Joj

Ok, so what's your takeaway? That the offense doesn't need to be upgraded from last year? Sum it all up for us in a sentence or two.

Oh, sure, they need help. Josh Hader. I was never talking about the bullpen, you were.

Oh, it's exactly what happened. Prospects get shots. They usually fail and get another shot later. With prospects, more equals better odds. Just look at the minor league numbers. Busch and Mervis are basically the same guy.

Shall we do the same thing with the same people, expecting a different result? 🙂

Whatever. He got a shot and they sent him back down. Busch did the same thing last season. Almost every player does. What's more likely is that they haven't completely given up on Mervis based on 90 PA's and instead are bolstering an inherently unpredictable situation. While saving money by not adding an actual, established major leaguer. 2 are better than one. etc.

Lol. Think he's mad from another thread.

How do you know that?

Agreed. He's a decent role player either way and that's fine. They can do far worse.

They also flopped for weeks at a time and couldn't finish the season. Last season's offense wasn't good enough.

Sure, for this to work you'd have to bank on their 2024 replacement(s) to be good. Will Busch be good? PCA? Belli? Probably. Maybe. But so were those 3 last season. These theoretical steps cut all ways. Last year's team was certainly an overperformer. At this time last year there weren't great expectations. The offense definitely surprised many in the first half of the season but there were obvious improvements to be made. It was a young team who started showing enough promise to force a GM into action. For which, we're still waiting (sorry, Jeimer). And that was with a resurgent, absolute monster Bellinger performance that almost nobody was predicting. This was never really a, "yeah, we're ready, let's go with it" situation. UPGRADES are needed. And meaningful ones. We've always known this. Just to be clear, we're talking about Josh Hader. A single BP pitcher? Or one of the best CP in the game. Argue honestly. Josh Hader moves the needle. https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/h/haderjo01.shtml Yep. 2023 MLB Busch - 81 PA, 9-2-7, .167/.247/.292 Mervis - 99 PA, 8-3-11, .167/.242/.289 2023 Minors Busch - 469 PA, 85-27-90, .323/.431/.618 (.274 in 2022) Mervis - 441 PA, 77-22-78, .282/.399/.533 (.309 in 2022) Busch had the better overall year but the ratios are very similar. Increase Mervis' overall production slightly and everything is a carbon copy. By the way, Busch's .323 is the highest of his career. He hit .270 over the previous 2 seasons. The more you dig in, the comparison is actually kind of amazing... Career Minors Busch - 1640 PA, 292-79-267, .283/.390/.529 (4 seasons) Mervis - 1322 PA, 209-67-241, .277/.370/.528 (3 seasons) Pretty dang close. Eerily similar approach and production. https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=mervis000mat https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=busch-002mic

I think you're reading too much into that comment. He was simply trying to excuse their inactivity and avoid scrutiny during a fan event. That said, Bellinger is required. Everyone knows it. And it won't even be that big of a deal, honestly, because that merely gets them back to last year's offense. Which already needed improvement. They need to sign Josh Hader. That will actually start moving the needle. Morel isn't a quality starter. Until he actually does it, Busch isn't either. Mervis has just as good of a shot, similar numbers.

Both common sense and recent comments by Hoyer seem to have put the final nail in the coffin on further SP talk. Not sure it's worth the time or energy to keep looking at Snell's or anyone else's numbers. The team is still playing catchup on offense. By quite a bit. Even if/when Bellinger signs. PIVOT.

Hoyer thinks he's gaining leverage which will ultimately amount to nothing. Nobody's going to offer much for Morel. Carter Hawkins with the Jose Ramirez comp. LOL Yikes.

Lol. You serious, Clark?

Barely treading water as a goal? Gross. Doing absolutely nothing means Jed has a genius master plan underway? And if it all works they'll be slightly above average? While crying poor to anyone still listening? 99.9% sure that's all garbage.

Jed Hoyer recently invented a thing called intelligent spending. Nobody else has ever thought like this. It's amazing. He's amazing. Before this, teams just threw money around without thinking. Unfortunately, it means that nobody signs FA anymore. Oh well, chalk it up to progress!

I see. Hey, at least it was a great conversation. Thanks for the memories!

Because guys like Hoyer are the gatekeepers. Be a keymaster, Jed.

They need to sign Hader. I don't really care for quibbling over a few imaginary millions here or there. We all know the Cubs can afford whatever the number happens to be. And Hoyer's oft-repeated qualifiers in softball interviews do little to move the needle on that particular reality. I'd rather not see Hoyer repeat the mistakes of his predecessor Epstein when it comes to approach on closers. Epstein traded young talent for closers twice (Chapman and Wade Davis) when he could've just paid the money to a FA and kept everyone (or traded them for other needs). Money is the easy (and maybe cheap) way. Especially when you're in a large market.

7 years, 200M. Yeah, sure, that's fine. Even though Bellinger's not really an elite hitter (everyone gets it), the Cubs don't have much leverage. He's the best available option, by far, and the Cubs CERTAINLY DO have money to spend. I'm not losing any sleep when they eventually have to overpay by a few million or whatever. After all, we've watched them underpay for too many years now. And that's no joke.

Manaea...I'm not seeing it. 2 years and 25M for a reliever with little upside? Just no on Hicks. I'm saying Bellinger, JD Martinez and Josh Hader. Like many others are. The Cubs need to sign all three, plus a couple starters (including Imanaga). This is one of the largest markets in the country and they, supposedly, have been saving money for future use for years now. I don't care how many qualifiers Hoyer generates during his latest softball interview, the lineup holes are glaring. Crying poor isn't going to cut it anymore.

Thanks!

I'll be the guy who says that every baseball team at every level does what the Brewers did. Always.