If my math is right, it’s been close to 160 days since the Cubs added a player from outside the organization to their major league roster. If you’re counting backwards, that brings us back to the trade deadline. Look at the team transactions page, especially the last couple of months, and it’s been only minor league contracts.
This has been a surprise for a couple of reasons. One, the Cubs are coming off of a 2023 season in which they missed the postseason by one game. The Diamondbacks, who took the second wild card spot instead of them, reached the World Series. Typically, a finish like that would incentivize a team to be aggressive in the winter. This is not to say that they won’t, but the first two months of the offseason have been radio silence from the north side of Chicago. The second reason it’s a bit surprising to see them so quiet this winter is that it’s in stark contrast to how the offseason started. In the beginning of November, the Cubs made perhaps this biggest surprise move by scooping up Craig Counsell to manage the team. You don’t make a move like that without the intention to give Counsell a contender to manage. The current roster isn’t going to do that. There are too many holes.
I argued on an episode of CHGO Cubs just before Thanksgiving that the Cubs are especially in need of a first and third baseman. They also need depth in the rotation and at least one more bullpen arm, but the biggest need is at both corners of the infield. Convincing Cody Bellinger to return would potentially fill first base. He is a gold glove defender at center and first and provides the most value defensively in the outfield, but the Cubs have a potential premier glove to play center field coming in Pete Crow-Armstrong.
But if the Cubs do not sign Bellinger, whether because they don’t make the right effort or he simply does not want to come back to Chicago, there is another viable option: Rhys Hoskins.
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