Bertz

I didn't think Riley Martin had bad stuff but shocked to see him here

No 2nd Tommy John is fantastic news

The Dbacks reshuffle their bullpen, sending several of their lesser guys to AAA or the IL. AJ Puk also hit the IL though. Justin Martinez and Jalen Beeks aside their bullpen's now fairly rested, but it's also a lot more uncertain than the group they opened the season with.

The Cubs started *really* babying pitchers coming out of the COVID year and this feels like a needed correction. Like even Jordan Wicks, a healthy low velo starter, wouldn't see the 5th inning of games in April. Baseball the last decade has been pulling back on both how much a guy is allowed to pitch and how often. My guess is that the latter is far more consequential than the former. If you look at College and Japanese baseball starters pitch once a week and still run up low triple digital pitch counts routinely. Obviously neither is immune to injury problems but it's not exactly a bloodbath compared to MLB. Relatedly, Jed did hire that Japanese company to consult on pitcher health this winter. So this might be Zombro led but it might also be an infusion of some Japanese practices.

His swing looks like a carbon copy of someone else's and it's killing me that I can't place it.

Dbacks bullpen is pretty shredded heading into this weekend: - Aj Puk, Justin Martinez, and Jalen Beeks each threw the past two days. So they're likely down today, and probably can only go once this weekend - Shelby Miller threw both Tuesday and Wednesday, so if you're AZ he's available but you'd like to stay away from him today, and probably only use him once this weekend - Ryan Thompson threw 33 pitches yesterday, so his availability is similar to Miller where he's usable but you'd like to stay away from him. Ditto on ideally limiting him to once this weekend

I'll do a deeper dive tomorrow so I can include today's game but eyeballing his FG page he's currently above average in every peripheral you can think of except chase rate and pull rate, and both those are only slightly worse than average. And always worth remembering that if he was a college kid he'd be in this year's draft. So decent chance he gets a taste of MLB before his peers get a single pro at bat.

God I hate to even at a top line agree with Tom but except for the handful of clinker like the Rockies I do think the differences between FOs at this point are minimal. Like I'm not sure there are more than 2-3 teams where I'm jealous of their front office. That's not saying that the Cubs are 3rd or 4th, it's saying the difference between 3rd and like 11th is pretty small. There's a spectrum of conservative vs. aggressive, which is heavily influenced but not totally determined by resources (and expectations of future resources). There's also some actual daylight between teams in terms of scouting and player dev, which also has some I would say medium influence from resources. Hoyer is *clearly* one the most conservative team leads in the league, but also this team is IMO clearly in the top third of the league on a scouting/dev standpoint. So on the one hand this team is sitting pretty right now. The team is good, there's a bunch of young talent performing right now, and a bunch more close to being ready. If you were drafting teams based on how many wins you expect they'll pile up the next three years, I don't think you'd need two hands to count teams you would take ahead of the Cubs. All that sounds pretty great! On the flip side, each of the past few offseasons have felt one move short. In particular in '23 leaving those wins on the table clearly cost the team a playoff spot. Maybe it ends up being worth it, but there's currently a hole to dig out of.

100%

Yeah this version of Horton feels pretty close to major league ready. He's got to cut the walks, though like we talked about in the game thread yesterday he hasn't been nearly as wild as 10 walks in 12 innings would say to you. I think if we were the Marlins, I'd expect him up before May, and be shocked if he wasn't up before Memorial Day. But given the Cubs' competitive aspirations combined with his IP cap likely being something in the 100-120 range, it's harder to say what the plan here will be. I wouldn't be surprised by minimal MLB time in the first half, maybe a few spot starts, followed by a more permanent callup coinciding with a move to the bullpen around midseason. But regardless of the specifics I anticipate inning management, both Horton's and Brown's, to have a major impact on Cade's MLB time this year.

Looks like Cade threw 54% of his pitches in the zones, which is pretty good. He only got 5 whiffs though, which is kind of bad. So yeah 3 walks overstates the wildness but it sort of evens out because he probably shouldn't have had 6 Ks either.

Moises dong! OPS up to .934

Yeah no horsefeathers

It's pretty wild that they're still this bad. Like if Paul Skenes isn't pitching on a given day they're not any better than the White Sox/Rockies/Marlins. And their farm is good but not great.

Bullpen's gonna be dicey today. Everyone but Little and Palencia would be working their 3rd game in 4 days. Merryweather and Thielbar are likely fully down as it'd be 4 of 5.

What a phenomenal game from the bullpen. Merryweather's very much back in the circle of trust for me.

The Velo was definitely more 2023-y than 2024-y which is good to see.

The Cubs don't face a LHH SP until Luzardo during the Phillies series next weekend. Though it looks like against the Pirates it will be Skenes and two lefties. So what I'm saying is Workman better get like 90% of this playing time.

It's certainly not as good as Iowa, but because of the shiny-new-toys of it all I am finding myself going to SB first now when I check scores. Really fun development.

The Shaw thing is dumb. The only argument I can see is helping keep his confidence intact by avoiding a tough slate of pitching. But if that was the goal sending him off with Glasnow and Cease is doing him pretty dirty.

He has exactly 1 at bat against lefties this year, so preposterously platooned. Also rocking a 40% strikeout rate. Still, good for him. Hopefully he can stick in MLB even if its likely to be a bench guy long term.

Palencia is a clear call. Like you mention he is a pretty similar profile to Pearson, and on top of that he's absolutely shoving to start the year (and frankly, going back to middle of last year). The other guy is where there's arguments in a couple directions: - Ideally to your point it'd be a lefty. That said Cosgrove hasn't pitched a game in the org yet, Little's looking rusty, and Martin hasn't been sharp yet. If you feel dead set on a lefty I think Brandon Hughes is throwing the best *right now* though he requires a 40 man roster move which isn't ideal - Keegan Thompson is, aside from Palencia, the guy getting the best results at the moment. But as called out in the game thread his velo is down, and of course he's not a lefty - Jordan Wicks already seemed relatively likely to come up and provide some innings in short order. That said after going 3 on Sunday, he's probably down until the homestand - Gavin Hollowell and Jack Neely are the only other optionable guys on the 40 man not covered above I think the plan probably depends on what the team was already planning with Wicks. If you are wanting to call him up on Friday, maybe you leave Pearson on the roster through the end of the road trip? If Wicks isn't imminent, I would probably eye Thompson or Hughes on the plane with Palencia.

Keegan's velo did weird things early last year at Iowa too and then immediately got fixed before his first MLB outing. He wouldn't be my choice for a callup but I wouldn't be shocked if he came up and looked totally fine.

Randy Vasquez is probably the worst full time SP on a good team in the entire league. Tonight is about as good as you can possibly feel playing a good team on the road.

We've got a freebie roster spot in Steele whenever Jed wants to cash that in.