Bertz

I'd love to see some of these articles. Because just about everything I've seen, both on the record and on background, has said some variation of either "retool not rebuild" or "¯\_(ツ)_/¯ until we know what the CBA looks like." I consider a 3 year "retool" a "rebuild". That's fair. I'd still love to see some of these articles.

I think it’s way too early to claim that. They have so much money to spend even if they run a “cheap” payroll. If 1-2 of these guys actually remain a thing to some level and they hit on the spending/trades they could easily be back to a division competing team. It really shouldn’t be that hard to build a team that can compete for the division without trading any major prospect pieces with the money they have and ancillary prospects to add a bit as well. They also are starting to amass the prospects to go make a major trade (Soto) if they go that route. They have money to spend, but they don't plan on spending according to all of the articles that I've read. They just have too many holes and weaknesses to fill to compete next year. I think we're looking at a much improved team in 2023 and a competitive team in 2024. Next year will be spent finding out whether Wisdom, Ortega, and Schwindel are for real, whether Hoerner/Madrigal is their middle infield for the future, whether Steele and/or Thompson can be a rotation piece, whether Happ is really fixed or not, etc. I'd love to see some of these articles. Because just about everything I've seen, both on the record and on background, has said some variation of either "retool not rebuild" or "¯\_(ツ)_/¯ until we know what the CBA looks like."

It's stupid early, but so far Alfonso Rivas has been showing crazy plate discipline. Early on, he's only swinging at 20.5% of pitches out of the zone. Among qualified hitters, only 13 guys are better than that so far this year. So 90th+ percentile chase rate. Again though, it's super early. I think Sergio Alcantara did similar his first few weeks up, so it's not at all a given it keeps up. But Rivas has always been a plus plate discipline guy so I'm hopeful it's at least mostly real.

Presumably from today on it's our last look for any SPs? Overall I find myself quite happy with Bain despite the mediocre full season line. Early on he was mostly good, but especially prone to the blow-up inning. But when he went to the pitch lab, he started pitching exclusively from the stretch and has been fantastic since. He's probably primed to open next season in the Tennessee rotation, and I could really see him making noise. And that Tennessee rotation next year. It's probably going to be Marquez Jensen Espinoza Vizcaino Bain That is a fun group. A lot of relief risk, but health permitting I think all five are MLBers. That's fun. And you have Kilian a little bit ahead of them and Wicks a little bit behind them, we've finally got a bit of a pipeline going.

Probably Deichman's biggest game in the org as well. Hopefully whatever changes they've made with him are close to sticking

https://twitter.com/Kevin_Goldstein/status/1437817347197358085?s=19

I find it interesting that Shanahan and Nagy both did something fairly unusual with their rookie QBs on the same day. Can't remember too many times where a rookie QB doesn't start but plays snaps sporadically during the game. I'm going to guess Lamar did it and that is who they are copying. Honestly I could be convinced that having a guy play partial games to get worked in is a savvy way to ease him into the NFL. Akin to using a Starting Pitcher in relief. That said, A) I'd think you'd want to do at least one full series, even this early on, and B) when something looks like it's either super progressive or super meatball-y, Nagy does not get the benefit of the doubt from me that it's the former.

Except for Ben Roethlisberger, even back when he was good. That's one of my favorite weird NFL nuggets is that it essentially works for everybody in the league regardless of QB and RB quality... except for that horsefeathers. Huh don't recall seeing that ever.

I agree, all I'm saying is that the offense produced more with Lazor, regardless of reason, and there was no reason Nagy should have taken back over IMO. When Lazor took over the Bears called the most play-action passes in the league, designed to get Mitch out of the pocket and to one side of the field where he could scan the field easier and make a read. Maybe that would be useless for a veteran like Dalton but I'm just stuck on the fact that he made a quantifiable change and it worked. No, the Play Action definitely isn't just a Mitch thing. It's a good cheat code, even for good QBs. Except for Ben Roethlisberger, even back when he was good. That's one of my favorite weird NFL nuggets is that it essentially works for everybody in the league regardless of QB and RB quality... except for that horsefeathers.

Awesome to see, even though the proeuction hasn't been there lately. Like Gilby said in the other thread I'm guessing he's pretty gassed. I wonder if we see Morel or anyone else join him to take advantage of the extra two weeks the Iowa season has over Tenn.

He was part of Tenn's COVID outbreak. I assume Strumpf was as well but I don't think I've seen it confirmed.

Man, getting Anderson Espinoza for Jake Marisnick is starting to look really silly

Pinango and Herz just missing zero beat with their promotions. Really awesome stuff.

Ignoring today's games, since I made this post Made has raised his wRC+ from a 69 to an 81. That takes him from ranking #78 out of 89 players to being tied for #66. Given how hot he's been he'll likely leapfrog a few more. Also, Owen Caissie has become a relevant part of this discussion. While he's just turned 19, he's in his age 18 season, though with how late he got called up he's not going to get to 150 PAs. However, setting the PA threshold aside (because I'm too lazy to re-pull data), his 112 wRC+ coming into today would rank 29th on this list. The four guys ahead of him are Wilmer Flores, Cheslor Cuthbert, Manny Machado, and Isaac Paredes. Luis Urias and Chris Owings are just behind him. Obviously some duds there, but Owen's performance is enough to say he's more likely than not an MLBer, which is pretty horsefeathering cool.

I kind of think that idea is too smart by half, as they say. There are a lot more 20-26 types than there are 1-5 types. If you make a mistake with a 20-26 type, the penalty is not as large as a 1-5 type (See, Jason Heyward). If you hit on all or even some, the reward is not as great. But there is a theory in sport about building a team. It's called weak link/strong link theory. In sports like soccer and hockey, a team with a few stars and a bunch of weak players will lose more often to a team with no stars, but few weak players. In basketball, it's just the opposite. So team-building is much different in those sports. I think baseball is much different. With a pitching staff, you may want to go soccer mentality. With position players, you may want to go basketball. For sure, calling those spots more important is definitely silly. But after sitting through the last ~3 years of Cubs baseball I do believe they're much closer to even than conventional wisdom? I like your soccer/basketball analogies. And I think it's especially complicated because IMO it flip flops when going between the regular season and the playoffs. Like on pitching, I think my mind is pretty made up. I think soccer is clearly the right approach in the regular season, and basketball is clearly the right approach in the playoffs. The latter especially I'm not even sure is up for debate. Position players are a lot harder. I lean toward it being the same as pitching? In the regular season, you need that depth to avoid the inconsistency the Cubs have had over the last few years. Teams routinely exploited the two or three holes in the lineup (whichever stars were injured or struggling plus Heyward/Almora), and also some pitchers were able to attack the lineup nearly with impunity because a number of the guys have the same strengths and weaknesses. Good depth, plus I guess versatility of that depth, would help alleviate both of those issues. Hitters in the playoffs I feel least confident about. I tend to think you need a few really good hitters, because you need guys who can hit all that premium pitching. This might be leaning too hard on anecdote though? Maybe if you have a handful of guys who can REALLY hit velocity and a handful who can REALLY hit spin then that's plenty? This is also why I'm fairly bullish on this team turning around quickly. The Cubs are not going to have much star power next year short of ludicrous luck in free agency (like the Blue Jays this year). BUT, with what guys like Schwindel/Ortega/Wisdom are doing, plus getting Hoerner/Madrigal back from injury, plus having an actual good Iowa team for the first time in ~5 years, plus having nearly 9 figures to throw around this offseason, depth shouldn't be an issue. Like can they be the Dodgers next year? Horsefeathering no. Can they be the A's of recent vintage (the team that most epitomizes this depth approach IMO)? Yeah that's probably doable.

Good replies here and interesting conversation topic. I do think building from the bottom up is underrated. I think broadly depth gets you to the playoffs, and stars win once you're there.

Yeah that's amazing in itself; now he's trying to turn into a 2:1 guy which is simply unreal. Tonight he struck out for the just the 2nd time in his last 12 games. Yeah 2:1 for a guy with power has always been impressive, but ESPECIALLY nowadays. Like that's some prime Gary Sheffield horsefeathers but it's coming against pitchers who throw on average 4-5 MPH harder.

It's interesting that Morel has started hitting the hell out of the ball while his K/BB numbers have gone the other way again. For most of the year, his plate discipline numbers were great for a guy with such a free swinger reputation, but he just wasn't hitting. Now it's essentially the opposite. That's not necessarily a problem, a lot of guys swing freely when they're feeling good and grind ABs a lot more when they're not hitting. If with a little more age and experience he can smooth things out a bit that'll work, though probably will lend itself to him being a streaky hitter.

Three guys who will all be on next year's team combined to give up one run over ten innings and that's....bad?? There's no reason to pitch both multiple innings. Give other guys shots in high pressure situation. Winning these games does nothing for the future. I feel like we went through this same thing in 2010 when the Cubs finished 24-13, bought into their roster, and finished the next season 20 games under .500 when the pressure was back on. Wouldn't you like to know if they're guys you can ask to go multiple innings, or whether they're like Craig Kimbrel and hate it? Isn't it nice to figure this out now while games don't matter? Like I'm all about the tank, but if guys who are going to be on next year's team want to step up right now go ahead. Going into the offseason I'd much rather have say, a 76 win on paper talent team with the 12th pick in the draft than a 72 win team with the 5th pick. Unfortunately, aside from Happ and maybe Steele, none of the guys currently playing are high upside enough to move the needle much on next year's projection. But if a bunch of guys all produce, like we're seeing right now, all together they can move the needle quite a bit.

Three guys who will all be on next year's team combined to give up one run over ten innings and that's....bad??

Despite having been a bonus baby, Perlaza's got fairly quiet tools right? Because numbers wise there's a lot to like.

Trevor Megill since August 14th: 9 IP, 6 H, 3 ER, 1 HR 0 BB, 1 HBP, 17 K, a 45ish GB% It's still mostly been low leverage work, though Ross appears to be testing him a little bit more in that regard lately.