Timestamp: Friday Morning. The last trade was the Rizzo one.
I didn’t think they’d actually do it. I didn’t think they’d trade Anthony Rizzo. They did it. They traded Anthony Rizzo.
Anthony Rizzo, of course, meant so much to the Cubs. He was a good prospect when he came over from San Diego, but it was 2014, I think, when he really blossomed into that role—the “heart and soul” role. 2014 when he posted the best offensive numbers of his career. 2014 when he objected to Aroldis Chapman throwing baseballs in the vicinity of Nate Schierholtz’s head. 2014, when Kris Bryant was there in the farm system and Albert Almora was there in the farm system and Addison Russell came over to the farm system and Kyle Schwarber was drafted into the farm system and Javy Báez and Jorge Soler and a guy named Kyle Hendricks made their major league debuts. Rizzo was there before the rest. Rizzo was the glue guy. Rizzo was the beaming face with the rosy cheeks. Rizzo was there at first base every day, a rock on the corner of the infield, and it didn’t hurt that—oh God, sorry, I just went onto FanGraphs to get this stat right and it says “Anthony Rizzo, New York Yankees” and that was a big ol’ punch to the emotional stomach—it didn’t hurt that from 2014 to 2016, only four qualified hitters (Mike Trout, Joey Votto, Miguel Cabrera, Paul Goldschmidt) were better than him by wRC+. Anthony Rizzo was never the MVP. But he was in many ways the most valuable Cub, down to his team-friendly, signed-early-to-lock-him-into-riches contract that made it so much easier to sign every free agent the Cubs signed over this last half-decade or so. We are going to miss Anthony Rizzo, the baseball player, and Anthony Rizzo, the baseball player for our favorite team, which is to say we’re going to miss having his person in our lives in this narrow channel that is the fan-player window.
It’s a good return. A great return, really. I defer to FanGraphs, and they’ve got Kevin Alcantara as the second-best prospect in the Cubs’ system now, just ahead of Reginald Preciado, the biggest piece in the Yu Darvish deal. The Yankees had a great farm system coming into the week and they were willing to trade from it, especially from their selection of guys like Alcantara (ETA: 2024) who are a ways away from making major-league contributions. The Cubs got a steal, and I wonder if they’d have made the trade if they weren’t going to get a steal.
Re-signing Rizzo was already a challenge. From 2019 through yesterday, he was only the 33rd-best qualified hitter in baseball, which is still great, but isn’t fifth, and is less valuable at first base than anywhere else on the diamond. The days for team-friendly contracts were past. The Cubs may have slightly lowballed him this spring, but was it really a lowball, considering the aging that’s already begun? To be sure, as we’ve written many times, Anthony Rizzo was worth more to the Cubs than just his numbers, even taking chemistry out of the equation and thinking about marketing alone. I’d been hoping he’d take the qualifying offer, have a monster 2022, and play himself into some great deal for all parties. That’s off the table now. He could still come back, and it’s fun to imagine him coming back even three or four years down the line and platooning at first and DH-ing here and there and batting seventh while Kevin Alcantara and Brennen Davis and Reginald Preciado make up a new Cubs core, but more likely than not, it will not be the case. There will be nostalgic reunions, and the biggest of ovations, but more likely than not, we’ve seen the last of Anthony Rizzo in a Cubs uniform. And we saw it on the bench.
I don’t think anyone should be blamed for Rizzo not getting that last Cubs’ at-bat. Not right now, anyway. There’s a story there, I’m sure, and I would have to imagine that either the deal came together too quickly or the Cubs asked Rizzo preemptively and he declined. Maybe I’m wrong, or giving too much benefit of the doubt, but that’s my perspective at this moment.
That said, watching Jason Heyward strike out while Kris Bryant waited in the hole felt like such a microcosm of what went wrong for this Cubs’ core, a core that we’ll look back on as more successful than it feels right now (tore down the Cardinals in ’15, won the World Series in ’16, put together a remarkable second half and a thrilling NLDS in ’17, won 95 games in ’18, still won the division in ’20), but still had its flaws, namely a failure to capitalize on an outrageously talented selection of bats, seeming to minimize their potential rather than even just hit the median.
We’ll see what else happens today. One would imagine Craig Kimbrel will fetch a haul and Zach Davies will find a new home. I would guess Kris Bryant is traded, because I don’t get the impression the Cubs and Scott Boras are going to reach an agreement after the season, but I don’t know that for sure. If a blow-the-doors-off offer comes in for Javy Báez, sure, he’ll go too. Maybe Dan Winkler. I keep mentioning Dan Winkler. Maybe Jake Marisnick, or Robinson Chirinos, or hell Matt Duffy or Rex Brothers or somebody. Might just be Kimbrel and Davies, might be an utter fire sale. The long and short is that by tomorrow morning, we should have a much better idea of when the next contention window starts. I doubt it can be as fun as 2015 was. But it can still be fun, and in his leaving, Anthony Rizzo’s value does remain with the Cubs.
Oh, also—not a great return for Ryan Tepera but vastly outweighed by the Rizzo return, and likely something where the Cubs just have a higher opinion of the guy they brought back than FanGraphs does. Not a #fleeceing.
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Around the Division:
No big deals for the others in the Central. The Brewers spanked the Pirates, 12-0. The Cardinals and Reds were off.
Standings, FanGraphs division championship probabilities with rosters as of probably this morning but I’m not positive:
1. Milwaukee: 61-42, 92.6%
2. Cincinnati: 54-49, 6.2%
3. St. Louis: 51-51, 1.1%
4. Cubs: 50-54, 0.1%
5. Pittsburgh: 38-64, 0.0%
The Reds go to Queens tonight, where Carlos Carrasco makes his Mets debut against Sonny Gray. The Brewers are in Atlanta, with Corbin Burnes opposing Touki Toussaint. The Cardinals host the Twins, with Wade LeBlanc opposite José Berríos if the latter isn’t traded in the next five hours and 26 minutes.
Up Next:
The Cubs go to Washington
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Whom:
Cubs vs. Washington
When:
6:05 PM Chicago Time
Where:
Nationals Park
Weather:
Temperature in the 80’s at gametime, wind blowing in from left at about ten miles per hour.
Starting Pitchers:
Trevor Williams vs. TBA (probably Jon Lester)
The Opponent:
The Nationals pivoted quickly to a fire sale of their own. I’m not sure if Max Scherzer and Trea Turner’s trade to the Dodgers (that seems like a fun flight to be on) has been announced, but that’s a thing, as is Kyle Schwarber to the Red Sox (he was bench coaching yesterday, we’ll get to why), Daniel Hudson to the Padres, Brad Hand to the Blue Jays, Stephen Strasburg to season-ending surgery, and a slew of players and coaches (including Hudson and Turner, and yes this is why Schwarber was bench coaching) to the Covid IL. A little support group for the Cubs, potentially, with Turner and Scherzer’s departures presumably especially gutting for a team that thought it was making a run even more recently than the Cubs. Also, Yan Gomes might be gone before tonight too.
The Numbers:
Not a lot of books have odds yet, but what I’m seeing is the Cubs as -130 favorites and their hosts at +110, which is about a 54% win probability for the visitors. Over/under’s at nine and leans towards the over.
Cubs News:
I don’t know if we’ve mentioned that Kohl Stewart’s on the 60-day IL now, that Dillon Maples is on the 10-day IL now, that Nico Hoerner did go on the IL (10-day) with his oblique injury, and that Jake Jewell, Trevor Megill, and Sergio Alcántara came up to take their spots. Alexander Vizcaíno is on the 40-man roster already (he’s the other half of the Rizzo return) and is finishing up a rehab assignment after missing the whole season so far with arm soreness. The expectation is that he’ll go to Double-A once activated. (Almost wrote “AA” there—whoops!) That leaves one opening on the 40-man at the moment, plus two on the active roster. Eric Sogard has been released after clearing waivers, so he’s not coming up. Maybe Frank Schwindel? Maybe Johneshwy Fargas? Maybe Nick Martini gets signed back onto the 40-man? With more moves likely coming, it might be all of the above, plus probably Tommy Nance again and Manuel Rodríguez before too long.
Cubs Thoughts:
Really feel for these guys. And for all who love Anthony Rizzo. Hopefully he has a monster two months and gets himself a big ol’ payday somewhere he’ll be a leader and be loved. Maybe even Chicago. Who knows.
