Cubs Acquire Nate Pearson
The Cubs have acquired right-hander Nate Pearson in a trade with the Blue Jays, according to ESPN’s Jesse Rogers and Jeff Passan (X link). Toronto will receive minor league outfielder Yohendrick Pinango and minor league infielder Josh Rivera in return. The Jays also placed closer Jordan Romano on the 60-day injured list.
Pearson was selected 28th overall in the 2017 draft, just one pick after the Cubs took left-hander Brendon Little (who currently pitches for the Jays). A broken arm and an oblique injury limited him to just 1 2/3 innings in 2018, but he re-emerged with a vengeance in 2019, rocketing up the minor league ladder to Triple-A Buffalo by season’s end and establishing himself as one of baseball’s top pitching prospects. MLB Pipeline and Baseball America both ranked him within the overall top 10 of their preseason prospect rankings in advance of the 2020 season, and that year saw Pearson make his MLB debut in the form of five appearances for the Jays during the pandemic-shortened campaign.
Since pitching 101 2/3 innings in the minors in 2019, Pearson has barely topped that total in terms of big league experience, with 115 2/3 frames on his resume in the Show. Pearson has posted a 5.21 ERA, 25.2% strikeout rate, and 11.6% walk rate in the majors, with a 15.1% homer rate contributing to that unimpressive ERA.
All but five of Pearson’s 93 big league appearances have come as a reliever, as Toronto shifted Pearson to the bullpen in an effort to keep him healthy after a number of injury setbacks. From 2020-22, Pearson had to deal with such varied issues as a flexor strain, a lat strain, mono, groin problems, and a hernia surgery, which limited his time on the mound and prevented him from any MLB action whatsoever in 2022.
Pearson has been healthy over the last two years, but his performance has been inconsistent as best, dashing the Blue Jays’ hopes that Pearson could at least become a high-leverage relief weapon. He is one of the league’s harder throwers with a fastball that averages 97.6mph, but batters have teed off that heater to the tune of a .342 average this season. Pearson’s slider has been a much more effective offering, but opposing hitters have learned to lay off the slider and chase the fastball, to great success.
Pearson recently expressed an interest in returning to a starting role, which would’ve seemingly been something the Jays would’ve been open to given their rotation and the organization’s overall uncertain future direction in the midst of an underwhelming season. Today’s trade, however, closes the door on Pearson’s Blue Jays tenure entirely, and it perhaps hints at a change in Toronto’s plans for the trade deadline. The Jays had reportedly been only planning to move rental or shorter-term players, while keeping a lot of their core in place for another run at contention in 2025.
Since Pearson is only in his first year of arbitration eligibility and is controlled through the 2026 campaign, the deal could signal the Jays’ willingness to expand their list of trade candidates, perhaps if the club is considering that some level of a rebuild is in order. Then again, it could be that the Blue Jays were open to moving Pearson simply because they no longer consider him any kind of core piece — a letdown for the franchise, given that Pearson seemed like a future cornerstone not long ago.
The Cubs are struggling through a disappointing year of their own, with a 49-56 record in comparison to Toronto’s 47-56 mark. President of baseball operations Jed Hoyer said earlier this week that the club is already looking ahead to 2025 in terms of potential deadline pickups, and to that end Pearson represents an interesting change-of-scenery candidate. The righty turns 28 next month, so there’s still lots of time for a second act to his career as either a reliever or starter. Between Pearson’s prospect pedigree and two years of remaining arb control, there’s some major buy-low upside for the Cubs if the right-hander is able to find his form in Wrigleyville. Peter Gammons (via X) reports that the Red Sox were also interested in Pearson, though it stands to reason that the Jays might’ve preferred to move the righty outside the AL East.
Baseball America ranks Pinango 17th among Cubs prospects, while MLB Pipeline has him 29th. The outfielder was an international signing in 2018 and he has spent the majority of his career in high-A ball, only reaching Double-A for the first time this season and hitting .223/.316/.345 with four homers in 225 PA for Double-A Tennessee. BA’s scouting report notes that the 22-year-old’s attempts to focus on adding power in 2022-23 led to diminished numbers overall, but he has shown a better approach in 2024 and posted improved hard-contact numbers and a better chase rate. Defensively, Pinango is an average defender probably best suited to left field or even first base over the long term, and the latter position would naturally put more pressure on him to deliver more at the plate.
Rivera is 23rd on Pipeline’s list but wasn’t included in Baseball America’s Cubs top 30, perhaps owing to his .169/.277/.260 slash line over 253 PA at Double-A Tennessee this season. Like Pinango, Rivera is also playing Double-A ball for the first time, and it has been a pretty quick progression since Rivera was only drafted last year, in the third round. The University of Florida product has played mostly shortstop as a pro with some second base and third base time, and Pipeline projects him as “an offensive-minded utilityman” given his raw skills at the plate and his ability to competently play multiple positions, even if he isn’t a standout in the field.
Rogers and Passan (X link) were the first to report that Pearson was heading to Chicago. ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel reported (via X) Pinango’s inclusion in the deal, while Sportsnet’s Shi Davidi and Arden Zwelling (X link) reported Rivera’s inclusion.
Padres Notes: Taillon, Catching, DeVries
Cubs right-hander Jameson Taillon has reportedly drawn interest from several teams as the trade deadline approaches, and it appears as though the Padres can be added to that list. The Athletic’s Chandler Rome, Ken Rosenthal, and Patrick Mooney write that the Friars “have Taillon on their radar,” as starting pitching remains a need in San Diego.
Joe Musgrove might be on the verge of starting a minor league rehab assignment this coming week, but he’ll need multiple ramp-up starts since he hasn’t pitched since May 26. Yu Darvish‘s last MLB game was on May 29 and his last minor league rehab game was on June 19, and his return date remains uncertain given how the veteran is still on the Padres’ restricted list dealing with a personal family issue.
San Diego’s rotation has still posted solid numbers even without these two frontline pitchers, with the trio of Dylan Cease, Michael King, and Matt Waldron leading the way. Bolstering that group with a veteran like Taillon, however, would allow the Padres to bump the struggling Adam Mazur out of the starting mix. Should the Padres get Musgrove, Darvish, and a new addition joining up with Cease, King, and Waldron, they could perhaps adopt a six-man rotation to keep everyone fresh for the playoff drive, or this semi-surplus could resolve itself should other injuries emerge.
Taillon is far more than just a rental player, as he isn’t yet halfway through the four-year, $68MM contract he signed with Chicago during the 2022-23 offseason. Taillon receives $18MM in each season of the deal, so he has roughly $43MM remaining in owed salary — a number that won’t appeal to a Padres club that is trying to reset its Competitive Balance Tax status. After paying the tax in each of the previous three seasons, staying under the CBT line was a known goal for the Padres this season, and the team is projected (as per RosterResource) for a current tax number of roughly $224.8MM.
While this gives San Diego some wiggle room under the $237MM tax threshold, acquiring Taillon would alone absorb the rest of that CBT space, to say nothing or any other additions the Padres might might before the deadline. The Padres could look to sweeten the prospect return in order to get the Cubs to cover a larger chunk of Taillon’s remaining salary, or perhaps some kind of larger multi-player deal could be arranged involving a notable contract heading from San Diego to Chicago to help offset the Taillon contract. A.J. Preller and Jed Hoyer are no strangers to creative trades, and it is perhaps worth noting that the two clubs have been linked up on multiple trades over the last eight years — most notably the blockbuster that sent Darvish to San Diego during the 2020-21 offseason.
Speculatively speaking, it might be more likely that the Padres view Taillon as something of a backup plan, as one would imagine the Friars would first explore less-expensive options before considering adding another long-term pitching contract into the organization. A possible trade might also be a moot point if Taillon happens to have San Diego as one of the 10 teams on his no-trade list, as his contract contains some partial protection against a deal.
Winners of their last six games, the streaking Padres have moved into a wild card position, and are only percentage points behind the Mets for the top NL wild card spot. Since San Diego is only 6.5 games behind the Dodgers, the NL West title isn’t yet out of the question, but in any regard, the Padres are heating up at just the right time. Preller figures to be aggressive in buying at the deadline to fully cement his team as a contender after missing the playoffs in 2023, even if upgrading while staying under the CBT line presents an interesting secondary challenge.
Beyond pitching, the Padres might also need help behind the plate, as the New York’s Post Jon Heyman writes that catching could be a target area. Luis Campusano and Kyle Higashioka have handled the catching duties this season, with Campusano hitting .237/.280/.375 with six home runs over 239 plate appearances and Higashioka showing unexpected pop in hitting .226/.269/.540 with 12 homers in 145 PA.
That translates to a 127 wRC+ for Higashioka and an 89 wRC+ for Campusano, who has also posted subpar defensive metrics. Former top prospect Campusano was seemingly starting to break out in 2023, but this season’s tough results could at least result in the loss of more playing time, if the Padres opt for the hotter hand in Higashioka. Adding a new catcher would shake things up entirely, and Campusano could potentially see himself sent to Triple-A in that scenario since he still has a minor league option remaining.
Since Ethan Salas is one of baseball’s top prospects, the Padres already have a “catcher of the future” in the wings for a couple of seasons down the road, giving them some leverage to eventually move on from Campusano if he can’t get back on track. Of course, there is danger in shuffling the catching position at midseason, and some teams shy away from deadline catching trades since it can be difficult on a catcher to join a new team and learn a new pitching staff’s tendencies on the fly.
Speaking of prospects, it remains to be seen how willing the Padres are to trade significantly from a minor league pipeline that has already been heavily mined for trades in recent years. The Athletic’s Dennis Lin opines that shortstop prospect Leodalis De Vries might not be entirely untouchable in trade talks but is at least close to such status, as “the Padres will not consider moving him for anything less than controllable, star-level talent.”
The 17-year-old De Vries was an international signing just this past January, inked to a hefty $4.2MM bonus. De Vries has already started to deliver on his potential by hitting .242/.362/.450 with nine homers and 11 steals (in 12 attempts) over his first 276 professional plate appearances, all at the A-level. Xander Bogaerts told Lin that he was very impressed by De Vries’ talent and maturity when the two were briefly teammates during Bogaerts’ minor league rehab assignment this season, further enhancing De Vries’ status as a possible future cornerstone in the Padres’ lineup. It is fair to assume plenty of other teams have taken notice and asked about De Vries in trade talks, giving Preller another big chip to possibly consider dangling for the right return by July 30.
Cubs Acquire Gilberto Celestino From Pirates
The Pirates traded outfielder Gilberto Celestino to the Cubs yesterday (h/t to Andrew Destin of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette). Celestino, who was on a minor league deal with Pittsburgh and will therefore not occupy a spot on the Cubs’ 40-man roster, is making his organizational debut at Triple-A Iowa tonight. It’s likely that the Pirates received a small amount of cash in return.
Celestino had spent the entire season with Pittsburgh’s top minor league team. He was hitting .271/.348/.356 through 264 plate appearances. Celestino only had three home runs but was striking out a lower than average 20% clip and had gone 9-10 in stolen base attempts. He played all three outfield spots in Indianapolis with a plurality of time in center field.
The 25-year-old Celestino played in the majors with the Twins between 2021-22. He got into 122 games in the latter season, hitting .238/.313/.302 over 347 trips to the plate. Minnesota kept him on the injured list or on optional assignment to Triple-A for all of last year and waived him at the start of the offseason. He went unclaimed and joined the Bucs in November.
Pittsburgh has had one of the least productive center field situations in the majors. Neither Michael A. Taylor nor Jack Suwinski has offered much offensively. Celestino’s Triple-A work was nevertheless not enough to convince the Pirates to give him a big league look. He’ll have a couple months to try to snag a roster spot in Chicago.
Cubs Select Christian Bethancourt
The Cubs announced today that they have selected the contract of catcher Christian Bethancourt. He’ll take the roster spot of fellow backstop Tomás Nido, who has been placed on the 10-day injured list with a right knee sprain, retroactive to July 25. To open a 40-man roster spot, right-hander Ben Brown was transferred to the 60-day injured list.
Bethancourt, 32, began the year with the Marlins but struggled significantly with that club. He hit .159/.198/.268 through 88 plate appearances and was released by the end of June. The Cubs had just two catchers on their 40-man roster in Nido and Miguel Amaya, so they brought Bethancourt over on a minor league deal.
He hasn’t done much to inspire hope that he’s put his offensive woes behind him since then. In seven Triple-A games since signing that pact, he has a line of .192/.222/.192. That’s a tiny sample size but the combination of that with his work with the Marlins earlier this year is fairly bleak.
The Cubs will seemingly be hoping for a bounceback. As recently as 2022, Bethancourt hit .252/.283/.409 in the majors for a wRC+ of 100. But he slipped to .225/.254/.381 and a wRC+ of 74 last year and, as mentioned, has been awful this season.
Even if he doesn’t hit, Bethancourt is fairly well regarded for his work in controlling the running game, though his framing metrics aren’t that strong. The move will at least come with a minimal cost, as the Marlins are on the hook for the majority of his $2.05MM salary, with the Cubs only having to cover the prorated version of the league minimum salary for any time spent on the roster. That will be subtracted from what the Fish pay.
As for Brown, he landed on the 15-day injured list June 9. His ailment was initially listed as a neck strain though it was later reported to actually be a stress reaction in his neck. He’s now ineligible to return until 60 days from that initial IL placement, which would be early August. He has yet to begin a rehab assignment and will presumably need at least a week or two to ramp up whenever he’s cleared to do so. Taking that into consideration, this may not indicate any kind of setback in his recovery.
Astros Interested In Erick Fedde, Jameson Taillon
The Astros are prioritizing starting pitching before Tuesday’s deadline. They seem to be casting a wide net in their pursuit of at least a mid-rotation arm. This morning, Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times listed the Astros among the teams in on Rays right-hander Zach Eflin. Eflin is one of many arms on their radar.
Russell Dorsey of Yahoo! Sports reports that the Astros and Cardinals are among 10 teams in contact with the White Sox about Erick Fedde. USA Today’s Bob Nightengale first reported the Cards’ interest in Fedde over the weekend. Chandler Rome, Ken Rosenthal and Patrick Mooney of the Athletic report that the Astros are also among the teams in the mix for Cubs starter Jameson Taillon, a Houston-area native.
Both pitchers have performed like #3 caliber starters this season. Fedde would command the more significant prospect package because of his affordability. A former first-round pick of the Nationals, Fedde never emerged as more than a back-end arm in Washington. He tweaked his pitch mix after signing with the KBO’s NC Dinos last season. After dominating en route to the KBO MVP award, he returned stateside on a two-year, $15MM free agent deal with the White Sox.
It’s the most successful move of Chris Getz’s general manager tenure to date. Fedde’s stuff has played in this look against big league hitters. He carries a 2.98 earned run average across 20 starts. Fedde is averaging nearly six innings per appearance and hasn’t had any difficulty turning a lineup over three times. His 21.6% strikeout rate is right around league average, while his 6.6% walk percentage is strong. Fedde doesn’t have the swing-and-miss stuff of teammate Garrett Crochet, but he has been a very productive source of above-average innings.
As something of a buy-low signing, Fedde is plenty affordable. He’s playing this season on a $7.5MM salary and will make a matching amount in 2025. Jon Heyman of the New York Post writes that the Sox are telling interested teams they’re willing to hang onto Fedde into next season if clubs don’t overwhelm them with a trade package. It’d nevertheless be a huge surprise if the 31-year-old is still in a White Sox uniform by Wednesday. There’s no realistic path for the Sox back to contention by next season and little chance that Fedde’s trade value will be higher than it is now — when he’s pitching at a career-best level and comes with a year and a half of cheap control.
Taillon’s production has been very similar. The 32-year-old righty has a 2.96 ERA over 100 1/3 frames. He’s striking out 19.1% of batters faced against a minuscule 5.1% walk rate. It’s a nice rebound after a home run spike led Taillon to allow nearly five earned runs per nine during his first season in Chicago. Taillon’s average fastball speed has dropped a tick to a career-low 92.5 MPH. That’s somewhat alarming but hasn’t prevented him from performing well this year.
Fedde is the more appealing trade chip based largely on the differences in their contracts. Taillon signed with the Cubs on a four-year, $68MM deal over the 2022-23 offseason. He’s playing on an $18MM salary and due a matching annual sum from 2025-26. While Fedde’s contract is well below what he’d get on the open market, Taillon’s is closer to neutral. If the Cubs were primarily concerned about offloading the latter half of that deal, they wouldn’t get a huge prospect return.
Houston has stormed back to overtake a reeling Mariners team atop the American League West. They’ve put themselves in position to buy — validating a front office that consistently maintained they’d do so — and now need to fortify the rotation. Houston is giving starts to rookies Spencer Arrighetti and Jake Bloss without much success.
They’re looking to move to a six-man rotation to lighten the stress on the rookies behind Framber Valdez, Hunter Brown and Ronel Blanco. Houston is hopeful of getting Justin Verlander and Luis Garcia back from injury after the deadline, but neither has had a linear recovery process. Cristian Javier and José Urquidy are down for the season, while Lance McCullers Jr. has hit repeated snags as he rehabs a flexor injury. If everyone’s healthy, acquiring another starter could push one or both of Arrighetti and Bloss out of the rotation.
The Astros don’t have a ton of assets to leverage in trade. Aggressive trades, picking at the back of the draft, and the fallout from the sign-stealing punishment have thinned the farm system. Outfielder Jacob Melton is the only Houston player on Baseball America’s most recent Top 100 prospect list, and the organizational depth is also lacking.
That’s not to say they can’t add rotation help. Hypothetically, Melton would be a compelling headliner in a Fedde package. Young big leaguers like Bloss, Arrighetti or outfielder Joey Loperfido are interesting potential secondary pieces. Houston isn’t working with the same prospect stockpile as are a lot of other teams in the market for rotation help, though.
One way to compensate for the mediocre farm system would be to take on salary. That’s particularly true with a player like Taillon. Yet Houston is already at an organizational high in terms of player spending. They’re going to pay the luxury tax for the first time in franchise history.
RosterResource calculates their CBT number around $256MM. Any noteworthy deadline pickup is going to push them past the $257MM mark for the second tier of penalization. That’s not much of an impediment on its own, but it involves a 32% tax on further spending. Houston is already paying a 20% fee on their first $20MM above the $237MM base threshold. It’s not clear how much further owner Jim Crane is content to stretch.
To that end, The Athletic writes that the Astros are trying to offload Rafael Montero in trade packages. Houston re-signed Montero to a three-year, $34.5MM deal early in the 2022-23 offseason. (That came while Crane was playing an outsized role in baseball operations between the firing of previous GM James Click and before Houston tabbed Dana Brown as general manager.) It has proven a very poor decision.
Montero was tagged for a 5.08 ERA across 67 1/3 innings a year ago. While this season’s 4.58 mark is a bit more respectable, Montero’s strikeout rate has plummeted to 14.6%. Montero has given up 12 runs over 13 2/3 innings since the start of June. He has walked nine batters and surrendered four home runs with only eight strikeouts in that time. Manager Joe Espada has had little choice but to relegate the veteran reliever to low-leverage work.
Clearly, Montero’s contract is well underwater. He’s playing on $11.5MM salaries this year and next. Other teams aren’t going to have any interest in taking any portion of that unless the Astros take back an undesirable deal or add to the prospect capital they’re putting in the offer.
Orioles Have Reportedly Shown Interest In Jameson Taillon
The Orioles are among the teams that have expressed some interest in Cubs starter Jameson Taillon, reports Bruce Levine of 670 The Score. USA Today’s Bob Nightengale connected two other AL East teams — the Yankees and Red Sox — to Taillon over the weekend.
Cubs president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer admitted recently that the front office was prioritizing next season and beyond in its deadline dealings. That more or less rules them out of the bidding on impending free agents and suggests they’re open to offers on their rentals. It doesn’t mean they’re planning to aggressively market players under contract or team control beyond this season.
Taillon is under contract through 2026. The Cubs could certainly hold him even if they’re conceding it’s unlikely they’ll make a playoff run this season. The veteran righty is set to make $18MM in each of the next two years, though, so Chicago could prefer to offload that commitment and look to reallocate the money to other areas of the roster next offseason.
Getting out from the Taillon contract seemed unlikely just a few months ago. His first season in the Windy City wasn’t great, as he struggled to a 4.84 earned run average through 154 1/3 innings. His run prevention has improved here in 2024, with his ERA down to 2.96.
His underlying rate stats haven’t changed as drastically, however. He had a 21.4% strikeout rate and 6.3% walk rate last year, with those figures at 19.1% and 5.1% in 2024. He’s allowed fewer home runs and his batting average on balls in play has dropped from .292 to .275, helping his strand rate climb from 64.6% to 76.4%. FIP, which credits pitchers for home runs or the lack thereof, has Taillon going from last year’s 4.61 to this year’s 3.77. But SIERA, which normalizes home run rate, has given Taillon a lesser shift from last year’s 4.34 to this year’s 4.23.
Whether Taillon has significant changed from last year or not, he has a track record of being a decent rotation stalwart. He now has over 1,000 innings in his career with a 3.90 ERA, 21.4% strikeout rate, 5.9% walk rate and 42.3% ground ball rate.
The Cubs could hang onto him for the remainder of that contract but there’s also logic in making him available, as the long-term rotation picture still looks good even without Taillon in it. They could go into next season with Justin Steele, Shota Imanaga, Javier Assad and Jordan Wicks in four spots, with guys like Hayden Wesneski, Ben Brown and Caleb Kilian in the mix as well. Cade Horton, the club’s top prospect, is current dealing with a subscapularis strain but could be back on the mound later this year and in line for his major league debut. Prospects like Brandon Birdsell and Connor Noland have also reached the Triple-A level.
For the O’s, they are tied with the Guardians for the best record in the American League despite some rotation challenges. Kyle Bradish, John Means and Tyler Wells all required season-ending UCL surgery earlier this year, knocking three arms out of Baltimore’s rotation mix.
Currently, they have Corbin Burnes, Grayson Rodriguez, Dean Kremer and Albert Suárez as the core four in their rotation. Burnes and Rodriguez make for a solid one-two but Kremer is mostly a back-end guy. Suárez is having a nice season with a 3.48 ERA, but he’s a 34-year-old journeyman in the big leagues for the first time since 2017. They’ve given brief looks to prospects Cade Povich and Chayce McDermott without much success.
Adding to that group should be an obvious target for Baltimore. They’ve also been connected to a high-upside option in Garrett Crochet but it’s fair to wonder if that’s possible or likely. It’s also possible to see both Crochet and Taillon co-existing in this rotation next to Burnes and Rodriguez.
Speaking of Burnes, he’s an impending free agent, which will open a massive hole in next year’s rotation. General manager Mike Elias has admitted that adding controllable starting pitching would make sense for the club, perhaps making the extra two seasons on Taillon’s deal part of the appeal for them. Levine’s report adds that Taillon’s contract allows him to block trades to ten teams, but it’s not known which teams are on that list.
MLBTR Podcast: Trade Deadline Preview
The latest episode of the MLB Trade Rumors Podcast is now live on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts! Make sure you subscribe as well! You can also use the player at this link to listen, if you don’t use Spotify or Apple for podcasts.
This week, host Darragh McDonald is joined by Tim Dierkes, Steve Adams and Anthony Franco of MLB Trade Rumors to discuss…
- Is the lack of sellers going to be an issue this year and going forward with the expanded playoffs? (2:10)
- The White Sox could sell Garrett Crochet, Luis Robert Jr., Erick Fedde, Michael Kopech, John Brebbia and others (6:30)
- The Marlins have Jazz Chisholm Jr., Tanner Scott, A.J. Puk, Bryan De La Cruz, Jesús Sánchez and others possibly available (16:40)
- Will the Athletics move Brent Rooker and what is his value? (22:35)
- Will the Rockies trade Cal Quantrill, Austin Gomber and others? (36:00)
- Will the Angels trade Taylor Ward, Luis Rengifo, Tyler Anderson, Griffin Canning? (49:05)
- The Cubs and Jameson Taillon (51:35)
- The Tigers and Jack Flaherty and Tarik Skubal (59:55)
- Would the Orioles get Flaherty again? If not him, what other impact starting pitchers are possibly available? (1:05:35)
- The Rays and Randy Arozarena, Isaac Paredes, Pete Fairbanks, Zach Eflin, Zack Littell and others (1:15:10)
- The Blue Jays will trade rentals but what about Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Chris Bassitt, Kevin Gausman or George Springer? (1:22:00)
- How will the Yankees approach the deadline? Will they remake their infield? If so, how? (1:30:40)
- How aggressive will the Orioles be at the deadline? (1:40:10)
- How useful his ERA these days? (1:46:55)
- The Braves and the deadline (1:51:20)
- The Dodgers and the Phillies (1:53:30)
- The Guardians and Brewers (1:56:25)
- The Twins and the deadline (1:58:20)
- The Royals and their outfield (1:59:40)
- The Pirates (2:03:30)
Check out our past episodes!
- Top Trade Candidates, Hunter Harvey To KC And The Current State Of The Rays And Mets – listen here
- Brewers’ Pitching Needs, Marlins Rumors And The Nats Prepare To Sell – listen here
- The Rays Could Deal Starters, Garrett Crochet, James Wood And Free Agent Power Rankings – listen here
The podcast intro and outro song “So Long” is provided courtesy of the band Showoff. Check out their Facebook page here!
Hoyer: Cubs Prioritizing “2025 And Beyond” At Deadline
This morning, The Athletic reported that the Cubs did not anticipate buying at the deadline. President of baseball operations Jed Hoyer essentially confirmed as much in a chat with reporters just before tonight’s matchup with the Brewers.
Hoyer said the front office will approach the deadline with an eye toward to the future. “Where we are right now, I would have to say that moves only for 2024 – unless things change over the next week – we probably won’t do a lot of moves that only help us for this year,” Chicago’s baseball ops leader said (link via Jesse Rogers of ESPN). “If moves help us for 2025 and beyond I think we’re exceptionally well positioned.”
While Hoyer left open the slight caveat that the situation could change this week, there’s not much ambiguity in how he expects to handle the deadline. He spoke frankly about the team’s “poor position” with regards to this season. “We simply dug a hole with underperformance for two months. That doesn’t affect how I view the organization or how I view things going forward but it certainly affects 2024,” Hoyer said.
It’s clear the Cubs aren’t going to pursue any impending free agents. Hoyer didn’t term Chicago’s approach as buying or selling. That leaves open the possibility of trying to acquire MLB talent that is under team control beyond this season. While that’s not unprecedented (the Reds’ acquisition of Trevor Bauer and the Mets’ deal for Marcus Stroman in 2019 are examples of teams acquiring controllable players at the deadline despite being out of contention), it’s not common. The Cubs would need to outbid teams that are motivated to land those players for both a potential playoff push this summer and future seasons.
Chicago’s farm system is regarded as one of the strongest in the league. That gives Hoyer and his staff the ammunition to make a deal for a controllable player of note, but the likelier outcome is that the Cubs will just move a few short-term veterans. Hoyer shot down any suggestion of a complete teardown, saying it’s “not going to be an option so (there’s) no point in going through the hypothetical.” That makes it unlikely they’d deal core pieces who are under contract or team control beyond this season (e.g. Justin Steele, Shota Imanaga, Ian Happ, Michael Busch).
Prioritizing 2025 would ordinarily put a team’s rentals on the table, but the Cubs don’t have much to offer in that regard. Kyle Hendricks, Drew Smyly (whose deal contains a $2.5MM buyout on a $10MM mutual option) and recent minor league signee Jorge López are the only true rentals. Hendricks is playing on a $16.5MM salary and has an earned run average pushing 7.00. While he has pitched better lately after a dismal start to the season, there’d be minimal interest. The Cubs could try to pay down almost all of the contract to find a trade partner. Hendricks also has full no-trade rights after reaching 10 years of MLB service (at least the last five of which have been with his current team) earlier this season.
Smyly has a 2.92 ERA across 37 innings in a long relief capacity. That solid run prevention isn’t supported by mediocre strikeout and walk rates (21% and 10.2%, respectively). Between his $8.5MM salary and the aforementioned option buyout, there’s likely to be limited interest in the veteran left-hander.
Cody Bellinger has the ability to opt out of the final two years and $50MM on his contract. He has had a fine but unexceptional season, hitting .269/.331/.410 across 344 plate appearances. That’d be a difficult contract to move even if Bellinger were healthy, and he went on the injured list a couple weeks ago with a broken finger.
If the Cubs wanted to more or less run things back in 2025, they’d be in for a very quiet deadline. Yet even if they’re not likely to move long-term core pieces, Chicago could entertain offers on role players who are controllable beyond this season. USA Today’s Bob Nightengale reported over the weekend that the Yankees and Red Sox were looking at starter Jameson Taillon, who’ll make $18MM annually between 2025-26. Rogers reports that the Cubs have also gotten interest in third baseman/DH Christopher Morel and relievers Héctor Neris, Mark Leiter Jr. and Tyson Miller.
Morel, 25, is under team control through 2028. He’ll be a borderline candidate for the Super Two cutoff for early arbitration next offseason. The Cubs are certainly under no financial pressure to move him, but it’s possible they’re prepared to move on if another team views Morel as a regular. Morel is a good athlete with big power upside who has never found a defensive home. Chicago has unsuccessfully tried him in second base and throughout the outfield in previous seasons. They’ve given him 562 innings at third base this year, hoping his top-of-the-scale arm strength would work at the position. Defensive Runs Saved and Statcast’s Outs Above Average have each given him very poor grades for his stint at the hot corner.
This also hasn’t been a great season for Morel at the plate. While he has 18 homers, he’s hitting .202 with a .304 on-base mark. It’s a step down from the .241/.311/.471 career slash line that Morel carried into the season. While that’s clearly not ideal, it belies some intriguing developments from a process perspective. Morel has upped his walk rate by a couple points while dramatically slicing his strikeouts. After fanning in over 30% of his plate appearances for his first two seasons, he’s striking out 23.8% of the time this year. An unsustainably low .221 average on balls in play has kept that from materializing into better results.
Even if the Cubs expect Morel’s offensive performance to normalize with an uptick in his average on balls in play, the lack of a defensive fit makes him a difficult player to value. The Cubs could hope to turn third base over to last year’s first-round pick Matt Shaw as soon as next season. They don’t have much in the way of short-term alternatives. If the Cubs traded Morel, they’d probably rely on Miles Mastrobuoni and Patrick Wisdom to cover the position for the rest of the season.
The Cubs should be open to offers on anyone in their bullpen. Neris has handled the ninth inning since Adbert Alzolay went down with a forearm strain. The offseason signee has been shaky, walking 16.1% of opponents and blowing four saves in 17 attempts. Neris had a 1.71 ERA for the Astros last season, but that’s up two runs this year thanks to his control woes. The 35-year-old righty is playing on a $9MM salary and has a matching option for next year. That’s currently a team option but would convert to a player option if Neris pitches in 24 more games.
Given his inconsistency, the Cubs aren’t likely to want Neris back at that price point. They’d presumably be happy to find a trade partner, but the potential for being saddled with a $9MM player option if Neris hits his vesting marker could make other teams wary. There’s less risk with regards to Leiter and Miller. The former is striking out 34.4% of opponents with a 50.6% grounder rate across 34 innings. He’s playing on a $1.5MM salary and is under arbitration control through 2026. Miller, whom the Cubs acquired from Seattle in May, has broken out with a 2.04 ERA while striking out nearly 26% of opponents across 35 1/3 frames.
Whether the Cubs get compelling enough offers to move anyone from that group remains to be seen. They’re not entirely buried in the Wild Card standings, sitting 3.5 games back of the last playoff spot (currently held by the Mets). With four intervening teams to jump, the front office has decided they’re at best a long shot to make the postseason. How much they’re willing to reshape the roster with the ’25 campaign in mind will be one of the bigger questions of the upcoming week.
Luke Little Suffers “Likely” Season-Ending Lat Strain
July 22: The Cubs today transferred Little to the 60-day injured list, per Meghan Montemurro of the Chicago Tribune on X. His roster spot goes to righty Julian Merryweather who has been reinstated from his own stint on the 60-day IL. Righty Hunter Bigge was optioned to make room for Merryweather on the active roster.
July 20: Cubs left-hander Luke Little was placed on the injured list with a left shoulder strain prior to the All-Star break last week, and today manager Craig Counsell told reporters (including Patrick Mooney of The Athletic) that the injury is “likely” to end the youngster’s season.
It’s a brutal development for the 23-year-old rookie, who has generally looked excellent since making his debut with the club back in September of last year. Chicago’s fourth-round pick from the 2020 draft, Little has posted a 2.76 ERA (158 ERA+) with a 3.61 FIP in 32 2/3 innings of work at the big league level to this point in his young career and has flashed the sort of high-end talent that could make him a potential high leverage arm for the Cubs in the future.
The hard throwing lefty averages more than 96mph on his fastball and has struck out a strong 28.8% of batters faced in the majors so far, but has to this point been held back by control issues. Little has walked an excessive 15.8% of opponents to this point in his career, including 16.5% this season. While his ability to avoid giving up homers (he’s allowed just one in his career to this point) has allowed him to post strong results in spite of that lack of control, his 4.29 xFIP and 4.19 SIERA both suggest that his current production isn’t entirely sustainable unless he can curtail his wildness.
Even with those potential red flags in his profile, the loss of Little is still a devastating blow for the Cubs. Chicago’s bullpen has been shaky all season due to injuries to their primary high-leverage duo of Adbert Alzolay and Julian Merryweather, which forced the likes of Hector Neris and Mark Leiter Jr. into more prominent roles. While strong performances from internal youngsters like Little and Porter Hodge as well as savvy external pickups like Tyson Miller and Jorge Lopez have helped to steady the Chicago relief corps’s production in recent weeks, only the Rockies and White Sox have blown more saves than the Cubs’ 18.
The news regarding Little figures to further tax a bullpen that also lost right-hander Hayden Wesneski to the 15-day injured list today, although Counsell told reporters (including Mooney) that the club believes that Wesneski’s forearm issue is not serious and that he’ll be back on the mound in Chicago fairly quickly. The righty has pitched crucial innings for the Cubs while swinging between the bullpen and the rotation this year and sports a 3.96 ERA (albeit with a lackluster 4.72 FIP) across 61 2/3 innings of work this season.
The continued stacking of bullpen injuries makes the relief corps an obvious place for improvement ahead of the trade deadline on July 30, but the Cubs haven’t made their plans for this deadline clear and entered today with a 47-53 record that places them dead last in the NL Central and 4.5 games out of an NL Wild Card spot. Should the Cubs opt to stand pat or even sell short-term assets such as Neris and veteran lefty Drew Smyly, the club will be left to hope that the likes of Merryweather and Alzolay can return healthy later this year and provide a boost while youngsters such as Hodge and Hunter Bigge step up to handle meaningful innings.
Cubs Don’t Expect To Be Deadline Buyers
The Cubs’ deadline trajectory has been an oft-discussed topic over the course of the past few weeks, with the team sitting at or near the bottom of the NL Central but also within striking distance of the final NL Wild Card spot. They’ve ostensibly explored possibilities on both ends of the buy/sell spectrum, showing interest in Toronto catcher Danny Jansen while also reportedly talking with both the Yankees and Red Sox about the potential of a Jameson Taillon trade. The Cubs dropped their first two games coming out of the All-Star break to a D-backs team that’s now tied for the final Wild Card spot, though they dodged a sweep in an extra-inning win Sunday.
While the Cubs are 3.5 games out in the Wild Card hunt, the latest report from Patrick Mooney, Ken Rosenthal and Will Sammon of The Athletic indicates that the Cubs aren’t planning to be buyers at next week’s trade deadline. That’s not an indication there’ll be any kind of prominent fire sale for the Cubs either, however. Chicago hopes to contend next year and isn’t likely to move players who are under control unless they receive big league-ready talent in return.
As for the Cubs’ slate of rental players, there’s simply not much to peddle to other clubs. Drew Smyly is sitting on an impressive 2.92 ERA in 37 relief innings, but he’s also walked 10.2% of his opponents and is playing on a contract other teams will want to avoid. Smyly is owed the balance of an $8.5MM salary for the current season (about $3.2MM) in addition to a $2.5MM buyout on a $10MM mutual option for the 2025 season.
Righty Kyle Hendricks is a free agent at season’s end but isn’t going to draw any interest with a $16MM salary and a 6.69 ERA (unless the Cubs eat the entirety of his contract, perhaps). Hector Neris has a 3.74 ERA and 24.2% strikeout rate in 33 2/3 innings — but he’s also walked a career-worst 16.1% of opponents. Neris is playing on a $9MM salary, and his $9MM club option will convert to a player option if he appears in 24 more games this season (60 total). That’s going to turn off any potentially interested parties. Cody Bellinger can become a free agent at season’s end, but he’s on the injured list with a fractured finger and the two opt-out provisions on his three-year deal would’ve made trading him extraordinarily difficult anyhow.
The Athletic’s report at least raises the speculative possibility of listening to offers for starter Justin Steele, though with three-plus seasons of club control remaining, the price would presumably be as high or even higher than the asks for crosstown ace Garrett Crochet (two years of club control remaining) and AL Cy Young front-runner Tarik Skubal (the latter of whom is not expected to be traded). There’s no reason to think the Cubs would outwardly shop Steele, but listening to see if someone steps up with a Juan Soto-esque haul for last year’s fifth-place NL Cy Young finisher is sensible enough.
With regard to Taillon, there’d be some sense to moving him even if the team doesn’t envision a broad-reaching sell-off. In signing any free agent to a long-term deal, a team is most interested in the first couple years of said contract. The 2025-26 seasons will be Taillon’s age-33 and age-34 campaigns. He’ll earn $18MM in each season on his slightly backloaded $68MM deal. Moving him would free up some money to potentially spend on a younger pitcher this offseason — or perhaps on another area of need entirely.
The Cubs control Steele, Shota Imanaga, Javier Assad, Ben Brown, Hayden Wesneski and Jordan Wicks through at least the 2027 season. Prospects Cade Horton and Brandon Birdsell are rising quickly through the system. There’s some depth from which to deal, and a Taillon trade could bring in talent, shed future payroll and reduce future luxury tax obligations. Taillon wouldn’t command nearly the same type of haul as Steele for a number of reasons (age, salary, general talent level), but there aren’t many arms available so the Cubs could conceivably take advantage of that shortage and see what the market bears.
It’s worth emphasizing, too, that most teams’ plans remain pretty fluid this time of year. While teams facing a gaps of eight, nine, ten or more games in their respective postseason pursuits are sure to focus on selling (just as clubs in the opposite position will primarily focus on adding), nearly half the teams in baseball exist in a relative purgatory between those two ends of the spectrum. There’s currently a three-team tie for the third NL Wild Card spot (Mets, D-backs, Padres), and another five teams are within four games of that final spot — the Cubs among them. In the American League, there are four teams within six games of the final Wild Card spot.
For instance, if the Cubs snapped off six or seven straight wins beginning today, they’d presumably be far more open to the idea of adding some pieces. That’s particularly true because their next three games come against the division-leading Brewers. But a win streak of that nature is always a long shot, and it’s plenty notable that for the time being, Chicago isn’t viewing itself as a team that will trade even lower-caliber minor league talent in exchange for some marginal rental upgrades. Time will tell whether the players on the field can push the front office to take a more aggressive stance, but right now it seems likely the Cubs are in for a relatively quiet deadline.