Bertz

I don't know what everyone's betting app of choice is, but BetRivers currently has the Bears as +10,000 to win next year's Superbowl. It feels like free money to park a couple hundred bucks in there and cash out in three months after the Bears have made a bunch of offseason noise and sit at like +3000 or +4000.

I don't think there had been any talk of the additional position player limits before this.

Yeah I think that's a fair distinction on the position/athleticism front. That said on the flip side if you get more picky on the offensive front it swings the pendulum back again. Set a BB% floor of 8 or 9% and a K% cap of ~25% and you filter out a lot of the riff-raff who flamed out in my initial sample. I think generally, even though it's top of mind people still don't consider ARL enough for hitters. And on the flipside there's way too much mind paid to it for pitchers.

Interestingly the stuff numbers don't love Fulmer. That said, he's one of only 10 guys who throws his slider more than 90 MPH. It's also got some interesting characteristics from a spin/movement perspective. I wouldn't be surprised if there's some low-hanging fruit to weaponize much more effectively. Curious what this means for the pen. Is another FA lefty also on the way? If not, I assume second lefty is one of the camp battles coming up? And I think that would imply only one of Estrada/Merryweather in the OD bullpen?

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/the-2023-start-of-spring-zips-projected-standings-national-league/ ZiPs has them at 78 wins here Aren't zips projections typically more conservative for teams that focus on defense and run prevention? Or is that just something I'm making up in my head? No, not so much. I think if you're looking for nits to pick there's two. First, the depth chart for the team on Fangraphs currently has several fairly silly choices. Dan's system will move guys up/down the chart within each simulation based on their performance (which is why this is so much more accurate than their live updating standings), but still if you're starting with several faulty assumptions it's going to have an impact. Second, some of the Cubs pitchers have fairly short track records behind their 2022 performance, but have real under the hood changes and data-driven reasons to think they're real and substantive. Wesneski is top of the list, but like Smyly and Sampson project as basically replacement level and it's pretty easy to justify them well north of that. Projection systems base their opinion on a longer track record, and they should, but if a pitcher drastically alters their arsenal you don't necessarily need three years or 400 innings to tell there's been a real talent level change. But generally whether it's 78 or 82 doesn't change much big picture. For the team to really be in it next year you're going to need a couple of major surprises. Something like two of the following: 1. The starting outfield to be awesome. Whether that's from one star performance and two solid ones, or all three guys being at or near All Star level, but through some means getting 10+ WAR from the 3 everyday guys 2. Strong (2.5+ WAR) performance from multiple youths. Morel and Wesneski seem most likely, but for the first time in years Iowa is pretty loaded with talent, so these performances could just as easily come from Mervis, Davis, Amaya, Kilian, etc. 3. Hottovy Devil magic to make a few major impacts. Tommy's shown he can essentially turn straw into a quality 8th inning guy, but we need bigger. Maybe that's Taillon’s new slider letting him bump up against the 4 WAR mark. Maybe it's fixing Hendricks. Maybe it's getting Wesneski to just continue what he did last September without major regression. But we need someone(s) to step up such that our top 4 SPs account for 10-12 WAR

Guys who hit as 18 year olds are just a really big deal. I just pulled a leaderboard from FG, and it looks like since 2011 therer are 52 guys who have had 120+ PAs in a season at Low A with a wRC+ north of 100. Of those 52: - 10 turned into legit stars - 10 more turned into good players, e.g. Ozzie Albies. A couple of these guys, like Wander Franco, still have a chance to jump up a grade - 4 ended up as low end MLBers/bench types - 11 outright busted - 17 it's still too early to say. Of these, 4 are currently on Top 100 lists So that's something like a 50% hit rate on getting a 1st division player or better? I have Moises at #13 on my personal list, and I'm frankly more worried about having him too low than too high. He's definitely not gonna catch but he's probably gonna mash.

Might be approaching time for a WBC thread. The DR team is as stacked as you'd imagine, except surprisingly sad at catcher.

I'm generally of the mind that age is just a number for pitchers but that still seems like a monumentally bad idea.

I know I can get annoying harping on "Hey look at all that shiny depth!" but I think this graph really illustrates why. Every playoff team was on the right handed half of the graph, and the ones on that side that didn't make the playoffs all barely missed the playoffs (Brewers), would be pretty far to the left on the pitching version of this graph (Dbacks, Twins, Orioles), or in the case of the Giants just had the misfortune of having their skulls stomped in by the Dodgers. I don't think it gets you very far into October, but being solid everywhere is a surprisingly effective recipe for making the playoffs.

Yeah, I think the arguments for Triantos are age, the fact that hit over power is seen as more likely to blossom than power over hit, and that MB's home park is more pitcher-friendly than FG's wRC+ numbers fully capture. But even acknowledging all of those I feel like he should be at the back of the 45 FV tier.

Can they please release their in market streaming option ASAP so I don't have to subscribe to FuboTV for one horsefeathering network? Last year I at least needed it for Better Call Saul as well.

Really good list. Even the stuff I'd disagree on (e.g. I'd move Horton/Mervis up a grade and Triantos/Kilian/Herz each down a grade) is imminently reasonable. I feel like there's just far more logical consistency here than Law's or BA's rankings.

I'm curious to see if this ends up being a thing. The Cubs paid a premium to sign Taillon despite generally letting the market come to them this winter. So hopefully this is very intentional. We also talked about around here early in the offseason that Tommy Hottovy has shown he can fairly reliably wring $10M production out of $5M signings. A bunch of those are fine for a rebuilding team, but to really switch gears and compete you need to next level someone who's already pretty good and make them great. If Taillon magically added a couple points to his K-rate without losing anything else, suddenly he's a guy in the neighborhood of Joe Musgrove and the Cubs' rotation looks drastically different.

Hopefully Arias opens the year at MB

I like Keith Law as a dude but it just feels like this isn't his lane anymore. He doesn't have the absurd number of contacts to be an opinion aggregator like Jim Callis, he doesn't have the data savvy of some of the guys like Kiley McDaniel, and doesn't hit the road enough to bring as much 1P perspective on as many guys as someone like Eric Longenhagen. Feels like he should drop the draft and just focus on pro scouting IMO.

It's going to be interesting to see if these have any noticeable team-specific impacts. The shift rules should generally be a positive for the Cubs. On defense, the team's defense is backed up by speed and athleticism. There should be less worry about our players previous results being overly reliant on the shift. It's more guys like Brandon Crawford on the Giants (11th percentile speed, 93rd percentile defense) where you'd worry more. On offense it's harder to say, Bellinger and Hosmer and maybe Happ look primed to get some significant help, but I'd guess most teams have 2-3 guys who will get some significant benefit? The stolen base rules are really hard to say. The Cubs have a bunch of guys who are pretty fast but don't steal many bases. Are those guys emboldened to run more now? Or are the beneficiaries guys who were already legit stolen base threats, who are now going to really pile it on? I'd lean the latter, which might be big for Nico but that's it. Defensively both Gomes and Barnhart control runners well, and I don't think we have any pitchers who are egregiously bad at holding runners anymore. The pace of play stuff looks poised to benefit the Cubs, but you have to imagine the magnitude is pretty small. That said, the Cubs' current pitchers all work relatively quickly. Of the guys who project to make the OD roster (plus adding in Sampson and Hendricks since they might not be there on OD but still get significant innings), Adrian Sampson had the slowest pace last year at 23.4 seconds between pitches. The league average was 23.1 seconds, so Sampson is still 48th percentile in pace. Personally, I expect this to really horsefeathers with a couple of the egregiously slow relievers like Kenley Jansen, but not impact most guys. The good news is even if the impacts are wider spread the Cubs should be in the clear. Potentially most relevant, Giovanny Gallegos and Devin Williams were the two slowest pitchers in the league last year, and Ryan Helsely wasn't far behind. So the Cubs' biggest gain might actually come from difficulties for the Cards and Brewers.

Fergie is a treasure

Sampson is interesting. He changed quite a bit under the hood last year, both with the pitch usage and also the slider got more sweep-y. He was way lucky, but even if you give him the 4.40 ERA the advanced metrics think he ought to have had, that's really good for an optionable 5th/6th/7th starter. I'm curious what the plan is for him if the team makes it through spring training with everyone healthy and effective. Long relief? Iowa? Do you sell high and trade him to a team that does get a couple nasty surprises during camp?

This is really great timing with us finally having a strong prospect loaded Iowa team

By the time he'd need to be added, a few guys will be on the 60 day DL On the position player side? They're already at 19 position players which is a little heavy for current roster construction. 8 of those (including Morel) are outfielders too. Sure Heuer and maybe Roberts or even Hendricks could be 60 Day'd by April, but I'm not sure that creates opportunity for Deluzio in particular. This is not to say that Deluzio has zero chance of making the roster through some combination of performance or injury, but I think the default assumption is that they're comfortable with the CF depth(Bellinger, Morel, Velazquez, soon Davis) already on the 40 man, even if it's not plus defensively. I hope it's as simple as Morel being the guy. My understanding is CF is the easiest position on the field assuming you have the requisite athleticism. Maybe his half season last year of learning on the job and an offseason (and ST) of focusing on smoothing out the rough edges is enough to quickly turn things around. It wouldn't be that crazy. I'm definitely on alert for at least a mild surprise on the bench though. The Athletic guys mentioning a few weeks ago that Madrigal or Morel are potential options to start at Iowa felt like it had some implication to it rather than just a "it could technically happen" sort of vibe. I think DeLuzio, as a ++ defender and a guy with real SB acumen feels like the most complimentary to the roster locks.

On the pitcher side, assuming Jed pulls the trigger on another FA lefty, I'd be surprised if any of these guys have a shot at making the team. Merryweather and Estrada don't have iron grips on bullpen spots, but I think if either fails to win a spot out of ST it's more likely that someone on the 40 man (e.g. Sampson or Rucker) gets the spot instead. On the position player side, I'm wondering more and more wonder if Deluzio has a real shot at a roster spot, with one of Morel or Madrigal opening the year at Iowa. It just seems a little weird to have all this focus on defense and then break camp with only one guy on the roster who can play an average or better CF.

http://pitchingapp.pitchingbot.com/ Wesneski right this second has three plus pitches including a plus plus slider. He also has plus command, and in a small sample at MLB absolutely DOMINATED. He's among the very safest bets in current prospectdom to be a good mid-rotation starter The arguments against him are his fairly middling numbers pre-trade (so the projections haven't bought in yet), and that his fastball kind of sucks (ironically its a reverse Wicks situation where its good velo belies crummy other characteristics). So like he's going to be better than several guys who are making these Top 100 lists, but I do get why writers are hesitant to anoint a guy that can't really lean on his four seamer for success.

BA’s Cubs top 10 podcast: https://www.baseballamerica.com/stories/2023-cubs-top-10-prospects-podcast/ Some notes: Cade Horton was one of the most popular guys MLB scouts kept saying they should bump into their top 100. Probably will crack their top 100 really soon. Thought he’d definitely go in the next few picks if the Cubs didn’t pick him at 7 and Pontes was flummoxed Cubs fans hated the pick, even if there were more famous potential picks available (Pontes wisely should continue to avoid a majority of this fanbase). On Wesneski, think he’s a 4/5 guy which is why he didn’t get top 100 consideration (and yet Liberatore is firmly in their top 100???) Cristian Hernández still has the talent and athleticism and is very young so don’t fret on his middling complex league stats. Because BA *loves* comparing Hernández to future-HOFers, they noted Miguel Cabrera looked the part in the GCL while posting bad stats. Felt like the top 8 guys were locked in but the next 2 could easily fall off (wild that anyone thinks Kilian belongs in the top 10). Wicks, Caissie and Hodge are guys outside the top 10 who could break into the top 10 soon. Other teams asked about Hodge in trades. It continues to be funny seeing a disconnect between BA and Kiley with regards to Wicks’ stuff. Said the average team takes 4 years from teardown to make the playoffs and Glaser thinks the Cubs make the playoffs ahead of that schedule by next year, partly because this isn’t a complete teardown/rebuild and partly because 3 other teams in the division aren’t really trying. I feel like the Wicks disconnect is mostly about data literacy. A 92 MPH fastball on its face is, even from a lefty, back of the rotation material. But Wicks' fastball is pretty stellar from a spin/shape standpoint, as evidenced by the 128 Stuff+ grade as sourced by Lance Brozdowski. To your point earlier, BA's just not the home to all the best and brightest doing this like it used to be.

I don't know enough non-star players to do a fully detailed offseason, but I think my broad strokes offseason would look like: - Star level FA investments in LT (Brown or McGlinchey), and the D-Line (Payne or Hargrave?) - ~$10Mish investments in RB, OG, and WR. Something like Josh Jacobs, Seumalo, and Michael Thomas - Use as much of the remaining ~$30M on depth defensive players as you can, with the exception of maybe an extension or two - Trade back with the Colts to #4, netting a '23 2nd and 3rd among other future picks - Take Anderson or Carter at 4 (Anderson seems more likely). Among your four Day 2 picks add another WR, OL, and TE (not a huge need but apparently it's a great TE draft) - Use that last Day 2 pick and everything from Day 3 on defense The offense should be very good right from the jump. There's no true #1 WR but there's everything else you could possibly want. The defense I imagine will eventually be pretty good, but probably quite weak early on. I think plugging various holes with better than replacement level players will improve it immediately over '22, but given that so much of the resource investment is youths, I'd totally buy a trajectory like the ~25th ranked defense in the NFL in the first half of the season and the 10th in the second half. Overall a good team (and enough depth that I think fairly high floor), but to be great Fields needs to take another step forward or Poles has to nail this draft.

Knowing that another lefty of some substance is still on the way, I'm really quite pleased with the pen. - You have two high leverage long relievers in Thompson and Alzolay - You have two monster stuff guys in Merryweather and Estrada. And they're not just spray and pray types, the projections like them too - Five of eight guys in the projected OD pen have options, pending how much the TBD lefty makes the other three have easily dumpable salaries if they struggle - Down at Iowa you have Leiter, who was great in relief last year and whose splitter/change-up makes him death on lefties, another monster stuff guy (Jensen), two more guys who can throw triple digits (Sanders, Correa), and a couple of more run of the mill relief prospects (Little, Leeper) - There are several more high octane arms at Tenn who could function as a second wave of reinforcements It's an absolutely Rays-like cache of arms. I don't like that there's not a guy we'll feel great about closing games on day one, but this is a part of the team that's very easy to see ending up dominant.