The Eighth Cut is the Bullet-iest and Other Bullets

Mar 28, 2013

A fresh podcast is on the way later this morning, and it’s a doozy. Sahadev and I take on the season preview thing, and we have many thoughts about BASEBALL. Until then, Bullets …

As another non-cut cut, I figured this Cory Wade news could lead off the Bullets rather than get its own post: the Cubs have informed bullpen candidate Cory Wade that he will not be making the Opening Day roster, meaning that the final spot in the pen is down to lefty Hisanori Takahashi and newly-picked-up righty Guillermo Moscoso (or another waiver claim that pops up in the next few days). It’s a tough call choosing between those two, because the Cubs wouldn’t have claimed Moscoso – and given him a 40-man spot in the process – if they didn’t like his chances of sticking, but Takahashi offers a second arm in the pen, a potential long-man, and a potential modest-value flip piece. As for Wade, the Cubs may try to see if he’ll be willing to head to Iowa, as he’s a guy you’d like to keep around. The truth is, the Cubs have so many fringe relievers – they brought a ton in by design this year – that they aren’t going to be able to keep them all. Some of the Wade/Takahashi/Moscoso/Putnam/Carpenter/Lewis/etc. types are going to see the numbers, and the ones who can opt-out might decide to take their chances elsewhere. And, from the Cubs’ perspective, there simply isn’t enough roster space – even at AAA – to keep every single one of those guys (plus McNutt, Cabrera, Coleman, Chapman, Parker … I could go on).

All that said, Gordon Wittenmyer took a Dale Sveum statement about Moscoso – “Organizational depth.” – to mean that Moscoso isn’t being considered for the final bullpen spot. If true, that means the Cubs grabbed him as a mere stash (which would be fine), and that the only way Takahashi won’t win the final bullpen job is if there’s another waiver pickup.

That piece is also a profile on Brett Jackson. Jackson, who’s been recovering from a sore shoulder, played a minor league game yesterday and is expected to play a few innings today.

George Ofman added an interesting wrinkle to the Wrigley renovation talks yesterday – he says he’s heard the city will not allow the Cubs to have a massive, 6,000 square foot JumboTron. Instead, the most they’ll allow is 3,000 square feet, which is actually smaller than the Old Scoreboard (which is around 4,500 square feet, according to Ofman (though, because it looks a little taller – relative to its length – than most video boards, maybe a JumboTron doesn’t necessarily have to be the same size to be effective)). A 3,000 square foot JumboTron would be about six times the size of the LED board in right field, which is to say it would be large enough to minimally accomplish the job of a JumboTron, but it would be on the smaller side of newer ‘Trons in sports. For example, it would be less than 1/3 of the size of the massive JumboTron going up in Seattle.

In relation to Carlos Marmol’s rough outing the other night, Dale Sveum takes a big dump on reading too much into Spring Training performance.

In case you missed the Pre-Gamin’ last night, Starlin Castro is away from the team to be with his girlfriend in New York – she’s having his baby, what a lovely way of saying how much she loves him. It’s Castro’s first child, so congrats, Daddio. If his early-season production dips, we’ll know it’s because of all the midnight diaper changing.

Want to be part of the Cubs’ “Committed” campaign? You can be.

Welington Castillo is a fun, positive guy, and the pitchers like having him around. That can’t hurt.

written by

Brett Taylor

Brett Taylor is the Lead Cubs Writer at Bleacher Nation, and you can find him on Twitter at @BleacherNation and on LinkedIn here. Brett is also the founder of Bleacher Nation, which opened up shop in 2008 as an independent blog about the Chicago Cubs. Later growing to incorporate coverage of other Chicago sports, Bleacher Nation is now one of the largest regional sports blogs on the web.

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