Winter Meetings Wednesday Night: Cubs Have to Head Down Various Paths, Available

On Dec 7, 2023

There will be more to say about the Winter Meetings, and the Juan Soto deal is still likely to be completed eventually … but man alive, that was absolutely the worst and most boring and awful Winter Meetings ever. Just a terrible, slow, uninteresting week.

Some bits to get into …

Jed Hoyer is not outright saying that the Cubs are out on Shohei Ohtani – and, to be clear, Hoyer has previously said the Cubs have not heard that they are out – but he is definitely making clear that the Cubs have to look at other paths:

Jed Hoyer on the Cubs’ approach to the offseason.

— Marquee Sports Network (@WatchMarquee) December 6, 2023

You can take that discussion however you want, and you can hold onto optimism as long as you want. I won’t tell you not to. But I will give you my perspective on what I’ve seen, heard, and read, and that perspective is that the Cubs have decided that they are sufficiently unlikely to get Ohtani – zero-ish percent – that they have to get cracking on their other offseason plans.

Those plans, by the way, could afford them around $60 to $70 million in added 2024 dollars to spend from here (if missing out on Ohtani), according to Bruce Levine:

“Their intent is to win.”@MLBBruceLevine and @Taylor_McGregor will be joined by Jed Hoyer on Cubs 360 tonight at 5:30 ⬇️— Marquee Sports Network (@WatchMarquee) December 6, 2023

Dave Kaplan also seems to believe Ohtani isn’t happening for the Cubs – or at least that the Cubs are proceeding as though they believe it’s not happening – but he has been told that “significant” moves will nevertheless be on the way:

REKAP – Rush Hour Time! The latest on the MLB Winter Meetings, Juan Soto is on the move and are the Bears looking at a new site in the city along the lakefront for their next stadium? Plus, the rest of the day in sports! #TakeThat https://t.co/AMtrSmD7nd— David Kaplan (@thekapman) December 6, 2023

Kap mentions Tyler Glasnow, Isaac Paredes, and Bo Bichette by name as possible moves for the Cubs, and obviously some combination of additions there, plus complementary moves, could make for a strong offseason. If they added Glasnow and Bichette, plus maybe Rhys Hoskins and relievers? Pretty hard to stay upset, in my opinion. To be clear, that isn’t Kap saying all that is going to happen, only that it’s all still on the table, as well as other things.

Maybe not on the table anymore? Yoshinobu Yamamoto. There were hints earlier that the Cubs probably weren’t going to go to the $300 million level, and now they are no longer being listed as among the finalists.

We get it, Rays. You want the Cubs to add more:

Cubs remain in on Tyler Glasnow trade talks. With $25M pricetag, he’s a deal for many teams but probably not his own Rays— Jon Heyman (@JonHeyman) December 7, 2023

Just get it done…

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