It’s going to be a busy day around here, which is not going to be aided by a sudden sickness in the Taylor Household. We’d generally avoided sickness for nearly a half a year, so I can’t complain. But I can comment on how I don’t feel well, The Wife doesn’t feel well, and the kiddos don’t feel well.
I’ll power through, though. Too much to discuss today as we barrel toward the Winter Meetings – and, hey, don’t forget to get your ugly sweater ready for the Ugly Sweater Winter Meetings. I’ll be wearing the same ugly Cubs sweater all week long, and I hope you’ll join me one of the days and send a picture I can share. I also plan to have a live stream Tuesday evening.
A data point reminder about just how awesome Wrigley Field is, and how important it is, not only to Chicago, but to Illinois as a whole? The Washington Post notes the most Instagrammed places – yes, that’s a data point these days – in each state, and the top for Illinois is Wrigley Field. That remains an important thing to remember throughout the renovation and development process: Wrigley Field is much more than the place where our favorite team plays. It’s a destination in and of itself. Preserving it and keeping it tasteful is as critical as utilizing it to better open up revenue streams for the Cubs to use.
Dave Cameron updated his trade value piece on players throughout baseball in response to Jonah Keri’s recent piece on the same. Like Keri, Cameron has three Cubs players in the top 50, and they’re the same three players – Jorge Soler, Kris Bryant, and Anthony Rizzo – in the same general places in the rankings (47, 17, 10).
You may recall that Cubs special assistant Tim Wilken and crosschecker Sam Hughes were being considered for the Diamondbacks’ open scouting director position, but there will be no brain drain for the Cubs just yet – a Nationals executive got the gig.
The next step in John Sickels’ Cubs prospecting process – he’s got his list of 45 players under consideration, and he teases with how many A’s, B’s, C’s the Cubs have. It’s easy to figure out who the two A prospects are (Bryant/Russell). The four A-/B+ guys are probably Almora, Soler, Schwarber, and Edwards.
Alberto Cabrera was a minor league free agent, so he was already technically out of the organization, but now he’s really, fully out of the organization. Matt Eddy reports that he’s signed with the Tigers (along with another former Cubs minor league arm, Rafael Dolis).
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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NEWSLETTER
It’s going to be a busy day around here, which is not going to be aided by a sudden sickness in the Taylor Household. We’d generally avoided sickness for nearly a half a year, so I can’t complain. But I can comment on how I don’t feel well, The Wife doesn’t feel well, and the kiddos don’t feel well.
