Bull
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Everything posted by Bull
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Back of the napkin you'd probably say something like 83. Coming into the offseason they were at 74 https://blogs.fangraphs.com/the-absurdly-preliminary-2023-zips-projected-standings/ They've added this offseason 13ish WAR. That's not going to equate to 13 wins though because it was spread so much through the roster, rather than being concentrated in a few spots. So I think depending on how you evaluate some of the particulars you'd probably say they added 7-10 wins. I think you have to also consider that they were better in the last half than the first half, making that 74 perhaps not the true baseline.
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The only real platoon opportunity I see is at catcher. Gomes mashes lefties. Barnhart hits righties better than Gomes does, but it’s not as pronounced. I’ll be curious if they play the catcher based on who’s pitching for the Cubs or who’s pitching for the opponent. If/when Mervis comes up, there will be some platoon opportunities at 1B/DH. Looking at handedness, Madrigal would be far more useful if he were a left handed hitter. His only place on this team right now seems to be insurance against Hoerner or Swanson getting hurt. I think that’s a yes to both. It will be by Cubs pitcher, but if they really want the other in the lineup, that one will DH.
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I think it was Carlos Marmol who was unhittabke a few ticks slower than his top speed. At 95-96 his movement was less, pitches straightened out and he got rocked. At 92-93 the four seamer had some natural sink, complementing that wicked slider well. Maybe they see something like this possible here? Also maybe I’m remember this all wrong.
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Was it news that Henricks may not be ready for opening day? I don’t remember hearing that explicitly stated before.
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Stroman and Suzuki were the only ones not there for opening ceremony of cubs convention. Has to be one of them.
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The Hosmer signing itself is almost impossible to be that bad, let alone terrible. It's a league minimum signing. Now, it sets up terrible downstream roster and playing time decisions. But the signing itself is pretty much risk-free. The playtime decisions are kind of the point. If this middling Cub team wants to sneak into the playoffs they need some people to outperform projections. Mervis provides that upside. Hosmer's upside is mediocrity. This team isn't talented enough to waste 250 to 300 pa on Hosmer. I don’t get this take at all. I see Mancini, Morel, Wisdom and Hosmer sharing time at three positions. In May, hopefully Mervis has continued to mash and pushes one of them out. Hosmer is insurance against ANY one of Morel, Wisdom and Mervis sucking, which I’D say is fairly likely. His 108 ops+ is not bad at league minimum, and if he’s more like his 77 with Boston, he’s the one pushed out and you’ve lost not league minimum, but a pro-rated portion of league minimum. Really zero risk.
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Third time's the charm! Correa to the Twins (6/$200m)
Bull replied to UMFan83's topic in Chicago Cubs Talk
Correa at 6/$200 is a really good deal. Probably. Depends how bad that ankle is. If he never tops 140 games and misses one entire season in the first half of the deal…maybe not. -
Third time's the charm! Correa to the Twins (6/$200m)
Bull replied to UMFan83's topic in Chicago Cubs Talk
"pending physical"...so it's just like the other contracts at this time. Yes…but The expectations of that physical are very different given that, A. He’s been with the Twins and their doctors have some familiarity here, B. Everyone now knows there’s a problem C. The numbers are very different than they were with the other two deals. -
I wish I could be that optimistic. In that they weren’t supposed to win in 2015. The wild card was a surprise. I would say a wild card berth would be equally surprising this year.
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I like staying under this year. They going over for one 5 war player takes you from a 79 win team to an 84 win team if things break right. And if they don’t you have to pay larger penalties next year to stay decent. This way you weather Heywards final year and have a big chunk to spend next year, the farm reaches maturity - or at least you know what you have in Davis, the pitchers, and Amaya heading into ‘24 - and you can spend big next year. There are so many question marks on this roster that even if things go reeeeally well and you are in the wild card or division drivers seat come July, there no way to forecast WHICH things went well and which things needs addressed at the deadline. Not to mention that a decent run this year makes you more attractive to FA next year. Lets be honest this wasn’t an attractive destination this off-season. In many ways this is 2015 all over again. Don’t expect this to be the year. Compete this year. Window really opens next year.
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Third time's the charm! Correa to the Twins (6/$200m)
Bull replied to UMFan83's topic in Chicago Cubs Talk
Can’t see it being the Cubs. Too close to the LT now I think As has been mentioned a lot, I don’t think they’d be against going over the LT this year for the right guy/moves. With all the money falling off after the year they could easily reset next year while having room to add. The only reason not to be in on Correa would be if this medical issue is really that big of a worry, which don’t blame them, or if they truly think they can get Ohtani next year and will wait until then to go over the LT. Nobody has said they are adverse to going over the LT, they try and not be repeaters but I’d be surprised if they aren’t over the LT in the next 3 years. Next year will be their year to be over. They will stay under this year unless the team **significantly** over performs as they approach the trade deadline. -
Happ and Dansby with similar OPS last year. So…three almost big bats?? A few years ago here someone was arguing that multiple 3-4 win players were better than the same WAR concentrated in one player surrounded by 1 win players. Not sure if they were right, but we will have the opportunity to see.
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How does another team’s acquisition of a player make the position less of a priority? I think the implication was that they were going to get a significant bat, and if Abreu was available, he would be that bat. With him gone somewhere else, there's no one else available at 1B that they feel fills that need, so they will find the bat at another position. I don't agree, but I think that's what is implied.
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There’s been so much noise and smoke about us doing a big addition or two for literal months, idk how that can be your expectation. Literally everyone from Jed to Ross to beat guys to national guys say we’re gonna be doing some significant additions. Didn’t Jed basically come out and say we weren’t signing a top tier guy? I’ll say it again: there won’t be long term contracts until Heyward’s is off the books.
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Yeah, I believe that was Rizzo Bryant money coming off. I think they’ll be able to spend what comes off this year, but the next big signing will be when Heywards comes off.
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What counts as a major signing for you? They added a 5/100 and 3/71 contract last offseason, and not too many had longer than 5 years or higher than 24 AAV(and even fewer had both). Should have said “top tier.” They will replace Heyward’s contract with a Heyward level contract when it’s gone but not before.
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No, he has been a very insightful poster in the past. One of the first and really educated a lot of us here. Account is clearly hacked.
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This has been my unpopular opinion for awhile now, but I don’t see any major signings until Heyward is off the books. Look forward to another year of throwing things at the wall and seeing if they stick.
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https://www.nj.com/sports/2022/07/mets-face-trade-deadline-bidding-war-for-cubs-willson-contreras-with-al-contender.html?outputType=amp Are we still afraid of Astros pitchers?
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paul kilgus was the first cub as a kid who i thought "this guy sucks." Doug Dascenzo, and Harry horsefeathering loved that dude. “Ya know, Steve, if you spelled Da-sinzo backwards it would be, Oz-nik-zode”
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the earth is flat actually so you can't really circle back to anything Its a disc, so you can still circle back to it technically. Sphere back?
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This post did not age well.
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Heywards contract comes off after 2023. That’s the timeline for prospects as well. As in many will be given a chance to prove themselves in 2023 looking towards “seeing what we have in x” for 2024. Expect big spending once jHeys contract is off the books and they are confident what the holes are going forward.
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I think this holds true for most people, but some people certainly know they're evil and what they're doing is evil. Putin knows he's an horsefeathers, the "bad guy" and he simply doesn't care. Same thing with Trump. Nah, these dudes are narcissists. They know that they’re doing wrong, but in their mind, it’s for the greater good and one day they’ll get the praise they deserve. Bauer’s just a creep, along the lines of Armie Hammer, who thinks that since there’s no law against sexual deviance, so long as it’s consensual-ish, he must be in the right. It’s the Nietzchean ubermench. It’s the inevitable modernist/rationalist resolution of the relativist morality we experienced in the late 20th century. If right and wrong is in the eye of the beholder then I am good to impose my will in society. It’s the clash of modernist and postmodern ideas desperately seeking resolution.
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Pirates announcers are always awful. Today not so bad. Mostly silence.