NEWSLETTER
I hope that for all of you, as it is for me, today is 99% about the excitement of the Cubs adding a true superstar bat in Kyle Tucker. This was one of those rare opportunities to add one of the best hitters in baseball, and this time, it was the Cubs who took it. That feels GOOD. We’re allowed to feel GOOD about it.
That remaining 1%, as it would understandably always be in these situations, is thinking about the cost of the trade. The trade is good and appropriate, but it’s OK to also acknowledge that the Cubs paid a very steep price to acquire Tucker. A whole lot of long-term value was given up for a whole lot of short-term value.
Isaac Paredes? He has been a very good big leaguer already, and the Cubs had him under control for three years.
Cam Smith? He exploded almost immediately after the draft, and was a clear top-100 prospect with substantial offensive upside.
Hayden Wesneski? He had his moments of struggle, but he also had moments of success. And have you seen pitching prices? Having an optionable young arm who can swing into the bullpen and rotation, and still have some untapped upside? Yeah. That’s not a mere throw-in.
So that’s a steep price. I’m feeling fine about it given the Tuckerness of the whole situation, but I recognize some folks around baseball will wonder why the Cubs gave all that up for just one season of a star player.
But I wanted to slightly reframe the trade cost. Not because it changes anything about the deal, but perhaps because it makes us think a little bit more about how you can possibly build up this kind of trade package. As in, how hard is it to recreate what the Cubs just lost?
Well, it’s actually pretty easy to talk through it on this one!
For Isaac Paredes, we know what the cost was: Christopher Morel, Hunter Bigge, and Ty Johnson. That’s an IFA development win, a late-blooming relief prospect development win, and a really good late-round draft win. It, too, stung in the moment, but it feels like the kind of thing that good organizations are doing on the regular with these categories of prospects and young players.
For Cam Smith, that is also pretty easy: it’s a first round pick. Yes, he was a well-scouted and well-developed one, but the Cubs didn’t reach to draft Smith *OR* luck into him falling precipitously. He was simply an appropriate pick at that tier of the draft, and then it was the start of a development win (driven this year mostly by Smith, himself). Can the Cubs get another Cam Smith in the draft next year? Not exactly, but that’s obviously what you’re shooting for! And you do get a first round pick every year, even if we hope the next few start coming much later in the round.
For Hayden Wesneski, there are some intervening years that muddy the waters a bit, but that, too, has a clear origin for the Cubs: they traded Scott Effross for him. Effross was a total development win as a later-round pick who was on the verge of giving up baseball before he converted to a side-arm delivery. Again, you can’t count on that happening all the time in your system, but good organizations do manage to pull that kind of thing off on the regular.
What’s my point? It isn’t to say that the Cubs didn’t lose a lot of long-term value today. They did. A lot. Years of it.
But my point is to say the Cubs, if they are a well-run organization that excels at scouting and player development – the kind of organization they want to be – then they should be able to continue generating this kind of long-term value. The loss today doesn’t have to sting in the long run.
