Cubs offseason rumors/transactions

[CSF77]

They better hope so, because those 2 guys will be a big part of how successful the bullpen can become next year

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If is me I’m resigning Davis and Duesing. They we the “best” in the pen. Then I’m making them my primary 8-9 guys.

Edwards and Wilson would be high leverage pitchers that come in and look for strike outs. Not guys you start a inning with but guys you bring in to shut a inning down.

Strop would be a guy for rotational uses when guys are over used in roles to give them a day off.

Tseng and Montgomery would be for middle innings. Pretty much low leverage starting a inning types. Have started so you can get their pitch counts up with out much concern.

Honestly what they need is established roles. Most successful pens work under this manor. They know their place and prepare mentally for them.

 

[beckdawg]

Honestly I think you both make excellent points here, but here's the issue; bullpens can never be trusted. If you invest money and it fails you're still looking for guys. I think Chapman's contract is going to look abysmal in less than two years. When he loses velo he's going to be awful. There are a handful of pen guys that are consistently good, and the Cubs have a couple of those in Strop and Montgomery but they don't have a stable of guys who can slide in and close. Edwards should have been the guy, he fits the entire profile but he's just not able to maintain consistency in big situations. If the goal is to stay under the luxury tax year after year you can't sing $60 plus million contracts to closers. On the other hand you're run out of prospects and you might hit a wall where you don't have enough starting pitching which is always my concern. Those two points pretty much encapsulate what both of you are saying. The bottom line is that they need some solid relievers to come out of the system in order to be able to spend on a closer. Until that happens I think it's rent-a-closer year after year, and I wish it didn't have to be.

I mean it's not that I disagree that paying relievers is stupid. But what are the alternatives? In my view giving up prospects is even dumber. And ok if you give up a few decent prospects for 3 years of Colome then fine. I can live with that. What infuriates me to no end is the fact they know going in that they are buying 1 year rentals. And Torres/Soler weren't some useless pieces. They were both top 15 prospects at some point. Now obviously Soler didn't play well in 2017 but that's looking at things in hindsight.

The way I see it is this. You gotta have someone for the 9th. That's always going to be the case and for whatever reason certain guys just aren't good there. If you have $40 mil to spend on your bullpen put $15 mil on an elite closer and find the other parts. The Dodgers got Morrow for basically nothing. The cubs got Duensing I believe for $2 mil. Finding 7 guys for ~$3.5 mil a pop isn't that hard. Now finding elite guys is tougher. But that doesn't mean you can't find effective guys.

In other words, I have 0 issue paying Davis. My issue is paying Rondon $6 mil or whatever he made last year to be next to nothing. Obviously the hope was he'd return to early 2016 form but clearly that didn't happen. So how do you stop that? In my eyes, you can't go half way. By that i mean you either pay for the elite talent or you pay for guys who are buy low like Duensing. Anything in the $4-8 mil range are going to be scary gambles. Just as an example, I thought at the time Koji was an interesting bet at $6 mil. But in hindsight that ended up being a lot of money for a guy who had a 3.98 ERA.

Koji in essence was the problem with the cubs bullpen in 2017. They paid a lot of average guys better than average guy money and didn't get performance out of them.

 

[chibears55]

Didnt realize the only reliever cubs have under contract is Pedro Strop..
Final year at 5.8 mil with 500,000 option for 2019...

They have 6 relievers in ARB years..
Rondon final year
Wilson final year
Grimm 2 yrs left
Monty 3 yrs left
Edwards 4 yrs left
Butler 4 yrs left

Then they have Maples and Zastryzny as bullpen depth..

Just a thought but if they add 3 or more relievers, they can use a couple of these guys in minor trades or add ons in a trade to a team looking for cheap relievers..

Grimm can net some IFA money [emoji16]

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[chibears55]

http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/baseball/cubs/ct-spt-cubs-leadoff-man-20171114-story,amp.html

General manager Jed Hoyer said at the GM meetings there’s not one leadoff man “clearly on the roster,” which means the Cubs will probably have to go outside the organization.


This tells me..
With CF and 2B the most common position to find a leadoff hitter..

They have ZERO plans of starting Almora in CF

OR

They dont plan on starting Baez or Happ at 2B, meaning 1 or both could be dealt..





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[DanTown]

I keep hearing this but teams like NYY and LAD disagree.

Are you talking about their much younger closers who have shown an ability and willingness to pitch multiple innings, even in the regular season? While having far better numbers than Davis has now.

 

[CSF77]

http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/baseball/cubs/ct-spt-cubs-leadoff-man-20171114-story,amp.html

General manager Jed Hoyer said at the GM meetings there’s not one leadoff man “clearly on the roster,” which means the Cubs will probably have to go outside the organization.


This tells me..
With CF and 2B the most common position to find a leadoff hitter..

They have ZERO plans of starting Almora in CF

OR

They dont plan on starting Baez or Happ at 2B, meaning 1 or both could be dealt..





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It would be tempting to go after Billy Hamilton. I have no idea what Cinci would demand but Billy has established himself into a premier D CF.

 

[CSF77]

Are you talking about their much younger closers who have shown an ability and willingness to pitch multiple innings, even in the regular season? While having far better numbers than Davis has now.

Last I checked Wade did go over a inning per when needed.


And if you have a quality pen then you really don’t have to wreck your closers arm.

And if you have these guys doing the same thing every day then it causes stability.

Then when you have to replace a pen pitcher you are not looking at a “name” you are looking at a skill set.

 

[DanTown]

It's not that any was necessarily "the guy" to get an elite young starter but rather the cumulative effect. For example, it's entirely possible you might have been able to work a deal around Soler/Jiminez for Q rather than Cease and then you have Cease for the next deal and so on.

I think arguing Dylan Cease and Jorge Soler have had similar trade value in the past twelve months to be highly suspect. Soler two or three years ago sure was at that level but after a massive regression in ability to hit MLB pitching with a continuing of nagging injuries has led to Soler being a drastically lower value prospect. Basically, when the Cubs traded Soler and Candalrio, I didn't care that those guys were leaving because they had never shown an ability to be a high level player on a ML team and if they playing for the Cubs then the Cubs likely weren't contending for a WS championship.

And the thing is Briton isn't even cheap. He's likely $3-4 mil less than Davis is going to get next year. Ok so you are giving Davis 3 years but then who replaces Briton? For example, the last 2 years Davis made $10 mil for the cubs and Chapman made $11.325 mil. Granted in Chapman's case he was a half season rental but my point here is you're saving $3-4 mil a year to not sign a guy and you're giving up a slew of decent prospects. If they go the Briton route they've effectively signed a closer for 3 years $33.325 mil or roughly $11 AAV.

Again, the problem with paying Wade Davis is that closers, especially at his age, are notoriously terrible.


Since 2000, only four relievers have been 6+ fWAR for ages 32-35

Rivera
M. Thornton
Wagner
Betancourt

Five others have been 5-6 WAR

Hoffman
F. Cordero
Quantrill
Otsuka
J. Nathan

That's it. For almost the past 20 years, only nine pitchers have returned what you'd call the most optimistic value for Davis seeing as he just was a 1.1 fWAR pitcher last year. That type of risk and price is simply why I don't see how Davis has any value to any contract he'd sign for.

I have a problem paying for saves in terms of long term money. Trading Soler was not paying anything to get Davis. Trading something not off the MLB roster and the top prospects is an adequate cost to get Britton if you trust his arm.

If you don't like Davis as the guy to sign long term fine. But this continual trading of prospect rather than signing someone is just stupid. Find a guy you like and pay him the money. There's also the issue that because the cubs bullpen has been in such flux season to season you end up where they are consistently dealing in season for guys like Montgomery and Wilson.

It's both though. I want to sign two guys (McGee and Morrow) but if you told me that you could get say Britton and sign Morrow for a 2 year deal, I'd do that instead. Morrow is a good backup if you truly believe you need a "closer" and then you have the hope that Edwards or someone else pops as a late inning guy.

I mean, a prospect has as much value to me in a trade for a player than he does to the future MLB team he would be on. Not every player and prospect is going to be valuable to you because of his on field play; that's unrealistic.

 

[DanTown]

It would be tempting to go after Billy Hamilton. I have no idea what Cinci would demand but Billy has established himself into a premier D CF.

He's also a terrible leadoff hitter.

 

[DanTown]

Then you are not getting Britton. I'm not sure you get him if you don't take those guys off the table.

Because Wade Davis, who had less injury related decline than Britton showed last year, went for Jorge Soler.

Baltimore clearly should have traded Britton a year ago when his value was likely where you're pegging it but after a year where he missed a ton of time, struggled to locate, and lost velocity, his value isn't there.

 

[anotheridiot]

I think arguing Dylan Cease and Jorge Soler have had similar trade value in the past twelve months to be highly suspect. Soler two or three years ago sure was at that level but after a massive regression in ability to hit MLB pitching with a continuing of nagging injuries has led to Soler being a drastically lower value prospect. Basically, when the Cubs traded Soler and Candalrio, I didn't care that those guys were leaving because they had never shown an ability to be a high level player on a ML team and if they playing for the Cubs then the Cubs likely weren't contending for a WS championship.



Again, the problem with paying Wade Davis is that closers, especially at his age, are notoriously terrible.


Since 2000, only four relievers have been 6+ fWAR for ages 32-35

Rivera
M. Thornton
Wagner
Betancourt

Five others have been 5-6 WAR

Hoffman
F. Cordero
Quantrill
Otsuka
J. Nathan

That's it. For almost the past 20 years, only nine pitchers have returned what you'd call the most optimistic value for Davis seeing as he just was a 1.1 fWAR pitcher last year. That type of risk and price is simply why I don't see how Davis has any value to any contract he'd sign for.

I have a problem paying for saves in terms of long term money. Trading Soler was not paying anything to get Davis. Trading something not off the MLB roster and the top prospects is an adequate cost to get Britton if you trust his arm.



It's both though. I want to sign two guys (McGee and Morrow) but if you told me that you could get say Britton and sign Morrow for a 2/3 year deal, I'd do that instead. Morrow is a good backup if you truly believe you need a "closer" and then you have the hope that Edwards or someone else pops as a late inning guy.

I mean, a prospect has as much value to me in a trade for a player than he does to the future MLB team he would be on. Not every player and prospect is going to be valuable to you because of his on field play; that's unrealistic.

Wow, never saw anything with Soler? How about the playoff run in 2015 where he was the only guy hitting, on base like 12 our of 16 times. He got thanked for his effort by signing Heyward to a 182 million dollar deal. How is that supposed to effect a young player who has been a man among boys all thru his career?

Dont give me that gave 7 speech, man shit the bed and did nothing but talk. 10 gold glove putouts from right field, big deal, I would have taken 40 more RBi's.

 

[DanTown]

There was 22 pitchers who were 1.5+ fWAR out of the bullpen in 2016
There was 29 pitchers who were 1.5+ fWAR out of the bullpen in 2017

Only five guys (Miller, Chapman, Hand, Giles, Jansen) from 2016 were on the list in 2017.
Nine guys (Otero, Familia, Herrera, Barraclugh, Britton, N. Jones, Bush, Thornburg, W. Harris) failed to post even 1.0 WAR seasons

Bullpens, except in rare and expensive cases, are year-to-year and not things you want to invest a lot of long term too.

 

[CSF77]

He's also a terrible leadoff hitter.

Depends. I would have him bunt myself. If they pull up then pull back and slap it past them.

It is old school but causes havoc when on. Add to it he is not a D void. Actually he would be a upgrade.

There are not any Ricky’s or Lou’s anymore. Sometimes you have to settle with a Vince

 

[CSF77]

Wow, never saw anything with Soler? How about the playoff run in 2015 where he was the only guy hitting, on base like 12 our of 16 times. He got thanked for his effort by signing Heyward to a 182 million dollar deal. How is that supposed to effect a young player who has been a man among boys all thru his career?

Dont give me that gave 7 speech, man shit the bed and did nothing but talk. 10 gold glove putouts from right field, big deal, I would have taken 40 more RBi's.

They signed Heyward because Soler sucked in RF. Add to it he was injured 50 games per year.

I would make that trade again.

 

[DanTown]

Wow, never saw anything with Soler? How about the playoff run in 2015 where he was the only guy hitting, on base like 12 our of 16 times. He got thanked for his effort by signing Heyward to a 182 million dollar deal. How is that supposed to effect a young player who has been a man among boys all thru his career?

How about the fact that in the regular season before that he was a .1 WAR player with over 400 PA? No one on this board was a larger believer in Soler's talents but even I understood why they went the way they did. I certainly don't judge a player's value based on the playoffs and 30-50 PA samples. In 2015, he literally never consistently hit and then in 2016 he was the same and in 2017, he did the same thing in Kansas City.

Prospect and player evaluation is an ongoing thing, not something that you do when a guy is 18-20 and then that label sticks forever. You're always evaluating. If the Cubs traded Soler in 2014 for a one-year closer I would have said they were crazy; after they did it in 2016 I can understand why as Davis' was more valuable to the 2017 Cubs WS chances than Soler most likely would ever be in any season going forward.

Dont give me that gave 7 speech, man shit the bed and did nothing but talk. 10 gold glove putouts from right field, big deal, I would have taken 40 more RBi's.

I think anyone arguing that before 2016 Jorge Soler was in the same orbit in terms of value and ability as Jason Heyward is obviously lying. Obviously the Heyward thing has gone almost as bad as you want but that has nothing to do with evaluating Jorge Soler's value.

 

[DanTown]

Depends. I would have him bunt myself. If they pull up then pull back and slap it past them.

It is old school but causes havoc when on. Add to it he is not a D void. Actually he would be a upgrade.

There are not any Ricky’s or Lou’s anymore. Sometimes you have to settle with a Vince

He had a .299 OBP and now has a career .298 OBP. He's an awful leadoff hitter.

 

[chibears55]

It would be tempting to go after Billy Hamilton. I have no idea what Cinci would demand but Billy has established himself into a premier D CF.

I was looking more at Kevin Kiermaier..
Or
They could make it a more bigger trade if Rays were to add a pitcher


Also

Dee Gordon could be a possibility if Marlins willing to move his salary

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[TC in Mississippi]

I was looking more at Kevin Kiermaier..
Or
They could make it a more bigger trade if Rays were to add a pitcher


Also

Dee Gordon could be a possibility if Marlins willing to move his salary

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How much of an upgrade is Kiermaier to Almora? I would say not a lot and Almora is cheaper, doesn't make any sense to me.

 

[chibears55]

How much of an upgrade is Kiermaier to Almora? I would say not a lot and Almora is cheaper, doesn't make any sense to me.

Im convinced they just dont like Almora as an everyday player...

He a lefty bat who had a .810 OPS vs LH starters and .777 OPS vs RHS last year..

He 27 and signed for 5 yrs with a team option for 6th yr..





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[anotheridiot]

How about the fact that in the regular season before that he was a .1 WAR player with over 400 PA? No one on this board was a larger believer in Soler's talents but even I understood why they went the way they did. I certainly don't judge a player's value based on the playoffs and 30-50 PA samples. In 2015, he literally never consistently hit and then in 2016 he was the same and in 2017, he did the same thing in Kansas City.

Prospect and player evaluation is an ongoing thing, not something that you do when a guy is 18-20 and then that label sticks forever. You're always evaluating. If the Cubs traded Soler in 2014 for a one-year closer I would have said they were crazy; after they did it in 2016 I can understand why as Davis' was more valuable to the 2017 Cubs WS chances than Soler most likely would ever be in any season going forward.



I think anyone arguing that before 2016 Jorge Soler was in the same orbit in terms of value and ability as Jason Heyward is obviously lying. Obviously the Heyward thing has gone almost as bad as you want but that has nothing to do with evaluating Jorge Soler's value.

I just think people take so much of human beings out of the equation. Soler was a stud, did a stand up job for his first full season when he was not hurt, probably touched 120 on the ball coming off the bat speed. He is the most productive in the playoffs and loses his job.

Put that in any job anywhere and it will effect people. Maddon just plain never liked him.

Anyway, now we are hearing all kinds of names to lead off and replace someone in the same predicament.

Nobody says why cant Rizzo or Bryant go opposite field, its **** Baez, Happ, Almora for not being able to do it and god forbid something negative is going to crack the egg shell psyche of Heyward, who has not been right since getting hit in the face.

Everyone preached patience to get the kids here, now its getting some replaced. Just seems like there are other options.