NEWSLETTER
Cubs President of Baseball Operations Jed Hoyer this week touched on a range of topics as the team moved just over .500, with a big series in St. Louis looming. You can read Hoyer’s comments here, here, here, here, and here, among other places. I’ll discuss some of the highlights below …
When and How to Think About the Trade Deadline
Hoyer has said it before, and he’s right to stick to it: there’s still a lot of evaluating to do right now before really thinking about an approach for the Trade Deadline in July. It really depends so much on how the team performs over the next month+, especially if they could – for example – crush the Cardinals in the upcoming stretch where they’ll play each other 13 times by July 22. If the Brewers and Reds really start to slump, the schedule might wind up dictating that the Cubs don’t make a set of trade decisions until after those Cardinals games.
Among Hoyer’s comments:
“Rushing that decision doesn’t seem prudent, you know?” Hoyer said. “Hopefully, we continue to perform well and make that decision obvious, and I think we should give it time to see that out ….
“Obviously, I understand why everyone is asking questions about the deadline, but I have a very open mind about it. This team, I think we’ve had moments of struggle, but we’ve also had moments of playing pretty well. I think we’re playing well right now. Our last six losses have been by one run. Right now, we’re hard to beat. The games we’ve lost, we’ve lost by a run and I think we’ve been playing pretty well ….
“I hope this trend continues. I hope we can go down to St. Louis this weekend and perform well. I’m trying to keep an open mind about this team and about the deadline. It’s May 20, there’s a lot of time. There’s two months and 10 days. Of course you think about these different things. Rushing that decision doesn’t seem prudent. Hopefully, we continue to perform well and make that decision obvious.”
If the Cubs are in a position to be buyers, by the way, Hoyer said the “budgetary flexibility” will be there as necessary.
Extension Negotiations, or Not
All the obligatory stuff about wanting to continue to have relationships with certain key players after this season, even as guys like Kris Bryant, Anthony Rizzo, and Javy Báez are headed for free agency. Box checked. It’s a sincere position for the Cubs, I believe – at the right price – but it’s also obligatory at this point. They like these guys and want to keep them. OK. Got it.
What really matters is whether extensions are still possible.
No surprise, but Hoyer reiterated that the in-season extension negotiations are not happening: “Right now there aren’t (contract extension) discussions going on with the players. It’s the middle of May, we’re playing and I think that’s not what’s on their minds. We always have the door open during the season, but we’re not going to actively reach out. I think we’ve been asked not to do that in a lot of ways because that’s not what the players want to deal with.”
When the sides did not get super close to deals by the end of Spring Training, I think we all kinda knew this was the deal. It’s conceivable that talks kick back up for one or two guys, but it’s far more likely that the Cubs will simply see where things stand come July, both from a trade standpoint and a production standpoint and a surveying-the-whole-landscape standpoint. And then maybe, at the end of this, the Cubs seriously engage with one or two of these guys in free agency. It sucks that it’s come to that, but I’m just trying to be realistic.
Oh, but if you want the crazy sliver of hope, Hoyer admitted that even if the Cubs were back in talks with one of their guys, he wouldn’t tell us at this point: “I wouldn’t be honest about it. I would say we’re not.” AH HA! SO YOU ARE TALKING WITH THEM!!!
The Second Base Decision
As I wrote recently, I think the Cubs were right in their decision to give David Bote a chance to take the second base job and run with it out of Spring Training, and I also think the Cubs are right now to make sure Nico Hoerner is starting basically every day.
From the sound of things, Hoyer sees it the same way: “As far as the decision in spring training, to be candid, I don’t have any regret over that. I think David Bote is a really good player. Giving him a chance to really establish himself and to have that role was the right decision in that moment. We couldn’t believe in Nico more. … He’s been exceptional. He’s a lot of fun to watch. I’m glad he’s up here and performing. He has had a really positive impact since he came back.”
Starting Pitching and Bullpen Depth
Noting that the rotation has not been giving the Cubs what they’ve hoped for so far, Hoyer credited the bullpen with keeping the pitching afloat. But even as the Cubs have had so much success in the bullpen, and are overloaded with options (in a good way), it’s still never enough.
“Our pitching depth is still something that I think about every day,” Hoyer said. “I think we always have to be wary of that. You can never have enough. You can never have enough pitching. There’s never a night that you go to bed in this job or David Ross’ job and you feel like, ‘OK, we’re good. Our pitching is all set.’ This is not the nature of it.”
Even now, the Cubs probably have five guys at Triple-A who could come up and contribute in the bullpen, but there are just no spots even with Alec Mills, Trevor Megill, Rowan Wick, Jonathan Holder, and Shelby Miller on the IL. I’ll never say Hoyer is wrong about wanting more, more, more pitching depth, but I will say this is easily the deepest the MLB-ready bullpen pool has been in the last decade. And that’s not even me talking about how GOOD they’ve been – just how deep!
That, by the way, doesn’t mean there won’t be slumps. Or that continued injuries won’t expose guys who aren’t quite as ready or as sharp. It’s just a comment on the state of things as of this moment: it is a deep, deep group, even as it’s also banged up. Like, you barely even notice how many relievers are on the IL right now!
Failing to Reach the 85% Vaccination Threshold
Hoyer did not mince words when it came to his team’s failure to achieve the 85% vaccination threshold that would’ve permitted the team to relax certain COVID protocols, *AND* would put players at a lesser risk of having to miss games because of contact tracing or symptoms. Hoyer is happy that a lot of players have been vaccinated, and credited them for it. But the overall disappointment was clear, including the fact that it could hurt them on the baseball side of things.
“We’ve worked hard to get as many people vaccinated as possible,” Hoyer said. “We’ve worked hard to try to convince or educate the people that have been reluctant. I think we’re at a place right now where I’m not going to give up hope that we can get there, but my level of optimism is waning, candidly ….
“I also feel like there’s a real competitive advantage that we’re gonna miss. The contact-tracing thing is a big deal. And when you have a positive case, but the people around you have been vaccinated, that takes away that contact-tracing element to guys being out and by not getting the 85% we’re missing that. So it’s disappointing. I can’t say it any other way ….
“The fact that we aren’t able to eliminate that is disappointing. Injuries can be avoidable but sometimes they’re not and your season can get derailed when you have injuries and that’s part of this job. But I feel like this is one that can be avoided.”
There is a whole lot more from Hoyer on this topic here. It is deeply frustrating to think that the Cubs could wind up losing a player or multiple players for long stretches of time completely unnecessarily. (And that’s to say nothing of the even more important helping to end the pandemic thing.)
