NEWSLETTER
MLB NOTES —
Me: “It’s so lame and predictable when everyone tweets ‘It’s baseball season!’ the moment the Super Bowl is over.”
Also me:
I can’t help myself. I’m seriously so freakin’ ready for baseball to be back, even if the Cubs still have more to do before the regular season begins. Just go get him, Jed. You know you want it.
Free Agent Projections
Well, it’s been two weeks since FanGraphs dropped their ZiPS projection percentiles for the top-five remaining free agents … but still none of them have signed! So this is as good and useful today as ever. And I think it’s fair to assume you want to see Cody Bellinger’s projected outcomes for 2024.
Basically, this chart shows you the range of expected outcomes for Cody Bellinger next season, where he ranges from better than his worse season to worse than his best season. Last year, for reference, Bellinger had a 133 OPS+ and was worth 4.1 WAR (right around the 85 percentile range). I think it would be unfair or unwise to count on that again, but I do think something between 60-70% is totally reasonable and perfectly acceptable!
And if he did wind up there for a couple of years before settling into that 50-60% performance range thereafter, I think the Cubs would be thrilled with the signing. I think that’s a very reasonable (albeit slightly optimistic) outcome.
The other players projected in that FanGraphs article include Jordan Montgomery, Blake Snell, Matt Chapman, and Jorge Soler. And for those players, I have to say: I’m pretty pleasantly surprised by Chapman’s spread.
Even his 30 percentile projection has him as a 104 OPS+ player worth 2.6 WAR. At 50%, Chapman projects to slash .240/.333/.453 (117 OPS+) with 3.6 WAR, well above the Cubs overall third base contributions from last season: .249/.323/.415 (102 wRC+) and 2.7 WAR.
I don’t know if Chapman would be the best use of resources, but the Cubs 2024 vacancy at third base is pretty glaring. Maybe Michael Busch ends up there if Cody Bellinger returns and Pete Crow-Armstrong is good sooner than later. Maybe Matt Shaw is closer than we think. I don’t know. But I do know that adding Matt Chapman would raise the floor significantly for the 2024 Chicago Cubs.
NL Central Breakouts
We are rightfully excited about the state of the Cubs farm system, including the potential for impact THIS season: Jordan Wicks, Michael Busch, Pete Crow-Armstrong, Alexander Canario, Cade Horton, Ben Brown, etc. But the rest of the NL Central isn’t too far behind. And when it comes to potential impact this season, the rest of the NL Central may have a jump on the Cubs.
At The Athletic, Jim Bowden listed ten players who could “explode” this season and the non-Cubs NL Central is stacked:
- Elly De La Cruz, SS, Reds (#8 in 2023)
- Jackson Chourio, OF, Brewers (#2 in 2023)
- Jordan Walker, OF, Cardinals (#4 in 2023)
- Oneil Cruz, SS, Pirates (#14 in 2022)
Three of those players were top-10 prospects in all of baseball last season, and the only one who wasn’t, Oneil Cruz, is a 25-year-old, 6’7″ shortstop that routinely breaks Statcast records on both sides of the ball.
Again, the Cubs don’t have a shortage of potential impact-prospects ready to debut this season, but don’t forget how stacked the rest of the NL Central is in that exact same regard.
With that said, the Cubs farm system seriously is loaded. Keith Law just ranked them fifth overall, behind the Brewers (2nd), but ahead of the Pirates (9th), Cardinals (13th), and Reds (14th). He also dropped this insanely-awesome line: “This system got good in a hurry; I could argue for 10 Cubs prospects to be in the top ~125 or so….” Brett got into that ranking in greater detail right here:
Cory Kluber Retires
In case you missed the news over the weekend, Corey Kluber announced his retirement. And Zack Meisel (The Athletic) gave him the write-up treatment, with a fun reminder for Cubs fans:
For a five-year stretch, from 2014 to 2018, Kluber ranked alongside Clayton Kershaw and Max Scherzer as the most prolific pitchers in the sport. He exceeded 200 innings and 220 strikeouts in each of those years, capturing the AL Cy Young Award for Cleveland in 2014 and 2017. He’s one of 22 pitchers in league history to win the hardware on multiple occasions. He also finished third in the balloting in 2016 and 2018.
His performance during the 2016 postseason, when the then-Indians were absent two members of their rotation, nearly landed the club its first championship since 1948. Kluber logged a 0.89 ERA in his first five starts that October, despite twice pitching on short rest. He finally ran out of gas in Game 7 of the World Series against the Chicago Cubs.
Kluber had a monster season in 2016 (215 IP, 4.9 WAR) and he dominated the Cubs in his first two World Series starts against them: 12.0 IP, 9H, 1ER, 1BB, 15Ks. But they got to him in Game 7 (his third start): 4.0 IP, 6H, 4ER, 0BB, 0K. And the rest is history.
Short-Term TV Resolutions for 3 Teams
The Twins, Rangers, and Guardians each worked out one-year deals with Diamond Sports to continue broadcasting games on those regional sports networks in 2024. But it’s not a particularly big win. While this deal provides at least a little relief, it’s still only one year and at a reduced rate (seems like something in the 15-20% range). And there’s no solution for the in-market streaming a lot of fans are still seeking.
That’s not likely to give any of the teams – but namely the Rangers – the long-term financial security they’d need to go out and offer, say, Jordan Montgomery a big free agent deal.
There’s other down-stream impact, too: “This situation is also affecting expansion plans. Drellich was at the owners’ meetings in Florida last week and spoke to the commissioner, who said that in addition to getting the A’s and Rays’ stadium deals more firmed up, the league needs this broadcast situation to be resolved before it can go through the upheaval of adding two more teams.”
Jurickson Profar Signs
It looked like Jurickson Profar was finally starting to break out a bit back in 2022, when he slashed .243/.331/.391 (111 wRC+) with the Padres, but he slammed right back to Earth with the Rockies (72 wRC+, -2.0 WAR), before a strong, but short finish with the Padres in 2023.
But the Padres are in a belt-tightening cycle, and saw the value in bringing Profar back on a one-year, $1M deal (worth up to $2.5M with incentives). And, why not? After all, they only had two outfielders on their 40-man roster before this deal (José Azocar and Fernando Tatis Jr.).
The Padres, of course, traded center fielder Trent Grisham and left fielder Juan Soto to the Yankees earlier this winter.
Needless to say, their outfield projected a LOT stronger before the deal …
Other MLB Notes:
Spring Training pictures and videos are starting to emerge across baseball, and I just thought you’d like to enjoy some of them:
