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Gonfalon Cubs — Cubs Baseball for Thinking Fans Wednesday, April 06, 2022I guess we’re still doing this?After last year’s bloodbath/cliffdive/whatever you want to call it, it can be hard to summon up much real enthusiasm for this year’s team. It’s maybe a mediocre team on paper with a slight chance of being better but a real chance of being much worse. It’s pretty impressive to have a roster that makes it both obvious how cheap the owners are - $136mil opening day payroll - while also being totally overpaid (I’m looking mostly at you, Jason). If you want to be kind to the FO, this is a transition year, one where they try to see if anyone is worth keeping and to give the very young - but potentially good - prospects another year to develop; less politely they’re inexperienced yet old. This is a roster than only has 2 clear every day players - one a Japanese rookie and the other a soon to be FA catcher; there’s a chance they have only 1 player start 130 games this year. They have 3 clear SPs, one of whom is a 35 year old who was more valuable last year than his previous best 2 seasons combined and is going to start the year on the IL. Everyone in the pen is either over 35 or under 25 (or so it seems). This is a Rays roster without all the talent and getting paid twice as much. Or to borrow the marketing slogan, it’s different here - whether that’s good or not is in the eye of the beholder. Trying to organize this into a typical season preview will be difficult. One of the best case scenarios still leads to a massive sell-off at the trade deadline. So I’ll just start typing and see where this goes…. The Good? The Bad The could go either way Final Prediction: 75 wins, with at least 12 guys from the opening day roster dealt at midseason. Moses Taylor loves a good maim
Posted: April 06, 2022 at 01:57 PM | 54 comment(s)
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1. Moses Taylor loves a good maim Posted: April 06, 2022 at 02:31 PM (#6070571)That's 4 more wins than last year's team, which started the season with better players. For this team to get to 75 wins, they need all their tradable players on the roster all season.
So even if, say, Contreras has a monster first half, what are the Cubs going to realistically get for him? Maybe some prospect on the edge of MLB's top 100 and a couple of lottery tickets that we're as likely as not to ever hear about again. But he's their most likely trade asset - hard to see anyone else on the roster fetching back much in a trade unless the Cubs want to deal Stroman and take on most of his 2023 salary.
I guess my point is that I think we're going to see the traditional deadline market dry up for the most part and building a roster with an eye towards being sellers in the trade market will be an increasingly dumb idea. So I'll take the under of 12 players traded.
Otherwise, I think this team as constituted is a 70-75 win team, so 75 wins doesn't seem outlandish. Probably would set the over/under at about 72 myself ... nothing below 80 would surprise me much; more than 80 would be an enjoyable year, I think.
Maybe my 12 guys prediction should really be at least 12 guys traded or released/DFAd. I don't think anyone of note will be dealt - I still don't see them dealing Contreras and I'm not high enough on Miley or Smyly or any of the relievers being good enough to fetch a real return - I just think the end of year roster is just going to be significantly different than the one at the start of the year.
First Cubs HR of the season, since 2000:
2022: Nico Hoerner
2021: Kris Bryant
2020: Ian Happ
2019: Javier Baez
2018: Ian Happ
2017: Willson Contreras
2016: Miguel Montero
2015: Chris Coghlan
2014: Anthony Rizzo
2013: Anthony Rizzo
2012: Darwin Barney
2011: Alfonso Soriano
2010: Marlon Byrd
2009: Alfonso Soriano
2008: Kosuke Fukudome
2007: Mark DeRosa
2006: Matt Murton
2005: Derrek Lee
2004: Corey Patterson
2003: Corey Patterson
2002: Todd Hundley
2001: Julio Zuleta
2000: Shane Andrews
-Suzuki looks great. Not just the homers, but the patience and the batting eye. Going into yesterday, he only had swung and missed once. He just seems so happy and like he's having fun all the time, great guy to root for.
-Happ starting hot is unexpected. I was most impressed by two hits going the other way as a righty yesterday.
-Heyward/Hermasillo looks like a straight platoon so far, which is disappointing. Heyward is getting his 4th start today (4th RHP starter they've faced), though he was PH for the other day against a lefty reliever. I still say they need to give Hermasillo more PT and I just don't want to see Heyward ever again.
-I've been pleasantly surprised with Nico's defense at SS, especially his arm. Maybe he's actually gotten better over there, though obviously too early to say.
-I'm also a little surprised that Ortega/Frazier appears to be a pretty straight forward platoon at DH (and leadoff) so far. Ortega clearly shouldn't hit against lefties, but Frazier should get ABs against righties too, and other guys should rotate thru DH. So I expect this one is more just about early season matchups.
-Gotta be pretty happy with the starters one time through, even if MIL and PIT aren't the toughest offenses (plus early season weather impacts). But lots of weak contact across the board. Steele looked great, and he's the guy I'm most interested in watching. Bullpens are bullpens, but I'm also ok with settling on Robertson as the closer for now. Roberts stuff is great.
Hendricks reverting to his 2021 self today is discouraging, though.
EDIT: and Heyward is hitting against a lefty here in the 6th. Weak 3-1 groundout.
So, like, we were worried about depth in the rotation this year, and we made it all the way to ... April 16 before the issue came to a head.
First Cubs HR of the season, since 2000:
And now, the 1990s & 1980s:
1999: Mark Grace
1998: Henry Rodriguez
1997: Mark Grace
1996: Rey Sanchez
1995: Mark Grace
1994: Tuffy Rhodes, of course
1993: Jose Vizciano
1992: Mark Grace
1991: Shawon Dunston
1990: Andre Dawson
1989: Andre Dawson
1988: Jody Davis
1987: Ryne Sandberg
1986: Leon Durham
1985: Keith Moreland
1984: Keith Moreland
1983: the immortal Wayne Nordhagen
1982: Bump Willis
1981: Mike Tyson
1980: Dave Kingman
Bit of a surprise that it was never Sosa.
I was at that game! All the HR off of Dwight Gooden, who gave up 7 runs and got the win.
1979: Dave Kingman
1978: Dave Kingman
1977: Steve Ontiveros
1976: Jerry Morales
1975: Jerry Morales
1974: Billy Williams
1973: Joe Pepitone
1972: Billy Williams
1971: Billy Williams
1970: Jim Hickman
1969: Ernie Banks
1968: Ron Santo
1967: Glenn Beckert
1966: George Altman
1965: Roberto Pena
1964: Andre Rogers
1963: Ron Santo
1962: Ernie Banks
1961: Andre Rogers
1960: Don Zimmer
1959: Ernie Banks
1958: Cal Neeman
1957: Bob Speake
1956: Ernie Banks
1955: Gene Baker
1954: Clyde McCullough
1953: Preston Ward
1952: Randy Jackson
1951: Andy Pafko
1950: Andy Pafko
1949: Bob Scheffing
1948: Phil Cavaretta
1947: Andy Pafko
1946: Phil Cavaretta
1945: Bill Nicholson
1944: Roy Easterwood
1943: Bill Nicholson (over 30 games into the year!)
1942: Lou Stringer
1941: Bill Nicholson
1940: Augie Galan
1939: Joe Marty
1938: Clay Bryant (starting pitcher)
1937: Frank Demaree
1936: Frank Demaree
1935: Gabby Hartnett
1934: Chuck Klein
1933: Riggs Stephenson
1932: Vince Barton
1931: Gabby Hartnett
1930: Riggs Stephenson
1929: Riggs Stephenson
1928: Freddie Maguire
1927: Earl Webb
1926: Howard Freigau
1925: Grover Cleveland Alexander (yeah, the Hall of Fame pitcher)
1924: Gabby Hartnett
1923: John Kelleher
1922: Hack Miller
1921: Bob O'Farrell
1920: Dode Paskert
No Hack Wilson. All hail Riggs Stephenson?
4 - Ernie Banks and Mark Grace
3 - Gabby Hartnett, Riggs Stephenson, Bill Nicholson, Andy Pafko, Billy Williams, Dave Kingman
2 - Frank Demaree, Phil Cavaretta, Andre Rogers, Ron Santo, Jerry Morales, Keith Moreland, Andre Dawson, Corey Patterson, Alfonso Soriano, Anthony Rizzo, and Ian Happ
Weidest one? I'll go with Andre Rodgers, who hit 45 homers in his career, and had more than six in a season just once (a big 12, with the 1964 Cubs).
Dave Kingman is the only guy to do it three years in a row.
1918: Fred Merkle
1917: Larry Doyle
1916: Vic Saier
1915: Wilbur Good
1914: Vic Saier
1913: Frank Schulte
1912: Jimmy Sheckard
1911: Frank Schulte
1910: Ginger Beaumont
1909: Frank Schulte
1908: Frank Schulte
1907: Frank Schulte
1906: Harry Steinfeldt
1905: Joe Tinker
1904: Frank Chance
1903: Johnny Kling
1902: Charlie Dexter
1901: Barry McCormick
1900:
Eh, that's as far back as I can get info.
All hall five time first-homer-guy Frank Schulte. He & Kingman are the only ones to do it three years in a row.
I'm not sure that's weirder than Rey Sanchez, who only had 15 career HR in 5200 PA, and who didn't hit another homer and slugged only .253 in 1996.
3 - Ron Kittle, Jose Abreu, Jim Thome, Carlton Fisk
2 - Zeke Bonura, Tim Raines, Sherm Lollar, Pete Ward, Paul Konerko, Minnie Minoso, Joe Kuhel, Shoeless Joe Jackson, Hal Trosky, Frank Thomas, Eddie Collins, Ed Walsh, Don Kolloway, Dick Allen, Danny Green, Carlos Lee, Buddy Bradford, Bill Cissell, Bibb Falk, Adam Dunn.
Notable White Sox who did it once: Yoan Moncada, Sammy Sosa, Ron Karkovice, Robin Ventura, Richie Zisk ('77, naturally), Ray Schalk, Magglio Ordonez, Luis Aparicio, Jose Valentin, Harry Hooper, Happy Felsch, Gus Zernial, George Davis, Gary Peters, Eddie Lopat, Darrin Erstad, Darrin Jackson, Chico Carrasquel, Chick Gandil, Chet Lemon, Carlos May, Bunny Brief (not a notable player, but how often do you get a chance to type out "Bunny Brief" Carpe diem, people), Buck Weaver, Albert Belle, Al Simmons, Adam Eaton.
7 times a pitcher did it, including three times in four years (1905-08, missing only the championship year of '06. In '08, their first homer came on July 4 - hit by Ed Walsh).
I was curious and bored so I did it for the Blue Jays:
3: John Mayberry, George Bell, and Carlos Delgado (Delgado almost did it 4 times across the span of 10 seasons, but in 1994 Alomar beat him to it)
2: Ernie Whitt, Ed Sprague, Shannon Stewart, Vernon Wells, and Teoscar Hernandez
Random one shots that I wouldn't have guessed in a million years: Erik Kratz (PH homer off David Price in the 8th inning), Maicer Izturis, Bengie Molina homering off Johan Santana in an opening day Santana/Halladay matchup, Domingo Cedeno hitting a homer on opening day in 1996 with the Oakland A's hosting in... Las Vegas?!?, Rance Mulliniks off Eckersley in 1983 (Eck gave up 7 runs to kick off his worst season as a starter), Pat Borders foreshadowing his World Series MVP award hitting the Jays first homer in 92.
Most impressive performance that I noticed was George Bell hitting a game-winning homer in the top of the 10th off Quisenberry in 85, then hitting 3 homers off Saberhagen in 1988's opener.
It's just different from past years where it seemed like they'd either hang 12 on their opponents or struggle to score 2 on any given night. I still miss the core guys, and I haven't seen much to make me think this team is a contender in the long run, but at least they're watchable.
Most times hitting the first homer of the season for the club:
4 - Yadier Molina
3 -
2 - Tyler O'Neil, Randal Grichuk, Pedro Guerrero, Matt Holliday, Mark McGwire, Jim Edmonds, Geronimo Pena, George Hendrick, Darrell Porter, Albert Pujols
Honorable mention: Joe Magrane, a pitcher, did it in 1988.
Well, we're already up to 1, as Jesse Chavez has been traded to the Braves for Sean Newcomb, who was just DFAd by the Braves.
At this point the sole evidence that he has potential as a useful MLB player is ... a good year at Iowa last year? His minor league numbers aren't very impressive aside from that. And lord knows he hasn't actually done anything in the majors yet.
Now 2 after Villar was released.
---
Last year's trade deadline deals still somehow surprised me a little, then I was angry. This year, knowing it's coming is almost worse. I couldn't quite put my finger on it, but I think Greenberg nailed it here:
Yes, it's great the Cubs have a good farm system again, that will likely be better in a week than it is today. But this whole process has sucked as a fan, and I have zero confidence this FO will get it right this time (both in reaching the same heights and in maintaining a good team for longer than last time).
Seems like less of an issue with the universal DH, though - you can split time for him between DH and C and that works just fine. And when the balance inevitably shifts to where that becomes increasingly more DH than C, that's fine too. I mean, you wouldn't want to sign him for 10 years or anything crazy, but it seems worth trying harder to keep him around than the Cubs reportedly have been. And if they overspend some, why should I care about that anyway?
Yeah. I think the problem is that the whole reason we're in this situation is because the bottom dropped out on the player development side. Yet here they are, tearing it all down and relying on player development. But that's the part they suck at! So it just seems like a downward spiral.
Well, Rizzo ... yeah, definitely. Bryant had some injury trouble early on but has been coming around to the point where he has perfectly respectable numbers now, and that deal might not end up looking bad at all. Javy gonna Javy, but we've seen him come out of extended slumps before and there's no reason to think he won't again; it's silly to judge that contract on a half-season of struggles given how volatile he is even in the best of times.
Simply put, I think the org is in better shape going forward if they have all three than they are now.
But, whatever ... turning a 36yo rando (even one that walks as few hitters as Martin) into a 27yo rando seems like something you might as well do if you're a crummy team and the chance comes along. McKinstry has good numbers in AAA for what that's worth - I assume basically nothing, but no doubt it's good enough for a few days of pretending like they just slyly picked up the next DJ LeMahieu.
And anyway, let's be honest: deep down, no one liked having a guy named "Chris Martin" on the team anyway.
The Martin trade doesn't make sense, like 90% of the Cubs current roster on the position player side are utility guys. But also, he probably had very little actual trade value; then again, I'd rather a lotto ticket than the expired scratch off that McKinstry is.
---
Out of all the things to kvetch about I wouldn't kvetch about letting a 30 year old catcher go instead of signing him to a big contract
For the purposes of this comment, I was purely talking as a fan. Yes, signing an oft-injured 30yr old catcher isn't the best use of resources, but at this point the Cubs are just choosing not to spend. I'd much rather have whatever deal Contreras gets than what Heyward got (same is true of all the old guys - Schwarber, Rizzo, Baez, and Bryant; of those, the one that could end up being the worst is Bryant but he's also the best player of the bunch). If the Cubs were signing someone else instead of Contreras (or any of the old guys), fine, but in this case they're just not signing him.
(I never really thought Happ would get traded.)
....... why? It was obviously relevant with the acquisition of Reyes and it's not like there's any trade value to salvage. Everyone already figured out that he was as good as gone anyway.
People will just complain about anything.
Oh, I see what you did there - I asked why you bothered, and then you turned it around on me and asked why *I* even bothered. The old flippity-floppity! That's amazingly clever. I can hardly imagine how proud of yourself you must have been after coming up with that all-time pwn.
Anyone want to screenshot that so it can be effectively memed? A sick burn like that ought to spread like wildfire across the internet instead of being stuck here in the BBTF ghetto.
That leaves us with 8 guys from the opening day roster that were traded/released during the season. I doubt there will be another in the last 2 weeks, unless there's a spate of injuries that necessitate some 40-man shuffling just to field a team.
In this thread, which is already closed for commenting, Walt was quite dismissive of the return for Scott Effross. He went so far as to say the following, even doubling down after the first one:
Wesneski will probably never be as useful as Effross has already been.
Wesneski's most likely outcome is to toss a few innings in a bullpen sometime on the AAAA shuttle. He's a starter for now -- much like half the relievers in MLB. Even if he comes up as a starter, his most likely outcome is to stink. All of this assuming he doesn't get hurt along the way. As such his "years of control" don't matter, he'll likely be a short reliever in short order, there's almost certainly no big payday coming his way. But sure, if he turns into Marcus Stroman then he'll make real money.
After just over two months from these statements, I present the following facts:
With the Cubs, Effross threw 58.2 innings last year and this, with a 143ERA+ and 2.46FIP with 0.9WAR. In 13 innings this year with the Yankees, he had a 188ERA+ and 3.43FIP with 0.4WAR; he also got hurt but is back now.
In 33 innings with the Cubs this year, including 4 starts, Wesneski had a 189ERA+ and 3.20FIP, with 0.9WAR.
Case closed, Cubs won this trade. Discussion over. :)
Seriously though, this appears to be a scouting success for the Cubs, along with development/scouting successes with Justin Steele, Keegan Thompson, Javier Assad and most surprisingly (and less likely to be a factor going forward), Adrian Sampson. All of which make up for Adbert Azlolay's stalling/injury and Caleb Killian's disappointing debut and year. The 2017-2019 Cubs would have killed for at least one guy in the system to have had this type of success. If the Cubs really do spend this offseason on SP (or trade for a top of the line type guy), they also aren't dependent on any of those guys alone to be in the rotation. Surely several of them will be, and with injuries and whatnot they all probably start a game or two at some point. The pitching has absolutely come a long, long way. Enough so that I think there are more questions about the offense than pitching for the 2023 team.
But let's throw something in your face too, Moses - final prediction of 75 wins? Man, you were waaaay off.
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