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Bertz

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Everything posted by Bertz

  1. Bertz
    This is what I don't get about the "moar prospects!" stuff is that we have a wave of guys pretty imminent already. Maybe you're bored of them because you've been following them for 3 years but there's not really much reason to think e.g. Heston Kjerstad has significantly more of a chance at being a superstar than Owen Caissie. And the few guys who are legitimately in a class above anyone we have just do not get made available. Mayyyybbbbee the O's would do Basallo for Steele? But other than that it's guys who are not going anywhere.
  2. Bertz
    I think it's a good idea if 3 conditions are met: 1. The team, having access to their medicals, is not worried about Alzolay and Merryweather for next year beyond the general worry you have around hard throwing relievers 2. The team is going to embrace the 2nd half youth movement in the pen. I want at least 3 and ideally 4 of Hodge/Bigge/Palencia/Kilian/Roberts/etc. in the pen at any given time, and use the opportunity to give those guys leverage opportunities even if they haven't totally earned them 3. Most important, and to your point, Leiter needs to return something legitimately fun. Wesneski and Brown were not super highly rated in preseason lists, but both were mid-breakout when we acquired them and after a few hours of sleuthing it became clear they were very very legit returns. I want someone back who we're all like "Leiter's great but if you can get THAT for a 33 year old reliever you totally have to"
  3. Bertz
    Related to the Athletic article is this podcast hit with Mooney. I listened to these two dingbats talk for 20 minutes so you all don't have to. Not a ton of insight (shocker!) but the things that stood out: - Jesse made it sound like Mark Leiter is definitely gone, and Neris might get moved too - He mentioned Hoerner, Taillon, and Bellinger as guys who probably don't go anywhere but could, which tracks with other reporting. However he mentioned Morel along with them, which I don't think we've heard any smoke around
  4. Bertz
    The luxury tax thing is overstated I think. The extent they appear to be over the line, if they are at all, is tiny. Essentially any cost saving move probably drops them back under. So like they don't need to move Bellinger or Taillon, honestly saving just like $2-3M on a Smyly or Neris is probably plenty. So I'd guess the framing here is more to indicate that if someone does want to play ball on Bellinger or Taillon Jed's willing to pay down their '24 salary. Speaking of Bellinger and Taillon, I think they are the big ones to watch. Depending in what exactly you have planned for this winter you may prefer to have those salaries back in your pocket. Otherwise I think we mainly see roster cleanup stuff, like for instance Canario *must* go if we want to wring any value out of him. Lopez probably needs to go before 60 day IL stints start running out, etc.
  5. Bertz
    I tend to think of baseball as a game of individual accomplishment, but I do believe there is a level of synergy that gets unlocked when a lineup has no holes. When pitchers have nowhere to hide fewer rallies fizzle out and even if a pitcher keeps runs off the board you grind him into dust. On top of that, when you have a team that's dominating the offense gets a bit of a superficial lift because they are much more likely to see the 7th or 8th guy in the bullpen pecking order than the 1st or 2nd. So I think the injuries plus Acuna no longer playing on god mode even when he was on the field put the other guys in less favorable spots. They're out of the bubble now and there's no more ordering off the menu and complementary app samplers out in the real world.
  6. Bertz
    Pitching matchups don't really scream Brewers sweep. I think the Cubs win 2/3 to keep themselves right in the most awkward middle ground possible leading into the deadline.
  7. Bertz
    I still like him. The start/stop he's had to deal with between injuries and the fact that this team could only play nailbiters for the last two months last season (and thus Alzolay/Merrweather/Leiter pitched every game) has IMO prevented him from getting into a groove. One of the silver linings with the team sliding out of contention this year is that I think you can just throw guys like Palencia/Bigge/etc. into the fire, and I expect that we'll come into next year with a much deeper and more settled pen than we've had in a long time for it.
  8. Bertz
    There is a lot more downside risk than I expect Jed to be comfortable with, but swapping Bellinger out and bringing in Robert and Crochet does a lot to bump up the ceiling on this team without requiring payrolls that we know Tom won't support. You'd have ~$50M this offseason to address catcher, 3B. and relief. That seems like plenty unless you are targeting Bregman?
  9. Bertz
    https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/gamefeed?date=7/21/2024&gamePk=752817&chartType=pitch&legendType=pitchName&playerType=pitcher&inning=&count=&pitchHand=&batSide=&descFilter=&ptFilter=&resultFilter=&hf=playerBreakdown&sportId=11&liveAb= He was all over the place and probably ought to hang out a tick lower than this but good lord that velo from Palencia today Also interesting that Statcast defaults to thinking Noland's fastball is a cutter. I want to see the pitch design guys dig in
  10. Bertz
    I actually wrote about this, I think for a catcher there's value in adding a guy on an expiring contract with the intent to resign him I'm also increasingly wondering if this logic applies to SPs as well. Imanaga aside, most of the Cubs' higher end pitchers acquired in the Hottovy era have had a rough first half season before locking in.
  11. Bertz
    GameDay has Noland going for Iowa. Really interested to see his statcast data.
  12. Bertz
    Miguel Amaya is hitting .500 since his little reset and has climbed back to replacement level. You can't let him be the guy going into next year regardless of what he does the next two months, but I still think he's a high end backup/2nd division starter.
  13. Bertz
    This is probably reductive but for right now the 1 walk is all I care about from Wiggins. Birdsell didn't pitch great but sat 95, Love that he'll be another depth option early next year. I wonder if he gets some September callup action in relief this year. I don't believe the 40 man situation this fall is too precarious.
  14. Bertz
    The smaller the sample the more you should assume that normal gravity is going to apply. Moises demolished AA, but he's been more good than great at AAA. And it's also only been 19 games at Iowa so it's not like he's running out ofthings to learn. There's no need to be impatient, he'll likely be an MLB regular as a 21 year old early next year. He's tracking great, he's just pretty clearly not ready to step in and excel right now.
  15. Bertz
  16. Bertz
    Honestly there's a good bit? Again at 20 these are all likely to improve, but right now he is: - Chasing pitches at a higher than MLB average rate (33.3% for Moises, 28.3% for the league) - Making less contact in the zone than the league (82.1% vs. 85.3%) - Hitting the ball hard (95 MPH+) less often (34.9% vs. 38.8%) He does on the positive side hit fewer balls on the ground (39.7% vs 42.5%) and with it comes an above average barrel rate (9.5% vs. 7.9%). But overall I'm not sure he's hitting that much better at Iowa than PCA did and we've seen how steep of an adjustment curve he's facing.
  17. Bertz
    Take it FWIW Levine's not exactly batting 1.000 these days
  18. Bertz
    It would be very 2024 Cubs to win 1/3 this series with the 1 being Hendricks-Gallen
  19. Bertz
    His peripherals aren't very good honestly, so I'd push back on him being major league ready. Now given that he's 20 years old and he's only been at the level for a month there's not much reason to be deterred long term, but the odds he could come up and legitimately help the team in the next month or two seem pretty long.
  20. Bertz
    I don't really understand Shaw/Triantos/Franklin still being at Tenn. Franklin maybe you could say because you wanted to wait for the inevitable Canario trade in the next two weeks? But like all three guys appear to have conquered AA, and for Triantos/Shaw the Futures game felt like a natural book-end. And this is not exactly a tough lineup, particularly infield, to crack your way into currently
  21. Bertz
    Horsefeathers yes!
  22. Bertz
    Obliques are an explosiveness injury. The reason they're more of a thing now is because today's players are lightyears more athletic than the guys 60 years ago.
  23. Bertz
    Based on this, Merryweather is trending towards about 2-2.5 weeks between starting his rehab stint in Arizona and being back in MLB. Assuming Alzolay is on a similar schedule he'd be back right around the deadline.
  24. Bertz
    I'm hoping it's less setback and more the fact that we're already 35 days in to his IL stint. Although Brown's 41 days into his IL stint so not sure how to interpret him not being transferred instead?
  25. Bertz
    I didn't realize he'd only started one of the last 10 there. Yeah looks like, kind of like we talked about in the offseason, he can maybe get some time there if flyballers like Shota or Taillon are pitching but absolutely not on Steele or Hendricks (or Wicks if he were alive).
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