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Bertz

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Everything posted by Bertz

  1. Bertz
    I really want him to hit, his skillset just compliments the roster so well
  2. Bertz
    Bigge staying instead of Roberts is a bit surprising, though Ethan's definitely been getting by on smoke and mirrors thus far
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  3. Bertz
    Yay Merryweather. On thr flipside I'm super curious about Assad. Is he starting on Friday or Saturday or no? I guess 3 weeks is probably short enough to forego a rehab outing, but I sort of expected one. And if it's not Assad/Hendricks/Wesneski in some order Friday and Saturday I have no idea who's making that 3rd start. Bullpen game since we're so close to the ASB?
  4. Bertz
    He's where my heart's at too. My brain knows TINSTAAP applies to catchers too, but Moore's the guy who has me most genuinely excited when I read about him.
  5. Bertz
  6. Bertz
    I wonder if the fact that there hasn't been a replacement for Shaw named means he should be good to go by them despite missing the last two weeks?
  7. Bertz
    The Philadelphia Phillies are an absolute powerhouse this season, currently sporting the best record in the game. One of their few holes in the lineup are at center field; Johan Rojas currently leads the team in plate appearances at the position and his dismal 60 OPS+ is a clear spot to upgrade down the stretch. The Phillies will have some choice in acquisitions, though. Along with Cody Bellinger potentially being available (pending medical results of his hit by pitch last night), the White Sox are looking to trade Luis Robert Jr.and the Marlins recently announced Jazz Chisholm Jr.is also on the block. While that's stiff competition, a healthy Bellinger should require far fewer trade assets to acquire. It's Ralph so take with all appropriate grains of salt. Edit: Additionally, it appears the Houston Astros, a team that has completely turned it around after a bad start to the season, are also interested in the services of Bellinger. View full rumor
  8. Bertz
  9. Bertz
    Probably? I know people probably get sick of me harping on xFIP and HR/FB rates but if you normalize Taillon’s he comes out as a slightly below average SP this year. He's on a legitimate heater right now, and maybe you write off his early season struggles due to his abbreviated ST, but ultimately the same numbers that said not to panic last year say he's been merely fine this year. That said he's on that aforementioned heater right now, he's presumably available, and he's safe/boring without any major worries (e.g. Garret Crochet's innings). So I think he's likely someone teams would be apt to take on right now, while in the offseason when they have to weigh that 2/$34M against just signing like Kyle Gibson there's probably less incentive.
  10. Bertz
    Do we have velo on Sanders? I think I have only seen fairly tepid reports from last year. I like the statistical profile though. Good amount of swing and miss, walk were high early but have settled down, and I don't care about HR rate in small samples.
  11. Bertz
    I don't think we need to find a better pitcher with less money. I fully expect this 3+ WAR pitcher to cost $25-30 M per annum. But I think we need to add that guy regardless, so dumping $17M ahead of time makes the budgetary impact that much more palatable. If we assume Bellinger and Neris don't return, there's about $70M between the Cubs' current 2025 payroll and the luxury tax. That's 1 big signing plus quality depth pieces, or two big signings plus some bargain shopping. If you're bumping closer to $90M to play with suddenly it's more of an "and" and less of an "or" between depth and impact, though it does bump SP to a necessity rather than a nice to have on the shopping list.
  12. Bertz
    It's tough, because obviously the current moment has shown how quickly 9 can drop to 4, and another lesson from this year is there's no law that says you can't also be down 3 relievers at the same time. But I do think we need to add a vet SP, it's one of the best ways to add multiple WAR in a single roster spot. Plus I have no faith Taillon will be a playoff caliber starter 15 months from now (I frankly don't have a ton of faith he will be 3 months from now). If we've got 4 vets heading into next year having 5-6 kids competing for that last spot plus some relief innings and depth starts feels like a total waste. Like there's being careful and there's wasting bullets. So I think in my mind we circle back to probably shopping Wicks or Assad.
  13. Bertz
    I think for me it's a few things: - The over/under on WAR we can expect from Taillon next year is probably south of 2 - If we want to take a big swing to improve the roster, adding a 3+ WAR SP is one of the best places to do it - While it's ironic for me to say at the moment with 5 injured SPs, I think the internal youths are enough to cover the 4 & 5 spots plus injury depth - If you're *that* worried about the depth hit you can sign a veteran swingman to take on long relief duty I think the depth is there that the Cubs should trade a SP. Probably just one, but they should trade one. I think the arguments against it being Taillon are more either - No one's actually going to take his whole salary off your hands and if they're not what's the point - You can get actual impact back if you do like Brown or Wicks instead But I don't buy that we need Taillon for next year.
  14. Bertz
    I actually saw a really good point on this recently. Hitters are adapting to velocity. not quite as fast as it's improving but they're adapting. At the same time we appear to be nearing a biological ceiling on pitcher velo and spin. There's a decent chance in 5 years we're having the opposite conversation, talking about how to help pitchers and wondering if we need to e.g. bring back sticky stuff.
  15. Bertz
    Similar to Bellinger, I don't have a good sense of what Taillon would bring back given his contract. I think it's above water but not by much? Someone like Norby seems about right though? Though honestly if we're shopping in the back of a team's top 30 I'd probably aim for guys in A ball with a little more upside. We've got a good crop of guys pretty imminent to the majors, you can never have too many but I'd hate to add a guy who's buried on the depth chart from day 1.
  16. Bertz
    I go back and forth on whether my favorite baseball stuff on Seinfeld is this or George taking BP with Jeter and Bernie and being shockingly prescient about launch angle.
  17. Bertz
    I wonder how much this start functions like an audition for Taillon. Holding down this offense on the road would definitely perk my ears up if I was a team looking for a SP.
  18. Bertz
    This is primo sleuthing, good stuff. Also the Cubs being obligated to take at least one arm from Arkansas every year is one of those things I always forget until the guy gets popped and then 5 days later I forget it again for another 360 days. Good reminder of that being a demo to keep an eye out for day 2 or early day 3
  19. Bertz
    I would love to know how our young SPs are valued, and approximately what value they offer. When you combine upside, production to date, and durability, there's probably an argument to have these guys in any order: Brown Horton Wicks Wesneski Assad The above is what I have right this second, but ask me again in three days and I might have something very different. I'm curious both what the industry thinks and what you'd get back for any of them in a 1 for 1.
  20. Bertz
    Mervis has a broken hamate so I think he can be back by the deadline. I think it's typically only a few week injury that you can't play, but it is a few months that your power is impacted. But if not here in July I do think Mervis gets traded in November. He won't return a ton but some fun relief prospect a la Ethan Roberts is probably about right. Canario similarly seems pretty certain to not be here in 4 weeks, though I expect that return to be a little richer.
  21. Bertz
    Expecting *this* would have taken magic powers, but catcher was supposed to be among the worst in the league. The team prioritized gamecalling which is a black box to public WAR. They also didn't really gather any quality depth despite Gomes (age) and Amaya (injury an inexperience) both being quite risky. I would compare this to 1B last year where it should have been a hole and then they got a far left tail outcome on top of it. 3B is similar but not to nearly the same degree thankfully. The bullpen being this bad is just plain bad injury luck. We all thought they were an arm short but that's an arm short of having an impact group not an arm short of being adequate.
  22. Bertz
    It's wild how completely unwilling the fanbase is to acknowledge this. The difference between what the Cubs have gotten at C, 3B, and RP and what the 15th ranked team has gotten at each of those positions is 7 WAR! That's the difference between where the Cubs are currently and being WC#2 and two games up on a playoff spot. Yet instead we have people continually tying themselves in knots trying to find ways to blame vibes or the outfield.
  23. Bertz
    All in all the team is not *that* far out of contention. Now I certainly don't expext them to get back in it at this point, but particularly without any fun rentals to sell it makes sense to wait and make sure they don't have like an 11-5 run in them heading into the deadline. I also think, pretty much regardless of standings, the team should be sniffing around on guys who would positively impact the 2025 team such as Vlad Jr. Though I expect the team will not be as zealous as I would in this direction.
  24. Bertz
    missed this yesterday
  25. Bertz
    I know Trueblood tried to be like "he hits too many balls to CF case closed" but I've yet to see an actual good argument that Morel's not a 120ish wRC+ bat simply getting BABIPed to hell right now. The defense is a problem but the added contact this year has made the bat pretty hard to argue against IMO.
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