Jump to content
North Side Baseball

Stratos

Old-Timey Member
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Posts

    4,147

  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    1

 Content Type 

Profiles

Joomla Posts 1

Chicago Cubs Videos

Chicago Cubs Free Agent & Trade Rumors, Notes, & Tidbits

2026 Chicago Cubs Top Prospects Ranking

News

2023 Chicago Cubs Draft Picks

Guides & Resources

2024 Chicago Cubs Draft Picks

The Chicago Cubs Players Project

2025 Chicago Cubs Draft Pick Tracker

2026 Chicago Cubs Draft Tracker: Picks & Bonuses

Blogs

Events

Forums

Store

Gallery

Everything posted by Stratos

  1. Stratos
    I would 100% deal Caissie before Alcantara. I like both and would keep both if possible. We have lots of talent in the low minors to deal plus guys like Triantos.
  2. Stratos
    I think recently, maybe from the end of season presser, Jed also said they would work to improve processes too. To get the most out of what they already have so players can "overachieve" their projections. Some of that has been with some coaching changes so far, and we've seen some scouting shifts. Who knows what's going on elsewhere behind the scenes that doesn't include personnel change. If they can make the rotation and pen a real strength, including by getting SP depth and forcing some of their young SP to the pen, that would go a long way. If .e.g Wicks were to do well as an SP and Brown/Assad are in the pen that would help us.
  3. Stratos
    True. Hoyer also said they'd try to be "creative" generally. But we have all positions filled with quality regulars besides catcher so unless there's a trade I can't see any quality FA bat wanting to sign here, nor does it even make much sense for us. Pitching should be the focus. Keep in mind that if the Cubs offense was suppressed at home that means the pitching wasn't as good as the results appear either. Cubs were 10th in ERA and 20th in xFIP.
  4. Stratos
    But then they still don't have money for other players like pitching and catching if they choose to stay under the tax
  5. Stratos
    RHB OF bench bat makes sense for PCA and possibly Busch. Belli has no issues vs LHP. For Busch any bat could pinch hit and Belli can slide to 1B and Seiya or someone in the bench could play RF. Same for PCA but Belli slides to CF. Harder to take PCA out because of the glove though. I wonder if they'll full platoon with Busch again, I assume they'll want a RHB just in case they do.
  6. Stratos
    He's about a 1 WAR catcher (keeping in mind the reduced playing time for catchers). He's ok. Jansen has a better bat. Per FG, 2.9 WAR was the median for what a team got out of their catcher position in 2024. Cubs got -0.1 WAR haha
  7. Stratos
    Very good pitcher. Wish he was more durable, but that will probably be reflected in his contract. Hasn't been the arm in recent years so that's a plus. It's an injury that keeps bothering him though.
  8. Stratos
    Fried would about 28 AAV, a top reliever around 13m, Jansen about 8m. That's 49m total. We may need some other pen arms, a bench guy or 2. I guess that may be do-able under the tax but it gets tight. Jed seems to work in FA by highlighting all the players they'd be interested in at each position of need, decide what their market value is, and then sign the player whose contract demand is the best bang for the buck. Exception is players where there's only 1 good or obvious option at that position and they seem to go aggressive for them, like Bellinger the last 2 offseasons.
  9. Stratos
    Nobody can predict the future but these guesses are pretty reasonable.
  10. Stratos
    Anything can happen, but with Cody back the most likely scenario for the offseason given the 50-55m to spend seems to be: a quality SP, a quality late-inning reliever (plus other lesser pen signings), a bench bat or 2, and signing a catcher like Jansen or acquiring one via trade. Good news is that given we got essentially zero WAR in 2024 out of every contract of significance coming off the books (Hendricks, Gomes, Mancini, Neris, Barnhart etc) that means the likelihood we spend that money better this winter and are a better team on paper on Opening Day (injuries aside) is virtually assured. 50 million spent could potentially nab us around 7-8 or so WAR in upgrades over last year, which could get us to 90 wins if we're adding to last year's win total, not including what improvements from Paredes, PCA, Amaya might provide (thought that's made up for Nico missing some time and possible other injuries and regressions).
  11. Stratos
    I think a bunch of those predictions you could easily see them getting another year tacked on though.
  12. Stratos
    Fangraph crowdsource predictions that was just posted thinks about 6/180. Fried they say about 5/135
  13. Stratos
    Not in one offseason.
  14. Stratos
    I looked at the fielding stats. Happ didn't rank great in OAA but ranked the highest in LF for UZR and DRS stats. Swanson was the opposite, he ranked the highest in OAA and Fielding Run Value (statcast stats) but for UZR, UZR/150, and DRS Tovar was better than Swanson. So it seems the Rawlings people are going by these older stats to make their judgements. Congrats to Happ.
  15. Stratos
    Thing is we said the same about the 2023 Cubs and their excellent hitting in the 2nd half. Not that you're exactly saying this, but I'm also not going to assume that the PCA and Amaya are the guys we saw in the summer (especially in Aug when we were playing bad teams) while ignoring the rest of their year. They may improve but we have no guarantees and we don't know by how much. Its promising but players also get hot and cold all the time. I think we have potential to hit a bit more HR but we're probably no better than average in HR/ISO and could be below average again.
  16. Stratos
    Yeah video and data probably work well. They'll miss some things possibly but are scouts watching a player warm up or how they interact with teammates in the dugout? And is it worth traveling to see if they do? The things scouts might not see on video like fielding jumps they can measure with the data.
  17. Stratos
    Besides catcher how could we get more HR into the lineup? Would involve a trade but i'm not against that idea.
  18. Stratos
    Even though I like Tauchman and he could fill in if someone gets hurt too I think the way our lineup is built it would be ideal to get more HR power on the team, even if it's the bench. If one of our OF get hurt Tauchman probably gets a bunch of paying time in OF or DH. Losing the power of Belli, Suzuki, or Happ and replacing with Tauchman would hurt on a team already with mediocre HR. I do like having a solid vet with a short simple swing like Tauchman on the bench though. Younger guys like Canario probably need more regular playing time to stay effective, especially if they haven't seen a lot of MLB pitching.
  19. Stratos
    I wonder how Tauchman's right- left splits were in the minors, especially AAA, he had a ton of minor league reps. That could give us more of a clue since we'd assume he'd be get regular playing time as a starterdown there. Not 1:1 to MLB pitching but better than nothing.
  20. Stratos
    5 different websites will have 5 different numbers for what the Cubs payroll was for luxury tax purposes in 2024. Exactly how much the Cubs have to spend under the tax this offseason is one of life's mysteries that nobody knows besides God and Jed.
  21. Stratos
    Tauchman has even career splits against LH vs RH though. Only 290 career PA vs LH, but thems the numbers.
  22. Stratos
    Don't they dare cut Mastrobuoni
  23. Stratos
    Thank you for posting all this. - What's their "Fld" stat? I assume "fielding" but what does it measure? Swanson is at -0.5 which seems odd. Busch had a high BABIP (his xBA in 2024 was .221) so maybe that's the key with their low projection. He has a nice swing and approach though. They project Seiya at 2,2 WAR, maybe the xBA and all his time projected at DH. Bellinger stays around his stats last year. These projections aren't surprising, they see basically our whole rotation ERA's regressing. This team doesn't look very good here. Projecting a whole lot of average-ness.
  24. Stratos
    Amaya has some upside but i don't think the FO should make decisions for next year based on 2 good months when the others were terrible (including Sept). Anyone can hit well for 100 AB's. I hope they see him as a 2nd catcher at this point until he proves otherwise and can find an upgrade to pair with him.
  25. Stratos
    Belli is a good player and think the HR can go up from last year but he's still a 20-25 HR guy. We could really use more HR. But he brings other things to the table, a good all- around player, virtually no holes in his game. This lineup is looking exactly the same as last season. That's a bit worrisome. At least we have a full year of Paredes. Counting on finding a catcher to get more power and an offensive boost to the lineup will be tough. Especially since catchers don't play every day. Jed has been good at filling holes when needed though. Amaya could do better next year but it's not something we should count on. He was terrible every month but July and Aug. A Bellinger trade is unlikely but isn't off the table. Jed is very flexible and does things we dont expect so I think they'll still look at Soto and any other options that could boost the offense.
×
×
  • Create New...