MESA, Ariz. — The Chicago Cubs’ offseason approach to improving a middling roster came with a vision.
While they haven’t won the National League Central division in a non-shortened season since 2017, the organization has a bigger focus as Cubs pitchers and catchers reported to camp Sunday morning.
To get back to the postseason, something that’s eluded them since 2020, they face challenging competition in the NL where the three highest payrolls in Major League Baseball belong to NL squads (New York Mets, Los Angeles Dodgers and Philadelphia Phillies) with two others joining the Cubs in the top 10 (the Atlanta Braves and San Diego Padres). Winning the division would eliminate any battles to secure what could become a crowded wild-card race.
“It’s going to be a hard-fought division, it’s going to be a hard-fought league,” president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer said Sunday. “As we thought about the offseason, both going into the offseason and throughout, is that wins are going to be at a premium in the National League, in particular, this year.
“We’re in a competitive window. I think we’ve gotten better each year. We’re at a place where we have a chance to be really good and trying to really maximize our resources within our budget to make sure that we could do that.”
The Cubs feature 11 new players on the 40-man roster coming into spring training, none bigger than superstar right fielder Kyle Tucker. Hoyer wouldn’t delve into whether the Cubs still have enough financial resources and payroll flexibility to make a significant addition to the roster this spring, stating that talking about exact budget numbers is “always a dangerous thing.”
“But I would just say we’ve been really focused this offseason trying to optimize as much we can within our budget to make sure that we are really competitive team,” Hoyer said. “I think we are.”
If the Cubs are going to make a splash with a free-agent acquisition, third baseman Alex Bregman continues to make the most sense. None of the seven players who started at least one game at third for the Cubs last year remain in the organization. Top prospect Matt Shaw will get a lot of reps there this spring for a chance to win the job out of camp.
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The front office knows Cubs fans are clamoring for them to sign the 30-year-old Bregman and are fending off any rumors that circulate connecting the franchise to the two-time World Series champion. Hoyer considers this part of baseball to be an entertainment industry while general manager Carter Hawkins noted it’s the byproduct of a fan base that wants the team to get better.
“There’s times that there’s rumors out there that have no basis in reality and you’ll read an article that’s thousands of words based on something that’s never come up, so sometimes that’s the nature of this business,” Hoyer said. “The reason we got into this in the first place is because baseball is an awesome fan sport. And to Carter’s point, people care so much about the Cubs, it’s why I love working here. That’s just the nature of it. People deeply care about us. They want us to be a really good team. They want to talk about it. They want to think about different possibilities and that leads to a lot of rumors.”
Fourteen years into his tenure with the organization as GM and now team president, Hoyer, who is entering the final year of his contract, has seen a lot through the Cubs’ .518 winning percentage during that span. He acknowledged he hasn’t personally endured much uncertainty in his career “so I think with uncertainty does come a level of anxiety, that would be a lie to say that it doesn’t.” With it has come some introspection.
“I think we put together a really good team,” Hoyer said. “We still have a really good farm system. I think every arrow is sort of pointing up on this organization right now. There’s a lot more opportunity for me, for Carter than there is risk, and I’m super proud of what we’ve built with a lot of really good people. That’s kind of how I look at it.”
The Cubs wouldn’t have made the Tucker trade if there wasn’t confidence within the organization that he could take them to another level. They know what is at stake this year. And while optimism and envisioning postseason baseball is often the theme for most teams when spring training gets underway, the Cubs cannot afford to again be sitting at home in October.
“You get to that place in the offseason towards the end where it just kind of feels like you’re waiting for the first day of school,” Hoyer said. “That’s what it feels like in a great way. I’m excited to get here.”
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