Stratos

I think trading away cheap young talented controllable 3B in Paredes, Cam Smith, and Shaw and having no 3B after years of not having one since KB would be a big organizational failure. Cubs chose to keep Shaw over the other 2 and I think they should see it out, he still has offensive potential. I get that a lot of fans no longer like him since Kirk-gate but I don't think this is the right call.

I could see someone like King or similar because there's some upside there which are SP they seem to target, I think they'd likely be outbid on Cease. Some upside on him too but probably less value there on the kind of contract he'll get.

What options do they have to decide, besides Imanaga? I know Kittredge, and...?

Personally my expectation is they bump payroll 5-10 million to keep pace with the LT increase and inflation. They seem willing to spend up to near the LT if there's a good player on a contract that at least pays for itself (like their interest in Bregman last offseason). But if they won't spend up to the LT even after acquiring Tucker then Ricketts really has no urgency to spend or be a championship team. Ricketts spent only around $225m, they got 92 wins, filled the seats all year, and got 2 rounds of playoff revenues, this was a successful season for Tom. Sure he'd love them to get to the WS but from a business perspective I don't think he sees spending tens of millions extra on payroll for a slightly higher chance to go deeper in the playoffs as a wise investment. He seems fine with having a team good enough to fill seats, sneak into the playoffs, and then roll the dice and hopefully get lucky.

Expect to be disappointed.

The Brewers really showed they have no class this series. What a bunch of petty trolls:

What would have happened this series if they had signed Bregman?

Hard to see Happ, Seiya, or Nico getting traded. Is there even a point if they could?

They really need to think of a backup option for Shaw. He's looked uncomfortable for most of the season. He dives towards the plate with his stride and pitches seem to come on him quickly, his plate coverage is also bad. I think there's definitely tweaks they can keep making.

Brewers may not have a lot of power but they put the fat part of the bat on the ball and drive liners around the diamond and don't swing greedy. They did a good job this series and the homefield was a big factor. They're really annoying. Also think we got a bit outmanaged. Pomeranz as an opener is a head-scratcher and Rea 2nd time through the order also. MeGill as opener was brilliant. Oh well.

I think the biggest thing is they lost Horton, he would have been a big upgrade and likely would have started 2 games this series. Tucker did nothing tonight and could still be hurt. Imanaga stunk it up down the stretch. Steele is hurt. Key bad luck to some of their best players. Shaw was also terrible, PCA has the hitting approach of a 3-year old (looked a bit better this series). At least it was a good series.

The Brewers had a week to prepare for our SP. Who knows what they figured out in that time.

Teams do this, it's legal. But the Brewers are bush league, I wouldn't put anything past them, I don't like the way they operate, but they're also not alone. They do seem very good at gaining value on the fringes, legal or not. Jed and the Cubs players seem like a group of really good people, and i suspect it's at least partially by design led by Jed. Maybe they're even too nice for this era? I dunno, but they can probably hang their heads high. I'm proud of them no matter what happens.

I'd throw anyone but. Brown + Civale plus rest of pen, whomever. Rea etc in Game 5. At best I think they should use an opener and use Boyd for 1 inning max if there's a spot in the lineup where guys haven't hit him this series/ season.

QUITTERS NEVER WIN AND WINNERS NEVER QUIT. EAT THESE BUSH- LEAGUE BITCHES. LET'S horsefeathers GOOOO!!!!!!

I mean maybe.

It could. Tucker/Seiya in RF/DH was about 7.5 WAR. So replaced with Seiya/ Caissie/Moises/Alcantara/Long/bench bat etc is maybe a difference of about 2-3 wins. You could grab 1-2 WAR upgrade signing a good SP, and if eg Shaw and Amaya have good years that's another 1-2 WAR. Last halfs of offense don't typically carry over to the next year. Didn't after 2023 or 2024. It's usually just randomness.

Why did you cherry-pick around the terrible start he had vs the Mets on Sept 25? Shota had a 6.51 ERA in Sept and was the worst qualified SP in the baseball in Sept. in terms of fWAR. Then he got lit up by the Padres in the NLWC. Colin Rea was the best SP in baseball in Sept in fWAR, the choice seemed obvious: Go back to Aug 1 and Rea is still better (this doesn't even include Shota's bad start vs Padres in NLWC: Shota's ERA in Aug was good but his xFIP was average, He pitched twice at Wrigley with the wind blowing in from CF and another start at Wrigley vs the Pirates, then started in STL (they suck) and in SF (huge OF). Given how he's been pitching he's likely not going to be good unless he's pitching at Wrigley with the wind blowing in.

It wasn't scientific....it was super scientific! (or not). Here's all the position players aged 34 or older this season. You have to be a freak to be above-average at that age. Nico's first season in his next contract he'll be 30 y/o:

People won't like this opinion but the Cubs aren't going to get much better if at all via free agency from what they had all year this year. Unless Ricketts ups the payroll to do something like both keep Tucker and acquire a quality SP. If Tucker walks then at best we replace the value via free agent SP etc. Otherwise the gains need to come from our young players getting better. Shaw, PCA, Amaya, Brown etc plus some of the Iowa guys. Still a 90 win team even if we don't improve over this year.

The Shota start might have been more questionable than the Boyd start IMO. At least he hadn't been terrible his last month in every single start.

Oh ok, It's so confusing LOL. Well could he beat 2/30 or whatever he's due the next 2 years with us? I wouldn't give him 3 years.

Shota is down 1 mph this year and not getting younger. His K/9 is down significantly and guys teeing off on his FB and inducing a lot of flyballs. His HR/FB is league average but has done this in a pitcher friendly park that inhibits HR. Our elite defense obviously makes his other numbers better. If they want to upgrade their SP beyond league average then they need to look at upgrading guys like Taillon, Imanaga, and Rea. Being solid isn't good enough. Shota has 2 more years guaranteed with us plus a player option for 2028 if we decline 2028. The opt-in this winter is for 2028, there's no team opt out. He's on the team next year and 2027.

Yeah. Tucker and Happ having a bad playoff, PCA and Shaw look completely overmatched, Swanson is Swanson, Kelly is Kelly. Pitching bad and hitting bad isn't a good combo.

If we get 2 WAR worse at 2B and get 2 WAR better at SP I don't think it makes a difference at all. A SP in the playoffs only throws 4 IP now apparently anyways so their value is even less in the playoffs. Our SP just happened to be performing terrible this round, but Boyd and Shota aren't bad pitchers, they're above average but struggling at this point in the season. We do need to acquire another good SP though. You could resign Nico to a 4 or 5 year deal or whatever. He's also a SS for teams so we need to keep that in mind. He could get 5/125 or something like that. But we can't expect him to remain a 4 WAR player in his 30's. From age 30-35 I could see something like 4.0 WAR, 3.5, 3.5, 3.0, 2.5, 2.0. Would I pay 5/125 for that? No. Shaw can play 2B also so we have to find either a 3B or a 2B to replace Nico and finding a 4.5 WAR guy there probably won't happen. Resigning Tucker probably nabs us around 2.0 extra WAR over whatever his replacement would be over the next 4 seasons or so until he starts to regress. If the Cubs can figure out a better way to spend 350 million or whatever over the next 8-10 years that nabs us more WAR then do it. e.g. 1 WAR upgrade at SP and another 1 WAR at another position does that. They could literally just trade Taillon and replace him by signing an above average FA SP (I consider Taillon an average SP) then sign another above average SP. Boom 2 WAR.