beckdawg
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- Oct 31, 2012
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-Fowler has already commented he is going to be a FA. Cubs surely QO him. Depending on price he could in theory be brought back but my working assumption right now would be a bit of a out field rotation of Schwarber/Heyward/Zobrist usually mixed in with Almora occasionally where needed. Given how joe played baez during the season I have to believe he's the starting 2B unless he pulls Baez over to third more and plays Bryant in RF.
-I expect the cubs will pick up Hammel's option and try to deal him. Team seem to sour on him a bit at the end of the season. He's not going to bring anything huge in return but you might be able to get a team needing a cheap starter in a weak FA market to give up a fringe top 100 player for him. I'd imagine at this point they would consider giving Zastryzny a shot at the #5 slot with the possibility of trying to acquire an impact starter.
-Bullpen seems like the clearest area of improvement the cubs need. Wood is a FA as is Chapman.
Free Agents
Chapman
Wood
Fowler(presumably)
Joe Smith
Coghlan
Cahill
Ross
Arbitration
Arrieta - final year
Strop - final year
Rondon - second to last year
Grimm - 3 more years
Kawasaki - 3 more years
Also of note, cubs are no longer paying Edwin Jackson so that's another $12.5 mil off the books. Excluding arbitration cases here's the breakdown of the non-rookie wage deals
Heyward - $28.167 mil
Lester - $25 mil
Zobrist - $16.5 mil
Lackey - $16 mil(last year)
Montero - $14 mil(last year)
Hammel - $10 mil(assuming they pick up his last option year)
Rizzo - $7.286 mil
Soler - $3.667 mil
-I expect the cubs will pick up Hammel's option and try to deal him. Team seem to sour on him a bit at the end of the season. He's not going to bring anything huge in return but you might be able to get a team needing a cheap starter in a weak FA market to give up a fringe top 100 player for him. I'd imagine at this point they would consider giving Zastryzny a shot at the #5 slot with the possibility of trying to acquire an impact starter.
-Bullpen seems like the clearest area of improvement the cubs need. Wood is a FA as is Chapman.
Free Agents
Chapman
Wood
Fowler(presumably)
Joe Smith
Coghlan
Cahill
Ross
Arbitration
Arrieta - final year
Strop - final year
Rondon - second to last year
Grimm - 3 more years
Kawasaki - 3 more years
Also of note, cubs are no longer paying Edwin Jackson so that's another $12.5 mil off the books. Excluding arbitration cases here's the breakdown of the non-rookie wage deals
Heyward - $28.167 mil
Lester - $25 mil
Zobrist - $16.5 mil
Lackey - $16 mil(last year)
Montero - $14 mil(last year)
Hammel - $10 mil(assuming they pick up his last option year)
Rizzo - $7.286 mil
Soler - $3.667 mil