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Cubs mailbag: Let the offseason intrigue begin · North Side Territory: A Chicago Cubs Podcast

0:04
Speaker 1: Welcome into Northside Territory, presented by Fox One Foul Territory Networks.
0:09
Speaker 1: Cubs Podcast. I'm Sahadi Sharma with my partner Patrick Mooney.
0:13
Speaker 1: We are your Cubs beat writers over at the Athletic
0:16
Speaker 1: and Patrick, we have another mail bag episode. It's been
0:20
Speaker 1: a little while. I'm not sure if we did one.
0:23
Speaker 1: I don't think we did one during the playoffs at all,
0:25
Speaker 1: and maybe maybe towards the end of the season we
0:27
Speaker 1: had one, but it's been a little while. Free agency
0:30
Speaker 1: is gonna start up soon. The World Series could end tonight.
0:34
Speaker 1: We're recording on Halloween Friday, and Game six with the
0:38
Speaker 1: Blue Jays up three to two. I gotta say I'm surprised,
0:43
Speaker 1: I should rise. Baseball is baseball and you never know
0:46
Speaker 1: what's going to happen. But the Dodgers just look like
0:49
Speaker 1: a force. Didn't seem like it was going to be
0:51
Speaker 1: that competitive. So it's nice to see that kind of
0:53
Speaker 1: anything can happen. Just a good reminder that you know,
0:58
Speaker 1: who knows what's going to happen in October or you know,
1:01
Speaker 1: the Cubs could have made.
1:02
Speaker 2: A run themselves if the thing's right. The Blue Jays
1:06
Speaker 2: right now, and it's funny.
1:08
Speaker 3: Yeah, I've been Oh, I mean I didn't stay up
1:11
Speaker 3: for all the eighteen in a game. I went to
1:13
Speaker 3: that pretty early. But otherwise been pretty glued to this
1:16
Speaker 3: playoff run, particularly watching the Blue Jays, and they've been
1:20
Speaker 3: just super entertaining to watch, and personally, I'm just rooting
1:25
Speaker 3: for a Game seven. I'd love to see that. Just
1:28
Speaker 3: one more night, an extra night of baseball, I think
1:32
Speaker 3: would be awesome. And uh, yeah, we have to wait.
1:37
Speaker 3: You know, we always like to do the you know,
1:39
Speaker 3: takeaways from the World Series winner or what's like the
1:42
Speaker 3: new blueprint THEO always loved those story ideas. Obviously, who's
1:50
Speaker 3: very dismissive of them, but be really curious to see
1:55
Speaker 3: kind of who emerges from this. And obviously a great
1:59
Speaker 3: time to do a mail bag because very soon we'll
2:02
Speaker 3: be inundated with rumors and speculation.
2:07
Speaker 1: Exactly, let's start off with regular mail bagger Tyler Dershall.
2:13
Speaker 1: With the trade deadline prices going up every year, is
2:15
Speaker 1: there going to be a change in the front office
2:18
Speaker 1: to spend more, be more aggressive in the off season
2:20
Speaker 1: to off set this? Tyler Jed was asked pretty much
2:24
Speaker 1: this question. I want to say at the end of
2:27
Speaker 1: season presser that he does, and he agreed.
2:32
Speaker 2: It was hard to get.
2:33
Speaker 1: I think in particular, he's talking about starting pitching. They
2:39
Speaker 1: had a deal we know this for Jesus Loosardo last
2:42
Speaker 1: winter that didn't get done due to him not passing
2:46
Speaker 1: the physical for the Cubs. But they tried to get
2:51
Speaker 1: another starting pitcher. I think it's pretty obvious that.
2:54
Speaker 2: I mean, we know they.
2:54
Speaker 1: Tried to get a starting pitcher at the deadline, at
2:57
Speaker 1: least one that was under control.
2:58
Speaker 2: Prices were exhorbited. We'll see what happens this.
3:02
Speaker 1: Year, but I think, like we've written it that like
3:06
Speaker 1: this is their plan to build up pitching. I don't
3:11
Speaker 1: know how they'll upgrade position player wise. I think you
3:15
Speaker 1: have to add something. You can't just let especially if
3:19
Speaker 1: Kyle Tucker walks. You can't just let them walk and
3:21
Speaker 1: then go all youth. Maybe they can, maybe that's what
3:24
Speaker 1: they do, but pitching seems like absolutely must get this winter.
3:31
Speaker 3: Yeah, another good question from Tyler, and I do remember
3:34
Speaker 3: that moment in the Wrigleyfield interview room where Jed was
3:37
Speaker 3: asked a version of this, and I think, just to
3:40
Speaker 3: add to what you said there, SOT it was from
3:43
Speaker 3: the front office perspective. I mean, I go back to
3:45
Speaker 3: when Jed was a Cactus League media day in Arizona
3:49
Speaker 3: and was saying like there is no war chest for
3:52
Speaker 3: the trade deadline, that maybe there's a little bit laying around,
3:56
Speaker 3: or you know, they have some flexibility if they kind
4:00
Speaker 3: of make presentations to ownership. But you know, they went
4:05
Speaker 3: after Bregman last spring training with the best offer that
4:10
Speaker 3: ownership would authorize, and it wasn't like, oh, didn't get Bregman,
4:16
Speaker 3: so let's go spread those resources around. It's like, no,
4:19
Speaker 3: that that was kind of a unique case. And you know,
4:24
Speaker 3: Tyler's followed this team a long time as well, and
4:26
Speaker 3: we all know that they're obsessed about pitching depth, and
4:30
Speaker 3: you know, I think there is a case to be
4:32
Speaker 3: made for being more aggressive in the offseason. As Jed
4:36
Speaker 3: likes to say, you're only getting a player for maybe
4:39
Speaker 3: a third of the season. Granted you get them for
4:42
Speaker 3: the most important games of the year, assuming you make
4:44
Speaker 3: the playoffs. But you know those costs as well. It's
4:49
Speaker 3: only like a third of the salary too, right, So
4:52
Speaker 3: you don't have to, like you budget that much to
4:56
Speaker 3: hold back, particularly when you're the Cubs, and if you're
4:58
Speaker 3: in the playoff race, you're gonna get around three million fans.
5:00
Speaker 3: So I think as we cover this offseason, this whole
5:05
Speaker 3: idea of how aggressive are they going to be is
5:08
Speaker 3: going to just be at the front end center of
5:10
Speaker 3: everything we're reporting on, just with the CBA coming up
5:15
Speaker 3: with kind of an imbalanced farm system with a team
5:19
Speaker 3: that won ninety two games and has a pretty nice floor, like,
5:25
Speaker 3: how what is the ceiling here?
5:29
Speaker 1: Yeah, here's the next question I think ties into this
5:33
Speaker 1: in a sense because I think it's kind of the
5:35
Speaker 1: follow up to, well, if they do add the starting pitcher,
5:38
Speaker 1: is it realistic that the Cubs would keep both keep
5:42
Speaker 1: Showdai Monaga and also add.
5:43
Speaker 2: Another surefire starting pitcher? This is handbone. He had more
5:47
Speaker 2: in this question.
5:48
Speaker 1: There was another question similar to it, basically saying, look,
5:51
Speaker 1: if you keep Showda, you have Shoda, Justin Steele, Matthew Boyd,
5:55
Speaker 1: Jameson Tywn and Kate Horton. That's what you feel like
5:58
Speaker 1: you go into this season with as you're starting five,
6:01
Speaker 1: and then if you add another one that's a six
6:03
Speaker 1: starting pitcher that feels like a sure fire rotation piece,
6:07
Speaker 1: what do you do?
6:08
Speaker 2: How do you how do you handle this.
6:11
Speaker 1: My initial reaction to this is, first of all, I
6:14
Speaker 1: think it makes it all the more important to to
6:18
Speaker 1: be patient with Justin Steele.
6:20
Speaker 2: Could Justin Steel be ready to go on opening Day?
6:24
Speaker 1: I think you've gotten the feel that, Yes, I think
6:27
Speaker 1: we've heard remblings that that's a possibility it could happen.
6:32
Speaker 1: Does that mean it's guaranteed? Does that mean they should
6:35
Speaker 1: do that? I think there's like, let's just go to
6:40
Speaker 1: the most recent example of this in in in baseball,
6:43
Speaker 1: and at least one off the top of my head
6:45
Speaker 1: is Sandy al Contra. There was no reason to rush him.
6:48
Speaker 1: They did it, and it was really rough for a
6:51
Speaker 1: couple of months.
6:52
Speaker 2: Uh.
6:52
Speaker 1: They if you have five guys that are no doubt starters,
6:56
Speaker 1: even if you don't, and it's Aavi rasad, maybe it's
6:59
Speaker 1: worth just kind of waiting with Justin Steele. I'm sure
7:04
Speaker 1: he would disagree with this, and I understand that, but
7:08
Speaker 1: I just think it makes sense to take a breath,
7:11
Speaker 1: let him really build up, maybe rehab in the minors,
7:15
Speaker 1: stay in extended spring training, whatever they want to do
7:18
Speaker 1: however they want to handle it, but there's no reason
7:20
Speaker 1: for him to start the season in April. That's one
7:23
Speaker 1: simple thing. The other obvious thing is I don't care
7:26
Speaker 1: how many pictures you add. There's like we got to
7:29
Speaker 1: spring training and Javier Asad was hurt, Like there were
7:35
Speaker 1: so many injuries this past season. Like, get as many
7:37
Speaker 1: starting pictures as you can and figure it out.
7:41
Speaker 3: Yeah, and Tyon and Boyd are both likely free agents
7:46
Speaker 3: after the twenty twenty six season. Kate Horton was terrific
7:53
Speaker 3: in the second half, but he does not have the
7:55
Speaker 3: most like voluminous track record in terms of workload. I
8:01
Speaker 3: think Cubs are good at finding those surefire starting pitchers
8:06
Speaker 3: in the off season if you're not going to spend
8:09
Speaker 3: big on Kyle Tucker, if you don't want to empty
8:14
Speaker 3: the farm system to trade for a controllable starting pitcher,
8:17
Speaker 3: like put the money in the rotation kind of see
8:23
Speaker 3: what happens. Mike's sort of guess right now is if
8:28
Speaker 3: Shoda does come back, it might be on a one
8:31
Speaker 3: year qualifying offer, and in that case, you know, you
8:34
Speaker 3: may want some insurance on the back end. And there
8:37
Speaker 3: are in We've talked about this in the in the
8:41
Speaker 3: hot stove pitching targets, there are like interesting pictures out
8:44
Speaker 3: there who aren't going to command like seven year, two
8:48
Speaker 3: hundred million dollar deals or at least we don't think,
8:51
Speaker 3: and this could be an area where they can get
8:53
Speaker 3: creative and improve the club.
8:57
Speaker 2: Yeah.
8:57
Speaker 1: Absolutely. One other thing that they that was questioned. There
9:02
Speaker 1: was one of these questions. I'm not sure Ifho's handbone.
9:05
Speaker 1: They wondered if Kate Horton could get optioned, look at
9:11
Speaker 1: some point in the season or maybe to start the season.
9:14
Speaker 1: I don't think you can rule these things out when
9:16
Speaker 1: a guy has an option, I don't care how good
9:18
Speaker 1: he is. Sometimes they make these decisions and it's and
9:22
Speaker 1: it's still like and it's not always the most fair decision,
9:25
Speaker 1: but it's you know, how many innings is he going
9:27
Speaker 1: to pitch next.
9:28
Speaker 2: Year or how whatever it is.
9:30
Speaker 1: I think there are the you shouldn't completely rule it
9:32
Speaker 1: out to start the season. Probably not at some point
9:35
Speaker 1: during the season. I don't know, like especially if he struggles,
9:38
Speaker 1: like you may say, like, hey, just go down and
9:41
Speaker 1: reset for a month. These are all things that like
9:44
Speaker 1: are so speculative right now that it's hard to know.
9:46
Speaker 1: But I wouldn't have ruled it out at the end
9:49
Speaker 1: of this past season. But they kind of, you know,
9:52
Speaker 1: they made it through and found enough ways to kind
9:55
Speaker 1: of limit his his innings, his workload, I guess is
9:59
Speaker 1: a better way to say that.
10:00
Speaker 2: Patrick.
10:01
Speaker 1: Next question Aaron Schmid schmidl Koper. I hope I got
10:06
Speaker 1: that right. We're gonna do our player spotlight soon on
10:09
Speaker 1: a specific player, but he's his questions are specific to
10:14
Speaker 1: like a couple pre ARB guys. Do you anticipate the
10:16
Speaker 1: Cubs having contract extension discussions with parts of this core?
10:20
Speaker 1: Do they attempt a pre ORB extension with any of
10:22
Speaker 1: PCA Shaw Horton, Casey, Bystaiirs I kind of edited that
10:26
Speaker 1: question because he had some longer stuff about PCA. Yes,
10:29
Speaker 1: they tried for PCA. I'm sure they'll revisit it. I
10:33
Speaker 1: wouldn't be surprised by any of these guys, A little
10:35
Speaker 1: surprised that this team really hasn't done that yet with
10:38
Speaker 1: the guys that have not proved it at all.
10:41
Speaker 2: Maybe by Stairs has kind of proved it, but.
10:43
Speaker 1: He has no defensive value, and that's that could like
10:46
Speaker 1: hesitate it be a point of hesitation. Casey's like this
10:50
Speaker 1: team just hasn't done it where they're just like so
10:53
Speaker 1: sure a guy's going to be a star.
10:54
Speaker 2: Let's extend him.
10:57
Speaker 1: I wouldn't be surprised if they try and do that
10:59
Speaker 1: with any of these guys. I think it's kind of
11:03
Speaker 1: it needs to be process, yeah, yeah, and it needs
11:06
Speaker 1: to be the thought process. Right. We've talked so much
11:08
Speaker 1: about how this team isn't going to spend two hundred
11:10
Speaker 1: and sixty two hundred and eighty million. Well, if they're
11:12
Speaker 1: not going to do that, they need to be start
11:15
Speaker 1: thinking in different ways and start doing different things. And
11:17
Speaker 1: I think they tried that with PCA. I don't think
11:20
Speaker 1: it was contentious or so far apart that the both
11:25
Speaker 1: sides were like, you're ridiculous or anything like that.
11:28
Speaker 2: I think it was productive.
11:30
Speaker 1: So maybe they revisit that, and frankly, with the way
11:33
Speaker 1: season ended, maybe there's some middle.
11:36
Speaker 2: Ground they can meet.
11:38
Speaker 1: I don't know, like a you know, he's going to
11:41
Speaker 1: focus on that first half, they're going to focus on
11:43
Speaker 1: that second half.
11:43
Speaker 2: And that's how these things work, right.
11:47
Speaker 3: No doubt. Yeah, And I'm all it takes is one
11:49
Speaker 3: phone call, right, and that goes, as we've seen into
11:53
Speaker 3: spring chaining all the way up to opening day, maybe
11:56
Speaker 3: a little bit past it. So I think everyone is
12:01
Speaker 3: sort of open minded about these things. And that's just
12:03
Speaker 3: a matter of who kind of steps forward and who's
12:07
Speaker 3: willing to sort of make a compromise from either side.
12:11
Speaker 1: Patrick, We're gonna focus on a specific player for our
12:14
Speaker 1: Draft Kings spotlight here. So, Nico Horner is entering the
12:24
Speaker 1: final year of his contract. He signed a contract accession.
12:28
Speaker 1: Was that before twenty two or twenty three? It's hard
12:34
Speaker 1: to remember. I believe it was twenty three three. Yeah,
12:36
Speaker 1: it was before twenty three. It added just one year
12:39
Speaker 1: to his deal, correct, So we could be if if
12:44
Speaker 1: not for that extension, would be talking about him as
12:46
Speaker 1: a pending free agent. You wrote about him, and look,
12:52
Speaker 1: I I've.
12:54
Speaker 2: Always liked Nico Horner. I think this year something.
12:58
Speaker 1: Stood out beyond just him being like this really solid player.
13:04
Speaker 1: I think he fully emerged as a leader, as a
13:07
Speaker 1: clubhouse spokesman, a leader. I think he'd always kind of
13:11
Speaker 1: been like that, but it just kind of felt more impactful.
13:14
Speaker 2: Maybe because they were.
13:15
Speaker 1: Good and they were winning so much, it felt like
13:18
Speaker 1: it felt more impactful. A year ago, at this time,
13:22
Speaker 1: you and I were both discussing, like, what are the
13:25
Speaker 1: chances they trade him? It doesn't make sense, And I
13:27
Speaker 1: was convincing myself that maybe it does make sense if
13:29
Speaker 1: you're improving in other ways. Now, I can't imagine that now.
13:33
Speaker 1: I can't imagine even contemplating that.
13:37
Speaker 2: It would be.
13:37
Speaker 1: Very unpopular, and maybe those are types of unpopular moves
13:40
Speaker 1: you're supposed to make.
13:42
Speaker 2: I think it'd be insane. I think it'd be a really.
13:45
Speaker 1: Bad decision to like, you'd be taking out the heart
13:48
Speaker 1: and soul of a team and just a really really
13:52
Speaker 1: strong all around player.
13:54
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm with you. I think being on a winning
13:57
Speaker 3: team really accentuated his strengths. Playoff baseball really brought out
14:03
Speaker 3: a lot of, you know, the best attributes of Nico's game.
14:09
Speaker 3: He's always been an extremely insightful and thoughtful person. I
14:14
Speaker 3: was going back to your story from when he signed
14:16
Speaker 3: that contract extension and Jed just talking about how I mean,
14:20
Speaker 3: Jed really ran the gamut there of like, I hope
14:22
Speaker 3: this isn't the last contract extension we do with him.
14:26
Speaker 3: He said something like, you know, I have three boys.
14:28
Speaker 3: I hope they grow up to be the type of
14:30
Speaker 3: person Nico Horner is. I'm paraphrasing here, but that's kind
14:33
Speaker 3: of the idea is getting at. And then just his
14:35
Speaker 3: exit meeting after twenty nineteen. I mean, the dude gets
14:38
Speaker 3: off his parents couch is up for like whatever, nineteen games,
14:43
Speaker 3: twenty days, something like that. And Jed came away from
14:47
Speaker 3: it like this guy was the most insightful person we
14:51
Speaker 3: had talking about this team, that he was absolutely on
14:54
Speaker 3: point and he had just gotten here. And basically the
14:58
Speaker 3: story I wrote in the Athletic for Friday morning was
15:00
Speaker 3: just kind of things I had been collecting. And we
15:03
Speaker 3: went into that playoffs saying like, we may have to
15:06
Speaker 3: cover a Game seven of the World Series, so you
15:09
Speaker 3: better be prepared to my write a lot of off
15:11
Speaker 3: day stories and you know, things like that. And I
15:15
Speaker 3: went back to the day after the Cups clinched, We're
15:17
Speaker 3: in Cincinnati, and a reporter asked Craig Counsel, using a
15:23
Speaker 3: basketball term, is Nico one of the biggest glue guys
15:27
Speaker 3: in baseball? And Counsel did sort of his you know, me,
15:35
Speaker 3: depends on your definition, And you know, in Craig Council's definition,
15:41
Speaker 3: Nico is way better than a glue guy. That he
15:44
Speaker 3: is a great player, period. And then I think sometimes
15:48
Speaker 3: because of the Stanford education in Nico's personality and certain
15:53
Speaker 3: elements of his game, you think glue guy, and he
15:57
Speaker 3: does certainly connect a lot of people in that clubhouse
16:00
Speaker 3: and bring a lot of intangibles. But you know, you
16:03
Speaker 3: look at his Baseball Savant page, his stat cast ratings,
16:09
Speaker 3: there's a lot of red there of just someone who's
16:11
Speaker 3: in ninety fifth, ninety sixth, ninety seventh, ninety eighth, ninety
16:15
Speaker 3: nine percentile of a lot of different areas of the game.
16:18
Speaker 3: When you add all that together, it's an elite player.
16:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, I absolutely agree Nico. Don't.
16:26
Speaker 1: Don't bring up to Nico that he doesn't hit for power,
16:28
Speaker 1: and that's fine because he disagrees. He thinks it, he
16:31
Speaker 1: wants he thinks power is an incredibly important part of
16:35
Speaker 1: the game. But watching him and the way he plays,
16:39
Speaker 1: like I wouldn't change a thing. Look, you need power
16:42
Speaker 1: on your team, Let other guys do it, and Nico
16:44
Speaker 1: Horner can be who Nico Horner is, and he's just
16:47
Speaker 1: incredibly valuable. You can't you can't understate that. I do
16:53
Speaker 1: think Craig Counsel has kind of learned about Nico Horner.
16:57
Speaker 1: Maybe he didn't appreciate just how valuable he was until
17:00
Speaker 1: he started managing him and kind of saw like, this
17:03
Speaker 1: guy is a little bit different than maybe he realized.
17:07
Speaker 2: And that's it's easy.
17:08
Speaker 1: It's easy to kind of overlook a guy that doesn't
17:11
Speaker 1: hit double digit homers or you know, it's just not
17:15
Speaker 1: that flashy in any specific way. But he just does
17:18
Speaker 1: a lot of things really well, and it's and some
17:22
Speaker 1: of them elite, and that's that's incredibly important. All right,
17:26
Speaker 1: let's throw it to our DraftKings player pick.
17:32
Speaker 4: Thanks a hot for my North Side Territory producer pick.
17:35
Speaker 4: I'm taking the under seven and a half runs at
17:37
Speaker 4: minus one twenty two. Yamamoto and Gosman threw a pitcher's
17:41
Speaker 4: duel in Game two. I'm expecting them to do the
17:44
Speaker 4: same in Game six. Don't know how it's gonna end up,
17:48
Speaker 4: but I do know it's gonna be under seven and
17:50
Speaker 4: a half runs tonight. It's a minus number, so I
17:53
Speaker 4: gotta put one twenty two down to win one hundred tonight.
17:56
Speaker 4: I do it under seven and a half runs on
17:58
Speaker 4: DraftKings at minus two. Sahadevan Patrick back to you.
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Speaker 1: Okay, welcome back to Northside Territory presented by Fox One.
19:09
Speaker 1: Let's get back to your questions. We got another one
19:12
Speaker 1: from Wade Remling. I may have spelled this wrong. Remlinger
19:16
Speaker 1: is what I'm guessing, not Reminger, but uh uh. Wade asks,
19:22
Speaker 1: I don't really see how you upgrade this offense without
19:24
Speaker 1: making a trade to open a spot. So my question
19:27
Speaker 1: is how dependent are the Cubs on player development to
19:29
Speaker 1: improve offensively? I think this is a really good question.
19:33
Speaker 1: And we were talking about what kind of narratives may
19:37
Speaker 1: build from the World Series, and you know, you talk
19:41
Speaker 1: about the Dodgers and it's always spend, spend, spend. That's
19:45
Speaker 1: a simple narrative. If they win, uh, nobody can beat
19:48
Speaker 1: them because of the money they spend. If the Blue
19:51
Speaker 1: Jays win, first of all, you get to shoot down
19:55
Speaker 1: that narrative that the Dodgers are unbeatable. The other thing
19:58
Speaker 1: is the dot the Blue weren't that great of a
20:01
Speaker 1: team as far as one loss last year. They just
20:04
Speaker 1: made tweaks to their roster. Now it doesn't it's not
20:06
Speaker 1: a perfect fit for the Cubs because the Cubs very
20:09
Speaker 1: well likely could lose Kyle Tucker. So you can't say
20:11
Speaker 1: they just can make tweaks to the roster. But the
20:15
Speaker 1: idea is in my head. But watching the Blue Jays
20:19
Speaker 1: is maybe you don't need to always make dramatic changes.
20:22
Speaker 1: Maybe player development is the biggest thing you can do
20:28
Speaker 1: to help your team level up, Like how do you
20:32
Speaker 1: make your team better. It's annoying because Jed says this
20:35
Speaker 1: all the time and people roll their eyes and say,
20:38
Speaker 1: just spend You're the Cubs, and I agree with that,
20:41
Speaker 1: but there is something to what way, Like what Wade's
20:44
Speaker 1: getting at here, I do think it's incredibly important for
20:48
Speaker 1: player development. I think Miguel Amiya one simple one. Miguel
20:52
Speaker 1: Amaya is staying healthy, getting better PCA, finding some consistency.
20:58
Speaker 1: One of these younger got Matt Shaw, Owen, Casey Moys's, Viceros,
21:02
Speaker 1: Cad Horton, Daniel Palencia, Porter Hodge, bouncing back some other
21:09
Speaker 1: pitchers that were not focused on right now. All of
21:13
Speaker 1: this is going to impact the Cubs in twenty twenty
21:16
Speaker 1: six in some manner outside of a trade moving one
21:19
Speaker 1: of those guys or a couple of those guys. There's
21:22
Speaker 1: a lot of youth and a lot of player development.
21:26
Speaker 1: It's imperative. We saw the impact of Michael Bush. He
21:30
Speaker 1: made he stepped up after a great season, stepped up
21:34
Speaker 1: to a borderline elite season, one of the best first
21:37
Speaker 1: basemen in baseball. That's player development. That they do a
21:41
Speaker 1: pretty good job of it. You'd like to see it
21:44
Speaker 1: kind of continue and for them to kind of stand
21:46
Speaker 1: out in that department.
21:49
Speaker 3: Yeah, completely agree. I think Jed Hoyer made that point,
21:52
Speaker 3: and it is sometimes lost even on me watching the
21:56
Speaker 3: team every day, that you sort of focus on where
22:00
Speaker 3: they didn't spend, what they didn't do at the trade deadline.
22:03
Speaker 3: But Pete takes these huge strides this year, match out
22:09
Speaker 3: and had a disappointing playoffs, but made, you know, enormous
22:14
Speaker 3: strides in the second half. Kate Horton unbelievable after the
22:19
Speaker 3: All Star break. And I don't know what sort of
22:23
Speaker 3: trade you can make to open a spot. I mean,
22:24
Speaker 3: off the top of my head, I believe Ian Happ,
22:28
Speaker 3: Dansy Swanson, En say a Suzuki all have full no
22:30
Speaker 3: trade clauses. I may have missed one of those while
22:33
Speaker 3: the Cubs were handing those out like Halloween candy. After
22:40
Speaker 3: Jen Theo came in a long time ago and inherited
22:42
Speaker 3: certain no trade clauses, We're you know, we're never gonna
22:44
Speaker 3: do something like that unless maybe certain circumstances and then
22:48
Speaker 3: lo and behold that there's stuck with several of those.
22:53
Speaker 3: But yeah, it does come down to player development. I
22:57
Speaker 3: think you do both ideally. But again, this can be
23:03
Speaker 3: a real off season theme here of do the cub
23:06
Speaker 3: spend at the top of the free agent market, probably not.
23:09
Speaker 3: Do the Cubs extend themselves super long into the future
23:12
Speaker 3: and the last year of a labor deal, probably not.
23:15
Speaker 3: And we'll be writing this kind of this weekend looking
23:19
Speaker 3: at the Cubs. Obviously the agenda. You could almost roll
23:22
Speaker 3: this team out next year without making any changes and
23:25
Speaker 3: expect them to be in the wild card on that's
23:27
Speaker 3: not the goal. That's kind of the bare minimum. But
23:32
Speaker 3: a lot of the heavy lifting has sort of been done.
23:34
Speaker 3: It's those like finishing pieces, those surprises, those developments that
23:39
Speaker 3: the Blue Jays, you know, win or lose, have really
23:42
Speaker 3: opened my eyes. I did not see a lot of
23:45
Speaker 3: the Blue Jays this year obviously given our jobs, and
23:48
Speaker 3: they've been just really fun to watch on a nightly basis.
23:53
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean there's it takes some surprises, it takes
23:57
Speaker 1: player development. It can't just be the superstars, like you
24:02
Speaker 1: can sign a superstar. But like a year ago, people
24:06
Speaker 1: were pounding the table for Corbyn Burns. It would have
24:09
Speaker 1: looked awful if the Cubs signed Corbyn Burns. I'm not
24:12
Speaker 1: saying I predicted that or I knew that. I'm just saying, like,
24:16
Speaker 1: these things happen all the time. There's probably, off the
24:19
Speaker 1: top of my head, I can't think of them all,
24:20
Speaker 1: but half the huge contracts signed last winter. My guess
24:25
Speaker 1: is don't look all that good a year in. It's
24:29
Speaker 1: a year things change and they can change quickly. But
24:34
Speaker 1: just saying they have you have to.
24:36
Speaker 2: Have player development.
24:37
Speaker 1: I think it's important to spend I think the club
24:39
Speaker 1: should lean into that, but I also think player development
24:41
Speaker 1: is imperative.
24:43
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, have you ever heard of Addison Barger
24:45
Speaker 3: Until just as I'd never heard of the guy, and
24:49
Speaker 3: he's like the greatest player of all time.
24:52
Speaker 1: The only reason is because I I'll read like about
24:56
Speaker 1: prospects and stuff like that, and I knew we hit
24:59
Speaker 1: the ball hard, that's all I didn't, you know, like
25:01
Speaker 1: it's flawedzing, but yeah, like he's fun to watch. You've
25:07
Speaker 1: been touching on this a little bit during this podcast,
25:10
Speaker 1: Patrick about the CBA. But how much does the CBA
25:12
Speaker 1: impact Hoyer's decisions? Can he just look at the crowded
25:15
Speaker 1: outfield to someone solid infield. I think you kind of
25:18
Speaker 1: touched on this and the returning starting pitchers and Stan
25:21
Speaker 1: pat and not make any splashes. That's WC with There's
25:25
Speaker 1: another question here by cub Neck and we can kind
25:28
Speaker 1: of tie these together. Is Jed positioning the Cubs to
25:30
Speaker 1: start another rebuild after the coming CBA battle?
25:34
Speaker 2: It would certainly explain.
25:35
Speaker 1: Hawkins twenty thirty two comment, Okay, look to get to
25:40
Speaker 1: WC Like. I think, yes, the CBA impacts a lot
25:45
Speaker 1: of these decisions. I think it's hard to say exactly
25:48
Speaker 1: how Like I'd be surprised if they signed only one
25:52
Speaker 1: year deals this year.
25:55
Speaker 2: Maybe they do. Maybe I'm just like.
25:58
Speaker 1: Not, maybe, like we have done enough digging yet and
26:01
Speaker 1: like the Cubs and maybe many teams will be focused
26:04
Speaker 1: on one year deals and it'll be like the outliers
26:06
Speaker 1: that are jumping and pouncing. I don't know, but I
26:11
Speaker 1: think to pretend like it doesn't have some impact would
26:16
Speaker 1: be crazy. You named the players, but it's like sayah
26:20
Speaker 1: Ian Hap, Nico Horner, Carson, Kelly Jamison, Tyane, Matthew Boyd.
26:28
Speaker 2: I think that's pretty much. I think I got them
26:30
Speaker 2: all right.
26:30
Speaker 1: There are those are the players with contracts that end
26:36
Speaker 1: after this season, and then there's a bunch of pre
26:39
Speaker 1: ARP guys, and then I think the only player under
26:41
Speaker 1: contract for sure is Dansby. We'll see what happens with
26:46
Speaker 1: Shoda Monaga's contract. But that's that's a lot of players.
26:49
Speaker 1: That's a lot of players.
26:50
Speaker 2: And a lot of different things happening right there.
26:53
Speaker 3: I will say, for Jed Hoyer, being viewed as a
26:59
Speaker 3: very con conservative executive for variety of reasons, extremely rational.
27:06
Speaker 3: I mean that perception is valid. He also comes up
27:10
Speaker 3: with some out of nowhere moves that we never saw coming,
27:15
Speaker 3: whether it's firing David Ross to bring in Craig Council.
27:20
Speaker 3: I guess we saw the Tucker trade coming up, but
27:23
Speaker 3: that was an extremely aggressive win now move that was
27:30
Speaker 3: out of character and probably not like universally lauded within
27:34
Speaker 3: his own organization. Does Jed Hoyer's contract extension change his outlook.
27:42
Speaker 3: I bet he would say no, but I bet on
27:48
Speaker 3: some level it's changed things a little bit. So I
27:54
Speaker 3: think their definition of splashes is different than our definition
27:58
Speaker 3: of splashes. Like, and that's Jed Hoyer, Carter Hawkins, Greig Counsel, like,
28:05
Speaker 3: they're all pretty pragmatic, rational, analytical, and they don't they
28:12
Speaker 3: don't work for an ownership group that gets caught up
28:16
Speaker 3: in a lot of that stuff. And the business side
28:18
Speaker 3: of their organization knows they can kind of roll out
28:21
Speaker 3: the baseball's and get about three million people into Wrigley
28:25
Speaker 3: Field no matter what. So I don't we're recording Halloween morning.
28:31
Speaker 3: I don't want to like say, this is going to
28:33
Speaker 3: be a boring off season and nothing is going to happen.
28:37
Speaker 3: I do think it's gonna be a very long off season,
28:39
Speaker 3: Like we've seen this. When was the last time you
28:42
Speaker 3: went to spring training and there wasn't like a free
28:44
Speaker 3: agent thing out there?
28:46
Speaker 1: Right?
28:47
Speaker 2: I mean, yeah, it's been a while.
28:50
Speaker 3: It's been a while.
28:51
Speaker 1: I mean Bellinger, say Bellinger, Bregman, all the way back.
28:56
Speaker 3: To when they signed Darvish, Like this stuff just drags
28:59
Speaker 3: out and how the cubs have positioned themselves. It's to
29:04
Speaker 3: be nimble to be in the mix whenever these kind
29:08
Speaker 3: of players fall through the cracks, or when maybe the
29:11
Speaker 3: industry values players differently, like they are going to be
29:19
Speaker 3: in that and maybe they do sign a couple of
29:22
Speaker 3: multi year got your guys just thinking like, hey, we
29:27
Speaker 3: need to backfill a little bit here. We need some
29:30
Speaker 3: sort of protections after twenty twenty six. So it's not like,
29:35
Speaker 3: you know what if the young players we talked about earlier,
29:38
Speaker 3: like just don't pan out and that, then you're then
29:43
Speaker 3: maybe you're spending some crazy prices because you have all
29:46
Speaker 3: of these holes you have to fill and there's labor certainty,
29:51
Speaker 3: So more teams are maybe spending Like, you're right, we
29:56
Speaker 3: have to dig more into this. We have to see
29:59
Speaker 3: how certain things deveen. But there's probably a case to
30:01
Speaker 3: be made to invest a little more into the future
30:05
Speaker 3: so that you're not kind of boxed in on the
30:07
Speaker 3: other side of this.
30:09
Speaker 1: Yeah, so it kup Neck is going to a really
30:14
Speaker 1: negative place.
30:15
Speaker 2: I think here wrong.
30:21
Speaker 1: So look, these are two separate things. I think that
30:25
Speaker 1: the CBA, like I don't think Jed, we focus so
30:28
Speaker 1: much on certain things that Jed says, and the fans
30:33
Speaker 1: aren't hearing that he's not. He hasn't decided or he
30:35
Speaker 1: hasn't made it clear whether it's a good thing or
30:39
Speaker 1: a bad thing that he has all these He points
30:42
Speaker 1: out the positives and the negatives of this. It's there's
30:46
Speaker 1: a ton your books are clean, you have you're very nimble,
30:49
Speaker 1: you're very flexible here after twenty twenty six, but you're
30:54
Speaker 1: losing a ton of talent, and that's a lot of
30:56
Speaker 1: talent to replace. He knows, he understands how daunting that tat.
31:00
Speaker 1: He's the one that traded there the World Series core
31:03
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty one.
31:04
Speaker 2: Did he think that was the right decision?
31:06
Speaker 3: Yes?
31:07
Speaker 1: Did he also see that it was an insane talent
31:10
Speaker 1: drain that he couldn't recoup in one year in one offseason?
31:14
Speaker 1: He saw that he doesn't want to go through that again.
31:17
Speaker 1: So this idea that does he want to start another rebuild?
31:20
Speaker 1: The whole point of twenty twenty one was to kind
31:25
Speaker 1: of reset and not do this again. They do not
31:29
Speaker 1: want to do that again. They don't want to be
31:32
Speaker 1: a seventy win team again, or worse that, like it
31:36
Speaker 1: may happen once you know like these one year blips.
31:41
Speaker 1: But if it's a multi year thing where you there's
31:44
Speaker 1: a complete talent drain, something has gone wrong. It is
31:47
Speaker 1: not part of their plan. Something's screwed up. Now you
31:50
Speaker 1: touched on it. Maybe the kids don't develop. That's that's
31:53
Speaker 1: a failure on their part. It is if too many
31:55
Speaker 1: of these kids us, yeah, it would be a problem,
31:58
Speaker 1: and that would be on that. I also think, look,
32:03
Speaker 1: I've said this to Carter's face, so I have no
32:05
Speaker 1: problem saying it on the podcast. I think it was
32:08
Speaker 1: a dumb move to put a number on this, like
32:11
Speaker 1: in say twenty thirty two.
32:13
Speaker 2: I think that was his mistake. How often do we
32:15
Speaker 2: hear Jed say we have one eye on the future
32:17
Speaker 2: and one eye on the present.
32:18
Speaker 1: We have to look, he's always saying that, but you
32:21
Speaker 1: don't say twenty thirty two, like you put this year
32:24
Speaker 1: out there, that's so far in the future for like fans,
32:29
Speaker 1: and you put this number out there, and.
32:31
Speaker 2: Fans are gonna go crazy.
32:32
Speaker 1: Of course they're gonna latch onto that, and they have
32:35
Speaker 1: every right to and to be frustrated and use it
32:37
Speaker 1: and like bring it back and use it as like
32:40
Speaker 1: this cudgel to be like look at these guys, what
32:42
Speaker 1: do they They only care about, you know, years from now.
32:46
Speaker 1: It wasn't a suggestion that there's multiple rebuilds in between there.
32:50
Speaker 1: It's just it was it was a he should not
32:54
Speaker 1: have put a number on it. He could have said
32:56
Speaker 1: twenty twenty eight or twenty twenty like just he you
33:00
Speaker 1: shouldn't have said any year.
33:01
Speaker 2: It was the same.
33:02
Speaker 1: It was the same mistake de Poto made when he
33:04
Speaker 1: said fifty four percent. The goal is to win fifty
33:08
Speaker 1: average fifty What you don't say that. Don't say the
33:11
Speaker 1: goal is to win average fifty four percent of your games.
33:14
Speaker 1: Like that's insane, Like no average fan wants to hear
33:17
Speaker 1: that the goal is to win ninety plus. Just say that,
33:19
Speaker 1: and and hope you understand behind the scenes that like, hey,
33:23
Speaker 1: this is how it is equal, Like we have to
33:25
Speaker 1: keep an eye in the future.
33:26
Speaker 2: Whatever. Just be more generic and don't put specific numbers
33:30
Speaker 2: on these things. And because it looks so bad.
33:34
Speaker 6: I'm going to just I want to be them to
33:36
Speaker 6: be as specific as possible, as brutally honest as possible,
33:42
Speaker 6: like and that's what I appreciate of.
33:45
Speaker 3: You know, between Jen Carter, they might be more available
33:48
Speaker 3: on any given Wrigley homestand than like the lead executives
33:52
Speaker 3: of the Bulls, Bears, black maybe even black Hawks combined
33:57
Speaker 3: like all year. And so while that may irritate fans,
34:05
Speaker 3: at least you get true insight into what they're thinking
34:10
Speaker 3: and like how they're running it. And again, you can
34:15
Speaker 3: disagree with how they're running it, but I think that
34:20
Speaker 3: is a good way for cups that I think of
34:22
Speaker 3: how hyper rational this front office is and how bottom
34:27
Speaker 3: line driven this ownership group is, and all of that
34:30
Speaker 3: taken together gives you a pretty good understanding of where
34:35
Speaker 3: they're coming from. And as long as they win, it
34:40
Speaker 3: doesn't matter. If they don't win, then yeah, it's kind
34:44
Speaker 3: of an unpopular, unsentimental place to be. But yeah, I'm
34:50
Speaker 3: glad we kind of got this kicked off because it
34:53
Speaker 3: helps us sort of think about how we're going to
34:56
Speaker 3: be covering this offseason.
34:58
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, I mean just like kind of put an
35:00
Speaker 1: emphasis on it, like this whole like cliff, this idea
35:04
Speaker 1: of a cliff and so many players leaving. I think
35:06
Speaker 1: that kind of makes me think that you have to
35:09
Speaker 1: sign a couple guys that are going to be around
35:12
Speaker 1: beyond now. Will we see them sign like thirty plus
35:15
Speaker 1: million dollar contracts for guys beyond twenty six or something
35:19
Speaker 1: like that.
35:20
Speaker 2: I think that's probably where they hold back. But can
35:23
Speaker 2: they get like.
35:24
Speaker 1: Jamison tie own type deals where it's like eighteen twenty
35:29
Speaker 1: million solid players, guys that you know are going to
35:32
Speaker 1: be good for the next few years. I think that
35:35
Speaker 1: makes sense. I think they need to look figure out
35:38
Speaker 1: how to do that. It's going to be interesting because
35:42
Speaker 1: there's a lot of position players coming up and that's
35:44
Speaker 1: where all the youth is. So like, there's some interesting
35:48
Speaker 1: decisions here. How do you figure out if that youth
35:50
Speaker 1: is going to be here beyond twenty six can impact
35:53
Speaker 1: the team.
35:54
Speaker 2: You gotta find playing time for them.
35:55
Speaker 1: So there's all these little decisions that they need to
35:58
Speaker 1: figure out. Things they need to figure out how it's
36:00
Speaker 1: going to work out. All right, thanks so much for
36:02
Speaker 1: listening to everyone. We will be back next week. We
36:05
Speaker 1: will have a World Series winner, and we'll officially be
36:08
Speaker 1: in the off season next time we record. This is
36:12
Speaker 1: Northside Territory presented by Fox One. Make sure to rate, review, subscribe,
36:16
Speaker 1: subscribe to the YouTube channel, and subscribe to The Athletic
36:19
Speaker 1: where Patrick and I are on top of all things
36:22
Speaker 1: Cubs this offseason. Thanks for listening to everyone