Chicago Cubs: Finding a Landing Spot for Kyle Schwarber
By Jason Burke
New York Mets
Sure, the Mets have plenty of outfielders and they can’t take advantage of the designated hitter, but they also have plenty of pitchers (though they can’t stay healthy) and are a middle-of-the-road offensive club. The two teams could definitely make sense as trade partners.
The Cubs are likely after more of a sure thing than this guy, but Schwarber isn’t a surefire Hall of Famer either, and the fact that the Cubs just won a World Series and appear to be loaded for years to come is going to presumably leave teams less willing to want to improve their competition too dramatically when trading their own players.
That’s where Steven Matz comes in. He has plenty of upside, but he has a hard time staying healthy. Leaving the Mets is probably the antidote to that illness. Across 34 career starts (spanning three seasons), Matz owns a 3.14 ERA and will be under team control through 2021. For a team that is going to have a hard time paying all of their stars in a short period of time, a young, controllable starter like Matz could go a long way for the Cubs. Heck, according to Baseball Reference’s similarity scores, Matz and Fulmer are pretty pretty much the same.
The question for the Mets would be where they would place Schwarber. He could roam left field, but that is where Yoenis Cespedes spends most of his time. He could slide over to right and leave Michael Conforto in center, but that isn’t ideal either. First baseman Lucas Duda is expendable, so the real determining factor here is how much the Mets believe in Dominic Smith, who is batting .330 with 12 homers and 58 RBI in his first taste of Triple-A.