Roster Set?

It looks as if Brian Duenseng will open the season on the DL.  This paves the way for both Szczur and LaStella to stick on the opening day roster.  I'm not sure what the deal was with Duensing last year, as he logged all of 14 innings with Baltimore and hardly many more bouncing around their minor league system.  Duensing was an OK starter and swingman for the Twins back in the day, but that was rather a long while ago.

Latest Roster Moves

The Cubs have returned the Rule 5 pick Caleb Smith to the Yankees and released utility infielder Kawasaki.  Indications are that left-handed reliever Brian Duensing will make the team.  I cannot figure out why the Cubs want to carry thirteen pitchers any time, let alone in April.  However, that pretty much means the last available slot, barring injury, will go to either Szczur or LaStella.  Personally, I rather hope it is Szczur.  I think he is the better player and, also, he is out of options, whereas LaStella has options remaining.  In addition, given the depth the Cubs have at all the infield positions, I cannot see anyway LaStella could crack the major league roster in the immediate future.

Rotation Set

Frankly I was a little surprised to read that Brett Anderson was named the fifth starter the other day.  Actually he will start the fourth game because Maddon doesn't want to use back-to-back lefties, which would be the case with Lester slotted into the #1 slot the second time around.  Actually, the Cubs must see something in Anderson that isn't immediately apparent.  I mean, the guy has good stuff, but he is hardly a stopper.  He has only two seasons of eight when he made thirty or more starts.  The remainder of his career has included lengthy stops on the DL.

In any case, I suspect the real reason Anderson is the choice lies in the fact that the Cubs were unable to find a quality left-hander to pitch out of the bullpen to replace Travis Wood.  Montgomery has been successful in a bullpen role, whereas Anderson is pretty much not a candidate.  The Cubs have a bunch of lefties on the forty-man roster, but none of them, including the Rule 5 pick Caleb Smith, have shown much this spring.  Really none of them seem likely to stick in the organization with the exception of Rob Zastryzny, who looks headed to Iowa for seasoning as a potential starter.

Given the number of off-days in April and the unimpressive performance of most of the rostered and non-rostered lefties, I kind of think the Cubs will wind up taking only twelve pitchers into the regular season.  The only thing that changes this prediction would be injuries or the sudden blossoming of Caleb Smith.  As a Rule 5 pick, he has to stay with the team all year.  So far he hasn't exactly shown much in spring training, three homers given up in six innings and an ERA over 4.

That means La Stella and Szczur look like the guys who fill out the bench.  Szczur is a genuinely good extra outfielder who has had a good spring.  I used to like LaStella, but I have somewhat changed by view.  He looks like a journeyman type who has reached his limit as a major league player.  I can't see him sticking all year with Candelario and Happ waiting in the wings and nowhere to fit in.

Spring Training Stars

I haven't been paying a whole lot of attention to spring training games.  I guess I am prejudiced in a way, but they do not seem like real games.  The regulars play three or four innings and then a bunch of minor leaguers finish things off.  Plus, of course, the Cubs have very few slots to fill on the major league roster.

Assuming that Anderson and Montgomery somehow share the fifth starter/swingman role, there is space or six or seven relievers depending on how many pitchers the Cubs want to carry.  It makes little if any sense to carry thirteen pitchers, especially given the number of off-days blended into the April schedule, but right now with six potential starters locked in, there are also six potential relievers locked in, viz., Davis, Strop, Rondon, Uehara, Grimm, and Edwards.  Which means there is room for one unnecessary arm there or none at all.

As far as the position players are concerned, there is a similar situation, there being in this case one or two utility slots depending on the number of pitchers being carried.  I kind of assume Szczur is a lock.  He is having a terrific spring and he is out of options.  That leaves possibly one bench slot.  Most people expect that to go to La Stella or, as a long shot, Kawasaki.  If it were my call, I might want to name Candelario.  Candelario is also having a great spring.  He can play third or first base.  Plus he has a lot more ceiling than La Stella.  Of course, that is just a gut feeling from watching a handful of games.

On a related topic, of course, the Cubs really have a terrific farm system.  This spring, Happ and Jimenez look like really good players in the making.  Maybe they are a year away, but they do look good.  A year from now, the Cubs are going to face some serious roster decisions.

Spring Training News

Montero and Maddon have not hashed things out regarding his playing time last year and in the playoffs.  Montero is happy to contribute to the team in any way he can while Maddon doesn't think there is really anything to talk about.

Arrieta is open to an extension but also open to being a free agent at the end of the season and doesn't rule out signing with the Cubs again.

Maddon says he will likely use his bullpen in a more traditional way during the regular season instead of the somewhat eccentric fashion he adopted during the playoffs and World Series.

Nobody likes the relocation of the bullpens at Wrigley Field under the bleachers but they all agree they will have to live with the decision.

Such is the news from Spring Training.  Much ado about nothing.

The Chapman Trade

I read kind of an interesting article about the Chapman/Torres trade, referenced here: hehttp://www.beyondtheboxscore.com/2017/1/28/14422404/gleyber-torres-trade-yankees-cubs-aroldis-chapman-andrew-millerre.  The gist of the piece is that, in retrospect, the Cubs were taken.  Sure, they got the dominant relief pitcher they craved to win the Worls Series, but, again in hindsight, they gave up a star prospect in Torres and the Yankees wound up eventually with both Torres and Chapman.

Hard to argue with that reasoning, though it should be pointed out that the Cubs did win the Series and that, potential superstar or not, they have two All-Star shortstops on the team already under their control for the next five years.

At the time, I didn't like the deal, not so much because they gave up Torres, but more because it did not look like they needed Chapman for other than pyschological or confidence building purposes.  As it turned out, because of injuries to Rondon and Strop, they really did need that big gun to bolster the bullpen.

This kind of one up trade of a prospect for the major chip that changes the game short-term has become a bit of a pattern for the Cubs.  Vogelbach for Montgomery was a no-brainer.  Soler for Davis, probably worthwhile, but still a player with a potentially big future for a rental with some issues.  The verdict on that one, in my mind, is a little less clear.

Recent Moves

I haven't written much this winter because not much has been happening.  The Cubs needed to add a veteran center-fielder as insurance unless they planned to move Heyward there on a regular basis, bolster the bullpen, and probably add another starting pitcher.  In some ways, they have achieved these goals.

The acquisition of Jay satisfied the first need, though he is a far cry offensively from Dexter Fowler.  Wade Davis is a pretty good replacement for Chapman as closer.  The departure of Travis Wood and the likely promotion of Mike Montgomery to the starting rotation exposes a weakness from the left-hand side in an otherwise strong group of relievers.

The lefties the Cubs have picked up are not exactly household names, nor do they begin to project performance at the level of the guys they potentially replace.  So that leaves a possible chink in the team's armor going forward.  Maybe they will bring Wood back, which would put them in a better position.  Apparently Wood still wants to start even though he is clearly a better reliever.  Given the makeup of the team right now, he would have little if any chance cracking the rotation even on a temporary basis.

For a while, it looked as if the Cubs were seriously pursuing Tyson Ross as a viable starter who could rehab at his own pace and slot into the fifth starter slot later in the year.  Ross, however, signed with Texas.  The Cubs picked up Brett Anderson as a kind of poor man's second choice.  Anderson has always shown a lot of promise, but he has knocked around forever and has had only one healthy and productive season as a starter, that being a couple of years ago with LA.  The odds of Anderson coming back to that level of play are not all that great.  It is possible he is effective out of the bullpen, more or less on the model of Trevor Cahill.

The Cubs are still a really good team even though right now they are probably not as good on paper as they were at the beginning of last year.  Still, last year they were an offensive juggernaut from the start even though they lost Schwarber in like the third game, Soler was injured off and on almost all season, Montero had a bad year, and Heyward was a total flop at the plate.  This year they will have Schwarber in the lineup on a regular basis, they can hope that Heyward returns to form, and that Baez continues to develop a disciplined approach.  Contreras is a major upgrade as the everyday catcher both offensively and defensively.  So I look for them to score a lot of runs.

The starting rotation is still quite solid even though Lackey is a year older and Hammel is gone.  The only real weakness that I can see is left-handed relief.

Pitchers and catchers report in only a couple of weeks.  Should be a fun year.