Team Leaders

Brewers

• OBP: Brice Turang (.409)
• ISO: Gary Sánches (.233)
• HR: Turang / Jake Bauers (6)
• R+RBI: Turang: 63
• wRC+: Turang (154)
• BSR: Turang (1.1)
• Defense: Joey Ortiz (5.2)
• Batter WAR: Turang (1.9)
• SP K/9: Misiorowski (14.12)
• SP BB/9: Logan Henderson (1.50)
• SP ERA: Kyle Harrison (2.09)
• SP FIP: Miz (2.27)
• RP K/9: Aaron Ashby (13.50)
• RP BB/9: Shane Drohan (1.29)
• RP ERA: Ashby (1.69)
• RP FIP: Drohan (1.67)
• Pitcher WAR: Miz (1.9)

Cubs

• OBP: Conforto (.456)
• ISO: Conforto (.309)
• HR: Happ (10)
• R+RBI: Happ (55)
• wRC+: Conforto (208)
• BSR: Swanson (1.7)
• Defense: PCA (10.4)
• Batter WAR: PCA (1.8)
• SP K/9: Imanaga (9.77)
• SP BB/9: Imanaga (2.15)
• SP ERA: Brown (1.60)
• SP FIP: Brown (2.44)
• RP K/9: Phil Maton (11.68) (LOL)
• RP BB/9: Milner (2.49)
• RP ERA: Palencia (2.00)
• RP FIP: Palencia (3.54)

It gives me no pleasure to report that Brice Turang is having a breakout season, if you can say that for a guy who was a 4+ WAR player last year.

Who isn’t available?

We’re pretty familiar with the Cubs laundry list of injuries, though at least one may be coming back soon in Caleb Thielbar. Matthew Boyd is supposed to throw a bullpen session today, hopefully he’s back in a few weeks after his bizarre injury.

The Brewers have a pile of injuries of their own, most of which I hadn’t checked in on since spring training. Last year’s breakout starter Quinn Priester has been out all season with Thoracic Outlet Syndrome. He’s on a rehab assignment and got shelled in a low-A game over the weekend. Old nemesis Bob Minocqua has been on the IL with shoulder inflammation after being pulled from a start at the beginning of the month following a big drop in velocity. He’s working his way back and has thrown a bullpen session or two. The Miz is day to day with recurring leg cramps over his last few starts, here’s hoping the Cubs forget to stock any bananas in the visitors locker room on Wednesday. OF Brandon Lockridge is out after superficially tearing up his knee earlier this month.

Pitching Matchups

ZiPS projected K/9, BB/9, ERA listed for each pitcher

Monday: Brandon Sproat, RHP (8.26, 3.65, 4.61) vs Shota Imanaga, LHP (8.76, 2.03, 3.79), 6:40 PM CT

Sproat was part of the return for the Freddy Peralta trade. He was a high draft pick college arm by the Mets in 2023 who moved up to AAA fairly quickly, but faced relative struggles at that level of competition. He’s made eight starts with the Brewers and has struggled with home runs, giving up eight in 36 innings this year with a nearly 20% HR/FB rate (!)

Given Shota’s fly-ball tendencies and the who-knows-how-accurate forecast I’m seeing for the wind strongly blowing out today, it could be a long game.

Tuesday: Jacob Misiorowski, RHP (11.73, 3.67, 3.57) vs Ben Brown, RHP (9.77, 3.06, 3.84), 6:40 PM CT

The Miz is unfortunately good! The only question with him from last year was just volume concerns, but he’s managed to go at least five innings in every start this year if not more. Well, and the other question whether his arm might fall off, which is only slightly more acute for him than it is for any generic pitcher. Despite the cramps issues mentioned above, in his last three starts he’s allowed zero runs while striking out 29.

As far as Brown goes, I’ve been excited with his outings since moving back to starting earlier this month, but we’ve been here before many times with Brownie. I’m just going to sit back and enjoy the ride, and probably a lot of strikeouts.

Wednesday: Kyle Harrison, LHP (10.07, 3.43, 4.07) vs Edward Cabrera, RHP (9.30, 3.47, 4.10), 6:40 PM CT

Harrison was a former top prospect with the Giants, who has bounced around to the Red Sox and now the Brewers after a meh year or so in SF. He’s found an extra gear with the Brewers, racheting up an already pretty good strikeout rate and giving up fewer taters. He seems to rack up pretty high pitch counts so often doesn’t work much past the fifth or sixth.

Cabrera has been kind of meh of late, though some of that I chalk up to him having to, much like the rest of the rotation, try to eat a bit more innings than the team would probably like given the state of the whole pitching staff. I’ve kind of felt like he’s been holding things back as a result. But we also knew after the trade that he was likely to be an inconsistent guy with a high ceiling so in that sense he’s still on track with my preseason priors.

Go Cubs. Or don’t. I can’t tell you what to do.

The off day is very welcome given the long stretch of games they’ve played, during which they took and built the current cushion, and then there’s just one more off day after a nine game stretch coming up before they play straight through the end of the month until the next one on June 1. Brutal, but just keep chugging, don’t get swept, and see where we end up from there.

The Tuesday game against the Reds featured Taillon as the starter, and I realized that the first time I ever went to a game at Wrigley Field was also against the Reds, albeit not a walkoff like the previous night, though still a come-from-behind victory of sorts. As you all know, the Cubs walked off the Reds again this night (though I didn’t know that at the time) to notch back-to-back walkoffs for the first time in exactly five years, and they have a more comfortable cushion on the rest of the division though there are still like five months left in the season. But you’d rather be up than down, right?

I found out when I got there that at least for this particular night game, they only open the gates to fans 90 minutes before first pitch rather than a full two hours as back in the day. I did also go to more games back in the day, but that was also because the Cubs sucked and tickets were way cheaper. So I was very grateful that I apparently won that bet I didn’t even remember. For whatever reason, Wrigley Field seemed a lot cleaner and spacious than before, although I had trouble finding food that didn’t suck and ended up just eating some shitty nachos and getting my customary souvenir soda. The cup at least looks really cool for the franchise’s 150th anniversary. Saw this kind of silly Jumbotron announcement too, like you’d be throwing half the fans out if the ushers actually gave a crap.

So naturally, Taillon gives up his requisite two bombs on dumb pitches yet almost finishes the sixth inning, the Cubs bullpen locks it down until the offense could tie it up, including a Michael Busch bomb that we pretty much knew was gone off the bat, and so it was until the ninth when Emilio Pagan hurt his leg. I had looked down for a moment to check other scores and when I looked up, he was on the ground. I did need to pee but that wasn’t exactly the way I wanted to get the lull in the action to go to the bathroom. It was nice to see the Cubs have a gift-wrapped walk off opportunity in the bottom of the tenth with Dansby Swanson at second base, and when Busch hit the chopper I thought at least Dansby can get to third and they’d have two shots or a wild pitch/balk to get him in. But then Elly de la Cruz glitched or something and as we saw the ball get past him, everyone in the stands waved Dansby in and it was yet another walk off win for me at Wrigley Field.

I have no idea how well the pitching will hold up, if the offense can continue chugging, or if Brewers devil magic gets ramped up again, but for now, let’s enjoy this ride as much as I did that night.

I have to admit that I was not sanguine about Ballesteros going into the season – I thought it was the right decision for the Cubs to give him a shot at the main DH job but put the odds pretty low on success, at least early in the season. I’m happy to be wrong! He’s hit at every level and MLB is no exception. The coaching staff has done a great job at putting him in a position to succeed, so aside from Ballesteros himself, obviously, big kudos to Craig Counsell. This is just vibes-based analysis but it wasn’t until this year that I’ve really felt like he’s been moving the chess pieces around in a low key successful way. I’d love to see him get some more time to develop at catcher, and from what I hear he’s been in all the meetings with the rest of the catching squad. But when a guy his hitting like this, you can’t really take him away from it (dying laughing). A good problem to have, let’s hope the Cubs do better by Kyle Schwarber 2.0.

Where We Stand Now

Following the Cubs past ten game and current five game winning streaks, they are finally in sole possession of first place in the NL Central. Unfortunately the rest of the division isn’t letting the grass grow under their feet. While the Cubs have a two game lead on the Cardinals and Reds, everyone has a winning record. Here’s the pythag/baseruns standings going in to Sunday:

It’s safe to say that the Reds and Cardinals probably aren’t as good as their record, but the Pirates (!) and Brewers (sigh) are also legit contenders. The Cubs host the Reds for a four game set at Wrigley starting tomorrow – hopefully those underlying Reds numbers are evident. Here’s a quick look at the pitching matchups

Monday: Chase Petty, RHP vs Edward Cabrera, RHP

This will be Petty’s first start of the season, as reported by grizzled Cincinnati journalist Gordon Wittenmeyer. This was Brandon Williamson’s spot in the rotation, but he hit the IL with shoulder fatigue after his last start.

Tuesday: Andrew Abbott, LHP vs Jameson Taillon, RHP

Wednesday: Brady Singer, RHP vs Colin Rea, RHP

Thursday: TBD vs Shota Imanaga, LHP

If you had also forgotten, Reds ace Hunter Greene is out for at least half the year with bone spurs in his elbow. Also of note, Cub-killer and Pat Hughes favorite Eugenio Suarez is on the IL with an oblique strain, and may miss this series. Here’s hoping.

Three up:

1. Dansby Swan-dong hit a ninth-inning go-ahead home run to cap the Cubs late comeback following a rocky start against Dodgers starter Emmet Sheehan. He went 2-3 with two runs, four RsBI, and a HBP on the day, and now has a .206/.349/.453 line on the season, good for a 125 wrC+. Not bad for the nominal ninth hitter in this lineup.
2. Nico Hoerner had a masterclass of a seventh inning. He knocked in the tying run with an RBI single in the top of the inning, then had two straight incredible defensive plays in the bottom of the frame. He made an incredible relay throw to gun down Andy Pages trying to stretch a triple, and on the very next PA he made an incredible play deep in the hole, on a deflection off Busch, to the pitcher covering first to nab Hyesong Kim. You love to see it, and to know that he’ll be around for quite some time.
3. Shoutout to journeyman reliever Ryan Rolison, who pitched three scoreless innings on the road against the back to back defending champs to save an injury-depleted and exhausted bullpen. Even aside from the injury situation I bet he sticks around for a bit after that one.

One mid:

1. Tiny shout-out to Jameson Taillon, who more or less performed to expectations against a great lineup and was able to gut out five innings and “only” give up four runs. The mistakes count too yada yada but he mostly managed to work around trouble, and only gave up one homer. Aside from that how was the play Mrs. Lincoln?

Three down:

1. I’ll always seethe about how much the Dodgers sound system annoys me, but it didn’t seem quite as relentless today, so I’ll seethe at having to hand it to the Apple TV broadcast instead for their sound mixing (dying laughing).
2. It was a rough day at the plate for Seiya, who was the only Cubs starter to not reach base in this one. Given the heater he’s been on I’m not going to complain too hard though.
3. He got the job done but I’m sure Counsell et al were shitting bricks that Corbin Martin of all people was the best option to try to nail down a save at Dodger Stadium. Maybe with Assad back in the pen it might be time for Ben Brown, closer, unless it looks like Daniel Palencia truly will spend the minimum on the IL.

Next up: Colin Rea takes on Roki Sasaki at 6:15 PM CT, broadcast by FOX. Time will tell if Roki’s resting Depressed Face will win out over Ian Happ’s resting Vaguely Annoyed Face.

Happ currently leads the team in homers with 7. There is an outside shot that he can get into the team top 10 and even notch his 200th career bomb with a career-best season. His current career high is 25, and with such an early surge having banked those 7, it isn’t impossible. Just Ian Happ being boring good again.

Overall, the Cubs scored eighteen runs to the Mets seven in the series.

Next up is a four game set at Wrigley against another flailing NL Least team, the Phillies, who are on a five game losing streak of their own and the Cubs saw just last weekend. The Phillies staff was just what they needed to wake the bats up, hopefully that continues. A quick look at the likely pitching matchups, assuming no one falls into a mystery spot or is arrested for every murder in the city of Chicago in the next few days:

Monday: Aaron Nola vs Colin Rea, 6:40 PM CT

Tuesday: Jesus Luzardo vs Shota Imanaga, 6:40 PM CT

Wednesday: Taijuan Walker* vs Matthew Boyd, 6:40 PM CT

*Taijuan Walker is currently sporting a 9+ ERA, but it sounds like he’ll be the bulk guy following an opener in this one.

Thursday: Christopher Sanchez vs Edward Cabrera, 1:20 PM CT

• Shota apparently had a bunch of whiffs, best since Yu Darvish during the COVID season, so that’s cool.
• The 11 strikeouts are a career high, and his other starts so far this season have been pretty darned good too.
• Along with all the strikeouts, Shota hasn’t walked very many batters.

Anyway, here’s a snippet of his start as the Cubs win the series!

Will throw more in the comments later.

Things I liked:

• Dansby doing baserunning silliness
• An actual sac infield fly…I was wondering about that scoring and I guess they confirmed it
• Jamo doing the innings eating thing, should try to do that without giving up the three bombs but I guess two of those were dumb wind ones
• The Cubs actually walked this one off this time

Onward!

I guess this means Colin Rea and possibly Ben Brown has to jump into the rotation for a bit (AC reminded me that Javier Assad is back too, given that he’s starting tonight, ha), Jameson Taillon has to eat more innings more often as well, and we’ll have to monitor depth from the minors and other sources until July. I didn’t expect the Cubs to be in survival mode so early in the season, but we’re here and there’s not much to do but just continue to compete, as Craig said. It would help if the offense would wake up and the relievers would stop sucking, and at some point all that will happen, but losing a key rotation cog really sucks.

The weather was pretty much perfect, especially following a week of pretty cold days leading up to this. Coming from New Mexico, where I had pretty much given up on winter (and the badly needed snowpack) ever returning this year, it was nice to have some proper Midwestern weather (dying laughing). I got there with time to spare and had planned to poke around Wrigleyville, but just ended up getting a new tshirt and a beer while I dealt with some work stuff that popped up, natch.

It was a pretty mixed group of folks, with several small kids and one guy who was decked out in full Cardinals gear who got lightly trolled by the tour guide over the whole shebang. When the guide was going into the story of who gave the field the nickname “The Friendly Confines”, he asked the crowd who was the greatest Cub, and a ~6yo promptly shouted that it was Pete Crow-Armstrong (dying laughing). I remembered that Ernie Banks was the origin of the name, but did not know the context that he first used the nickname in reference to his relief at getting back to Wrigley after road-tripping in the Jim Crow south

Shout-out to said tour guide, whose name I immediately forgot due to my name-blindness, but had an incredible Chicaaaaaaaaago accent. We spent some time talking about past Cubs ownership, mostly the Wrigleys, which I thought was fairly evenhanded. He didn’t really soften the fact that Phillip K Wrigley was not a baseball fan and the on-field product mostly reflected that fact, though I did find it interesting that the reason there’s so much green around the park was at his insistence, namely, that he wanted it to look like a park in the nature sense. Thankfully he kept his remarks short about the Tribune era of owning the club while still making his opinion clear . There was not really any Ricketts hagiography, which kind of surprised me, not just for the fact that they’re the current bosses but because of how much work was done on the park in the past decade or so.

Next we headed down to the field level, at the so-called Elephant Gate where they’d bring the circus animals through in the Wrigley days. Sadly we couldn’t go on the field itself that day as they were nominally doing active work (though to be honest not much was happening on the warning track…) so it was mostly just a chance for a photo op. For similar reasons, no trip to the dugout(s), boo.

The next stop was the visitors locker room. I recalled that it had been renovated as part of the general Wrigley renovations, but if this is the new version of it, well played, Cubs (dying laughing). The tour guide made a big deal about guys like Babe Ruth etc having been in the same room, but I don’t know if that’s the best tack to take – reminds me of the A’s trying to sell tickets based on guys like Aaron Judge being in town.

I was able to poke my head in to a few of the side rooms, including the visiting manager’s office (with mini locker-room), the trainers’ room, and the tiny kitchen/dining area for the players. The real highlight was this however

Clearly, the Astros have come to town!

Despite some mild disappointment at the lack of dugout / clubhouse stops, the final stop was my real bucket list location – the press box, and in particular, the radio booth.

Slightly dampened excitement, as clearly WSCR hadn’t moved anything in yet for the new season, but still! There was a small break area behind the booths with pictures of all the Cubs affiliated media award members, including the GOAT, and I took a few other shots around the area. The Marquee booth also exists.

Finally we went to the press box itself, which still seemed to be set up for the Cubs-Brewers playoff series based on the nameplates. Shout-out to one name in particular

We all sang/mumbled Take Me Out To The Ballgame, and that was the end of the tour. I had a great time!

Post-script, I grabbed dinner at my favorite place in Wrigleyville, and waved at Nisei next door but didn’t have time to grab a beer as I needed to head to the airport.

• ABS Shenanigans – We know the league has generally cracked down on, among others, the Brewers’ plan to use posters or whatever to signal when a player should challenge a pitch. The other day, a manager (I wanna say Derek Shelton) got tossed because he thought the pitcher didn’t challenge fast enough, but replays said yeah he did, so that’s another random thing people will get peeved about. I wonder if the ABS rules as currently outlined are good enough and people are just bitching because that’s what humans do, or if they need to be better clarified, but just thought that was illy and interesting.
• Extensions, Free Agency, and the CBA – It isn’t just the Cubs who are extending their talent, as there have been a few around the league at a time when you’d think folks would be a bit more cautious with a looming lockout surrounding negotiations for the next CBA. Berselius shared a bit about MLBPA ramping up their war chest and I believe the owners have a bigger war chest to fall back on as well. I feel like the high number of extensions is not a coincidence as teams try to lock up young talent for cheaper while the union tries to keep their talent paid but also move more money to the younger group, given how teams value youth and just about everyone knows the post-prime years aren’t worth investing in anymore.
• Tanking? – I saw a bit the other day about the NBA trying to fix tanking, and while they have fewer games and fewer roster spots than MLB, I wonder if there’s a way to encourage MLB clubs to stop being so cheap and actually try to compete. Most of the NBA proposals involve the way the draft lottery is set up, and that got me to brainstorm ways to set up a “loser’s bracket” or even play-ins to get into the big postseason tournament to make it worth a team’s effort to at least not completely suck.
• Umpire accountability – This is mostly for CB Bucknor, who has taken over as the whipping boy now that Angel Hernandez is gone, but it would probably be good to do something to reduce the amount of arguments due to questionable calls, if we’re speaking diplomatically.

The Angels are coming off a split in Houston, and like the Nats they are not projected to be particularly good this year. Case in point, in Saturday’s loss, one of their relievers put up a fun 1 IP, 6 R, 0 ER line thanks to multiple errors and walks, and was rewarded by being shipped to the minors the next day. That said we’ve got recent evidence that lousy teams can always win a series on the road.

Team Leaders

(ZiPS preseason projections)

Angels

• OBP: Nolan Schanuel (.353)
• ISO: Jo Adell (.227)
• HR: Adell (33)
• R+RBI: Zach Neto (188)
• wRC+: Mike Trout (120)
• BSR: Josh Lowe (2.3)
• Defense: Neto (6.4)
• Hitter WAR: Neto (4.3)
• SP K/9: Reid Detmers (10.06)
• SP BB/9: Ryan Johnson (2.93)
• SP ERA: José Soriano (4.05)
• RP K/9: Kirby Yates (10.77)
• RP BB/9: Shaun Anderson (2.60)
• RP ERA: Ben Joyce (3.69)
• Pitcher WAR: Soriano (2.9)

Cubs

• OBP: Seiya (.342)
• ISO: Busch (.221)
• HR: Busch (28)
• R+RBI: PCA (192)
• wRC+: Busch (128)
• BSR: PCA (2.2)
• Defense: Swanson (18.0)
• Hitter WAR: PCA (4.9)
• SP K/9: Cabrera (9.68)
• SP BB/9: Shota (1.97)
• SP ERA: Cabrera (3.90)
• RP K/9: Palencia (10.21)
• RP BB/9: Harvey (2.26)
• RP ERA: Harvey (2.83)
• Pitcher WAR: Boyd (2.4)

Who isn’t available?

Seiya is on the IL with the sprained knee suffered in the WBC. He’s done some running over the weekend and Counsell mentioned during pregame that Suzuki would likely go on a rehab assignment while the Cubs are on the road next week. Justin Steele has been facing hitters in live BP sessions; hopefully he’ll be able to start ramping up in some rehab / buildup starts soon.

For the Angels, bygone Cubs offseason target Kirby Yates is on the IL with knee inflammation and the Angels are playing things cautiously. Retread starter projects Alek Manoah and Grayson Rodriguez are both on the IL but could return later this month. Flamethrowing reliever Ben Joyce is working his way back from 2025 shoulder surgery and will miss this series.

Pitching Matchups

ZiPS Projected K/9, BB/9, ERA listed for each

Monday: Ryan Johnson, RHP (7.82, 2.98, 4.27) vs Edward Cabrera, RHP (9.68, 3.70, 3.93), 6:40 PM CT

Johnson made a handful of appearances out of the pen last year for the Angels, but this will be his first start in the bigs. Johnson was a second round pick in 2024 who skipped the minors entirely before his debut in 2025, but eventually found himself sent all the way down to A ball as the season went on. He throws hard, but somehow is also kind of a junkballer? Seems like the kind of weird rookie that has always baffled Cubs hitters the first time around in the past, bleh.

Cabrera of course was the return for Owen Caissie, who has looked pretty good for the Marlins/Team Canada over the past month. Hopefully Cabrera returns the favor and impresses as well.

Tuesday: José Soriano, RHP (8.60, 4.07, 4.11) vs Jameson Taillon, RHP (7.01, 2.24, 4.49), 6:40 PM CT

Soriano was the Angels opening day starter, and he posted a quality start with six innings of shutout ball, albeit with four walks. He’s been a resonably cromluent pitcher over his two-plus seasons with Anaheim, and especially good at keeping the ball in the yard.

After an awful spring/WBC, Taillon is low-key on Cooked Watch for when Justin Steele gets back. I was a believer in his new kick change last year but the dude has just been getting crushed of late. Hopefully he was just working on some stuff and we can all point and laugh at me for reading too much into ST performance.

Wednesday: Yusei Kikuchi, LHP (9.12, 3.44, 4.49) vs Matthew Boyd, LHP (8.26, 2.54, 4.05), 1:20 PM CT

Speaking of getting crushed, Boyd got knocked around by the Nats lineup on Opening Day to the tune of six runs in 3.2 innings. Only one home run but in my head it was more like four as the fickle winds shifted on a batter by batter basis. He ran out of gas down the stretch last year with the big innings jump and hadn’t posted a full healthy season for several years before 2025, so the pitch lab folks will need to be keeping a close eye on him all season.

I hadn’t realized that Kikuchi has been in the league for seven seasons already…goes to show how little I know about the AL. He struggled in his first several seasons in the bigs after coming over from Japan before 2019, and finally managed to put things together with the Jays in 2023. He put a lot of traffic on the bases in his first start of 2026 and did not make it out of the fifth inning, but somehow managed to limit the damage to just two runs.

I was looking at the contracts on Cots and while they’ve updated the sheet for PCA, they haven’t added the numbers for Nico yet (probably because it’s late on a Friday and they’re drunk, or they’re just waiting for the Twitter graphic). With PCA but before Nico, the Cubs would be about $140MM under the luxury tax threshold in 2027 (pending lockout etc), but with Nico’s reported contract terms, that would probably be about $120MM to play with, pending arb raises and whatever else. So my mind turned to who might be up for extensions after that…

1. Michael Busch – Busch is now 28 years old, and first arb-eligible in 2027, so a buy-out of all three years of arb plus a couple free agent years may be in the cards?
2. Cade Horton – Cade got a pretty good bonus when he was drafted by the Cubs (even if underslot) and some pre-arb pool for finishing second in ROY last season, so he isn’t exactly hurting for money, but there is a universe where he could be game for some job security for a while.
3. Edward Cabrera – Cabrera has some injury history but there’s a reason the Cubs gave up a non-insignificant prospect haul for him. B-Ref says he’s a free agent after 2028 so they have some time to work with him here assuming he performs as hoped.
4. Moises Ballesteros – Mo Baller got a pretty good IFA bonus when he signed with the Cubs, but super life-changing money might convince him to stick around long-term (in this case, “super” is relative because of course the Cubs will try to keep this “reasonable” for them as opposed to like Realmuto money or something).
5. Daniel Palencia – Why not? Daniel didn’t get a particularly big bonus when he signed so this might be easier than the others listed.
6. Seiya Suzuki – I don’t think it’s hyperbole to say Seiya was one of the best Japanese “imports” by the Cubs, the power is something this lineup needs and he seems to like it in Chicago, as long as they don’t force him to DH all the time now that Mo is around and Kyle Tucker decided to get paid elsewhere.
7. Ian Happ – Happ was my pick for “forever Cub” before this round of surprise extensions (which weren’t really surprises in that they made sense and we wanted them to happen anyway), but he might find himself the odd man out unless he really does like Chicago that much and takes a major pay cut.

What say ye all?

Tonight’s only game is the Yankees at Giants on Netflix but there will be a fuller slate tomorrow and that includes the Cubs in some potentially weird weather. Good luck everyone!

It’s a six-year deal starting in 2027 worth $115MM, reports Jeff Passan of ESPN. That means it buys out Crow-Armstrong’s four arbitration seasons and what would have been his first two free agent years. There are no options in the deal. Bob Nightengale of USA Today reports that Crow-Armstrong can unlock an extra $18MM via escalators.

MLBTR

Having received a fairly sizable signing bonus (per Cots) when he was drafted and a nice chunk of change from the pre-arbitration bonus pool the past couple seasons, Pete isn’t exactly hurting for money, which meant to me that he could afford to wait a while. It would appear the patience paid off as he secures some guaranteed money going forward, giving up only a couple years of free agency and being able to test the market again when he’s just 30 (heading into the age-31 season). It is probably just pure coincidence, but Pete turns 24 on Wednesday’s off day before the Thursday season-opener at Wrigley, so I’d expect a press conference then. The fact that this contract doesn’t kick in until next season helps the “bottom line” with respect to the luxury tax, but I imagine they’ll give him a bit of a bump over league minimum in his final pre-arbitration season.

As with most of Cubs fandom, the speculation now turns to whether the team will also extend other core players such as Nico Hoerner. Time will tell, but this type of extension is what you expect a big market team like the Cubs to do with their superstar-in-the-making talent.

As for the future, baseball makes its return to Olympic competition in 2028 in Los Angeles, but with only a six-team field. The USA gets a spot because they’re the host, and it sounds like the Dominicans and Venezuela getting to the final four also means they’re in. While reading this article from ESPN, there are a bunch of cool ideas for how MLB players will participate, but with this caveat…

“It can be on a separate track, but I’m sure it will come up in the course of negotiations,” new acting union head Bruce Meyer said Sunday night at the World Baseball Classic. “If we’re in a situation where games are being missed in ’27, that could have an impact on playing the Olympics after that.”

Meyer said a lost 2027 season would eliminate big leaguers from the 2028 Olympics.

“If we don’t have a season, we’re not going to play in the Olympics,” he said.

That was abnormally large but it is a big deal and could represent a huge bargaining chips in the union’s favor besides the whole missing games thing (which I doubt anyone wants). There will most likely be a lockout but MLB hasn’t missed games since COVID (which, duh) and 1994/1995, so they should theoretically figure this out.

We’ll get back to Cubs roster stuff later, but since they’re not playing Cactus League today and a goodly bunch of Cubs have fared well in the tournament so far, it seems a good time to check in as pool play in the WBC starts wrapping up. Between Alex Bregman getting on base like crazy, Seiya Suzuki dropping bombs in the Tokyo Dome, and Daniel Palencia firing 100+ for Venezuela, it’s been a strong tournament for their respective clubs and the Cubs party as a whole. The tiebreaker thing is a bit wacky, but it’s basically head-to-head first and then runs allowed quotient. The standings so far, with a few day games being played in the various pools as we type…

Pool A (San Juan)

Kinda cool to have this in Puerto Rico, despite the few rain delays here or there. Puerto Rico and Cuba lead this pool with 2-0 records, and play each other tonight. Canada has the inside track to tie whoever loses, as Panama needs to win to stay alive, but Colombia is eliminated. However, Panama being no-hit as we speak is not a good thing for them, particularly as Colombia has just jumped ahead with nothing left to lose…

Pool B (Houston)

Mexico, Italy, and USA are tied at the top with 2-0 records while Great Britain and Brazil are eliminated. Mexico and Team USA play tonight, and whoever wins will clinch a spot, so here’s to a great game!

Pool C (Tokyo)

Japan and Korea have clinched, with Japan at 3-0 earning the pool championship and Korea riding a tiebreaker to make it into the elimination rounds.

Pool D (Miami)

The Dominicans are destroying their opponent at the moment, so they’ll likely grab a spot. Venezuela plays a winless Nicaragua team tonight and might grab the other. Should Venezuela falter, they open the door for a tie with Israel and the Netherlands, but that doesn’t seem likely right now.

The Bracket

Japan and Korea now travel to Miami to take on whoever comes out of Pool D (most likely Dominican Republic and Venezuela). Pool A and Pool B top dogs will duke it out in Houston before everyone meets up again in Miami for the final four. If I had to make a guess, it’s probably USA and Mexico from B, Puerto Rico and Cuba from A, and the Dominicans and Venezuela from D in the elimination rounds. Good luck!

I’m reasonably sure that the Cubs won’t be making any more major free agent signings at this point, particularly since the good ones are mostly gone from the last time I wondered about this. If I had to guess, it’ll be mostly scraping the barrel for some pitching (here’s the list of remaining players from MLBTR), though there are a few intriguing bats still looking for work. We can probably safely assume that the team will be made up of guys in camp barring a late surprise claim (like the Cubs playing waiver yo-yo with Ben Cowles).

As usual, here’s the official Cubs roster, currently full, along with the notes from Arizona Phil and FanGraphs’ roster resource page. They’ve already put Shelby Miller on the 60-day IL, and it’s probably just a matter of time before Justin Steele (maybe, depending on how optimistic the Cubs are) and Tyler Austin (not that we cared all that much but it sucks that he had a major surgery in a spring that he probably wanted to show what he could do) join him to open up another couple spots for the potential non-roster guys who make the Opening Day squad. We’ll do the usual bit with 13 pitchers (the maximum allowed) and 13 position players.

Starters (5)

• Matthew Boyd
• Cade Horton
• Shota Imanaga
• Edward Cabrera
• Jameson Taillon

This hasn’t changed, and we would like guys like Shota and Taillon to stop throwing the “give up a home run” pitch, but also something about spring training working on stuff and Arizona being one step removed from the moon or Colorado.

Bullpen (8)

• Hunter Harvey
• Caleb Thielbar
• Phil Maton
• Hoby Milner
• Jacob Webb
• Daniel Palencia
• Colin Rea
• Javier Assad

The general thoughts here are who 1) got paid some substantial-ish amount of money, 2) who can’t be optioned, and 3) who doesn’t suck and/or has shown in the past that they are useful. Having the rest of the 40-man bullpen guys being optionable helps a lot in case of injury, and there is still a chance that the Cubs decide to option Assad to keep him stretched out in Iowa so they can carry another reliever who shows out and probably has a minor league opt out date in their contract.

Catchers (3*)

• Carson Kelly
• Miguel Amaya
• Moises Ballesteros

All three guys have seen practice game action so far without much incident, and Ballesteros, despite being delayed by visa issues, even got into a game as catcher and got some rave reviews there, so we can reasonably assume that if the bat continues to play, they’ll consider Mo Baller a third catcher* when he isn’t DHing.

Starting Infield (4)

• Michael Busch (1B)
• Nico Hoerner (2B)
• Dansby Swanson (SS)
• Alex Bregman (3B)

Starting Outfield (3)

• Ian Happ (LF)
• Pete Crow-Armstrong (CF)
• Seiya Suzuki (RF)

Bench (3, not including whoever is DHing that day or the backup catcher)

• Matt Shaw
• Backup OF
• Backup UTIL?

At this point it’s deciding things like handedness, versatility, and some of that has to contend with whether the guy has options remaining. I’m not entirely sure a guy like Michael Conforto has anything left in the tank, but there’s still a few weeks to go before the final decision needs to be made. We suggested on the pod that Kevin Alcantara should probably play every day at Iowa, and that leaves the decisions down to the following, including Conforto…

• Dylan Carlson (no options remaining, switch hits, OF only pretty much)
• Chas McCormick (has options, right-handed hitter, OF only)
• Justin Dean (has options, right-handed hitter, OF only)

This assumes that Matt Shaw is the all-purpose infield backup, and one wonders whether Carlson or Conforto get some kind of priority due to the options situation and to make sure the bench isn’t too right-handed. Shaw has also been playing the outfield so far, including in center field against Team Italy, so if they think he can at least handle the corners, the final bench spot can get a bit more creative.