OT: Cubs Offseason Thread

[Jeffster81]

Dodgers in 5.

[SalmonsSuperfan]

Cubs are blowing their competitive window with cheap ass ownership (racist and democracy-interfering too but irrelevant). Somehow the Reinsdorfian White Sux with far less revenue generation spent the same amount in 2022 as the Cubs did this year for a team that went 81-81. Didn't do jack at the trade deadline. Or this past offseason.

Congrats to the Brewers though, they are my favorite NL team and their organization, despite being cheap, does things the right way and is one to emulate. They have a lot of really solid players set to debut the next couple years as well. I think the Cubs have peaked unless they re-sign Tucker, re-tool a bit, add a real SP in free agency (Framber, Ranger, Gallen, etc), and Caissie, Wiggins and Alcantara perform to their utmost potential. That's a lot to ask. The window is closing though. I doubt the Ricketts family actually cares, the team prints money.

[Ccwatercraft]

What a fun season! It's always sad to see it end this way, but I can't complain. I'm optimistic that next we'll.see them in the post season next year.

Good job boys!

[Chi town]

What a fun season! It's always sad to see it end this way, but I can't complain. I'm optimistic that next we'll.see them in the post season next year.

Good job boys!

My feelings as well!

Having a healthy Steele and Horton will certainly help. Wiggins will probably be brought up on the Horton plan. If Tucker returns and he better I think Happ gets less playing time and MoBaller gets some DH and hopefully even catching once every 4-5 games.

I’m all for trading Cassie and Alcantara for pitching. Cassie stays if Tucker goes.

[Dresden]

Well, it was likely to end sometime, either last night or v. Dodgers. Just not quite there yet. But it was a fun season, especially those first few months, and it was very nice to see them battle the Brewers to a game 5 after losing the first two.

[Dresden]

I doubt they bring back Tucker- Cassie should be ready to play and needs a spot. With Steele and Horton back, their rotation should be steady, if not spectacular. The bullpen may need to be rebuilt, and most of them are free agents. They did a good job the last 3 months, and I hope they bring some of those arms back, if not most of them.

I disagree about their window closing- they have a number of young guys that should only get better- Shaw, PCA, Cassie, Busch, Hoerner. I don't know if they have any good arms in the farm system.

[SalmonsSuperfan]

I doubt they bring back Tucker- Cassie should be ready to play and needs a spot. With Steele and Horton back, their rotation should be steady, if not spectacular. The bullpen may need to be rebuilt, and most of them are free agents. They did a good job the last 3 months, and I hope they bring some of those arms back, if not most of them.

I disagree about their window closing- they have a number of young guys that should only get better- Shaw, PCA, Cassie, Busch, Hoerner. I don't know if they have any good arms in the farm system.

I think you guys have to bring back Tucker. He's the premiere free agent this offseason, the only position player worth spending big bux on IMO compared to guys like Josh Naylor, Eugenio Suarez, Cody Bellinger, JT Realmuto (who might be a good fit for the Cubs actually) etc. My pipedream is Tucker simply loves Chicago and signs with the South Side team. Perfect fit for both Chicago teams in the corner outfield, can move to 1B/DH as he ages. Super consistent hitter and reliable despite an extended poor stretch this season. He won't ever be a Sock, but as the Cubs are actually competing, it makes a lot of sense to keep him around. Can't rely on Happ/Seiya for too much longer I think. Caissie seems like a good player to me, but he might flop. I really like Alcantara but his bat also has gone missing and he seems redundant to PCA.
I'm also still predicting a trade involving the Sox'x Edgar Quero going to the Cubs for one of the young outfielders. Catcher is the only position the Sox are deep at and Quero seems to be the odd man out because Kyle Teel is a budding superstar and using Quero as a backup C/DH is a waste of his talent. I think you guys would really like him behind the plate, he's a better hitter than what his rookie season numbers showed. Veteran command of the strike zone, switch hitter, every AB is a professional one that usually ends in a single. Huge arm behind the plate and has picked off a number of guys sleeping on third base. Poor framer, but he's 22 and might get better and that trait might be less important with ABS coming in. He has more power than what he's shown so far but he's simply a professional hitter at a young age. I'm a big fan but I want the Sox to move him so that he gets a proper opportunity somewhere and the Cubbies make perfect sense. I also really want Alcantara specifically on our team. I like our prospects and the future seems kinda bright to me, but we need a kid who can actually play center field.

[jc23]

good season.

[Stratmaster]

I like the human element.

ABS is coming and I fully expect it to be better than the "human element."

For the most part, I do believe umpires do a good job calling ball and strikes, ABS is simply for the times they miss the call.

https://www.mlb.com/news/abs-challenge-system-mlb-2026
Mixed feelings. Something needs to be done and I prefer a challenge system to fully automated luxury space baseball, but check out the implementation above. I'm concerned about how they're actually measuring the strike zone. It's based on player height with no mention of batting stance. Batting stances are a bit more homogenized than they have been in years past, but there's still plenty of variety and I worry that every player will change their stance to whatever most efficiently takes advantage of the new technology.

As an example of variant strikezones, Jeff Bagwell and Craig Counsell are the same height but had wildly different stances and thus strike zones. It seems to me under this new system, they would have the exact same strike zone regardless of how they are standing. Players might also change their stance based on the count, right? I don't think the technology is going to adjust for that. How do we know it's even calibrated properly in the first place? Where the ball is shown as crossing the plate on TV is not necessarily accurate and there are several websites that track it as well and often give different positions. ABS will be good for obvious misses (which happen far too often) but I worry about close calls. I'm also of the opinion that veteran pitchers should be given 'close' calls...the strike zone being a perfect box strikes me another example of standardization that baseball has been trending toward for a while now. I find that a little unfortunate, but perhaps 'fair'. I hate the DH in both leagues (the DH in general), it's my 'old man yells at cloud' take.




These guys shouldn't have the same strike zone!!!

I understand your mixed feelings. The umps used to do a good enough job. But now guys are throwing 105 mph fastball with crazy movement and some are throwing curves in the 90's. There are just way too many bad calls. Even if they just used it in the post season where the calls are too critical. I was counting double digit bad ball/strike calls. And they weren't all against the Cubs. There are just too many of them any more.

As to the technology, I read things saying it is already there but I would have to leave that to the experts.

As far as the strike zones help me understand why two players the same height should have different zones just because they choose to use a different stance. I guess their build could be such that the distance from the top of the knee to the bottom of the shoulder could be different. But on first consideration I don't really see that as a problem.