Bertz

I wonder if the plan would be to see where you're at at the end of ST and if miraculously everyone's healthy make a trade then. You'd have way more leverage, and you'd not be in the clear on injury risk but gotten through the worst time for it. But it seems like the immediate thought is definitely "MOAR PITCHING".

They haven't signed a QO guys but they've explicitly said they're open to it. Like Neuby said they've got the Tucker pick coming their way so that tends to soften the blow. Losing a second rounder and gaining a comp pick nets out to ~10 or so spots of draft order.

I wonder if the Cubs and Gallen could do a swell opt. Something like 3/60, opt out after the first year, and if Gallen triggers his opt out the Cubs have an opportunity to add another two years onto the deal? It feels like the O's are definitely going to add one of Gallen/Framber, but beyond that it's anyone's guess. Cubs are cleary being opportunistic, while the Braves/Padres/Giants/Dbacks definitely want SPs but there are mixed signals around if they want to do a $20-25M AAV. I suspect those latter teams are all going to shop in the Chris Bassit tier, but it only takes one.

I would suspect that he's in an awkward no man's land that makes the Cubs a bad fit: - He's not definitely better than Taillon - He doesn't have roster flexibility (an injury to rehab from, a minor league option, a salary you'dbe quick to swallow) - He's far too good to have to settle for a minor league deal or a bullpen spot - Even if he was willing to settle for a bullpen spot, he doesn't have the bullpen experience or the stuff that makes you think relief is an attractive fallback option I'd put Chris Bassitt and Justin Verlander in the same bucket as Giolito. I think the Cubs either pony up for Gallen, sign someone coming off an injury that they can stash on the IL (Jordan Montgomery?), or sign someone you feel like would be good in relief (Nick Martinez? Walker Buehler?).

Yeah the lower levels of the farm are healthy, I don't think there's a lot of concern about backfill. Conrad especially seems to be a pretty wide consensus pick to click. It's that absolute void at AA that's going to understandably drag down a ranking like this. Like if you were giving letter grades to every affiliate, it'd probably be something like this: Iowa: B- if Alcantara starts there, C if he's in MLB Tennesee: D (F- if god forbid anything happens to Rojas) South Bend: B (A lineup, C pitching) Myrtle Beach: B-/C+ You cant just handwave away Tenn, but also I think the shape of the talent distribution tells you a lot.

Has the Cubs narrowly in first with 87 wins and 62% playoff odds. I thought the note on the Brewers was interesting: I've seen Dan mention this in chats before, but more or less the reason the Brewers have been crushing their projections is less individual players overperforming and more guys like Isaac Collins with surprisingly strong projections getting buried in the FG depth charts but once the season starts getting the PT more commensurate with their talent.

Cubs 18th. https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/47684217/2026-mlb-prospect-rankings-farm-systems-kiley-mcdaniel-brewers-guardians-pirates-dodgers-mets#chc Kiley McDaniel has his rankings as well. and he has them 25th. That feels low, probably frankly the wide difference in Alcantara. but it's a good writeup

Just incredible stuff

I'd be lying if I said the superficial comparisons don't color this at all, but Josh Naylor's bat feels like the obvious "optimistic but still firmly realistic" comp. Give Mo an extra half a win per year for being able to catch 30-40 games a season and you've got a comfortable 3 win player. ETA: Looking at Baseball Prospectus, which I don't love broadly but I think is the only place still doing minor league framing, they have him at -0.8 framing runs and -2.4 overall defensive runs at Iowa this year. Prorated out to a full 120 game catcher workload that's -1.4 and -4.1 respectively. Very much does not feel like average is out of reach at his age?

I suspect that the plan for the bench is for Austin, Alcantara (or McCormick), and Shaw to each start most days against left handed starters. The questions are A) which of the four lefties in the main lineup doesn't lose out on playing time and B) can any of the RHH bench guys usurp a current starter. But back to A: - Mo seems almost certain to be platooned. He was fairly platoon neutral early in his MiLB career, but sucked last year at AAA. .230/.296/.281 in a very hitter friendly environment. I have strong hopes that he'll eventually be split neutral, but in the short term it seems very unlikely - Michael Busch will probably be platooned. He showed some signs of life against LHP late last year, but absolutely tiny sample (22 PAs of 140 wRC+ in August/September). Hope for the best but smart money is he still needs a caddy - PCA sucks against LHP, and I suspect will continue to. But the magnitude of suck will likely dictate if he gets platoon support or simply slides down the order to 9th against LHSP. Also worth noting Pete did noy have problems with lefties in the minors, so you can dream on him improving - Ian Happ is playable against LHP, but certainly below average. He has a 126 wRC+ against RHP the last three years, but 96 against LHP (with a matching 96 in 2025). I suspect that Happ has the political capital to not get relegated to platoon duty as long as his performance against lefties can ve considered at least "fine." But it's an obvious lever to pull if his performance slides or other guys start earning more playing time For Austin specifically he's obviously not going to directly take any playing time from PCA, and probably not Ian Happ, but unless/until he faceplants he's going to start in place of one of Busch/Mo against every LHP.

Agreed. I think the question is if they want/have to move someone out to make space for him or if they just want to enter ST with silly levels of depth.

Also this is probably the best/most succinct writeup of Mo I've seen

Kiley: 51 - Ballesteros 83 - Wiggins Has Caissie at 77 FWIW

Listened to Sharma and Mooney's podcast from late last week. They seem to think another pitching move is coming. Didn't really sound like they were reporting anything, Mooney just laid out the logic: - Based on the media scrum at the convention it's clear Craig Counsell is pushing the front office to keep adding - Jed and Carter are always paranoid about injuries - They love acquiring pitching depth and they LOVE being opportunistic - They are signaling that they have more money than recent offseasons and they're not maxed out on budget yet - If the acquisition cost now makes sense vs. giving up prospects at the trade deadline it makes sense I feel like it's hard to fit a guy onto the roster unless he's optionable or rehabbing, but you can never have too much depth I guess.

Cubs signed this guy to a minor league deal. He's been in indy ball the last two years, and apparently has had a velo bump during that time 🤷‍♂️ Also was reading BN this morning and apparently Chas McCormick has minor league options. So even if Alcantata beats him out for a spot, if the Cubs add him yo the 40 man they can hang onto him all year at Iowa.

Absolutely wild to leave Nico Hoerner off this list

Thinking more about next year's planning, '27 payroll as of right now is somewhere in the $140M neighborhood. So for the sake of nice round numbers, let's say the team is $100M under the luxury tax pending whatever changes with the CBA. Also as of right now the bullpen will need to be rebuilt again and the situations at 2B, C, RF, LF, DH and two SP slots are varying levels of unsettled. Again for the sake of nice round numbers assume it costs $15M for a good quality first division starter at catcher and DH, and $20M for each of those other holes (I'm counting the bullpen collectively as one $20M hole). That means the Cubs would need to spend $150M AAV in free agency to get the team back to the level of top to bottom strength where it is right now. That's uhhh....probably not gonna happen. So in order to feel like the team isn't going to take a big step back after this season you probably need three kids to stake claim to 2027 starting spots. If you want to not just tread water but have fun in free agency next year, i.e. chase $30M plus guys instead of $20M minus guys, you need a fourth or god willing a fifth kid to step up. That's actually not as daunting as it sounds! Shaw's basically already there, and Mo's got a pretty high floor and a good bit of runway to open the season. There's another five guys on the Iowa/Chicago border in Alcantara, Long, Wiggins, Brown, and Wicks. But IMO it does mean that from here out, where the roster decisions are at the margins. the team should generally swallow a little risk in exchange for giving the kids more runway.

My mental model is you fill one of the OF spots with a kid and one with your checkbook. - Alcantara's the most straightforward and desirable option, hopefully he earns it - Long is very likely to have the bat, the question is whether he'd be more like a -5 outfielder defensively or more like -15 - If the team otherwise addresses 2B, whether that's extending Hoerner or internally with a Rojas or a Ramirez, Shaw's got a decent chance at being a very good OFer - It's unlikely but it wouldn't be insane for Kepley or Conrad to race through the minors. You'd absolutely still want a veteran hedge in this scenario, but you might be able to get away with e.g. a $10M Ramon Laureano instead of a $25M Seiya Suzuki And then the market's lacking a tio end talent like Tucker, but it's solid in pretty good outfielders. Happ and Suzuki obviously, Randy Arozarena, Taylor Ward, Trent Grisham, Dalton Varsho. None of these guys (save mayybe Varsho) move the team forward, but they'd all hold the line.

Not the biggest fan of Law at this point but realistically opinions on Mo and Alcantara (and Caissie) probably shouldn't be a lot different than they were a year sgo.

Keith Law: 41 - Alcantara 47 - Ballesteros 79 - Rojas No Wiggins

There's probably not a lot of harm in letting him try in the spring, but for me it's a longshot that it'll be needed. If Austin fails then that role (and roster spot) would seem to have Jonny Long's name on it. So for Shaw to get run there you basically need Austin to fail, Long to fail, AND Busch's late season progress against lefties to not carry over.

What a guy. Even including the 2016 guys has a good argument for best combo of cool on the field and cool off the field of anyone we've had in a long time.

It took two years of handholding for you to understand how to look up payroll you dufus

Not a new feeling for you