The thing that sucks is if this team is in the same spot in July as it has been the past 2 years Jed will probably not sell like he should since he is a lame duck at this point so I could see him make some terrible decisions with trading prospects for more rentals in a last ditch effort to save his job. He and Carter Hawkins made their bed to sleep in right now, Ricketts is to blame too for being cheap but we've been hearing for multiple years now promises to spend and promises about addressing the bullpen and they haven't. I've said it many times, what exactly is the vision this front office has with roster construction? We sold off the core roster in 2021 and some small deals at the deadline in 2022 with the biggest one being David Robertson for Ben Brown and Effross to the Yankees for Wesneski who is already gone. They didn't trade away Happ or Contreras when they had a chance so instead they extended Happ with a NTC and let Conteras walk for no return. Probably had chances to trade Bellinger for some kind of return and instead they resign him to a deal they hoped he opt out of, when he didn't have as good of a year he opted in and they wound up trading him for nothing in a salary dump.
Are they committed to building through the farm system or not because some of the moves they've made since 2021 don't seem to point that they are. And they sure haven't signed anyone of significance in free agency to make you think they are going to add the needed pieces around the prospects either. At least the 1st go around they signaled they would by signing Lester then traded for or signed the remaining pieces like Fowler and Zobrist and I guess you can throw Heyward in that mix too as they gave him a big deal. Haven't really seen them attempt to do anything like that with this current roster. Tucker is just a rental and originally made you think they were finally serious about adding some more expensive pieces to the mix but we found out that was not the case. So instead we have a roster without an identity and vision on where it is headed and prospects we acquired or drafted in recent years some are blocked at certain positions.
Even the long term payroll doesn't give you much of an idea where the roster is headed. Happ and Suzuki's contracts with NTC both go through 2026, Nico through 2026, Swanson 2029, Shota technically through 2028 with his strange options in his contract, Taillon 2026, Boyd 2026 with a mutual option for 2027 then the rest of the roster are all either team control Arb years or set to become UFA after this year. I guess you can say they are in wait and see mode with guys under team control and are saving payroll to extend them? By my math they've only spend just over $26 mil on the bullpen and that is assuming the numbers in the link below are what we are actually paying Pressly. There are teams contending for the playoffs that pay just 2 high end guys that much or more combined.
Chicago Cubs Multi-Year Table
