projections?pos=all&stats=bat&type=rzips&sortcol=16&sortdir=desc The only guys who might possibly be available in the next 9 months are those two, Brent Rooker (do you really want to buy high on him?) and mayyyybbbbeeee if things go just the wrong way for the Astros Kyle Tucker.

Fun matchup, though I hadn't noticed how much Burnes' K-rate has dropped this year. Despite the sparkling ERA he's probably not an ace anymore. Still very good but more Justin Steele than Cy Young. Not related to tonight, but the Cards getting rained out last night and having their DH today looks like it's going to have us miss Sonny Gray this weekend.

Birdsell tomorrow

Very successful first outing for Merryweather, 1-2-3 with 2 KS. ALSO, Savant classified two changeups as fastballs, dragging his average "fastball" velocity for the day down to 91. Don't have a heart attack like I did, he was actuallt sitting right around 96, down a bit for him but not at all alarming as he works his way back