Matthew Trueblood

Image courtesy of © David Banks-Imagn Images When Pete Crow-Armstrong struggles, it's tempting to assume that swinging too much is to blame. Swinging too much is the fundamental vulnerability in his game—his biggest weakness. It's why he runs lowish on-base percentages even when relatively hot and why he's been a scar in the middle of the lineup card for the last 10 days (.091/.118/.121 in August) and a low-key problem for much longer than that (two walks in the last 30 days, .285 OBP since June 1). Here's the thing: during his current slump, Crow-Armstrong is actually swinging less than he has at any time since he first unlocked his talent in full this spring. It sure looks like Crow-Armstrong is aware of the need to swing a bit less, and like he's trying. A bit of newfound patience (relatively speaking) worked like a charm back in April; it launched him on the torrid stretch that had so many talking seriously about his MVP candidacy. This time, though, he's just plunging to new lows in terms of production, just as he reduces his swing rate. One reading of that data set might be: Crow-Armstrong has to get back to being himself at the plate. Maybe he just needs to cut it loose and swing at everything, after all. Is it just time to show the donkey the snake? In a word: no. Crow-Armstrong's problem isn't confidence or approach, except in the same way that it has always been (somewhat) the latter. He's in trouble because of a mechanical flaw that he can't seem to shake. Back in the first half of July, I spoke to Crow-Armstrong about his superb season and the unexpected power binge he'd been on for (by then) almost three months. However, we also talked about an unfortunate bit of grit in the well-built machine of his swing: a creeping tendency to overstride. That created two main problems for him: He was too often late on the fastball, trying but failing to work around a longer front side. Because he could sense that timing problem, he was more prone to chasing spin and offspeed stuff—mostly subconsciously, he was trying to hit what he could be on time for, which wasn't often the thing he really wanted to hit. It probably won't shock you, then, to read that as Crow-Armstrong sinks into a slump, he's overstriding again (or still; he only very briefly corrected the problem in the middle of last month). Here's what his stance and stride looked like in May, when he was at the peak of his powers. Lately, though, he's less spread-out in the box. That change might have been a conscious one, trying to stay balanced and athletic even as the grind of a long season starts to leaden his legs. Unfortunately, he's not managing that more upright, compact starting point well; he's striding too far. Perhaps finding that the stride length is difficult to correct, Crow-Armstrong is getting even more aggressive with his swing. His solution to the problem of a longer swing (not as Statcast measures it, but in the way hitters actually feel and must plan the movement) is to use the extra energy his stride creates to swing faster, and (since a flatter bat path was also a symptom he mentioned last month, when the stride is too long) to exaggerate the tilt in his stroke right from the beginning. That's not an entirely unreasonable attempt at problem-solving. No less a luminary than Branch Rickey believed "the overstriding hitter cannot be corrected," and while that's an outdated notion 80 years after Rickey first said it, there's a kernel of truth to it. Fixing this particular mechanical issue within a season, absent a prolonged reset (think a full series on the bench, as the team has done with Miguel Amaya, Seiya Suzuki and Matt Shaw at various points over the last two years, or a sojourn to Iowa, as the team has done with both Shaw and Crow-Armstrong himself), is hard to do. Crow-Armstrong put lots of early work into trying, but it doesn't seem to have worked. Finding an alternative—using his freakish athleticism to generate his best bat speed ever, since the start of July—is creative, and even admirable. Alas, it comes with its own problems, and it doesn't quite solve the basic ones it's meant to address. It ameliorates them, a bit, but it doesn't eliminate them. For instance, no amount of bat speed can make up for not feeling like you can get to that heater, and the problem with the overstrider is that they feel that extra length and can't always get started on time. Here are the rates at which Crow-Armstrong has swung at fastballs (four-seamers, sinkers and cutters); his whiff rate on those swings; and his average contact point, relative to his own body on those swings, by month. Month Swing Rate Whiff Rate Contact Point (in.) April 59.0% 23.7% 26.5 May 56.5% 34.2% 28.6 June 60.1% 31.8% 29.3 July 55.7% 34.6% 30.9 August 49.1% 25.9% 32.9 When Crow-Armstrong is swinging at fewer than half of the fastballs he sees, something is wrong. Yes, he's actually making more contact, and the idea that he's late on those swings is belied by the fact that he's catching the ball farther out in front. But the real message of these data is: Crow-Armstrong is mostly on time for the fastball, but only when he gets started early enough to swing at all. He's not doing that often enough, given who he is and how his game works. That's the problem a faster bat can't solve. It can get you to the ball, even the heater, and do it out in front, but it can't give you the quicker trigger you lost when you fell into the habit of the overstride. Now, here's the problem the faster bat actually introduces, against heaters: Crow-Armstrong is hitting the top of the fastball a lot. This often shows up looking like nothing more than bad luck. Here's a line drive, caught by the second baseman, where you can tell yourself a story about Crow-Armstrong simply being snakebitten. MTZxNFJfWGw0TUFRPT1fQmdkVEFGeFdCd3NBV1ZJSEFnQUhCRlFEQUFNREFsZ0FDbEVGQmdRQVV3QldCUXBX.mp4 There is a bit of luck in this mix, of course. But that out is also a factor of Crow-Armstrong's change in mechanics and timing. Notice, early in that swing, that exaggerated tilt he's putting on the bat path, trying to make up for the way the longer stride tends to flatten him out. Against fastballs, though, to get there on time, he has to accelerate the barrel late in his swing, which means flattening out, anyway. His top hand takes over and he rolls over, the way you're probably more accustomed to seeing hitters do on soft stuff. Here's another example, from this weekend. cU82NHpfV0ZRVkV3dEdEUT09X0QxQUFCUVlGVXdBQUR3QUZYd0FIVUFCU0FGaFFCVlVBQmwwTUNGSUVDUUJWVVZZSA==.mp4 That's another hard-hit ball, but it's also another playable ball for the second baseman on a heater in the middle of the zone. When Crow-Armstrong was right, he crushed that pitch in the air. Right now, his attempts to work around a mechanical problem have him hitting it low and right at the defense. Breaking balls and offspeed offerings are a different story, but within the same anthology. Here's the same chart I gave above, but for his approach against those softer pitches by month. I've added one extra column. Month Swing Rate Whiff Rate Contact Point (in.) Bat Speed April 63.2% 22.4% 35.9 68.0 May 67.7% 32.0% 40.7 69.8 June 64.4% 25.4% 42.0 68.5 July 66.0% 29.9% 43.8 72.0 August 58.5% 36.8% 39.1 73.2 Aha! Ok, several things. First of all, you won't find many good hitters who swing more on soft stuff than on fastballs, and you won't find many hitters of any kind who whiff less on soft stuff than on heaters, but that's how Crow-Armstrong usually works. This month, though, while his whiff rate on fastballs has come down, he's missing much more often against everything else. There's no clear contact point problem here, but there's an interesting question afoot. Look at that new column at the far right. Crow-Armstrong's bat has been faster even against fastballs the last two months, but the magnitude of his increase is much larger against breaking stuff. That, itself, is interesting. That he's swinging much faster but making contact deeper this month is even more so. Crow-Armstrong is actually making later swing decisions against breaking balls and offspeed stuff, lately. He's just not making materially better ones, because he's more than a small adjustment away from chaining together enough good takes to cash them in for walks, and he's not in a position to profit much from getting ahead in counts while he's so off, mechanically. He's waiting longer, then swinging faster, and when his eyes and hands see spin, he's doing the opposite of what he's been doing on fastballs. Here's an example. cU82NHpfV0ZRVkV3dEdEUT09X0JsVlFYQVVFWGxjQUFGc0xCd0FIVlZCUkFGa0ZBbEVBQXdFQVZnUUdDUVpkQXdNQQ==.mp4 That's the kind of pitch he often hammered earlier this year; he'd put a cousin of that same low, swooping swing on the ball and yank it on a high arc into the right-field seats. Right now, though, there are a couple of problems. First, that longer stride puts him a bit off-balance. It's harder for him to get down through that ball while maintaining barrel control. He's swinging faster, which only exacerbates the trouble, because more speed means less accuracy—at least when your arms are this extended and your legs are locked into place by the length of that stride. Second, instead of that top-hand takeover we see on fastballs, Crow-Armstrong keeps the bottom hand in control and retains that exaggerated tilt throughout his swing on soft stuff lately. That's the right way to get the timing right on those pitches, but it's putting him below the ball a lot. His launch angle against fastballs is substantially down from his season average since the All-Star break; his launch angle against everything else is substantially up. That's why he's producing more low-value contact, in addition to swinging and missing more often on non-heaters. How Crow-Armstrong fixes any of this is, of course, the important question. The answer likely lies in getting rid of that early, exaggerated bat tilt, and giving in to a bit more flatness. He could try widening his stance anew, to force his body to cut down the stride that is causing all of these downstream problems, but since he was aware of that stride issue five weeks ago, we can safely assume that he's already considered that. It's more likely that he and the team will continue to try anything that incrementally reduces that stride length and gets his swing started earlier with more consistency. Mainly, he needs to feel good about his ability to attack the fastball again. Everything else flows from there. His first half might have set an unreasonable standard for his second, but he can still be a much more dangerous hitter over the final seven weeks—if he has the physical and mental stamina to keep making good adjustments and keep solving problems. View full article

Image courtesy of © David Banks-Imagn Images Suddenly, you can't make a mistake to Matt Shaw. He's not just coming along slowly, anymore; he's breaking out. Shaw is batting .328/.349/.770 in 63 plate appearances since the All-Star break, and he looks to be turning a corner with seven weeks left in his rookie campaign. In fact, importantly, he's literally turning a corner more often. About three weeks ago, @Jason Ross detailed the fact that Shaw had opened up his batting stance and was subtly better oriented to both cover the whole zone and get the barrel around the ball. Our foremost Shaw scholar, Jason wrote this within that piece: He was right at the time, and the games since have borne that out for everyone to see. Jason has been a Shaw believer all along, and there was a longer and tougher stretch than anyone wanted to see in which Shaw's huge leg kick and the team's failure to prepare him for what a successful big-league hitter really has to be conspired to make him a dreadful hitter. Near the end of that piece, though, Jason made a declaration that has also been borne out gorgeously since: "I think this is finally it. He's putting it all together; each of those little tweaks have made him a much better hitter." Here's how he's turned out to be right. Yes, the key for Shaw was always to pull the ball. The big question, though, was how he'd ever do so, with a stride that still cut him off pretty badly, even after the adjustment to open his initial stance. The big leg kick and the shy, kid-trying-not-to-be-noticed closed stance that he started the year with utterly precluded getting around the ball and driving it to left field; he didn't have the time or the bat speed to do it. As a reminder, here's what Shaw's stance and stride looked like in his first taste of the majors. Look at the angles his feet are creating, and look at the purple dot that signifies his average contact point. That's not going to yield any consistent ability to pull the ball. Shaw came back after a sojourn in Iowa and looked better for chunks of June, as we saw him reduce that leg kick (making it harder for opposing pitchers to mess with his timing) and start to move toward the plate, covering it better. He's also catching the ball a bit farther in front of himself in this image, which is important. Still, most of the time, it felt like he was out of space to get the barrel to the ball by the time he found it, but at least this version of Shaw was capable of getting to both inside and outside pitches. Now, here's what Shaw's stance, stride and contact point look like in August. As Jason had already told you, his stance is more open. The stride still takes him into the pitch a bit, which helps him cover the plate—but it's no longer working against his power at all, because look at that beautiful purple dot way out in front of home plate. Shaw's biggest difference, since the All-Star break, isn't even the physical changes he's made in setup or orientation; it's in timing. If you start early enough to get all the way through the hitting zone and catch the ball out front, like this, the long stride and the still-unconventional setup Shaw uses works. You stay cut-off through much of a swing like this one, but if your plan is to attack the ball way out in front, you'll find the ability to extend your arms and accelerate the barrel just in time to whang the ball off into the left-field corner. Even when a pitcher goes to a breaking ball, if they miss their location and you stay back just enough, you can backspin it out to left-center. Sonny Gray found out about Shaw's evolving capacity there the hard way, Sunday night. NHlNRzhfV0ZRVkV3dEdEUT09X0FGSUNVbE1EQWxBQUNRTUxVZ0FIQmdBRUFBQUhCd2NBVVZBSEFBRUVCQUZYVkZGZQ==.mp4 He's so committed to this approach (and having such success with it, by starting early and being on time, out front) that Shaw has become a dead pull hitter since the break. In fact, looking at his spray chart, you might be forgiven for asking: "Hey, didn't the Cubs trade away Isaac Paredes?" It reads like a typical development arc, on an impressively accelerated timeline: Shaw came into the league letting the ball travel and thinking about the opposite field, but as he's cleaned up his mechanics and gotten more confident, he's also gone to get the pitch farther out front—and he's no longer trying to be the modern, conventional hitter. He's swinging flat through the zone, but by getting to the ball early, he's ensuring that he can pull it. Lifting it is just a matter of knowing more about how pitchers will attack him and being more ready for the way big-league pitchers' stuff works. When you actually watch Shaw hit, though, it doesn't evoke Paredes. He's quite a bit more like some of the sluggers of the 1980s, whose swings were flat like his and who got to their power by being very intentional about it. One exemplar is Brian Downing, the catcher-turned-outfielder who cracked 275 big-league homers after finding his power quite late in his career. Like Shaw, Downing was just 5-foot-10, and his listed weight is just 170 pounds. (In reality, Downing played most of his career closer to 190, which makes him a fair comp to Shaw's listed 185 pounds.) Downing wasn't considered small by the standards of his era, as Shaw might be by the standards of this one, but his power was similarly surprising—and, similarly, it absolutely all came from his dedication to being early and pulling the ball. There's a more fun comp to throw on him, though. The other guy I can't stop thinking about, as I watch Shaw go on this tear and find himself as a hitter, is Ryne Sandberg. Sandberg didn't come up as a slugger. He came to bat almost 1,400 times in his first two seasons with the Cubs, playing mostly at third base at ages 22 and 23. He hit a total of 15 home runs and slugged .361 in those seasons. Then, in 1984—well, you know what happened. He suddenly smacked 19 homers, to go with 36 doubles and 19 triples. The big secret—the key change: he started pulling the ball. A lot. It's tempting to imagine that the dead-pull hitter is an inelegant modern invention, created by sabermetric coneheads to optimize everyone. That's half-true, at most. Henry Aaron's career changed radically when he decided to begin pulling the ball more consistently. Reggie Smith blossomed into a star when he learned that he couldn't go back through the box with the inside pitch and find any success in the majors. Sandberg, Downing and dozens of others have hewed out great careers by tapping into more power, because they realized that pulling the ball isn't an ignoble, one-dimensional plan. It's the result of a good, well-rounded process at the plate. Sandberg also made some changes to his setup in 1984, relative to 1982 and 1983. The biggest changes, though, were to how he started his hands and what he sought to do at the plate. Shaw is doing the same things, now. As the modern game compels players to do, he's compressing three years of the Hall of Famer's development into a handful of months. That doesn't mean he'll become a Hall of Famer, himself, but it's a clear step toward stardom—or at least a consistent level of quality on the infield. Shaw's long-term future might be at second base, as Sandberg's was. His medium-term future is certainly as a more important offensive player, further up the lineup card than he's been even over the last month. Right now, though, it's the short-term future that matters most—the present, even. If Shaw can sustain this surge, it might be the key to the Cubs' success for the balance of the season. View full article

Image courtesy of © Jeff Curry-Imagn Images I hadn't taken a true, all-tools-down vacation since baseball writing became my full-time job in November 2023. After the trade deadline, though, my family and I had a long-scheduled week away in the northernmost reaches of our home state—and, since our home state is Minnesota, the northernmost reaches of the country. It took a day or so to feel any easing of the urge to check scores and second-guess managerial moves, but only that long. Thus, I spent the last week playing cards with nieces and nephews, working on my backflip off the water trampoline, and hiking long trails in a fruitless but delightful quest to spot a moose. I also sat down for long stretches with baseball, but baseball as Roger Angell relayed it. I was attached to the world just long enough to wonder why Craig Counsell went to Caleb Thielbar for a second straight day in the eighth inning on Aug. 2, when Gunnar Henderson made him pay with a game-winning homer. Why didn't Counsell go to fresher-armed newcomer Taylor Rogers? I asked myself the question, then contented myself with the fact that it was beyond my control or comment, and turned back to my coffee. Since then, I've been largely unplugged. Coming back, I can't say I'm surprised to find the Cubs lagging even further behind the Brewers than when I left. The 2025 Cubs are good, even if bum luck in the injury department and a prolonged offensive nonaplegia have made them look less so of late. They're scraping out enough wins to stay comfortably in playoff position. The 2025 Brewers are, simply, one of those teams made of special cloth. What they're doing should look familiar to Cubs fans. They have a trifle less power, but they're very much the 2016 Cubs in secondhand jeans. The Cubs were 4-4 while I was (mostly) beyond their reach, and while their two months' worth of water-treading is understandably frustrating, it's also admirable. They're bobbing and weaving and staving off the Padres, even after San Diego was much more aggressive at the trade deadline. They'll probably hold onto the top Wild Card position, at worst. The real bad news for Cubs fans all came from Milwaukee, because the Brewers were 8-0 between my last two bylines. They're down their two best, most prodigious young players, and somehow, that doesn't matter. Their two best active hitters are a 28-year-old rookie they signed as a minor-league free agent and a draft bust plucked from the farm system of the worst team in baseball largely because his salary balanced the one the Brewers needed to offload due to low morale, and somehow, that doesn't matter. The Brewers won two or three games while I was gone that would be the best win of the season even for these Cubs. There's just something in the air up at The Ueck. No matter. Saturday night was a vital sign, a sudden spasm of the formidable muscles of this offense, and Chicago is suddenly one Sunday night win from having taken two series out of three since the deadline passed. Just as importantly, Jameson Taillon, Miguel Amaya and Javier Assad are all on the verge of readiness to join the team, one that has missed them fiercely in their respective absences. Yes, the Cubs are 67-49 even though Assad has yet to pitch for them this year, but Ben Brown's -2.0 Win Probability Added almost all could have been eliminated if Assad were healthy enough to start the season in the rotation. They're just not as dangerous (36-28) since Amaya went down as they were when he was active (31-21), and they've struggled to replace Taillon in the rotation, too; they're 18-14 since he went down at the end of June. Add those three to the mix, jettison Reese McGuire (whom Counsell has barely trusted at all over the last three weeks and who has a .250 OBP for the season) and send Brown to Triple-A Iowa for quick re-outfitting as a short reliever, and this team should begin to hum again. Kyle Tucker is a problem, habitually early, off-balance and too flat in his bat path, and Pete Crow-Armstrong's lack of plate discipline has become a glaring problem, but the team's depth will carry them forward from here. Cold hitters will warm up. Better health is on the horizon. Better still, for this particular team, is to have the vague notion of outside help deleted from the ticker. I love the final two months of the baseball season, because it ceases to be about uncertain evaluations or breathless rumors. The story, every night, is on the field—sometimes in Chicago, or wherever the Cubs travel; sometimes on the scoreboard, wherever they keep the Brewers tally; and sometimes in Iowa, but always on the field. For the Cubs to win anything worth taking, Matthew Boyd and Michael Busch have to execute better than they did Friday night, when they gave the Cardinals extra outs multiple times. Thielbar and Andrew Kittredge have to be the consistently strong middle relievers they're capable of being, and Counsell has to use them a bit more judiciously to make that easier. (Perhaps Rogers is a key to that, but so, too, could Brown be.) The offense has to get going again, and that's no longer a question of having any more of a catalyst added to their midst (Willi Castro should be an adequate one, especially with Matt Shaw rounding into form as his first season unfolds) or of Counsell needing to rearrange his lineup card. The hitters will hit, or not. The pitchers will execute, or not. The fielders will make plays, or not. And we all get to enjoy (or excruciate over) that binary. What the team's prolonged flirtation with .500 has cost them is their margin for error. With the Brewers coming to Wrigley Field for five games next week, they could yet catch the Crew, but it's very unlikely. They're now fighting to hold onto the right to host a Wild Card Series, and that fight will be a hard one. Not since mid-June has the club seemed to be fully in touch with its talent. That will have to change. If it does, though, they can be every bit as dangerous as they could have been from the front of the pack. There are 46 games left to play before the postseason, and the Cubs can get there by winning just half of them—but all the joy and merit of the campaign will lie in the pursuit of something more than that. The national spotlight has rightly swung from the North Side of Chicago northward. The freedom, if you're the party left in the cold spot where the light once shone, lies in the fact that you're now competing not for others' attention, but for your own satisfaction and success on your own terms. View full article

Image courtesy of © Daniel Kucin Jr.-Imagn Images Caleb Thielbar has been legitimately marvelous. Drew Pomeranz's magic is less about a tingle in the fingertips and more about smoke and spin mirroring, though, so the Cubs have snatched up another lefty to help them navigate the middle innings: veteran (and former Thielbar teammate, with the Minnesota Twins) Taylor Rogers. Rogers, 34, is enjoying a career resurgence over the last two seasons. He's pitched 93 innings since the start of 2024, with a 2.42 ERA and a 24.8% strikeout rate. He's a sinker-sweeper specialist, but saying that really doesn't convey the thing as thoroughly as it deserves. Here, look at this. You can probably guess the problem Rogers runs into, from here: home plate is only 17 inches wide. Rogers has walked 10.4% of opposing batters over this season and a half of brilliance, but in fairness, the approach is still essentially working. He induces weak contact; he works his way out of whatever jams he creates. Rogers joins Andrew Kittredge to give the Chicago bullpen two more mid-30s middle relievers, and while that description sounds uninspiring, the presence of two reliable hurlers like these should stabilize the team's relief corps nicely. The Cubs sent back North Side Baseball favorite Ivan Brethowr in the deal, a fair price given Rogers's clear but limited upside as a rental relief arm. Brethowr is a real prospect, but not a star prospect. Rogers's job is important enough to this team the rest of the way to make such a player expendable. Speaking of making players expendable, Rogers's arrival also had to come with someone's departure. In an unsurprising but weighty move, the team designated veteran righthander Ryan Pressly for assignment to make room for Rogers. It will be a meritocracy in the Chicago bullpen, the rest of the way. Rogers slots into what looks like a deep and improved pitching staff; Pressly's departure is (bittersweet) addition by subtraction. View full article

Image courtesy of © Daniel Kucin Jr.-Imagn Images For the third year in a row, a ghastly lack of help off the bench has hamstrung the Cubs at certain stages of the season. This time, though, they're taking decisive action. In a deal in the final hour before the MLB trade deadline, Jed Hoyer pounced on erstwhile Twins utility infielder Willi Castro, sources confirmed to North Side Baseball. Jon Heyman was first with the news. Castro, 28, will be a free agent at the end of this season. In the final year of his arbitration eligibility, he’s making $6.4 million this year, which means that just over $2 million remains to be paid. That’s a small price to pay, though, for a switch-hitting utility man who offers a modicum of both power and speed. After hitting a career-high 12 home runs last year, Castro already has 10 in 2025. In 344 plate appearances with Minnesota, he entered Tuesday batting .245/.335/.407. The Twins scooped Castro up off the scrap heap before the 2023 season, signing him to a minor-league deal after he’d been non-tendered by the Detroit Tigers. Since then, he’s been the Swiss Army knife for the team, playing all over the diamond and slotted in all over the lineup card. His defense has declined sharply the last two seasons, perhaps because he’s been moved around so much, and this year, he’s mainly played second base and the corner outfield spots. However, his versatility (in both halves of innings) made him appealing to multiple teams. For the Cubs, Castro figures to play mostly at third base, as a complement (although less than a full platoon partner) to Matt Shaw. For the first time, the Cubs will have depth not just within their lineup, but beyond it—a sense that they can bring someone in tactically within a game or give days off to their regulars, and still have competence suffuse the lineup. Castro can still move around some, positionally, and as a supplemental piece in the lineup on something less than an everyday basis, he's a dynamic addition. He's improved signifiantly this year in his performance and his under-the-hood data against left-handed pitching, and he's a beloved teammte. A solid upgrade, Castro did come at a meaningful cost—but certainly not a painful one. The team surrendered two pitchers from their Double-A Knoxville roster, in helium guy Ryan Gallagher and righty Sam Armstrong. Gallagher was the club's 6th-round pick in last summer's draft, out of UC-Santa Barbara. He's made a quick ascent of the system thus far, putting up good numbers and opening some eyes with his immediate uptick in fastball velocity. He's not an electric arm, but he was a successful (if short-term) development project by the team's player development department. Even for a player who will hit free agency at season's end, he would not have been enough to headline a deal for a substantial contributor when he first entered the team's aegis. Armstrong, largely a throw-in and an organizational depth arm, is a candidate for a late switch to relief work, where he might take off a bit. There's no reason, however, for Cubs fans to lose sleep over this price. Castro often batted near the top of the Minnesota batting order this year; much less will be asked of him in Chicago. If he can keep the line moving and occasionally spell a weary or banged-up hitter, he'll advance the team's pursuit of good playoff position nicely. View full article

The Cubs haven't made Moisés Ballesteros untouchable. But they're only going to trade him if one of their potential partners on a deal is willing to accept him as the centerpiece of a trade for a controllable, high-end talent. To this point, according to at least one report, those would-be traders haven't put a fair value on Ballesteros, at least from Chicago's perspective. Ballesteros is still very young, and he's thrived as a hitter at Triple A over an extended sample. The Cubs are right to be open to trading him only if the agreed-upon deal reflects the fact that he could easily be an impact player in the majors as soon as the end of this year. If that's not happening, neither Jed Hoyer nor Carter Hawkins can really force it to. On the other hand, as the deadline creeps nearer, it's fair to wonder just how value-conscious the team intends to be. That's one of their hallmarks; it's part of the organizational DNA. At a moment when they need some high-octane help to keep pace with the streaking Brewers in the NL Central, that resolve is about to be tested in a way that it hasn't been since Hoyer took over as the main guy when Theo Epstein departed the organization. Passing that test might not mean showing the willpower not to make a move; it might have to mean showing the courage and conviction to take a bold chance. View full rumor

Image courtesy of © Kamil Krzaczynski-Imagn Images Andrew Kittredge and Michael Soroka each signed significant (but not exorbitant) one-year deals this winter. When the Cubs traded for them Wednesday night, they took on the full remaining salaries for each player, which adds up to just over $5.8 million. (By competitive-balance tax payroll calculation, the figure is more like $6.8 million, but the Cubs only need to worry about the real cash this year.) That's the amount the team figures to have added to their payroll for the season, which now stands just over $201.4 million, according to Cot's Contracts from Baseball Prospectus. The team's CBT number is over $222 million, but that has almost no bearing now. To add another $18 million and change (with just one-third of the season left) would mean acquiring more than $50 million worth of player talent. The team won't do that, and they don't have the authorization to do so, anyway. Rather, according to sources with knowledge of the club's operations, Jed Hoyer and Carter Hawkins have about $10 million more they can spend Thursday, if the right opportunities arise. What can that buy? What constraints could it create? Well, first things first: if the front office succeeds in bagging the controllable pitching they're seeking, the budget will almost certainly not be a concern. The full-season salaries of MacKenzie Gore ($2.89 million) and Edward Cabrera ($1.95 million) each leave them owed less than $1 million for the balance of 2025. The hurdles to acquiring them are about how much talent the Cubs are and aren't willing to surrender, not about how much they'd be obligated to pay either Gore or Cabrera. There are other, less famous names who might also be available; who would also be around for three or more seasons; and who also don't make much money this year. If the team ponies up for any of them, they'll face no meaningful financial constraints. If the team has to pivot toward more veteran hurlers who have signed longer-term or higher-dollar deals, though, things change quickly. Let's ignore the obligations to Sandy Alcántara beyond 2025. This year alone, he's making $17.3 million, which would mean paying him almost $6 million for the balance of the campaign. Mitch Keller is making $15 million this year, which means $5 million after coming aboard with 54 games left. Shane Bieber makes $10 million this season, and so would be owed just over $3 million for the final third thereof. Robbie Ray, a latecomer to the trade market on whom the Cubs made a call Wednesday night, is making $25 million this season, which means he'd take up $8 million—almost the whole remaining budget for Hoyer and Hawkins. The budget does matter, because it slightly narrows the field of options. If the Giants sell, they don't want to eat money in the process, so the Cubs would have to take on all of Ray's money. That would mean making no other additions, or paying steeper prospect costs to avoid taking on salary in trades for other, smaller needs. The Rangers are trying to create payroll flexibility, but the Cubs can't take advantage by jumping into that mix—unless it be by prying loose Nathan Eovaldi and his own $6 million in remaining salary for this year, plus $12 million in signing bonuses payable this offseason. Dylan Cease ($13.75 million) and Zac Gallen ($13.5 million) are each owed roughly $4.5 million the rest of the way, which shouldn't be prohibitive—but if the Cubs also want to add even a relatively cheap reliever and a bench bat, it all adds up quickly. Willi Castro ($6.4 million in full-season salary; $2.1 million still owed) would soak up about 20 percent of what the team can still spend, for instance. If the team does add three more players today (unlikely, but possible), we could see them allow one of the teams making a deal to retain a portion of the salary. That would mean giving up a better prospect to complete a trade, but it might be the cost of doing business the way the Rickettses prefer to do it. While we're talking about money, though, let's take a moment to remember one other key factor in that regard: The business operations department sets each year's baseball operations budget based on the previous year's revenue. Thus, an aggressive trade deadline—and the packed houses and playoff home games it could yield—would pay for itself, come this winter. While Hoyer and Hawkins have to stay under budget, they should be looking for the best possible way to spend right up to their ownership-imposed limit. That's the best way to ensure that they'll have the flexibility and muscle this winter that they have lacked at times over the last year and a half. View full article

Image courtesy of © Brad Mills-Imagn Images The Cubs had interest in Michael Soroka this offseason, before he signed a one-year deal with the Washington Nationals for $9 million. They first talked to the Nationals about trading for him over a month ago, in late June, around the time they also reached out to the Royals to discuss a possible Seth Lugo deal. Wednesday, in the shadow of the looming trade deadline, they got their man, sending outfielder Christian Franklin and shortstop Ronny Cruz to the Washington organization in exchange for Soroka. It's a pursuit born of a profile the Cubs very much like. Soroka moved from the starting rotation to the bullpen mid-season for the 2024 White Sox, right alongside then-teammate Chris Flexen. As he did, he mostly junked his pedestrian sinker and tapped into something new and important, by becoming a four-seam fastball-dominant arm. He also discovered new velocity, by "letting it eat" on every pitch. Over the winter, he also lowered his arm slot—something the Cubs would have implemented themselves, if he hadn't beaten them to it—and tapped into another new dynamic: his heater now enjoys superb spin mirroring with a breaking ball that has morphed from a slider into a uniquely big-breaking two-plane curve. As @Jason Ross wrote just 10 days ago, Soroka's results haven't truly dazzled this year, but the under-the-hood indices all have. He had a 4.87 ERA during his stint in the Beltway, but lousy defensive support explains a good chunk of that. According to Baseball Prospectus, his adjusted Deserved Run Average (DRA-, where 100 is average and lower is better) is 91, which is the second-best mark of his career, trailing only his All-Star season way back in 2019. Matthew Boyd's DRA- is 87. Soroka's figure is tied for 41st-best among the 127 pitchers with at least 70 innings pitched this season. Among those with whom he's tied: Spencer Strider, late-emerging trade candidate Robbie Ray and much-rumored Cubs target Merrill Kelly. In short, Soroka has been very good this season. He's striking out 25.4% of opposing batters and walking just 7.0% of them. That curveball may not be a game-breaker, but it's an out-getter. Though he's been limited by injury (he missed virtually all of April and the first week of May with a biceps strain) and has just 80 1/3 innings pitched in 16 starts, when Soroka has been on the mound, he's been solidly above-average. Why, then, was his price tag considerably lower than Kelly's? Why did the Cubs get a starting pitcher they've targeted for months at a discount, one day before the deadline? Well, that injury history is certainly a key factor. Soroka not only had that biceps issue in the spring, but missed a big chunk of last summer with a shoulder strain. He's torn his Achilles twice, which has kept the mileage on his arm relatively low, but he's not a durable pitcher, the way Kelly is. Another key reason why he wasn't in as much demand as you might have guessed, though, is that his stuff doesn't grade out as well as that of other (potentially or actually) available pitchers, going by industry-standard pitch modeling. Within that is the big, waving red flag (or is it?): Soroka's velocity is down significantly in his three starts since the All-Star break. This isn't a small change. Soroka's average heater is down almost 3 miles per hour since the break, which is especially weird, since he got eight days off between starts at that point. There'd been a downward trend even before that, so some teams were scared off by what always has a chance to be a sign of lurking or impending injury. In this case, though, the change seems to be a matter of mechanics. It's likely fixable, but just as importantly, it might not need to be fixed. Let's dig in. Here's Soroka inducing a whiff by Heliot Ramos on one of his big breaking balls, back in the first half. b0daQTBfVjBZQUhRPT1fQWxCVVhRRUZWUUFBREFNQVhnQUhCdzlVQUZoUVcxRUFBMUFDVmxjSENBTlZWZ0pT.mp4 Here's him doing the same thing to Manny Machado, just after the All-Star break. ek1MR29fVjBZQUhRPT1fQVFSVVhBSldCRlFBV2xvRUJ3QUhCbFZTQUZoVVcxTUFWRkpUQXdJTVYxWmNBRmRU.mp4 I don't know how well you can see it, but one very early mechanical difference begets another here. In the second video, Soroka strides slightly more open as he comes down the mound. If you isolate the frame when his front foot hits the dirt—what pitching gurus call 'foot strike'—in each clip, it's easier to spot. Firstly, getting even slightly more open will often sap a small but noticeable amount of zip from a pitcher's stuff, because one key ingredient in generating velocity is the torque created by delaying trunk rotation for as long as possible—the creation of hip-shoulder separation, whereby the lower half rotates slightly ahead of the upper half and the body is forced to move extremely fast to realign itself. Secondly, though, that slight difference in landing position means that instead of whipping around his landing leg's block, Soroka vaults over it slightly more. The stride that lands more open is slightly longer, so he ends up getting farther down the mound, but is falling off to the first-base side more. That leads to a slightly higher arm angle at release, as you can see if we isolate the frame in which he releases the ball in each clip. See how the lines I've superimposed there are shorter in the image on the right? That's not because Soroka is extending his arm less, but because he's releasing the ball farther in front of his own body lately than in the first half. Broadly speaking, a mechanical change like this is of neutral value. It can be good for some guys; it can be bad for others. It's only an unmitigated problem if it's a product of a pitcher being physically compromised in some way, forcing them to move differently to compensate. Although we're seeing less power from Soroka recently, there's no immediate reason to believe that he's thus compromised. The Cubs did approve his medicals, after all, and we know that that's no guarantee where they're concerned. The change in arm angle is real, and a trend that has been happening all year. He's still throwing from a lower slot than he used for most of 2024, but he's trended back up after coming way down to begin the year. That turns out to be fine for him; it accentuates the unique stuff he possesses. For one thing, it's given him an extra inch or two of carry on his four-seamer, which is a bit of a dead-zone offering and can benefit from the boost—especially at the top of the zone, which (unsurprisingly) he's had an easier time hitting with the pitch since changing his delivery slightly. Here's where his fastballs ended up in the first half. And here's where they've been in his three starts since the break: Despite the velocity loss, Soroka's outcomes on the fastball have significantly improved recently. He's hitting the high, arm-side sector of the zone (and just above it) more often, and that's where he gets whiffs and weak contact with that pitch. Throwing harder is turning out to be less important, for him, than locating better and achieving slightly improved movement. Speaking of improved movement, though, Soroka has also discovered a new and much more functional changeup: the kick-change. He's always been good at generating spin and bad at killing it, and that's the very problem the kick-change is meant to help pitchers like him solve. Before implementing the change to his change, Soroka was allowing a .380 wOBA to left-handed batters. Since then, it's .308. When you see just how drastic the difference in the depth on that changeup is, that makes sense. The Cubs believe in the kinds of changes Soroka has made. They're willing to bet on him despite the dip in velocity, not least because it looks like the kind that might be as salutary as it is limiting. They believe he can be a mid-rotation starter whenever he's able to take the mound, although he'll need to be lifted more proactively than starters with deeper arsenals or better stamina would be. They were able to get him at a price that doesn't reflect either the underlying performance he's already delivered or the upside they perceive, when you compare him to pitchers with whom he's similar. On the other hand, the main reasons why they were able to get him are that velocity dip and the injury history, and the potential linkage between the two makes it hard to buy too heavily into the idea that he's their top acquisition. One reason why they were willing to give up what they were for him is that he defuses the leverage of certain potential trade partners. Soroka is good enough that, even if the team still badly wants to add a stronger starting pitcher (as they probably do), they can credibly approach negotiations in a posture of willingness to let him be their main guy. It's harder for a team like the Marlins to hold their feet to the fire, because they got Soroka. That's one more small way in which he provides value. Plainly, though, the main focus for the team will be the more tangible, on-field value they expect to get from Soroka. He has an unusual breaking ball and a much-improved changeup. He should benefit from pitching in front of their defense, instead of that of his old team. He's inarguably better than Colin Rea, provided that he's healthy enough to pitch at his best, but he also has recent experience working in relief, so he doesn't foreclose any other options for the team. The risks associated with his health record are real, but taking them was a no-brainer. View full article

Image courtesy of © Gregory Fisher-Imagn Images Well, after a confusing morning, we gained some clarity on the state of the Cubs' roster—for one game. Beyond today, this update will largely leave us all eager to hear what's next. According to beat writer Meghan Montemurro, the team has designated Vidal Bruján for assignment, and Moisés Ballesteros will join the active roster not in the stead of dinged-up outfielder Ian Happ, but at the expect of Bruján. This takes much of the mystery out of the choice to recall Ballesteros instead of Owen Caissie or Kevin Alcántara. Ballesteros is the natural option for the role that actually appears open here, which is basically a one-day cameo as the designated hitter. Instead of taking over for Happ on a long-term basis, Ballesteros will plug a hole for one day, and then the trade deadline will pass on the team's off day before they return to Wrigley Field on Friday. By the time they do, it feels safe to speculate that there will be another position player in their midst, other than Ballesteros. The timing of this little maneuver makes it look a lot like the team expects to permanently upgrade the bench spot Bruján has occupied until now. Could that be Eugenio Suárez, taking over at third base and pushing Matt Shaw into the bench mob? It's a long shot, but it's possible. It could also be Willi Castro of the Twins, or Ramón Urías of the Orioles, two others in whom the Cubs have expressed interest, sources say. One way or another, the team decided that it was time to move on from Bruján and bolster their mix of position players. It's unlikely that Ballesteros is the permanent plan to do that, because he's still very young and needs more consistent playing time than the roster is likely to offer. Thus, this feels like the prelude to a move that will round out what has been a slightly misshapen positional roster—and it ends up being much better news than a Happ injured list stint would have been, on multiple levels. View full article

Image courtesy of © Michael McLoone-Imagn Images Just before Opening Day, I projected that the Cubs would win the 2025 NL Central, with 89 wins. I had the Brewers just one small step behind, at 88-74. At multiple points over the first half of the season, I made note of the fact that despite what appeared to be trends away from that projection, it still felt right to me. Now, a day before the MLB trade deadline and roughly two-thirds of the way through the season, the Cubs could go roughly .500 from here and finish with exactly that 89-73 record. I feel like I largely got them right this year. Justin Steele's injury was a major setback, but not a wholly unexpected one. Pete Crow-Armstrong's season has been a wonderful surprise, but there have been some oft-overlooked warts lurking there all along, and indeed, Crow-Armstrong has a .284 OBP in his last 40 games and is starting to have lapses in the field and on the bases. Many things have varied from any specific expectation, but they've averaged out, and looking forward, I see a team that will need to fight hard to get to 90 wins. That's fine; 90 wins was a reasonable goal for this season and will certainly get them into October, if they get there. What I had wrong was the Brewers. Their unexpected performances haven't evened out, and they're not going to. Between Isaac Collins, Jacob Misiorowski, Quinn Priester and Andrew Vaughn, Milwaukee is legitimately five or six wins better than I had projected in March. I expect them to win 94 games or so, which means that the Cubs have to keep the pedal down in order to keep pace—or resign themselves to playing in a Wild Card Series somewhere just after the end of the regular season, at best. Should that alter Jed Hoyer's approach over the next 29 hours or so? It's a bit hard to say. The Cubs extended the contract of their president of baseball operations earlier this week, in a head-scratching, cart-before-the-division-title move. Presumably, that wasn't a move designed to take pressure off Hoyer, so much as to redistribute that pressure in a healthier way throughout the organization. Either way, though, Hoyer now has job security. He faces the dilemma, therefore, of whether to trade from the long-term depth of the organization to make this team better by a significant enough margin to give them a real chance to beat out the Brewers over the final two months. It's been hard to feel good about the (no pun intended) prospects of going all-in over the last two nights. The Cubs didn't just lose to the Brewers; they got righteously whupped. None of the main candidates identified as their top trade targets would have materially changed what happened over the last two games; they were beaten by wide margins and in all facets. It doesn't feel like marginal upgrades will close the lacuna between the clubs. Feelings be damned, though, the Brewers will cool off at least slightly, sometime between now and the end of September. When they do, the Cubs have to be able to pounce, as Milwaukee has pounced by racing past the limping, .500ish Cubs over the last month and change. Right now, the Cubs roster lacks the depth and the dynamism to do that. They need better pitchers at the back end of their starting rotation and in middle relief. They need better bench options, to give their regular position players some needed rest and put the danger back in those bats, the lift back in their step. If Hoyer doesn't acquire multiple players with real and immediately visible utility to this roster by Thursday evening, his team will founder and fumfer their way to a quick October ouster—or worse. That won't necessarily mean the team failed. They're probably going to hit that 89-win benchmark I set for them four months ago; they might yet exceed it. It'll just mean they were overwhelmed by a team on a mission, doing things better than them. Since the Brewers are set up better for the future than are the Cubs, though, that would be extremely cold comfort. To get the Cubs out of the quagmire they've been stuck in since before he took over the job, Hoyer needs to get his arms extended and hit a home run at this trade deadline. Whether he even has the pop in his bat to do that when he barrels one up is not clear. View full article

Image courtesy of © Michael McLoone-Imagn Images Baseball insider Bruce Levine, of 670 The Score, characterized the news as the Cubs having "dodged a bullet". Ian Happ had X-rays on the shin off which he fouled a ball late in the team's latest loss to the Brewers, which pushed them two games back of Milwaukee heading into Wednesday's series finale. Perhaps that's true, in a way, but we should widen the lens to complete the analogy: that one bullet they dodged appears to be just the latest in a hail of them, many of which have riddled the corpus of this team over the last few weeks. Despite not having a break in his lower leg, Happ will be placed on the 10-day injured list, according to reports that emerged overnight from ESPN's Jesse Rogers and the Marquee Sports Network. To replace him on the active roster, Chicago is calling up designated hitter (and quasi-catcher) Moisés Ballesteros for his second stint with the parent club. If you're hunting for silver linings, at least Ballesteros will get a chance to prove himself a bit more ready than he was early in the season. If his bat is everything the Cubs believe it is, they shouldn't miss Happ all that much during his time on the shelf. It's fascinating, though, that the team chose to go with Ballesteros, rather than either Owen Caissie or Kevin Alcántara. Caissie is the one with more experience at Triple-A Iowa, and whose bat has been hotter of late. Alcántara is the right-handed batter who could give Pete Crow-Armstrong some time off his feet, which Crow-Armstrong seems to need desperately. The best apparent explanation for electing to promote Ballesteros has to do with the team's plans at the trade deadline—only you can tell yourself as many different stories as you'd like about what shape that influence might take. Is the team avoiding bringing up Caissie or Alcántara, because they expect to move them? Are they allowing themselves a final, one-game showcase of Ballesteros, in whom some prospective trade partner is interested? Or is this a matter of pure logistics, wherein it made the most sense to bring up the only one of the three who has been in the majors already this year and they could well replace him with an outside acquisition by the weekend? The answer doesn't matter much, because it will reveal itself almost immediately. The trade deadline is just over 30 hours away. Ballesteros will be with the team for the final game of this road trip to Milwaukee. After that, what happens is anyone's guess. UPDATE: In a twist that makes sense (but which sure casts the official broadcast partner of the team in a lousy journalistic light), it now appears that the multiple overnight reports that Happ would go on the IL might be mistaken. Bruce Levine is at the park in Milwaukee, and his reporting suggests that ESPN and Marquee both jumped the gun by saying Ballesteros would take Happ's place on the roster. It's possible the team recalled Ballesteros on a just-in-case basis, to join the team's taxi squad, and that wires got crossed for that reason. It's also possible Happ's swelling came down better overnight than he or the team expected. Either way, this is good news—but a bit of a needless false start, fueled by a report from an official and team-sanctioned outlet. View full article

Image courtesy of © Jeff Curry-Imagn Images The expanded playoff format has altered the landscape of Major League Baseball enormously over the last few years. It shows up most, perhaps, each July, when teams flirting with .500 behave not as frustrated sellers, but as tentative buyers—and sometimes, when teams who looked like sellers even at the All-Star break pivot toward buying at the last moment. The Cubs did that as recently as 2023. This year, it's happening again. The Royals are no longer sellers, so cross the several interesting players they might otherwise have shopped this week off the list. The Rangers are in limbo, but it seems clear that (at least) they will hold onto their top two, expensive starting pitchers. Meanwhile, the streaky Rays have made a pair of moves that makes it clear they'll both buy and sell. Who's left on the market? And what possibilities have gone by the boards for the Cubs? Let's revisit the list I first made last week, of the 105 best likely trade candidates, to see who still belongs there and who doesn't. Joe Ryan, RHP, Twins: If you want to hold onto a sliver of hope, I won't stand in your way, but the Twins seem disinclined to deal Ryan, and sources say the few teams who have even been bold enough to feel them out were gobsmacked by the price tag. He's unlikely to be dealt. Eugenio Suárez, 3B, Diamondbacks: Between the scare of a fastball that hit Suárez in the finger Monday night and the fact that Matt Shaw has come out of the break hitting like Suárez with a better glove, it seems very unlikely that the Cubs will pull the trigger on this kind of move now. Opinions on whether he'll be dealt at all are mixed, but I would guess he will be. It's just not likely to be to Chicago. Dylan Cease, RHP, Padres: The rumors of this flared and then went quiet, but behind the scenes, many still believe San Diego will do something bold—and yes, that could include trading Cease. The Cubs' position in a market for him looks favorable, but whether it makes sense for them is likely to depend on what else Jed Hoyer is able to do. Emmanuel Clase, RHP, Guardians: There's a decent chance Clase never pitches in the majors again. He's on administrative leave at least until the end of August, as the league investigates his ties to suspicious betting activity on Guardians games. Obviously, count him out. Jhoan Duran, RHP, Twins: With Clase off the market, Duran has become even more popular. The Cubs remain very interested, but the price remains very high. Sources with knowledge of the team's conversations are skeptical that Hoyer will make an exception to his usual value calculations just to shore up the bullpen; the team would strongly prefer to get a starter. Edward Cabrera, RHP, Marlins: If this list were predicated on balancing the likelihood of the Cubs landing a player with the impact they would have, Cabrera would be No. 1. He's not an ace, but he's trending in that direction, and the Cubs have told multiple other teams that their interest in those teams' available arms will have to wait until they can ascertain whether or not Cabrera will be available at a price they find palatable. They consider that a real possibility right now. Miami had a contingency starter on hand in St. Louis Monday, in case a deal got done before Cabrera took the mound, so they think it's at least plausible, too. Jacob deGrom, RHP, Rangers Nathan Eovaldi, RHP, Rangers: The Rangers might still lightly sell. They're in the thick of the American League Wild Card race, but not in a great position within it. At this point, though, they're obviously not interested in trading deGrom or Eovaldi. MacKenzie Gore, LHP, Nationals: Still an option, but a far-fetched one. The Nationals have set a higher asking price for Gore than Miami's for Cabrera, despite Cabrera being under control one year longer—and Washington wants either Shaw or Cade Horton, rather than being content with top prospects in the minors. Unless that changes, no deal will materialize. Jarren Duran, OF, Red Sox Seth Lugo, RHP, Royals: Lugo was on the market only briefly, at the beginning of this month. Once the Royals felt out what was realistic (and on what timeline suitors, including the Cubs, were interested in doing a deal), they circled back to Lugo, who agreed to a two-year contract extension instead. David Bednar, RHP, Pirates: Very much still in play. The Cubs would rather land Duran, all things equal, but Pittsburgh's asking price is lower than Minnesota's, sources say. Thus, there's a chance Hoyer pivots. Here, too, much depends on the team's pursuit of a starter. Ryan O’Hearn, 1B/OF, Orioles Merrill Kelly, RHP, Diamondbacks: The Cubs would really prefer a controllable starter. If they can't find one at a semi-reasonable price, though, Kelly tops their wish list among impending free agents. Kris Bubic, LHP, Royals: A rotator cuff strain is likely to end Bubic's season. Consider it a bullet dodged; the Cubs were interested in him over the All-Star break. Sandy Alcantara, RHP, Marlins: Alcántara seems committed to the idea of being traded, and sources familiar with the Marlins' plans say they do feel some payroll pressure to move him. I don't think the offers they're actually going to hear will clear Peter Bendix's bar, though. I'm not crossing this one off, but consider it a long shot. Jesús Sánchez, OF, Marlins Cade Smith, RHP, Guardians: Suddenly, this former closer of the future is very much the closer of Cleveland's present. They might decide to pivot into a rebuild, given the atrocious vibes of having two players suspended (if not banned) amid gambling questions, but it seems unlikely that they trade Smith this summer. Robert Suarez, RHP, Padres: Again, the Padres have to get creative, and everyone within the industry expects them to do so. Trading Suarez would be a natural way to do so, and he's a good fit for the Cubs' predilections when it comes to high-end relievers. Given his contract structure, though, the price would have to be quite low to get Hoyer interested. Ryan Helsley, RHP, Cardinals Griffin Jax, RHP, Twins: My sense is that Duran is more in demand, and that the Twins are more likely to trade him. Jax can stay on the radar, and would be a more intriguing long-term play, because he has a starter's arsenal and some glorious peripheral metrics. Just don't count on him. Willi Castro, UTIL, Twins: While Castro could certainly help this team in a number of ways, there are lots of other suitors in the mix for him. Other teams have clearer roles waiting for him, and sources familiar with the Twins' thinking believe the Cubs will be outbid. Drew Rasmussen, RHP, Rays: Tampa's recent stumble, their road-heavy late schedule, and their minor-league home make it easy to understand why they traded Danny Jansen to the Brewers Monday. They might continue a buy-and-sell approach by being willing to move Rasmussen, and the Cubs are one team who would be very interested if they do. Taylor Ward, OF, Angels: Like Willi Castro, only more so. Ward is likely to be dealt, one source said. I very much doubt that it will be to the Cubs. Zac Gallen, RHP, Diamondbacks: It's been a tough year—in fact, a tough year and a half—for Gallen. He's the rental Arizona is most likely to retain, if their asking price isn't met, and the Cubs are unlikely to be the team to meet that price. Pete Fairbanks, RHP, Rays: Like Rasmussen, only more so. The Rays will be willing to move Fairbanks, no matter what they contend to the contrary. The question is whether the Cubs are willing to give up quite a bit for a pitcher who's not quite at the level of dominance he reached a few years ago. Harrison Bader, OF, Twins: The fit is so, so good. The Cubs need someone who can platoon with Pete Crow-Armstrong. They need someone who can spell both Ian Happ and Kyle Tucker. But Bader is almost certainly bound for some team who has more playing time open for him. Carlos Santana, 1B/DH, Guardians Sonny Gray, RHP, Cardinals Ryan Jeffers, C, Twins Yandy Díaz, 1B, Rays Mitch Keller, RHP, Pirates: Note how much farther down this list (the criterion for which, as a reminder, is how much a player can contribute to the effort of winning in 2025) Keller is than Cabrera or Gore. This is why the Cubs are interested in him, but unwilling to break the bank—and why their previous efforts to acquire him fell apart earlier this summer. Ryan McMahon, 3B, Rockies: McMahon is a Yankee now. Charlie Morton, RHP, Orioles: Morton will certainly be dealt, and probably not for a huge haul. The Cubs have at least felt out Baltimore about a package deal involving both Morton and Seranthony Dominguez. Such things are never especially likely, but it's possible, and could be a great fit. Trevor Larnach, OF, Twins Cedric Mullins, OF, Orioles Luis Severino, RHP, Athletics: Severino really is a solid potential pickup, with the ability of the Athletics to demand much of anything for him limited by both the size of the contract they gave him this winter and his obvious unhappiness as part of that team. The question is how much money Hoyer could get the A's to absorb, without sending the prospect price too high for the team's tastes. Aaron Bummer, LHP, Team from Suburban Atlanta: I've heard that Alex Anthopoulos would move Bummer this week, but he's under contract for 2026, so it would be a steeper price than some of the other available lefties have. His surface-level numbers are a bit underwhelming this year, but Bummer is still a terrific ground-ball guy and he limits walks well. He'd thrive in front of the Chicago infield. Ramón Laureano, OF, Orioles: [I'm leaving this note, which appeared in the first version of this list last week, intact. Nothing important has changed.] Righty bats who can back up Ian Happ, Kyle Tucker and Seiya Suzuki in case of injuries or (in Happ's case) shaky showings are a little-discussed profile the team is looking at. Like Bader, though, Laureano likely ends up somewhere else. Kyle Freeland, LHP, Rockies: The Rockies are getting inquiries on Freeland, including from the Cubs—who love themselves a lefty starter. The profile is intriguing, though only if they can effectively land him as a buy-low opportunity. Zack Littell, RHP, Rays: The odds of Littell being dealt are steadily rising, and he'd certainly be an upgrade over the existing fluidity at the back end of the starting rotation. That said, the team is only likely to trade for one starting pitcher, and Littell is a bit below the bar you'd like that one acquisition to clear. Adrian Houser, RHP, White Sox: Like Littell, only more so. Houser would be such a low-wattage addition that he doesn't quite move the needle the way fans might rightfully hope that the team's big move will. If Hoyer does land someone like Duran to anchor the bullpen, perhaps settling for a starter in the Houser range would be more palatable. Danny Coulombe, LHP, Twins: Coulombe is a really, really good lefty reliever, with plenty of ways to get both lefty and righty batters out. He's only owed about $1 million for the balance of this year. The Cubs do want to shore up their left-handed relief, with Drew Pomeranz's magic quickly wearing off, so this is a possibility, but the Twins are in position to ask for a solid return. John Schreiber, RHP, Royals: The Royals' hot streak out of the break and the extension they were able to strike with Lugo has largely taken them out of the seller column. That's a shame, because Schreiber really would give the team needed flexibility as an optionable reliever at a higher level of reliability than most guys on whom you'd actually spend an option. Anthony Bender, RHP, Marlins: One of the hotter names on the rental setup arm market, Bender could stabilize the bridge from the team's starters to Daniel Palencia at the back end of the game. Nathaniel Lowe, 1B, Nationals Carlos Estévez, RHP, Royals: Another Royal off the list. Dennis Santana, RHP, Pirates: [As with Laureano, I'm leaving this comment as-is. Santana is a good target for the Cubs, although not an overwhelmingly likely one.] Though less famous and less dominant than Bednar, Santana could be a tremendous pickup from Pittsburgh. He has a plus slider, and has figured out how to really fill up the zone over the last year and a half. He's under team control through 2026. Brock Burke, LHP, Angels Adolis García, OF, Rangers Michael Soroka, RHP, Nationals: He's farther down this list than Houser or Littell, but Soroka might be higher on the Cubs' version of the same document. They like his stuff and the potential fit for him in their rotation. If they do make a splash in some other demographic of the roster, and if the Nationals are willing to eat a bit of the $3 million or so he's owed the rest of the way, this one could come together quickly. Luis Robert Jr., OF, White Sox Phil Maton, RHP, Cardinals Andrew Kittredge, RHP, Orioles: Chicago would rather have Dominguez, but Kittredge is likely to come cheaper, which might make the difference—especially if Hoyer lands the controllable, higher-end starter he craves. Yoán Moncada, 3B, Angels Amed Rosario, IF, Nationals: He, too, is a Yankee now. JoJo Romero, LHP, Cardinals Gregory Soto, LHP, Orioles: Another Soto lost to the Mets. Jose Quintana, LHP, Brewers: No, the Brewers and the Cubs aren't getting together on a deal that would help the Cubs fix the back end of their rotation. And no, the Cubs and Quintana reuniting probably wouldn't be welcome news to most fans, anyway. Nestor Cortes, LHP, Brewers Taj Bradley, RHP, Rays: The Cubs still like Bradley. The Rays still seem not to. Tampa's vaunted pitching philosophy is not perfect, and the Cubs do feel they could unlock Bradley a bit if they can get ahold of him. The price tag is the question mark. Pierce Johnson, RHP, That Team Near Atlanta Jeffrey Springs, LHP, Athletics Dane Myers, OF, Marlins Randal Grichuk, OF, Diamondbacks: The Royals pounced on Grichuk, as part of their pivot into a cautious buying posture. Brock Stewart, RHP, Twins: Don't overlook this possibility. Stewart is really good. He's akin to Santana, of the Pirates: blooming late, and under team control through next season. Kevin Ginkel, RHP, Diamondbacks: [Another held-over comment:] If Arizona is holding out fiercely for a player like Owen Caissie in talks for either Suárez or Kelly, don't be shocked if the Cubs finagle Ginkel as a second piece coming their way. Don't be fooled by his hideous ERA this year, either. Ginkel still has a nasty slider and the skills to be a late-inning difference-maker. Sam Haggerty, OF, Rangers Seranthony Dominguez, RHP, Orioles: Dominguez's sheer stuff is filthy. His bugaboo, when it rears up, is a lack of control, and that's plagued him this year. Nonetheless, the Cubs like him, and if he can just hit the zone occasionally, he becomes a lethal weapon in high-leverage spots. JP Sears, LHP, Athletics Kyle Finnegan, RHP, Nationals: [Nothing new here, either. All of the following still stands.] Why the Cubs didn't just sign Finnegan for around $7 million this winter, I'm really not sure. They liked him last July; they liked him this winter; they have circled back to Washington about him this July. He can be maddening to watch, with a hard but not bat-missing fastball and a splitter that makes many save opportunities long sweats, but he'd be a solid addition. Isiah Kiner-Falefa, SS, Pirates Jake Cronenworth, IF, Padres Wandy Peralta, LHP, Padres Tommy Pham, OF, Pirates Zach Eflin, RHP, Orioles Raisel Iglesias, RHP, Rich Men South of Richmond: Chicago is after Iglesias, but they've gone as far as they're willing to, and Atlanta will not budge. I suspect that that's not going to change, and thus, that no deal will come to fruition. He's not an arm for whom Hoyer is willing to overextend himself. Jorge Soler, DH/RF, Angels: An injury took Soler off the market. Josh Bell, 1B, Nationals Royce Lewis, 3B, Twins Michael A. Taylor, OF, White Sox: [Nothing new] Another great clubhouse guy who'd also be a great defensive substitution or all-purpose backup to Pete Crow-Armstrong and company. Caleb Ferguson, LHP, Pirates Mike Tauchman, OF, White Sox Chris Paddack, RHP, Twins: Minnesota dealt Paddack to Detroit Monday. Tyler Kinley, RHP, Rockies: The Cubs have been in touch with the Rockies about both Kinley and fellow (more controllable) reliever Jake Bird. Kinley is a slider monster at this stage of his career, and would just be one more arm in the mix, but he's good enough to stick in the thin Chicago pen. Kenley Jansen, RHP, Angels Ke’Bryan Hayes, 3B, Pirates Miguel Andújar, 3B/DH, Athletics: [Same as it was five days ago] His glove and legs are too leaden to make acquiring him to play in lieu of Matt Shaw viable. If the team wants just a bit more offensive depth from the right side, though, he could replace Vidal Bruján without anyone really noticing. Ramón Urías, 3B, Orioles Luis Rengifo, IF, Angels Austin Slater, OF, White Sox Enyel De Los Santos, RHP, The Team By the Highway: [Still true] Going back two years, De Los Santos has popped up on the Cubs' radar multiple times. He's a very low-grade target, but if he shakes loose just when they have an opening, they might well decide to scoop him up this time. Luis Urías, 2B, Athletics Christian Vázquez, C, Twins Ty France, 1B, Twins Andrew Chafin, LHP, Nationals Aaron Civale, RHP, White Sox Nolan Arenado, 3B, Cardinals Andrew Heaney, LHP, Pirates Jakob Junis, RHP, Guardians Kyle Hendricks, RHP, Angels Sean Newcomb, LHP, Athletics Tomoyuki Sugano, RHP, Orioles Luis García, RHP, Nationals Tyler Anderson, LHP, Angels I've crossed 16 names off this list since Thursday, and plenty of them remain extreme longshots. Still, it should be clear that the Cubs have a large number of possible ways left to improve their squad before Thursday evening. Some of the odds have shifted in each direction, and they'll do so again in the next several hours. For now, though, few things the team was ever very interested in doing have ceased to be possible. View full article