His is a name that has come up frequently among the many interesting players attempting to come over from Japan or South Korea to MLB this year, but it’s not one that had been directly connected to the Cubs until now.
Source: #Cubs, free agent Josh Lindblom have had discussions this offseason, but it appears other clubs are more heavily involved now. Lindblom, the 2019 KBO MVP, grew up in West Lafayette, Ind., fewer than 150 miles from Wrigley Field. @MLB @MLBNetwork
— Jon Morosi (@jonmorosi) December 9, 2019
Lindblom, 32, has been an ace in the KBO the last two years after spending the second half of his 20s as a bouncing-around guy in MLB, from team to team, from role to role, from AAA to the big show. He just never quite landed, and, like some others have been able to pull off, he went over to Korea and really put it together. He figures to get a couple years and $10+ million as a guy who might emerge as a nice back-of-the-rotation type, or even a very good multi-inning reliever.
Of course the Cubs are going to be in on any pitcher with that profile, especially if he isn’t going to be very expensive. Indeed, fellow KBO pitcher Kwang-Hyun Kim is on the Cubs’ radar.
The rub for the Cubs, as we’ve discussed, is that I tend to think they’ll save their shopping in this tier for later in the offseason, after they’ve attempted to work the trade market (both for the purposes of landing an impact arm, and also for the purposes of determining what their financial picture is going to look like).
The real question is why is this getting out there at all? If the Cubs are not heavily involved – and that actually rings true to us – then why this report? Could it be that an agent is trying to push this idea that, ooh, Lindblom might like to pitch in Chicago, and maybe we’ll wait on the Cubs, so maybe you better up your offers now …. (I’m leaning this way particularly because Morosi has reported many other teams’ interest in Lindblom – like, specific team names – which would almost certainly only be coming from an agent).