Bertz

I think Gausman, Gray, and Holmes, are still really good pitchers. They're old enough you worry about them falling off the table and don't want to give them a ton of years, but they're really good right now. And personally I'd rather bet on them staying good than someone like King going back to being good, especially since the latter will probably cost more money. It sucks that there's not a Max Fried or Dylan Cease in this market, but I'm generally comfortable with depth over top end talent on the pitching staff. Like my Plan A at the moment would be Taira, Gausman, and Tyler Mahle. And eyeballing Roster Resource there are about 12 guys on the market who, assuming the price was reasonable, I'd be happy to give a rotation spot to. Plus another half dozen guys like Aaron Civale I'd be happy to give a swing man job to.

Fewer dongs, and that's despite more barrels so clearly luck rather than skill. He also got much better sequencing luck. He did start throwing harder, so maybe over a longer time horizon that would translate into things that matter like whiffs or groundballs, but he actually pitched a little worse for the Rays than the Mets IMO. It's honestly not that different than David Peterson for us. Peterson pitched a little bit better for us than the Mets, but got way better sequencing luck and of course enjoyed our insane defense.

Honestly I think that rotation is probably quite good! I'm sure people would complain about the lack of a fire breathing ace but I suspect that'd be a top 10 rotation. My point so much as I had one is that Peralta and King aren't performing appreciably better than the guys we're letting walk. And for Peralta specifically despite the sparkling ERA the Rays haven't fixed a damn thing. This SP market is really deep, which is great news for a team that needs to add 3 SPs. On the flipside the top tier after Skubal is really weak. Decent chance Trevor Rogers is the only other SP to get a $100M+ deal. So I totally understand wanting to take a swing on a Peralta or a King turning the clock back to 2024. I'm just wary that after these playoffs they're going to be priced as if that work has already been all or at least mostly accomplished rather than the buy low guys they are in reality.

A is Shota B is Michael King C is Matt Boyd D is Freddy Peralta on the Mets E is Freddy Peralta on the Rays

Player A 3.80 xERA, 3.74 xFIP, 24.6% K, 5.2% BB, 36.9% GB, 9.8% barrels, 36.9% hard hit Player B 4.40 xERA, 4.30 xFIP, 21.0 % K, 9.2% BB, 44.6% GB, 8.2% barrels, 32.6% hard hit Player C 4.64 xERA, 4.32 xFIP, 18.5% K, 7.5% BB, 42.2% GB, 7.7% barrels, 37.6% hard hit Player D 3.86 xERA, 4.25 xFIP, 22.1% K, 9.4% BB, 40.9% GB, 5.2% barrels, 38.2% hard hit Player E 3.74 xERA, 4.62 xFIP, 19.7% K, 6.7% BB, 36.1% GB, 7.0% barrel, 35.0% hard hit

There is a pretty interesting push/pull because the team does have 5 legitimate SPs (plus Wiggins plus a convalescing Horton) but all of them aside from Assad obviously have at least one pretty big red flag. And Assad's lighter on question marks than the rest but also much lighter on talent So you definitely need volume, but also we don't need to operate like there's nothing currently on hand to be used. Two good starters and a 3rd guy who's more swing-y feels like the need, while three 3 legit SPs is an appropriate level of surplus. 4 feels like overkill, you're better off just funneling more resources into those first 3 IMO. I'm generally against a big SP trade. There is likely sufficient money to throw at the problem, so use your wallet and let the farm lick its wounds for a transaction cycle. You can always add another starter through trade next July when you know more about what you're holding. I'm generally hoping to come down with one of Rogers/Taira, one of the high end old guys (Gausman, Gray, Holmes), and then someone who's pretty good even if a bit boring (David Peterson, Tyler Mahle, Foster Griffin, etc.) Michael King and Freddy Peralta feel like they're going to get overpaid based on name value and a splashy October. I'd stay away from both, far away from Peralta.

Yeah a real MPV 2005esque Ichiro Rodriguez situation

I think it's a geography joke, Japan -> USA generally involves going east and your title says he's heading west. I like Sato. I feel like we could use a bat with OMG level power even if the plate approach isn't exactly Bregman/Tucker level, and him being only 28 is a big deal. I'm generally of the mind we shouldn't do anything big on the position player side, but this is the one guy where I'd leave the door cracked for a $50M+ deal.

I definitely expect that at least one of Conrad or Kepley won't be in the org 15 months from now. In an org that has PCA firmly entrenched in CF there's simply too much redundancy in those two, Hartshorn and Sorrell. That said I don't know about this winter? For Conrad you'd be selling pretty low. He's a guy who is tooled up enough that he'd probably be a Top 100 guy if he opened next year with a six week heater. For Kepley you might be selling high, but also he's close enough that he's second-order OF depth for next season in a year where we're probably going to have question marks in the OF. Wiggins I definitely don't expect to see go anywhere. In addition to it being another sell low situation, the team is not in a position to move near MLB ready optionable pitching depth. Honestly between A) there seemingly being a good bit of cash to play with B) the farm being a bit thinned out and C) the lockout I don't expect a big time trade this winter. I could definitely see cashing out some blocked/redundant types like Triantos or Alcantara, and mayyybe moving one of Shaw/Ramirez, but I would frankly be pretty floored if the team trades one of the top 5 prospects in the org this winter.

Yeah Garrett's being slept on. He was really good before his TJ and if you account for the run environment was really good in AAA this year. I know we as a fanbase are sick of lefties who throw 92 but he's probably still another good one. I'm just hoping we build up sufficient depth where he's out of necessity in the Colin Rea role to open the year.

Thinking about Reid Detmers I'd love to nab the next Reid Detmers instead of paying retail for the current one. Detmers was a pretty obvious breakout candidate: big stuff, top prospect pedigree, horrendous ERA not really backed up by peripherals. And unlike say Ben Brown and his only two pitches there wasn't even some flimsy rationale for why Reid might stay an outlier in the wrong direction. There's not as obvious of a Detmers out there currently, but there are some guys that catch my eye: - Emmet Sheehan's about as close to a slam dunk as it gets. That said he's obvious enough and the Dodgers rotation being full of glass cannons makes it feel like he'd be tough to match up on - Zebby Mathews on the Twins is an interesting guy. We're now at 250 innings over parts of three seasons of him drastically underperforming his peripherals. But he throws hard, throws strikes, and while he didn't so much in '26 he's shown the ability to miss bats. He needs a weapon to get lefties out, both his cutter and change are ass, but it feels like there's a pretty decent chance for a mid rotation starter and an obvious floor of late inning relief - The A's have a guy I'd never heard of named Jack Perkins who I now really like. Big time swing and miss, good stuff, throws enough strikes. He got murdered by dongs this year, but that seems to be the dumb Sacramento ballpark. He also has some big reverse splits. I suspect there's a pretty simple "switch from a sweeper to a gyro slider and move to a legitimate ballpark" path to having a pretty damn good pitcher

Firing Tommy would have been dumb glad they avoided that own goal

They don't have a big one since Franco, but via FG they've got got five IFA prospects who are 45 FVs and another five who are 40 FVs, and another nine who were worth ranking. So at minimum they seem to have a really high average in that market. I also tend to think that group probably deserves some Junior Caminero credit. When you trade for a guy that early in his career it's based on info from when he was an amateur IMO. Similar if Alcantara works out for us.

Probably? The Cubs' IFA pipeline was definitely busted during the back half of the Theo era from 16-20. And we've really felt going 0'fer half a decade the past few years. That said it's not clear that there's still a problem? Pedro Ramirez, Mo Baller, Jefferson Rojas, Cristian Hernandez, Angel Cepeda, etc. look like probable major leaguers from the '21-'23 era. Some fun guys are either currently at Myrtle Beach or almost there from '24/'25 as well. We're not the Brewers but things seem perfectly healthy. But Tampa's obviously a player development power house, so even if the Cubs' IFA group have improved from 30th to like 14th already, there's probably room to get even closer to #1.

I think Duran, purely as a player, is a reasonably smart buy low guy. But like I don't see any coherent rationale for why we'd be okay with a buy-low veteran and not a young player already on hand?

Fairly big loss. Hoping they don't lose Carter or Kantrovitz too. That said it's A) a clear endorsement of what we have here and B) an opportunity to poach from another org to backfill him

Bello's a pretty solid buy low target but the idea of him costing something like Shaw is laughable. He had a 7.18 ERA and a 4.65 xFIP as a SP and had to be sent to the minors to get himself straightened out. He's going to cost $15M AAV over three years, and has had a K rate under 20% in 3 of his 4 fullish seasons. Like aside from throwing hard is Bello any better than David Peterson?

The mental gymnastics this fanbase goes through to try and avoid giving playing time to a kid are so funny "Matt Shaw doesn't have the bat for the position. You know who might though? The second worst hitter in baseball!"

I think a lot of the velo conversations need more nuance than they get, but looking at the list of FA SPs hard not to feel like this is gonna be the scene in the Cubs' front office this winter

We know the Cubs like guys wired like this too, Everything you're saying about Taira feels pretty Alex Bregman coded. Some other things that make this a good fit: - In an offseason where you might have some trepidation around the luxury tax, the posting fee is an advantage. A 6/$150M contract is closer to 6/$125M for LT purposes - It obviously is a good thing long term and big picture for the Cubs to keep this NPB pipeline flowing - The FA market behind Skubal is, for good or for bad, deep with boring. You have good older guys like Gausman, Gray, and Holmes. You have a small army of lefties who throw 92 like Peterson and Boyd and Griffin. You have guys with huge injury histories who appear to have finally come through the other side as boring #3 starters (Soroka, May, Bubic). Pairing Taira with like a David Peterson re-signing is probably good portfolio building As an aside those first two points probably lend themselves to exploring Sato's comfort with being an outfielder as well.

6'8 extension from a guy his size is crazy. That's Tim Lincecum type stuff. I would assume even eith a weak IVB that fastball has a stellar VAA to boot. One of the tough things this offseason is that the timing is perfect for a Dylan Cease/Max Fried caliber addition to the rotation. But unfortunately the market has Skubal way beyond that tier and then a bunch of mid to back of the rotation types. The possible exceptions are Taira and Trevor Rogers, depending on your evaluation of each. The Cubs under Breslow felt like they really cared about height. Under Zombro that hasn't been the case? Jasa is a giant but most of their other prominent draft picks have been 6'1 to 6'3. And their acquisitions haven't really stuck to a type either. 5'8 is obviously a whole other thing, but then again seeing how much Tread is glazing him makes this feel like a pretty perfect fit.

The Dodgers spending more than double the median team in payroll is obviously not great, but a salary cap is a ****** blunt wildly anti-labor tool for dealing with it

No I'm not particularly worried about missing 35 year old Seiya Suzuki