All the Attention is on Alex Cobb
The Chicago Cubs got their closer and not all attention is on Alex Cobb. Theo Epstein and Jed Hoyer still have another reliever or two to land, one of them will be a strong lefty – but the main focus turns to completing that rotation.
In all actuality, the Cubs went to the Winter Meetings with Cobb top of mind.
Here at the Winter Meetings The Cubs are hoping to close on Alex Cobb. Four other clubs with interest
— Bruce Levine (@MLBBruceLevine) December 10, 2017
Cobb has spent his entire career playing in Tampa. Due to injury, he has relatively low mileage for a 30-year old starter pitcher. Health could be a risk, but if he is healthy Cobb is a solid starter.
Additionally, Cobb would give the Cubs five starters that are under control until 2020. This is a huge improvement from where this team was just last season where only Jon Lester and Kyle Hendricks were signed after the 2017 season.
Cobb, along with the Tyler Chatwood signing, allows the Cubs to fill the gap before young starters like Brandon Little, Jose Albertos, Adbert Alzolay, and Alex Lange are ready. Bridging that gap will prove to be important as they are the real next wave of star prospects in the Cubs organization.
“We have plenty more work to do,” Cubs president of baseball operations Theo Epstein said after signing Chatwood. “We are certainly not done. The focus of the winter has been pitching. We need to continue to add to the rotation and retool the bullpen to a certain extent.”
This has been the goal of the winter, upgrade the pitching staff. It is going pretty nicely with the Chatwood signing, landing Morrow, and hopefully signing Cobb in the coming days. If this happens, the Cubs will have a very interesting rotation in 2018.
- Jon Lester (33) career 3.51 ERA
- Kyle Hendricks (28) career 2.94 ERA, 1.098 WHIP
- Jose Quintana (28) career 3.53 ERA, 3.51 FIP
- Alex Cobb (30) career 3.50 ERA, 2.6 BB/9
- Tyler Chatwood (27) career 3.31 road ERA
Perhaps the most important part of a Cobb signing is… the Cubs won’t have to trade anyone from their 25-man roster to fill the rotation. This could be the biggest win of the Cubs offseason, an offseason that began with Theo saying they will be open to trading someone.
We all had our preferences on who the Cubs would (should) trade. A Cobb singing could stop all of the asinine arguments Cubs fans have had for months. Your “Cubs should trade ________” posts become invalid. Hell, my “Cubs should trade _______” articles are invalid.
The organization can retain Kyle Schwarber, Javier Baez, Addison Russell, Ian Happ, Albert Almora, all of them. This keeps the Cubs offense intact. This improves the Cubs pitching staff. It makes the entire organization incredibly strong.
I fully expect to see that the Cubs have signed Alex Cobb by the end of this week. We should all be extremely happy about this.
